Thursday 3:14 AM

Thursday 3:15 AM

Two fives and an eleven.

Thursday 3:17 AM

I like the pegging potential with this keep and want to keep the AA4 together.

Thursday 3:39 AM

I believe The Flush is the best keep as it increases with every cut; plus the opportunity of gaining an extra point with 9 diamonds out there. I see that we are in trouble. If pone gets the usual 10 points that puts him/her at 117. With our cut of a 3, we are at hole 104.

Thursday 4:00 AM

Flush to keep that adds in a few ways. Eleven count to help in the pegging. Now we may have to get clever to get more in our pegging. dec

Thursday 4:37 AM

Like the AA4 together here with the possibility of a 31 for 4-no cards really help the flush more than our hold or discard-plus tossing the A9 to keep the flush doesn’t really excite me

Thursday 4:40 AM

Keep A-A-4 so throw 7-9. More points than retaining flush.

Thursday 5:59 AM

I like the eleven that includes twos aces.

Thursday 6:09 AM

Thought provoking puzzle James..Thx. The pegs say this is a two hand game. The flush keep gets help from all ranks & maxes out @ 10. The A-A-4-9 gets help from 11/13 ranks & maxes out @ 12. I think this is a total score puzzle..hand+crib+pegging. These three in total often produce @ least 11 points for the dealer. So toss the 7-9 [ I like the close gap here ] which leaves the best pegging hand imo. I may end up @ 109 with above average work to be done counting first next hand. All this is said, after having the time to put the options to pencil & paper. Under the pressure of time in a live game, I would have chosen the flush [ when in doubt do so] because I can’t count the winners fast enough in the two keeps to make the optimum decision.

Thursday 6:18 AM

Don’t really like the makeup of the flush or the A-9 to our crib. Like keeping the aces with the 4 as every face will help. Also the two aces could work nicely with the lone 9 (3-card magic 11).

Thursday 6:28 AM

Ever go to a restaurant. look at the menu and not see anything you like? I kept the AA4 because I was hoping for a face card. I saw the flush, but A9 wasn't enough of an incentive. When in doubt, order the chicken?

Thursday 8:08 AM

We have 2 issues: that the pone does not go out; and a preference for us get to at least Hole 111. This configuration seems best; in addition to the advantages of this hold already mentioned, an ace cut gives us 12; or maybe our opponent throws 8X, and we cut a 7 or 8. We can only hope.....

Thursday 9:38 AM

It's all crud, so the "it pays to flush" adage applies here, trust it.

Thursday 10:09 AM

I prefer the flush slightly because of the pegging flexibility. Depending on the cut, care must be taken to not just take pegs no matter what with my opponent just 14 out.

Once the cut hits, I’ll gauge if they seem pleased or not, then look at the lead card before proceeding.

With this spot, I’ll cautiously take pegs, but not sure if I’m interested in taking a 15 on an 8 lead. I would pair most lead cards though.

Thursday 11:18 AM

Am thinking of an optimal pegging strategy until seeing that lousy cut (of no help to hand and no apparent assistance to the 7-9 discard. Now it's a more offensive approach, will take pegs as offered, and don't want to give up six pegs on a triple so will pair with some caution. Would pair an Ace or nine lead. In a pretty tough spot here as only know of that guaranteed dealer peg, four points in hand, 7-9 to own crib averages 4.064. With the trey on the deck, likely be between 105-107 with first count next deal. On the upside n/d at 107 will likely hold the best scoring hand possible; so dealer might pick up a 6-8 or 8-9 discard. Success in cribbage can be sometimes measured by "how you hold your mouth". Think that's what we've got to count on here.

Thursday 11:45 AM

I should have tossed the other 9 but apart from that I agree with everyone who threw 7 9 to their crib/

Thursday 2:23 PM

flushed....

Thursday 4:43 PM

I think it is probably between the flush and A-A-4-9S:

AD-4-7-9D: 4pts + 3½pts (Schell: 3.40) = 7½pts

A-A-4-9S: 4pts + 4¼pts (Schell: 4.04) = 8¼pts

Potential:

AD-4-7-9D: Improves with AA, 2222, 3333, 444, 5555, 6666, 777, 8888, 99 + 16xXs = 46 cuts = 46/46 = 100.0% up to 8/9pts with AA, 444, 777, 8888 = 12 cuts.

A-A-4-9S: Improves with AA, 2222, 444, 5555, 6666, 99 + 16xXs = 35 cuts = 35/46 = 76.1% up to 8/12pts with AA, 444, 5555, 99 + 16xXs = 27 cuts.

Position:

We're 2pts past 4th street positional hole and Pone is 4pts short of where they would like to be. So I'll play Defense and keep Pone as short as possible.

Pegging:

Playing Defense I believe the flush will peg better but A-A-4-9 may actually score more points.

Summary:

A-A-4-9S has the better starting value by ¾pt over AD-4-7-9D. However the flush has guaranteed improvement and 12 cuts for 8/9pts while A-A-4-9S has 27 cuts for 8/12pts. Although the flush may well peg slightly better I'll still throw the 7-9D.

Thursday 8:05 PM

In case anyone's interested, here's how I did in this afternoon's tourney at Cribbage JD:

I did better last week.

107 players, 5 rounds, 1 game/round.

I won games 1,3,5. Lost 2,4. No skunks either way. I won the odd-numbered games. Most who know me say I'm odd so I suppose that's appropriate. :-)

I'm in the middle of the leaderboard today. It confirms to me that to win a tourney like this(win 5 in a row) you need both skill and luck. If either of those are missing, you won't do that. It takes some lucky cards, even if you're highly skilled, to win 5 in a row. And if you depend on luck with not so much skill, well, good luck to you - you'll need lots.

I now wait to see how it works out next week.

Have a good evening, everyone!

JCM