Tuesday 3:05 AM

I'm sorry if a few of my recent replies and discussions appeared to be critical of someone's ideas.

I have written about numerous Cribbage concepts and topics over the past two or three decades, and I often look up a particular thought or topic from the past, hoping that it may help address or answer a certain issue, and if it seems to fit, I post it.

None of these have been written recently to cover the specific hand or person where I re-posted them, and these should probably at least be edited to better fit the current topic, and I should only reply beneath another's name when asked. The goal should always be to boost the spirit and the enthusiasm of other players, and in certain cases, I likely did the opposite.

Is it worth beginning with a 'static' One Point LESS if we begin with a 6-7-8 Run still intact in our Hand as opposed to PAIRS Royal in the form of Q-Q-Q? It's a great question to ponder as we wander into what is this solemn week of Thanksgiving in America.

This will be my thirty-fifth year in-a-row alone for the Holidays, and while you can virtually ignore Easter and almost entirely tune-out Christmas in America these days, Thanksgiving simply doesn't care, and comes at those who are alone boldly and with both barrels. Mind you: it's nothing that some extremely expensive Bourbon and a good Cribbage Puzzle cannot cure completely!

The 6-7-8 Run is greatly boosted by about Seventeen Cuts (AAAA, 666, 777, 888, 9999), while the PAIRS Royal of Queens is only greatly helped by a Single Cut, another Queen.

We should note that some of those Cut Cards listed that would help the RUN will also boost Toss (7 8), while certain other Cut Cards like a 5 Card would help the Queens regardless of their location! Here we can begin to unravel some of the reasons why placing a PAIR into our own Crib is often not the best idea.

What helps a PAIR is of course a "matching" card, and yet, by definition, the existence of a PAIR already means that HALF of such cards have been dealt to us! And today, it's even worse: Since we were dealt Three Queens, the odds that the "case" Queen would turn up in our Crib or as the Cut Card is extremely remote. And notice, that in order to otherwise 'boost' such cards as a PAIR, we would require "surrounding" cards, such as T-J, or J-K.

Those three Queens we dealt ourselves today are therefore akin to those three, unaccompanied, left-over, awkward wedding guests that usually end up being squished together at the "last" table, the one where hardly anyone knows anyone else. And yet the tendency to split them by sending two of the three to yet another table becomes an even-worse solution. They probably didn't want to be invited to your wedding in the first place!

Touching Cards such as Toss (7 8) can be helped by much more common occurrences, because much of the "energy" needed to boost these cards is already inherent within the discard itself! Therefore, single cards such as ANY Middle Card (666, 777, 888, 9999) can help this discard. And if a 6 Card or a 7 Card shows up, then an Ace can help as well. This is because while PAIRS dissipate such energy, Touching Cards are full of this energy for growth!

It should also be noted that Keep (6 Q Q Q) will peg Nine Holes against a certain number of Pone Hands, which will occur when Pone's first two cards played 'add up' to more than Fifteen, and those remaining two cards 'add up' to Eight or less, when we shall say "go" at a Count of Twenty-Two or higher, while still holding three Queens. Then, in the event that Pone 'plays out' the remainder of his or her cards, we will peg those three Queens in immediate succession, or back-to-back.

The aforementioned 'pegging coup' is fun when it occurs, but since it requires not only a specific type of high- and low-ranking cards to be in Pone's Hand, but for them to also be played in a specific order, it cannot be expected to occur too often.

And, while the 6-7-8 may seem more powerful together, in our Hand, we must remember that Toss (7 8) gets help from THREE cards in the Crib (two we get from Pone, plus one is the Cut Card), while in our Hand the 6-7-8 Run is ONLY going to be helped by One Card, the Cut Card.

This is what 'clinches' the decision for me: Let's Toss (7 8) and put that 'Touching Card' ENERGY in our Crib, where at least in our Crib it can be influenced by three times as many 'outside' variables. In fact, these 'Touching Card' discards are often so powerful, I would even put Toss (6 7) in Second Place on the podium today, rounded out by Third Place Toss (Q Q).

After the King Cut, we have Six Points in our Hand, with prospects for a good Crib. And we're probably wishing by now that we had chosen Toss (Q Q). Such is Cribbage and such is Life! "In order to defeat an Opponent, we must first defeat Ourselves."

   

Tuesday 3:18 AM

An extra point prior to the cut, and I very much doubt Pone will given me a Jack or a 5 card to go with Q-Q. They might be prepared to part with a 6,8 or 9 to help the 7-8 though.

   

Tuesday 5:49 AM

Awkward hand, I think I've mentioned before referred to as "2 triangles" by a Western player. At first glance the 678 looks more attractive, but as pointed out by the 2 early-birds 78 more likely to receive help than QQ.

   

Tuesday 5:58 AM

Awkward indeed. I kept the points.

   

Tuesday 6:09 AM

Looks like I’m with the crowd today.

   

Tuesday 6:42 AM

Eight points six and two. A five or duo help with a different cut and discard help. Pegging I would have to do a A to Z list on pegging possibilities just go for single pegs pegging here. dec

   

Tuesday 7:02 AM

No echo today. I went with having more hits possible in the and and pegging. I hate holding face cards lol.

   

Tuesday 7:05 AM

Always like tossing middle cards to my crib. Not as good as 2-3 or 5-5, but 7-8 is nothing to sneeze at (OK, time to do an internet search.... "nothing to sneeze at"? Who came up with that saying.. off to DDG to see.... hmm a 17th century expression. Today I learned!

   

Tuesday 7:19 AM

This was a tough one, & while I did end up going the route of the minority, my initial thought was keeping the three Q's. Both are pretty solid options, I figure.

So, at first thought, I figured keeping the six points & putting a 15 in the crib with opportunities to see it maybe grow into a run was good, but keeping Q-Q-Q-6 left little potential for that to grow. What? A 5 or 6 or 9 or of all things, the last Q?

BUT, if I keep the 6-7-8-Q, I can shoot for a 5-6-7-8-9-Q & obviously an opportunity for that run to become a straight 8 was appealing AND I liked these cards for pegging more so than all the Q's.

The point in the game was probably the final reason that I went this route. 0-0, why worry about a one point difference & take the option that gives you a possibility to come out of the gates alittle stronger. Just my .02 cents.

   

Tuesday 7:34 AM

Based on my experience, I am still most of the time in Rob’s camp of not over thinking the discard.choice. As dealer , my par holes are 8 & 18. Start with six…3/4ers of the way to 8 and place the power of the 7/8 in my crib. Play defense to the lead.

   

Tuesday 8:09 AM

Thank you for your comments today. The discussion in Raleigh was promoting the merits of tossing QQ due to more cuts helping the remaining hand, much like GT25UMP mentioned above.

   

Tuesday 9:05 AM

Went with the (7-8). Defense to the lead. Looks like an interesting puzzle as Pone at 0-0*, as well. The Q's would have to go over the board as Pone on offense, and optimal I imagine.

   

Tuesday 9:13 AM

Like retaining the extra point overall in this hand -and any middle cut has a decent shot of giving me 12 in the crib-so keeling that extra point in case the cut completely misses our hand and crib couid be useful later in the game

   

Tuesday 10:11 AM

Ready to learn today. At first I thought the pegging flexibility overcame the lack of potential to the crib, but I think my
Mind has changed here.

   

Tuesday 10:43 AM

jmath714--that was my problem with the 6-Q-Q-Q hold also--just not a lot of pegging flexibility.

   

Tuesday 10:56 AM

I'll keep the 6 points and throw the much superior toss of (7 8) in the crib on first deal. Although it doesn't have much flexibility on the pegging, I think it will do a good job of holding pone short on pegs, and the cuts which would help the (6-7-8) run in my hand might get MAGNIFIED in my crib with the toss of (7 8) and 2 other potential cards on the discard from pone.

   

Tuesday 10:57 AM

Hey, thanks to Ras2829 for the heartwarming and kind comment yesterday. I really appreciate the encouragement. I've been going through a really stressful couple of weeks here at school, and I enjoy the few minutes of daily diversion I get from tinkering with this project. Here is CribEDGE's result for today:

Keep: Six of Clubs, Queen of Spades, Queen of Diamonds, Queen of Hearts
Toss: Seven of Clubs, Eight of Diamonds
Worth: 6 / Bonus: 5

   

Tuesday 12:24 PM

I think it's between 6-7-8-Q (Q-Q) and 6-Q-Q-Q (7-8):

6-7-8-Q: 5pts + 4̖¾pts (Schell: 4.79) = 9¾pts

6-Q-Q-Q: 6pts + 6½pts (Schell: 6.53) = 12½pts

Potential:

6-7-8-Q: Improves with AAAA, 2222, 5555, 666, 777, 888, 9999, Q = 26 cuts = 26/46 = 56.5% up to 8/10/12pts with 5555, 666, 777, 888, 9999 = 17 cuts.

6-Q-Q-Q: Improves with 5555, 666, 9999, Q = 12 cuts = 12/46 = 26.1% up to 12pts with 5555, Q = 5 cuts.

Position:

As First Dealer positional hole is 8pts so I'll play Defense but hope to achieve the average 16pts or more.

Pegging:

Playing Defense I think 6-Q-Q-Q will peg better but 6-7-8-Q should peg well also.

Summary:

6-Q-Q-Q isn best for starting value by 2¾pts but it has many fewer cuts for improvement and only 5 cuts for 12pts. 6-7-8-Q has 26 cuts for improvement and 17 cuts for 8-12pts. 2¾pts is a lot to catch up though and I think 6-Q-Q-Q should peg better so I'll throw the 7-8.

   

Tuesday 12:29 PM

At 0*-0 playing a Defense strategy for the pegging the dynamic expected averages and Win/Loss %s are:

_______________Pone's
Defense___Hand_Pegs____Crib_Total____W9 %____W10 %
6-Q-Q-Q____6.96+(-2.11)+6.57=11.42____39.0____52.9
8-Q-Q-Q____6.91+(-2.24)+4.83= 9.50____34.5____48.9
6-7-8-Q____7.15+(-2.04)+4.30= 9.41____34.8____47.7

Defense_______L9 %____L10 %
6-Q-Q-Q________24.2____21.5
8-Q-Q-Q________24.0____24.4
6-7-8-Q________26.7____26.4

6-Q-Q-Q is best for expected averages by 1.92pts and is considerably best for Win %s and slightly lowest for Loss %s. So I'll select 7-8 to discard.

After the K cut I'll play Defense to the lead.

   

Tuesday 1:47 PM