Tuesday 3:29 AM

Those of you who know me know that I loathe that Keep (A 2 3 5) hand, so let's try what may even be safer today.

   

Tuesday 3:38 AM

I have tried pegging with that A-2-3-5 as non dealer and have been miserable at it. So I will go with a balanced strat and go with prefered cuts of 2-3-4-7. Lead the three maybe trap a few points pegging. dec

   

Tuesday 4:17 AM

Just a percentage play to keep the A-2-3-5-a 6 or 8 cut are the only ones that don’t get us to at least a 7 point hand-if the dealer has all pictures we will peg 4 on him-first hand is too early for the break everything up toss and too early for the risky 5-6 toss to keep the A-2-3-9-this is a happy medium-any low card or picture card-so basically two thirds of the deck-provides us with help without helping the 6-9 discard to the crib

   

Tuesday 4:21 AM

all cards give us at least 2 more points.

tossing 69 here or worse 56 seems like good ways to be playing catch up

our hand is not much good but maybe neither is pones

6 points after the cut is not so bad though

   

Tuesday 5:12 AM

6-9 seems the least dangerous option without destroying my hand.

Plenty of cuts for 7+.

3(3)-X(13)-2(15/2)-X(25)-5(30)-go-A(31/2) in the pegging, maybe.

   

Tuesday 5:12 AM

Not too exciting, but at least pegging possibilities and all cuts help.

   

Tuesday 5:17 AM

Good chance for at least seven points and to early in the game to give up 5-6.

   

Tuesday 5:32 AM

Like the more defensive toss vs 6-9 today. Although that would be my second choice. Every cut helps this hand so we will at least improve on the two starting points. I like the ace lead as dealer often responds with a 8 or 9, which we can get 15-2.

   

Tuesday 5:36 AM

I didn’t want to throw a 5, 2 3 or 6 9 to dealer so threw 2 9 as a least worst (I hoped) option.

   

Tuesday 5:46 AM

Since there are so many face cards still out there for the cut, I decided to keep both the 2-3 and the 5. The 6 cut works out just fine.

   

Tuesday 6:36 AM

Hedging with the A356. Everything helps, and the dealer's crib probably won't go boom. Lead the 3?

   

Tuesday 6:46 AM

Keep 2 points. All cuts give us more.

   

Tuesday 7:05 AM

Nice puzzle. The first hand is positionally very interesting to me. How much does relative position matter 121 points out? How many risks should you take? Should you try to play "optimally"? Or should you make more extreme plays, offense or defense, while you have time to come back if your strategy doesn't pay off?

I have to admit I didn't even consider 2-9

   

Tuesday 8:28 AM

Giving away 5,6 for a 5 pt hand is a non-started. This isn't really a defensive strategy so much as it is why bother (giving up 2 pts (6,9) so I can have 3 pts). So I did this.

   

Tuesday 11:07 AM

First hand. Lost the deal. OFF. toss 6-9. Damn the torpedoes. OOPS. One of the torpedoes hit.

   

Tuesday 11:19 AM

Choosing off. off., off., holding A-3-5-6 is the way to go. One of two favored hands of two points, the other being A-3-4-7, these hands often score 8 points after the starter card is added. That's the case today here. If not holding these, would have held 2-3-5-6 for zero points and the best pegger among these six cards. Based on my scant empirical evidence the 6-9 is a poor choice. You could do worse with the 3-5. Anybody for that? Because of the higher scoring 6-9 (421) discard to opponent crib 6.204. That's slightly higher than HalscribCLX will show at 5.97 I think. In any case combined values are own pegs, hand score, less crib. The 2-9 (2,056) avg. 4.573 and the A-9 (1,604) is 4.340. In addition the A-3-5-6 or 2-3-5-6 have higher offensive pegging potential. So giving up the extra points in crib and giving up a few in the pegging cause the A-3-5-6 to be the better choice this day.