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Dan Barlow:

I see no advantage to playing a low card here. I'd play a face card. Would it be the K or Q? Let's see, if pone had both a K and Q and threw one of them into my crib, it would probably have been the K. So I'll play the K.

DeLynn Colvert:

Holding a 2-3-Q-K with a 7-9 discard, I would peg a little defensively, playing my 2 on the 4 lead. I have discarded a 9 to cut off the 15 play somewhat. And the 2 will confuse my opponent. My 3 covers a run if he plays a 3 (I then pair the 3). Playing a Q or K would be a good play if playing offensively, as a run may well develop with the count over 21. But being the dealer and playing defensively on the first hand (26-Theory), I prefer to lay off. He may very well have an A to score on a Q or K response as well.

George Rasmussen:

The first hand of game should be played defensively by dealer. The cut of the 8 should also give hope for a reasonable crib with your 7-9 discard, especially after seeing the lead of the 4. Play the K on the 4 offering. The worst that can happen is two points scored by the opponent. By playing the 2 or 3, non-dealer may score either a 15-2 or a run of three.

Michael Schell:

I have four points in my hand, am guaranteed to peg one, and have at least five points in the crib. Pone led a 4, a card that doesn't mesh particularly well with mid-cards, so I might have an even bigger crib. All this points to playing cautious offense or to playing off. Enticing a run with the 3 is not advisable, since with just one other low card I'm unlikely to outscore pone in a run-building contest. The question then is whether to play the K, the least likely card to be paired, or to play the Q, saving the run-proof K for later in case pone has 4-9-10-J or 4-10-J-Q. In general, with lo-hi hands distributed 2/2, I prefer to play the K first. This gives up fewer pairs against hands like 2-2-4-x, 3-4-5-x and 4-5-6-x. With a 1/3 hand like 2-J-Q-K or 3-J-Q-K though, I would play the Q first. The idea there is that if pone gets a 15-2 with an A, I'll then dump the J, leaving my K (instead of the more vulnerable Q) for the second play series — very possibly saving me two or three points if pone started with A-4-x-x.

Phyllis Schmidt:

I would play the K. I don't care to get into any runs with only two cards to play runs with.

Peter Setian:

I would play one of the face cards, probably the K, on the 4 lead. I'm in a conservative position, and if pone has an A with the 4, and the 8 is cut, their hand can't count for much (eight points max). Let him or her have the 15 for two points. Then, I'd probably play the 3 to make the count 18.

HALSCRIB:

The cut gives me four points in the hand. I expect to get about six more in the crib, and two in the pegging. That'll get me to 12 points on average. Based on that, I predict that I will win at 126, with opponent dealing at 117*, suggesting that my strategy here should be defense.

Based on typical pone hands that include a 4, I calculate the following values for the possible replies:

	Average pegging:     Net (Pone/Dealer)
2	+0.10  (2.43/2.53)
3	-0.63  (3.05/2.42)
Q	+0.42  (1.69/2.11)
K	+0.47  (1.66/2.12)

The K comes out microscopically better than the Q, so that's what I'll play to minimize opponent's average pegging points.

Panelists

Dan Barlow won the 1980 National Open Cribbage Tournament, and made the 1985 All American Cribbage Team. His cribbage strategy articles appeared in Cribbage World for many years, and can be seen on the ACC Web site. He also provides strategy tips at MSN Gaming Zone. He has written seven books on cribbage, two of which have been glowingly reviewed in Games Magazine. All, including his latest book Winning Cribbage Tips, are available at The Cribbage Bookstore.

HALSCRIB is widely regarded as the world's strongest computer cribbage player. Its opinion was solicited using a special analysis version of the program. Since HALSCRIB only speaks binary, its thoughts have been translated into English by Michael Schell and its creator, Hal Mueller, a retired mathematics professor and eight-time ACC tournament winner. For more information, see the HALSCRIB home page.