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Three faces of eight
Dear Mark,
I have not seen any Basic Blackjack Strategy that
suggests doubling
down on a hard eight. All I have read or seen on
Basic Blackjack
Strategy states you only hit the hard eight. Do you
have a
professional’s view of the decision to double down
on eight? I do not
remember you addressing this issue. Dan J.
Because single deck games are harder to find than
the proverbial needle
in a haystack, current writings on blackjack, (as
well as on blackjack
basic strategy cards) are created for multiple deck
games. Usually they
all suggest the same thing: Hit your hard eight
against any card the
dealer is showing. However, Dan, if you happen to
stumble upon a single
deck game, it is commonly recommended that you
double down on a hard
eight when the dealer is showing a five or a six.
Dear Mark,
Do all casinos use the same dice size on their crap
games? Mickey H.
Most dice on crap games today are the size of a
three-quarter inch
cube, but the size can vary up to a sixteenth of an
inch because
different companies make dice.
Up until the early sixties, dice were somewhat
smaller, measuring about
five-eighths of an inch. The increase in size was
for a few different
reasons, the foremost being complicate life for the
cheaters. It is
much harder to "palm" or "switch" the bigger dice.
Another reason is
that as crap tables grew larger to accommodate more
players, it became
advantageous to have larger spots making it easier
for the dealers and
players to read the numbers.
I once positioned a five-eighths inch die next to a
three-quarter inch
cube at the end of a crap table, and what a
difference an eighth of an
inch makes! even with my botched lasik surgery.
Dear Mark,
A quick question about Texas Hold’em: Let’s say the
five community
cards are all hearts. For example, the board shows
the 6, 7, 8, 10, and
Jack. In my hand, I have the Ace of hearts. Do I get
to play my Ace of
hearts and take the pot, or am I screwed and the pot
is split? Our
poker group had a minor argument the other night and
would like
clarification. As long as I have played, we have
played that if you can
make a higher flush, then you win. Andrew R.
Correct you are, Andrew, in that your pocket Ace of
hearts ranks
supreme and you can marry it with the just four of
the other hearts on
the board (the five face-up cards in Texas Hold’em).
Your Ace-High
Flush would be higher than any other flush whose
highest card ranks
lower than the ace. If ever the highest card in the
flushes of two
opponents is the same, the hand is counted down to
the next highest
card to see which flush is higher. This countdown
can continue until
the final card of the hand determines the higher
flush.
One exception (there’s always one, n’est pas) to
your specific example
would be if someone were holding the nine of hearts
as one of their two
pocket cards. They trump your hand because that
player would have cards
in sequence, making their hand a Straight Flush.
Online Gambling quote of the week: I believe that some good
poker players
actually employ a degree of extrasensory perception
(ESP). While I’ve
never studied the subject in depth, it seems to me
there’s too much
evidence to ignore that ESP exists or that most
people have it to some
degree. Doyle Brunson, How I Made $1,000,000 Playing
Poker (1979)
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