Teaser may be too strong a word for this one, but I found it interesting anyway. Final hand of a $75 sit and go, which paid $320 for first and $75 for second. Bets are $10 to $500 in $10 increments, late surrender allowed, dealer stands on all 17s. Final hand, in button order: Harry Fox: $1520 bets $500 Stan Roper: $995 bets $490 Ken Smith: $1755 John Leland: $700 Before I go on and list my bet and John's bet, the first question is: What should I bet here? I'll follow up with the outcome later, after I play tonight's event in Tulsa.
I'm going to go with 430. And let the others decide how and what amount they would bet. That was about my 6th choice BTW. I just didn't see a better one, and wouldn't have bet that amount in 30 seconds anyway.
I probably would have gone for 460, because it allows a surrender back to 1525. I think anywhere in the range 430-460 is equally good. In fact, if you exclude the small possibility of having to win 3 bets to match Harry doing the same, then the range of equivalent bets looks to be 390-460. The only other option I can see is 270. Harry can now double past you, but Stan still can't. But, if Stan swings you you will both be on 1485, and if John doubles his BR and gets a swing he will still be behind.
Duh,Late Surrender? I have never played outside my local area where they don't have(or offer) late surrender. What is it? How is it used?
Surrender is the option to give up your hand and take back half the amount you originally bet. 'Late surrender' refers to the fact that you can't do it until after the dealer has checked for a BJ, so if the dealer has a BJ you always lose your entire bet. 'Early surrender', on the other hand, allows you to surrender before the dealer peeks at their hole card, but as I understand it you won't find that available anywhere today. In regular BJ there are just a few hands, such as 16 versus dealer 10, for which the correct strategy is to surrender. In tournament play, however, surrender is a big tactical weapon. One of the possible bets to consider when you are in the lead is 'twice your lead, minus a chip'. Betting this amount mean that if you surrender you will still be in the lead if your opponent does not win their hand (even if they push). In Ken's teaser my suggestion of 460 comes from the fact that - Ken:$1755 - Harry:$1520 = $235 2 * $235 - $10 = $460 If Ken bets $460 then surrenders, he loses $230, leaving him on $1525.
Colin nailed my bet. Back to the hand, now that I've bet $460. Harry Fox: $1520 bets $500 96 Surrenders Stan Roper: $995 bets $490 T7 Dbl (face down) Ken Smith: $1755 bets $460 99 John Leland: $700 bets $500 88 Dbl $200 (face down) Harry surrenders, playing for a very likely 2nd place finish. Now I can afford to lose my entire bet and still stay ahead of him. I stand on my 18, and my only exposure is if either Stan or John's long-shot doubles swing me. The dealer has a pat 20, and now the double down cards are revealed. John catches a 5 for 21! He's won the table, unless Stan catches a 4. No, Stan's card is a 3 and he pushes. John wins it, and I take second.
teaser Maybe I'm confused...but when I read Ken's first post, my choice would have been $270.00, which if made would have won the table. Can someone explain why 460.00 is better?
better late than never My first bet that came to mind was 390. It's the minimum needed to cover the double down. Since it's less than double the lead, it gives me the surrender back as well. I'm of the mind that betting the minimum needed to cover the double down is safer than betting the max that can be surrendered to cover a push, because of the blackjacks and swings from the low bankrolls that seem to happen a lot. Covering the opponent's bj with single bet, or your opponent's double with your bj, requires you to lead by more than half a bet, and then your thought process is different anyway. 390 wouldn't have made any difference in this scenario, though. Is there some reason 460 is superior to 390 in this scenario?
bet 430 to 460 Is there some reason 460 is superior to 390 in this scenario? Monkeysystem, to cover Harry’s triple bet Ken needs to win $1,270; and if Harry manages to split twice and double then it becomes $1,290. The chance for this happening is small but at the same time there is no drawback to making bet that covers it. So the right bet is 430 to 460. Also, playing strategy in that sit’n’go was interesting. Once Harry surrendered Ken can surrender and lock out both Harry and John, even if John wins double or has a blackjack (I don’t know if cards were dealt face down in this tournament). If Stan wins his double he takes the first place and Ken takes the second, if Stan pushes or loses his double hard 17 vs. the dealer Ten Ken is the winner. The other option for Ken was to stand on his 99. In that case Ken takes first place if he wins, or pushes and Stan does not win, or loses but neithe Stan nor John wins. Ken takes second place if he pushes and Stan wins, and when he loses and but either one Stan or John wins (assuming John doubles his 88). Ken takes third place if he loses and both Stan and John wins. Anybody would like to guess or calculate EV for both Ken’s playing options? (First place pays $320, second place pays $75) S. Yama
If Ken had surrendered If Ken surrenders as you say Harry and John are locked out. Now since Stan doubled for 200 then the probabilities are as follows: Ken is 1st .8172 Stan is 1st .1828 Therefore Ken's EV is .8172 x 320 = 261.50 ............................ .1828 x 75 = 13.71 ...............................Total..........275.21 With Ken standing his EV is higher but only can guess that he has about 91% chance of 1st and 8% chance of 2nd and 1% of 3rd. .....................BlueLight
After much struggling, I get the following probabilities for standing - 1st: 88.30%, 2nd:11.19%, 3rd: 0.51% And an EV of $290.96.
Better Bet I Am In Agreement That 460 Is The Better Bet, After The Discussionby Many Of The Better Tourn. Players,but How Much Better Bet Is 460 Than 270. It Seems That The 460 Would Have Taken Me Much Longer To Calculate Than My Original Guess Of 270. As Ken Has Made Note If [there Is Always A Better Bet] It Is Sometimes Difficult To Make The Better Bet While Under Time Constraints And Other Pressures. It Seems To Me That 260 Solves Many Issues While On The Fly, Whereas 460 Is The Absolute Best Educated Bet. Ken, How Long Did It Take You To Arrive At The Amount That Was Your Final Bet? /
$460 was actually a quick decision for me, and it's one that I later second-guessed, particularly after the outcome. At the table, I never seriously considered locking out BR4, but instead wanted to make sure I could cover Harry in the double/double scenario. Since that tactic required a bet of at least $385, I figured I would bet all I could, just in case it covered any extra blackjack possibilities by my opponents.
surr. vs. stand Yes, great play by Ken. That is why analyzing real cases develop better intuition. As to the numbers we are all in the same ballpark. Using dealers 6deck results and infinite deck for playing, expected value (rounding) for Ken’s surrender is $275 and standing is $291. I used exact probabilities after removing each seen card and the EVs are $274 and $285 respectively. That’s only 4% difference. A few cards that we'd seen, even in six decks, improved chances of successful doubling on 16 and 17. Let’s continue this investigation. Surrendering guarantees at lest second place, so benefits of this decision lay in higher second place payout compared to the first place payout. If the first place still paid $320, how much would the second place need to pay to make surrender a better play than standing? And how much would it differ depending if we use infinite deck or exact chances? Also, seeing numbers for this play, if Ken’s hand total was seventeen instead of eighteen what would be Ev’s for surrender and standing? S. Yama
surr. vs. stand This is another example of close decisions and I found it interesting to see to what degree our “exact” knowledge of the deck composition influences optimal play. So I checked this play removing the same nine cards from a single deck. Since these numbers were closer to infinite deck’s numbers I rechecked my process – and sure enough I missed values of one cell in my previous calculation - damn. The EV for standing with the exact deck composition is 290.5 not $284. So, the exact deck composition in this case changed very little. The second place would have to pay $298 to make surrender better play, same number in both cases -exact and infinite deck approach. If Ken's hand was a hard seventeen, standing still would be better play by about one dollar and fifty cents. Second place would have to pay $150 to make surrender the right choice. S. Yama
Thanks for the extra work Yama. It's nice to know that in cases like this, exact deck composition doesn't affect much. I've switched to using infinite decks for almost all of my research, because it is so much more convenient. Certainly there are times when it makes a difference, but hopefully they are few and far between.
