Category: cribbage

A Few Thoughts on Calvinball Cribbage

OK, so Sena and I have been experimenting with a few cribbage variants in the last few days and I ran into this Calvinball comment on a Reddit cribbage thread about 10-card cribbage. Yes, people play that! I’m afraid to look on the web for 11-card cribbage although Sena asked about it.

Briefly, 10-card cribbage is usually a two-player game. Deal 10 cards each; 2 cards from each player go to the dealer’s crib; each player divides the remaining 8 cards into 2 four card hands, one for pegging and either one or both for the show.

As an aside, the Reddit thread person who started the thread about 10 card cribbage asked if anyone else ever played it. One commenter facetiously replied “Yes, there have been many many posts of Calvinball crib.”

You have to know where that term “Calvinball” comes from. I’m pretty sure it’s from another social media forum which plays a game called Calvinball—which is a whimsical, forever evolving game which has nothing to do with playing cards, is based on the comic Calvin & Hobbes and has no real rules whatsoever. Participants make it up as they go along. So, I think what the commenter might have meant was that 10-card cribbage is yet another of the many proliferating variants (some better than others) of the more well-established game, usually identified as 6-card cribbage.

Anyway, we found out later that there are two sets of rules for 10-card cribbage. The intent is to make the game play faster and yield higher scores.

 Given that context, we played it both ways to 121. In the one set according to AI, you deal each player 10 cards and both throw 2 cards to the dealer’s crib. Each player divides the remaining cards into hands of 4 cards each. You play one hand only during the pegging phase and the other for the show (scoring the hand). It was pretty slow and didn’t yield high scores, partly because we used only the four card hand for the show.

And then there’s a Wikipedia article which says you peg with one hand and score both for the show. We got higher scores all around, the game was faster, and we both enjoyed it much more.

As a reminder follow up to the post about the 9-card and 8-card cribbage games, Sena still likes the 9-card variant but doesn’t care for the 8-card (neither do I) because it seems clunkier, probably because you need to bury cards under the deck. The 9-card variant has an on-line scorer which didn’t work consistently. We seemed to fare pretty well without it for the most part. The suggestion to play to 323 (up, back, and there again on a 121-hole board) seems like overkill. I’m retired but not that retired.

OK, is 8-Card Cribbage a Thing?

We’re still getting used to the 7-card cribbage game and guess what Sena asked me today?

“Is there an 8-card cribbage?”

So, I looked it up on the web and, sure enough, there was a Reddit thread a year ago with only one relevant entry. It was from someone asking if anybody else played 8-card cribbage. That person went on to admit uncertainty if it was a thing or not and wondered if they just made it up. I would vote for the latter. Two commenters didn’t shed any further light on the subject.

The rules for 8 card cribbage are that it’s played like 6-card cribbage except each player is dealt 8 cards, each chooses 4 cards to keep in the hand, tosses 2 cards to the dealer’s crib and the remaining 2 cards get buried at the bottom of the deck.

We gave 8-card cribbage a spin and it felt a little clunky, maybe because of the added motion of burying a couple of cards under the deck along with the extra cards—yet despite that we ended with 4 card hands and played to 121. So, it felt much like regular 6-card cribbage.

We both prefer 7-card cribbage. Even though it doesn’t have a lot of documentation about it, it feels less like word-of-mouth and a little more streamlined. The scores are more challenging to count. Anybody else out there ever heard of 8-card cribbage? Anybody else ever play 7-card cribbage?

We Are Muddling Through 7 Card Cribbage!

We’ve been working pretty hard today trying to teach ourselves how to play 7 card cribbage. There’s not a lot of information on the web about the game. The gist of it is that you play to 181 and each player gets 7 cards with 5 cards to the dealer’s crib. You can have 4, 5, and 6 flushes but the 4 and 5 card flushes have to be in your hand. We found out about it on a website called Masters Traditional Games.

We’re not used to playing past the 121 hole in cribbage. We struggled over it until Sena finally got the idea that it must mean we just go back to the starting hole when you get to 121. We’re not sure why the goal is 181 points to win. Other goals are to play to 151, 121, or play to 61 three times.

The opportunity for big scores is higher in 7 card cribbage and they can be difficult to count. The highest score is 46 with cards 4,4,5,5,6,6 which includes the starter card. It took me a while to count it. One person said it was easier for him to get that than a 29 score in the 6-card cribbage game—which is very rare.

We also got new long sleeve cribbage shirts for the occasion. Mine says “That’s What I Do, I Play Cribbage And I Know Things.”

I’m not sure how often we’ll play 7 card cribbage. The games should play pretty fast because the scores tend to be higher than in the 6-card version. On the other hand, you can get pretty bogged down figuring out your score!

15 Minute Push in Cribbage Game Today!

Today we filmed our cribbage game with a goal of completing a game in 15 minutes. We managed to do it, although I played out of turn on the last pegging phase. Sena got skunked today, but that’s rare!

You have to pay attention to the clock on the table in the video, showing we essentially made the 15-minute mark that cribbage tournament rules require for playing a game. We also decided to shuffle a few times every deal so as to try to mix the cards enough.

This is better than the time we usually take to play a typical game, which is generally 20 minutes. It’s hard to shave just 5 minutes off the game. I get pretty jittery trying to stay that focused, but today we did it. We helped each other, which doesn’t happen in tournaments. And there’s not the distraction of hundreds of other players in a giant auditorium all crammed together cheek by jowl and talking at once.

We’re not going to play that fast all the time.

Cribbage Could Help Preserve Your Brain Health!

I just saw an article that working on your cognitive skills might make you less susceptible to dementia. There are some websites that help you, but I think some, like BrainHQ, could cost you money.

On the other hand, there is some evidence that playing card games can help protect your brain. I think cribbage could be one of them, although it’s tough to find specific studies on it.

I checked around and found a few studies about how playing games like solitaire and hearts could help keep you sharp. On the other hand, when I was a young man, I worked on a land survey crew. We played hearts over lunch hour and when it rained. I consistently lost.

But for the last several years, Sena and I have regularly played cribbage, a card game that calls for some math skills, concentration, attentiveness, and strategy.

The one problem I see with picking cribbage as one of your main sources of cognitive stimulation is that many people see it has an old person’s game. They should try playing cribbage with someone who really knows how to play.

Cribbage players tend to be older; many tend to be over 50. The American Cribbage Congress (ACC) is the major organization for cribbage and they hold lots of tournaments, both local (called grass roots clubs) and national. They always welcome new and younger players. In general, you need to be able to play a game in 15 minutes in tournaments.

We have tried to finish a cribbage game in 15 minutes, but we can’t seem to do it in less than 20 minutes. I always know when Sena wants to play. She like to use the automatic card shuffler (I like to shuffle manually) and whenever I hear the card shuffling machine (which is loud enough to hear from all over the house), I know it’s time for a game!

I Made a New YouTube Channel Trailer!

I made a new YouTube Channel trailer today since it’s been a couple of years since I made the previous one. Thanks for watching!

James Amos, MD (who prefers to be called Jim but his YouTube handle is @JamesAmosMD) is a retired psychiatrist who graduated from the University of Iowa College of Medicine, did his residency, practiced and taught at University of Iowa Health Care (UIHC) in Iowa City, Iowa for about 24 years. Since retirement in 2020, he’s enjoyed bird-watching, taught himself to juggle, and plays cribbage. He co-edited and published a book with former UIHC psychiatry chair Bob Robinson, “Psychosomatic Medicine: An Introduction to Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry” in 2010 which is still available for purchase. Bob passed away in 2024 and all who knew and learned from him remember him fondly. Jim and his wife have made Iowa City their home for over 3 decades. Jim’s been blogging since about 2011 and you can read his current blog at Go Retire Psychiatrist. He’s mainly a humorist and has a certificate from Dad-joke University of Humour (DUH), even though he’s never been a dad and doesn’t really tell jokes per se.

I Got a 28 Hand in Cribbage Today!

I got a 28 hand in Cribbage Pro scrimmage today against Brutal (the most difficult level). I also won the game. The odds of getting a 28 hand in cribbage is about 1 in 15,028. It’s the second highest hand score in cribbage. The highest score is a 29 hand and the odds of getting that is 1 in 216,580. There are different ways to calculate the odds which yield different results which involve crazy difficult statistics that I can’t explain, but you can find the details here.

The Ups and Downs of Cribbage Solitaire

I made this YouTube video of a full six deal game of cribbage solitaire—and missed a 3-card run which would have won the game!

What the heck, I probably made other mistakes too that others will notice.

The rules:

Cribbage solitaire has six hands and six cribs and you peg your six hands.

Start by dealing two cards down to form part of your hand, then one down to form part of the crib. Deal two more to your hand, one more to the crib, and finally two more to your hand (which now has six cards and the crib has two.

Discard two of the six cards to form a four-card crib. Then flip the top card of the deck for the starter card.

Then peg your hand for maximum count, which would not always be the way you’d peg in a game with an opponent. Colbert’s example paraphrased: if you hold 5-10-10-jack. Play the 5 first, then a 10 for “15-2,” then the other 10 for “25, a pair for two and a go.” The remaining jack also scores a “go” for one point. Your peg is six points total.

After scoring the peg, count your hand, then your crib.

Then start the second deal by using the first-hand starter card, which becomes one of the first six cards for your hand. Again, deal the crib two cards. Repeat this process until you complete the game with the sixth deal (the deck will have four cards after six deals). (Colvert, 2015)

Reference

Colvert, D. (2015). Play Winning Cribbage 5th ed. Missoula, Montana: Starr Studios.

Won Cribbage Solitaire on First Game Today!

I won cribbage solitaire in six deals (meaning I got to 121) on my first try today. Lucky break. I’m beginning to think I should just film these because, at least lately, I seem to be on a winning streak. My first and most recent win was 3 days ago and I think I’ve played once or twice since then.

Rules summarized and demo video below:

Cribbage solitaire has six hands and six cribs and you peg your six hands.

Start by dealing two cards down to form part of your hand, then one down to form part of the crib. Deal two more to your hand, one more to the crib, and finally two more to your hand (which now has six cards and the crib has two.

Discard two of the six cards to form a four-card crib. Then flip the top card of the deck for the starter card.

Then peg your hand for maximum count, which would not always be the way you’d peg in a game with an opponent. Colbert’s example paraphrased: if you hold 5-10-10-jack. Play the 5 first, then a 10 for “15-2,” then the other 10 for “25, a pair for two and a go.” The remaining jack also scores a “go” for one point. Your peg is six points total.

After scoring the peg, count your hand, then your crib.

Then start the second deal by using the first-hand starter card, which becomes one of the first six cards for your hand. Again, deal the crib two cards. Repeat this process until you complete the game with the sixth deal (the deck will have four cards after six deals). (Colvert, 2015)

Reference

Colvert, D. (2015). Play Winning Cribbage 5th ed. Missoula, Montana: Starr Studios.

A Little Iowa Hawkeye Cribbage History

Sena played a couple of games of cribbage solitaire today and came within 8 points of making 121! And so that makes us both fans of this variation on cribbage.

There was a little project I set for myself given that DeLynn Colvert’s book, “Play Winning Cribbage” has a section called Cribbage World Publication, which is a monthly publication you can find on the American Cribbage Congress (ACC) website. Colvert was an editor of Cribbage World and included in his book copies of events and ads of interests to ACC members. Many items are odd and comical.

One of the interesting tidbits is an announcement that is historically important for cribbage in Iowa. However, none of the items including this one are dated. So, I had to hunt it down in the archives on the ACC website. The title is “Two 29’s Within 5 Minutes!” It refers to an event called the Hawkey Classic, which used to be the name for the annual cribbage tournament held in Des Moines, Iowa. Two 29 hands were scored within 5 minutes of each other during this tournament. This is remarkable because the odds of dealt a 29 hand are 1 in 216,580!

I had to dig through many pages of Cribbage World and Artificial Intelligence (AI) was no help at all (not that I asked it because AI intrudes itself on all my searches whether I want it’s help or not). In fact, it denied the existence of the Hawkeye Classic cribbage tournament.

Anyway, I had to make a guess about what issue of Cribbage World that announcement was published. I guessed that it was in the 1990s (for no particular reason) and I found it on page 3 in the June 1990 issue after striking out in the 1991-1993 issues (although I found one item related to cribbage solitaire which involved playing five hands instead of six).

It turns out that there’s been an annual cribbage tournament for over 40 years in Iowa and that tradition did start in Des Moines. It was called the Hawkeye Classic and was ACC sanctioned. However, my guess is that it gradually became absorbed into the Iowa State Fair schedule of events. It’s usually held on the last day of the fair. This year, I found out there were 252 entrants, which I think is probably not unusual.

Another interesting note about this issue of Cribbage World I noticed is that there isn’t a Hawkeye Classic cribbage tournament announcement listed in The Tournament Trail section. However, it does list the Grand National (National Awards Banquet) on September 20, 21, 23 in 1990 at the Hotel Fort Des Moines, Des Moines, Iowa. But I did find an announcement about the Hawkeye Classic in one of the earlier issues from 1991-1993.

Iowa Hawkeye cribbage is alive and well!