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The Throw-In Count

In partnership play, there is an additional factor involving the third or last game in a set, known as the throw-in count. If a team has, through one or two of its players, scored a sufficient number of points to put them out in the last game to a degree where the last remaining player on that team can no longer lose sufficient points for the game to remaining in play, that is a throw-in.

For example, in a four-handed game the score of the first winning partner plus the score on the score card has brought their game total to 370 points and the hand is being played at double value. If the remaining partner holds 10 points or less, he cannot lose enough points to keep that game in play, so therefore, the game is automatically ended at that point. Since he can no longer lose the game, he cannot play for additional score or boxes. However, he is not required to play for a throw-in. He has the privilege of staying over the count if he so chooses, but this privilege is exercised only on rare occasions. For instance, if a player knows he has his opponent’s hand dead and the odds favoring a gin for him far exceed those of his opponent, he is then taking a calculated risk of possibly losing the game against the possibility of winning extra boxes, extra roodles, and score.

In addition to this, there are many cases where side bets are made on a game as to which team will win a plus score. These side bets sometimes exceed the actual money that is bet on the points. In a case where one side has won the first two columns of a game, the other team will be forced not just to win the three columns but to win more points in the three columns than their opponents have won in the first two columns. In this case, they might be forced to play for extra boxes and roodles.

For example, Team A has won 1634 points on the first two games. In the last game, Team A has 236 points on score and a total of nine boxes. With the first partner winning his hand, Team B has reached a total score of 332. The four boxes that they receive for the winning gin give them a combined total of 10 boxes. The partner on Team B has reached a throw-in count of seven. In checking the score he notes that if the game were thrown-in at this point, their total score would consist of 332 and 300 for winning the game, 63 for the difference between the opponent’s score and 300, and 25 for one additional box. This totals 721 points, which double comes out to 1142. Team B would obviously lose all side bets. The Team B player is also aware that if he were to gin his hand he would receive four boxes for the gin, which would be worth 200 points since the last game is doubled. Four extra boxes for winning roods would be worth another 200 points, the gin bonus of 25 would add another 50, and the at least one point in his opponent’s hand would be worth 2. This would bring his minimum game total to 2114 points which would of course cause his team to win all side bets. This is a case where the risk involved would be measured against the actual value of a side bet.

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