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Common Mistakes

The most expensive sheepshead mistakes are picking on points instead of trump, forgetting that queens and jacks are trump, burying trump, leading the called suit before trump is drawn, schmearing onto a trick that can still be taken, and cracking on fail aces. Each one has a simple fix.

Mistakes beginners make

  1. Treating a jack or queen as its printed suit. The J♥ is trump, not a heart. Sort queens and jacks into your trump the moment you pick up your cards. The trump order.
  2. Picking on points. Aces and tens do not win tricks against trump. Count trump first, and weigh them by quality. When to pick.
  3. Hoarding aces. An ace held to the end usually gets trumped. Schmear it onto your side’s trick, or cash it early on defense. Schmearing.
  4. Forgetting the bury counts. The picking side’s points include the bury. Leave it out of the count and you will think a won hand was lost. Card points.

Mistakes as the picker

  1. Burying trump for points. Bury fail points and make a void; keep your trump. What to bury.
  2. Calling a long suit. The more cards of the called suit you hold, the likelier a defender is void and trumps your partner’s ace. Call your shortest. Which ace to call.
  3. Leading the called suit too early. Draw trump first, until at most one is unaccounted for. Leading as the picker.
  4. Picking four trump with the jack of diamonds in hand. At jack of diamonds that is a lone hand on four trump, and it loses. Going alone.

Mistakes on the picking side and on defense

  1. Schmearing onto a trick that can still be taken. Check who is still to play before throwing points. Before the partner is known, an unknown seat is an opponent. Schmearing.
  2. Overtaking your own side. If a teammate is winning and nobody behind you can take it, add points, do not take it over. Playing as the partner.
  3. Leading trump on defense at call an ace. It does the picker’s work. Lead fail, and the called suit low. How to defend.
  4. Spending the wrong trump. Following a trump lead you cannot win, throw the strongest trump that cannot win, not the cheapest; small diamonds win late tricks. How to defend.

Mistakes with the stakes

  1. Cracking on fail aces. A crack is a bet on trump. Most defensive hands should not crack at all. When to crack.
  2. Cracking after passing. Only a player the blind never reached may crack. Cracking.
  3. Blitzing on two trump. Two black queens and nothing else is a hand to pick quietly, if at all. Blitzes.
  4. Passing everything. At a doubler table the stakes pile up behind a table that never picks, and late seats should pick lighter. When to pass.

How to stop making them

Pick one mistake at a time and watch for it for an evening. The replay of every recent hand, trick by trick, is the fastest way to find your own, and the coach at Sheepshead Club can leave a note after a hand about your pick and your card play, using only what you could see. It can be switched off. See the coach.

Related

Play a hand

Sheepshead Club is free, with no ads and no account needed. Play a first hand with the coach beside you (about three minutes), or sit down at a table with computer players or real people.

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