Learn the Bidding Systems for Pinochle

Series Summary

Playing cards date back to ancient China, where they are believed to have originated, when paper currency was both the vehicle for the card games, and the bet. One popular card game that incorporates playing cards is Euchre. Euchre is a card game based on trick-taking and trump cards played with a deck of 24 cards. It is played and is very popular in the British Isles, New Zealand, Australia, and Canada. Euchre has declined in popularity in the United States recently due to the rise of poker, but is still played in New York state and the Midwest.

In this free video series, our expert Joe Andrews will teach you how to play pinochle. He will tell you about the bidding systems of pinochle, opening bids, bids of 52, and bids of 55. Joe will also teach you about the board, saving melds, climbing or crawling, and the importance of counters in pinochle. Joe will teach you about trump requirements, trumping side suits, playing aces and scoring hands before talking about counting trump and live vs. online internet play.

Video Transcript

"Bidding systems in Pinochle fall into the realm very similarly to those of bridge and perhaps even to those of spades. They are conventional. They are a private agreement between the partners. Now because the options are wide open and there is no established governing body of Pinochle it says that a bid of 51 must mean specifically this: you're bidding system that you agree with your partner to use is one that you feel most comfortable using. Now there are some that are traditional and I will be going through those and exactly what that means and we will certainly go from there. Because the bidding starts at 50 and goes in increments of 1 it would certainly behoove you and your partner to utilize these advantageously. By the way, there is one thing that we might have missed in the previous section and that is if the bidding goes pass, pass, pass the dealer is stuck to take it for 50. Now that's the strategy and sometimes the partner may want to come in to protect his partner because three passes to the dealer is called sticking the dealer and that's a painful thing and we will cover that in a little bit too. Whatever system you choose to use make sure you understand it and make sure it is memorized because if you don't it will be an absolute disaster. If you have the opening bid and you are over here and you bid 50 you are basically showing an all around hand, maybe 10 meld, maybe 15 meld. You are just showing a hand that is basically nondescript. You are not really trying to push hard for a trump. You are just giving your partner some basic generic information. The bid of 51 is traditionally used to show aces all around, four different aces, that's the traditional bid of 51. If you have a chance to open with a bid of 51 you are doing your job in showing aces all around; very useful information to the partner okay? Now we'll put those puppies back and put this hand over completely."