When to Split Your Pair of Ten's

During the time that you find yourself playing the game of blackjack, either in a casino or on the Internet, you may find yourself being dealt a pair of tens. In blackjack, a pair of tens does not have to be like other like pairs, in order to split them. A pair of tens in blackjack does not strictly have to be a pair of jacks, or a pair of queens, kings or tens, you can have a ten and a jack, a jack and a queen, a queen and a king and so on, and it will still be considered a pair of tens in which you could very well split, if you so choose.

A lot of different blackjack players have a lot of different ideas how to play blackjack, but for the very most part, it seems most all blackjack players have the same general idea as to how to play a hand when you have a pair of tens. Most all blackjack players will agree, twenty is a pretty good hand, good enough not to mess with at all. In fact, a lot of people would say that to split your pair of tens is a lot like trading a Cadillac for two Yugo’s, trading a winning hand, for two losing hands. Let us always keep well in mind, the only winning hands in blackjack, are the ones that get paid. You could just as very easily lose on a twenty as you could win on two fifteens.

Some blackjack players, usually blackjack players that are new to the game of blackjack, and sometimes blackjack players that are intoxicated or card counters, or even blackjack players that are just trying to upset other blackjack players at the blackjack table may not chose to stay on a pair of ten valued cards. Some blackjack players may chose to place a second bet out there, of course equal to the amount of their original wager and inform the blackjack dealer that they would like to split their pair of ten valued cards. When they split their pair of ten valued cards, if they receive an ace on one of those ten valued cards, it is not considered to be a blackjack or a natural twenty one, a blackjack or natural twenty one has to be a combination of any ace and any ten valued card as your initial first two cards. Your first two cards, in this scenario, are the first two ten valued cards you were dealt. Instead, an ace added to your split ten valued card is considered to be a soft twenty one, which could also be counted as an eleven and could very well be doubled down on in most casinos.

Since I am a big fan of playing the game of blackjack based on basic strategy and since basic strategy recommends never splitting a pair of tens, I tend not to do anything with a pair of tens other than just stay on the total of twenty, hope for a win, expect a tie or a push. After all, basic strategy for blackjack is based on well calculated odds, not guessing, meaning hopefully if you follow the basic blackjack strategy card to the letter, you will come out ahead more often than you do not. Keep well in mind, you should not expect to get rich, just because you stay on a pair of tens as the basic blackjack strategy suggests, it only means you are playing on the right side of the math.