Hunches and luck

Great pleasure comes from confidently standing on a hard twelve against a dealer five and watching the dealer bust. It's so much fun you might forget that your hand had a 58 percent chance of losing. Luck is luck. Basic strategy doesn't fix a bad hand; it simply tells you the best way to play it. Nothing guarantees a win because blackjack is gambling. It is subject to streaks like any game. You can play perfectly and the dealer can win ten hands in a row. Basic strategy won't beat a blackjack or a dealer twenty when you double on eleven and pull an eight.
Some people get frustrated and start playing hunches when cards repeatedly fall the wrong way. Even when cards are falling the right way, some people want to follow a "feeling." As we said in Chapter 4, hunches aren't mathematically correct, but it's your money. Just realize that you are paying for the pleasure of making a guess. You might win, but on average you are more likely to lose. If you can live with that, then do what you "feel."