Review of the Left Panel, 2026

 

Greetings and salutations from your Passover-prepping Bubbe, postponing my grocery shopping at Livingston ShopRite just long enough to go over the left hand side of the 2026 NMJL card!

Reminder about abbreviations: 2026 hands will be listed as Y for Year; 2468 hands will be referred to as E (Even); and hands from the Any Like Number section will be denoted as LN. Variations on a hand will also be listed. If there are a one- and three-suited version, for instance, they will have suffixes of .1 and .3. if a hand has both a lower and upper end of the number line they will be versions “a” and “b”.

Year section: 

Note that there are no concealed hands in the 2026 section; all four Year hands are open / some melds can be called for exposure. The four tiles in 2026 itself cannot be called except for mah jongg, as they are considered four singles. Also remember that the soaps used as “zeroes” for the purpose of Year hands are like Flowers: they have no “suit”. 

Y1: a very attainable hand. Jokers can be used for any and all melds. There are pungs of the first “2” and Soaps, and then kongs of 2 and 6 in a second suit. Most important thing to remember: the “2” melds are of different sizes and therefore not interchangeable, so if you expose, remember that the *2 and 6 kongs* must be of the same suit. 

Backup options: Y2, Y4, LN2 

Y2: This hand uses pungs of dragons in two suits. The first dragons match the suit of the numbers in 2026; the second dragon pung must match the suit of a kong of either 2’s or 6’s. Remember that the “0” itself has no suit, so for example, you could have “2026” using bams with a matching pung of green dragons, and then a kong of 2 dots with a pung of Soaps. 

Backup options:  Y3, E4

Y3: This hand uses all three suits. Remember that “0” has no suit, so the 2026 meld does not have to be in dots. The melds include a pung of Flowers, 2026 in suit A, a pung of 2s in suit B, and a kong of 6s in suit C. 

Backup options: Y2, E1.2 

Y4: This hand is not a concealed hand, although only two of its component melds (the pungs) can be called for exposures. It's definitely a little trickier, hence it's worth 30 instead of 25. 

Using any two suits, you'll need a pair of 2s in suit A (it does NOT have to be dots!), a pair of soaps, pungs of 2s and 6s in suit B, and NEWS (which are all single tiles and can't be called for except as final mah jongg tile). Be careful not to make the second exposure if you're not close on all the other melds; there is no other hand with exposures of 2 and 6 pungs.

Backup options: Y1, E3, W4 

Interesting to note that the first three hands *may* each use a kong of 6s. This is very helpful when you're thinking about backup hands. 

 

 

Evens section:

E1.1 and E1.2: Very simple pung pung kong kong hand, ascending with the 2 and 4 as pungs and 6 and 8 as kongs. You can do it either all in one suit or in two suits: remember that the lower numbered suit As are both pungs; the higher numbered suit B are both kongs. Again, remember that any meld can be called for exposure, and jokers can be used in any meld.

Backup options: You may easily switch between E1.1 and E1.2, or choose a different suit for E1.2 

E2: This is a two-suited hand. I think in previous years I've called it the sandwich. “Bread” kongs of 2 and 8 in suit A, filled with pairs of 4 and 6 in suit B, and then two Flowers as garnish to complete the set of 14 tiles. 

Backup option: the only option you can have , once you have both kongs exposed, would be to switch the complementary suit of the pairs of 4 and 6.

E3: Similar to Y4, it is not concealed, but there are only two components that can be called for exposures: pungs of 4 and 6. In addition,you've got four additional pairs to contend with. This is one of those scenarios where Wind tiles have “flown the coop” and are now in a Number section! As we'll see again on this card, there's an NMJL convention (E/O) that East and wEst go with Even number tiles, and nOrth and sOuth go with Odd. 

Backup options: as with Y4, there is no other hand on the card with pungs of 4's and 6's, so if you expose, you're stuck! Prior to exposure, I would say E1.1 and E5 would be possible backups.

 

E4: I spoke about this one yesterday. Kong of 2s and pung of matching dragons in suit A; kong of 8s and pung of matching dragons in suit B. It may help you to remember that there are *no hands this year with two kongs of dragons*. This is a pung and kong hand (again, love it: jokers for any meld, any can be called for exposure!) and since we're working with dragons, they must be the pungs.

Backup options: Y2, or sticking with this hand but using suit C

 

E5: Like E1.1 and E3, this is a one-suited Even hand. This time we have an ascending hand: the pairs are the lowest numbers (2 and 4), with a pung of 6s. Remember that there are no kongs of Flowers on this card; the Flowers are a pung leaving you with four tiles as a kong of 8s.

Backup options: if you've exposed both the 6s and 8s, CR4; otherwise, keep E1.1 and E3 in mind.

E6: A three-suited hand. Matching even-numbered kongs in suits A and B, each with its respective single dragon tile. The final four tiles are the “pseudo chow” of 2468 in suit C. … OR….(this is the part where Bubbe starts tripping): 

You can think of this hand as the Monster Creature Double Feature: Even numbered King Kong vs. the Dragon King in suit A, with their rematch in suit B. The audience (suit C) is so excited that they give out a big “2468” cheer.

Backup options: you can only expose the two like numbered kongs; your hand can't go dead. LN2 is particularly nice if you have the single dragons, but you could also consider LN1 or LN3, as well as W4.

E7: More cheering–2468 in suit A! This time, it's for the beautiful Fay Wray. She gets two pung bouquets of Flowers (one in each arm). She’s the one in control, having tamed the Beast, and gets to pick the even number of her choice, for the kong in suit B.

Backup options: once you've made all three exposures, if suit A is unavailable then you have to stick with E7 but make the pseudo chow (2468) in suit C. If you expose both pungs of Flowers and all the Even tiles are out, you can only claim you are going for W5. If you expose a pung of Flowers and the kong, you have a lot more flexibility: CR2.1, CR2.2, or possibly E5 if your kongs were 8's.

E8: Our first concealed hand, and the only one on the left side of the card!! The melds are 246 pseudo-chows with a matching pung of 8s, in each of two suits. The pair of Flowers completes the hand.

Backup options: first of all, this is just for switching purposes; as a concealed hand, no one else will know if it goes dead, unless--like me--you have no poker face. You might consider switching to E5 in the stronger of the two suits, especially early in the game if the 2 and 4 pairs come in. 

Like Numbers section:

LN1: our first sextet of Flowers. Remember, you can use as many jokers as you want, but you cannot call to expose the meld until you have a combination of five Flowers and Jokers ready. The other part of the hand is fairly simple, kongs of the same number in two different suits. 

Backup options: one of the eight hands (!!!) that use two kongs of Like Numbers (including LN2 and LN3) or (if you put up the sextet) CR6.

LN2: Three-suited hand–two like-number kongs in suits A and B, with a pung of that number in suit C. Matching single dragons for each. Or….a triple feature, for the very dedicated: King Kong versus the Dragon King (any number) in suit A, plus the sequel in suit B. It ends with a very poor quality third chapter, much shorter with a pung facing off against the Dragon Prince.

Backup options: LN1, LN3, E6 (if even)

LN3: once again, we have two like-number Kongs in suits A&B, plus a pair of the same number in suit C. They're complimented by a pair of Flowers and a pair of dragons in any of the three suits (dealer’s choice!). That flexibility is probably why this hand with three pairs is only worth 25.

Backup options: if you happen to be using an Odd number, and your problem is getting the dragons or the Flowers, you might consider O4. Otherwise, consider LN1 or LN2.

You may have found even better backups: please share your ideas with me, as well as any other questions or comments, at bubbefischer@gmail.com

Talk to you soon! 

Bubbe

Let's Talk About SIX, Baby!

 

Greetings and salutations from your favorite sexagenarian, Bubbe Fischer, giving you my overview of the 2026 NMJL card. Yes, I know it's not even March 20th yet, but the Mah Jongg Groundhog got her act together this year and you ought to receive your card any day now!!

I'll start out with today's overview and then follow up with additional posts, almost daily. My next three articles are devoted to the three panels of the card, with lots of specific detail. After that I'll be talking about ambiguous exposures, illegal exposures, and underlying things to watch out for on the new card. 

Bubbe's overall philosophy is “luck favors the prepared mind.” Mah jongg is 70% luck. We can't control the 3/4 of the tiles that we don't pick from the wall, nor can we control the timing of when tiles come out: while we may want to call for an exposure, we might not be ready. 

My goal is to help you learn (NOT memorize!) the new card. I want you to be as prepared as possible, to maximize the 30% under your control, by thinking analytically about hands. If and when a lucky opportunity arises, you'll know what to do with it!

 

Let's get started. It's 2026, so of course “6” is even more valuable. THREE sections of the card rely heavily on it: 2026 (hereafter referred to as “Year”), 2468 (aka “Evens”), and 369. Of course you might see them in any other section (except 13579 or “Odds”), but they're essential to the three sections mentioned above.

Another observation: the card designers continue to think outside the box, not relying on the same predictable hand patterns we saw in older cards. The first hands in the Consecutive Runs section (“CR1”--a and b versions for the lower and upper ends of the number line) used to be either a bell curve

AA BBB CCCC DDD EE

 or a stair ascending from lowest to highest:

AA BB CCC DDD EEEE

This year, it's a stutter step: pair pung pair pung kong. 

AA BBB CC DDD EEEE

The pattern also occurs in Odds and 369.

Pung and kong hands are some of my favorite go-tos because they don't require any pairs, meaning you can use Jokers and/or call for exposures in every meld. Unfortunately there is no set pattern this year; they appear in different forms: pung pung kong kong, pung kong pung kong, or even kong pung kong pung. I'm going to suss out whether there's any easy way to remember which hands go which way, but it’s still good to keep your card in front of you to double check the correct components.

Other things to note: 

*three hands use at least two pungs of dragons; several hands use a single dragon in multiple suits

*You may remember how the Winds mysteriously appeared in the Odd section last year. This year they've busted out of Winds and Dragons (“WD”) again: we see them in Evens, Odds, and 369, as usual as well as their usual cameos in Year and Singles and Pairs (“SP”).

*Like-numbered kongs in two different suits appear in eight different hands on the card. They are represented in all three LN hands, but also Evens, Odds, WD, and 369. 

*Following last year's surprise, there is again a hand featuring a chow, and we’ll also see some “pseudo chows”!! As a reminder, a chow in Chinese mahjong is three consecutive single numbers in the same suit. NMJL used them in last year’s card, and the chow is back again in its pure form in one CR hand. 

As for the pseudo chows, there are “Even” pseudo chows (single tiles within that family, skipping the odd numbers, so a 246 or a 2468).  Of course, you can expect to see some pseudo chows in the Odd, 369 and SP section as well. There's even a “si lian shun” (four consecutive numbers in one suit, or what I'd call a "super chow") in WD. 

*We see a variation on another interesting hand from last year, the “floating pair,” now in the Odd section. Remember, that's the hand where you have kongs of the same number in two suits–then a matching pair in the third suit, surrounded by four single consecutive tiles in that suit. Since it's an Odd hand, a single of each of the other four odd numbers completes the meld in the pair’s suit. Don't worry, I'll go over it again when we do the middle panel.

*I kept hoping for the “kongs of 1-9-D and 2-8-D” from many years back. I am happy to see the return of kongs of 2 and 8 in two different suits, this time with pungs of matching dragons.

*There is one very special knit hand this year. This means the melds alternate between two different suits. It's unique on the card, one of only two hands that use a pung of a number and then a kong of a dragon in a different suit. I’ll be discussing it further in the “middle panel” article.

 

VERY IMPORTANT: Possibly the most confusing feature of this card involves Flowers. Some hands use pairs or pungs, and there are two hands where you will need two pungs of Flowers…. but there are another two hands that require an actual *sextet* of Flowers. Please note that “two pungs” is quite different from a sextet. To make either of the sextet hands, you will need to keep ALL SIX Flowers together, as opposed to being able to expose/complete them as two separate pungs. As I'll mention again in the Illegal Exposures article, there won't be any kongs of Flowers this year. 

 

One final takeaway: because 6’s are very useful and pungs are easier to make, I strongly recommend NOT passing 6’s or Flowers if you have other options. Even if you don’t need them, I recommend holding onto a Flower until you have two, in the hope of using the first as “Joker bait,” luring out someone who will call for it and, in so doing, expose a joker: then you exchange for that joker with your second Flower. With 6’s I would keep them in the Charleston but then throw them out early in the game. In general, with so many pungs of dragons and Flowers, I would keep my eyes wide open for exposures and opportunities to exchange. Jokers will be flying all over the place with this card!! THIS is exactly the kind of preparation ("pay attention to exposed jokers") that is going to bring you more luck.

I can't wait to do that deep dive with you over the next few days. Obviously, there's a lot to cover. I don't expect you to absorb it all right away. Just familiarize yourself with the patterns and especially recognize that tiles can appear in more than one section. I want you to be fearless: play the hand that's right for your tiles, regardless of its section.

Feel free to contact me at bubbefischer@gmail.com with any questions or comments you might have. 

Talk to you very soon!

Bubbe