why don't i get the answer i want

[bowlofred]

The problem in your first program is that your card values are strings and they don't sort the way you expect.

>>> playerhand = [['7', 'h'], ['5', 'h'], ['13', 'H'], ['10', 'h'], ['12', 'h'], ['11', 'h'], ['9', 'h']]
>>> sorted(playerhand)
[['10', 'h'], ['11', 'h'], ['12', 'h'], ['13', 'H'], ['5', 'h'], ['7', 'h'], ['9', 'h']]

If the card values were ints, then the sort would be as expected.

>>> playerhand = [[int(r), s] for r,s in playerhand]
>>> sorted(playerhand)
[[5, 'h'], [7, 'h'], [9, 'h'], [10, 'h'], [11, 'h'], [12, 'h'], [13, 'H']]

That's better.

One other thing to think about. Do your straights/suites allow the ace to play both high and low? Is [1, 10, 11, 12, 13] a valid straight?