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There are 56 combos of AKQxxx missing 5 of them. AKQJxx is ~37.5 %, AKQTxx is ~26.8 %, AKQxxx is ~35.7 % Let's say you are 97 % opposite AKQJxx. Let's say you're 74 % opp AKQTxx Let's say you're 68 % opp AKQxxx That's about an 80 % grand. These are estimates, I have ignored that possibility that spades break very badly and you go down but to counter that I have ignored the possibility of partner having 7 hearts (since arguably he should not bid 3H with AKQxxxx and an ace and a king, though apparently this partner would). If Art really thinks it is a sure 85 % for bidding slam, then to answer his question of why risk it, it is because your expected score is more than 85 % from bidding a grand. I mean, obviously you would bid a 99% grand if you get 85 % for playing slam. How far is the cutoff? Well, it partially depends on how of the non game people are in grand vs just small slam, but you should not bid an 80 % grand. That being said, it is difficult to believe that a hand like this is the type of hand where you will get 85 % of the matchpoints for playing slam. People who say that rarely have data to back that statement up, because it is difficult to analyze which are the types of good grands that the field plays game vs which are easy for them. Hands where people have a lot of highcards, multiple sources of tricks, and a lot of keycards are the types of hands that people bid slam often on. You might have to estimate the field but one needs to be careful of pulling numbers out of thin air like "on this hand, I will get 85 % for bidding a small slam." We are all biased and risk averse people will inflate that percentage and it matters a lot. I think a better practice is to strive to bid 80 % grands. Yes, partner might have AKQxxx and we are on 3-2 trumps. Partner might also have AKQJxx of trumps and we are basically cold. All that being said, if you want to involve partner in a grand bidding decision during a keycard auction, the most important thing to do is to tell him you have all the keycards. Most players know if you ask for keycards opposite an unlimited partner and have them all, you must bid 5N to tell him that. Surprisingly, those people don't realize that if you ask for the queen, and partner shows it plus some king, you should do the same thing. Here, we queen asked and partner showed it and we signed off. Partner is out of the game. He does not know we have all the keycards. The bid to say we have all the keycards in this case is 6D, the only bid between slam and the current bid. Admittedly, partner is not unlimited here, and he might *gasp* bid the grand without the trump J if he has something extra like KQx of clubs. If you really think you need to be 85 % to bid a grand then you will bid few grands, and rightly so. But the point about bidding 6D or in general making a try after queen asking is an important one in general, many people do not seem to realize that partner does not know we have all the keycards and thus can never bid 7 himself even if it was a spot where he could count 13 if he knew we had them all.

I assume you are familiar with a more detailed study on risk-taking that showed some sex-differences: http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/4405460/RWP10-034_Zeckhauser_alia.pdf?sequence=1&origin=publication_detail One of the authors was economist Richard Zeckhauser, who was a Blue Ribbon pairs winner. Peter

Greece is not like Mississippi Medicare for all *is* the answer. Angela Merkel is a political genius.

Could well work to his advantage. This scenario is so unlikely to occur in real life -- even in your original post it is not clear whether East was actually misled or just claimed to be -- that I don't think it is close to satisfying this requirement. People call for "ten" when they mean "the ten of the suit with which dummy won the previous trick" frequently. I can't remember whether I have ever heard someone call for a switch of suit by rank only, it certainly would be years ago if I have, and I think almost anyone would stop and check that was actually what had happened. Not, of course, that East has any business playing so quickly anyway; law 44B makes it clear that it is his turn once dummy has played a card, not merely when declarer has played a card from dummy.

The only parzero deal in my sample with a 9-card fit or better: [hv=pc=n&s=st72hjdakt872ct93&w=s9653h8642dqjcqj2&n=sk84hakqtd543c864&e=saqjh9753d96cak75]399|300[/hv]

I fail to see how anyone would expect that this very common deviation from correct procedure could work to his advantage. You might as well apply Law 23 willy-nilly to every deviation. I remember reading that Edgar Kaplan used to say "decide what ruling you want to make, and then find a law to support it". It seems to me that's what Lamford is doing here. It also seems to me that the approach is deprecated.

The choice of thread titles seems in bad taste

I would really really dislike almost all of this, and think it's an example of the overuse of information just because it can be collected. You get into personality contests and mob rule and people refusing to play with weaker players because it brings down their stats. It seems to me that BBO is becoming less friendly for random players all the time and if all this started to happen I think it would be really unfortunate. All of those things are designed to make sure that people mix only with their own and would further ghetto-ize beginners and weaker players who already are having problems finding people to play with them. That leads to the idiocy of novices putting advanced on their profiles and making things even worse. It's almost already got to the point that no-one wants to play with anyone not an "expert". Someone told me the other day quite seriously that she was a better player than a certain teacher because she has better stats..the fact that the teacher is playing highly skilled and competitive players while she is frequently playing with an advanced p vs beginners apparently doesn't figure in her assessment. For a while, I was compensating for playing with weak players by playing with GIBS to bring my stats back up, I've mostly stopped doing that because I can only get the GIBS past their best before date as I prefer the download version of BBO..which is likely enough to make anything I have to say disregarded entirely in any case, but there it is. OTOH maybe that's why my scores with GIBS were generally good, perhaps I should rethink that. :) Also, mob mentality is alive and well on BBO as much as anywhere else, as evidenced by the adventures when G was alive and playing. Suppose someone decided to have a dozen IDs, which apparently some people already do, and have them all mark each other as friend..or.. mark someone as enemy and each of those ID's convinced one or two friends to do the same? It could turn into a business opportunity, like the outfits you can hire to give your website "likes" and links and competing websites "dislikes". Hopefully BBO will never get to the point of acting on the belief that good scores are the only point and purpose of bridge. It is after all, supposed to be a game, and although the purpose of a game is generally to win, there is generally a social and fun aspect assumed as well, at least below the pro level. The posters who won't sit for even one hand at a table because it might not be good for their results are imo missing a very large part of what bridge should and can be about. OTOH it might be useful for people who feel strongly about what system they play to be able to filter the available tables for that system.

It's interesting, I have occasionally observed the same thing when playing with players I know to be much better than I am. Despite their clear superiority, they do (infrequently) make errors that I am able to recognize as such. Bridge is a complex game with many widely varying points of skill. The strong player will understand many more of these than I do, which is why she is stronger. But even so, once in a while, there will be a point that I understand and she does not. Bridge is thick with mixed feedback when learning, to me this is the biggest thing that makes it challenging.

That all sounds nice, except that there are problems with your analysis, despite only three sentences. If the problem is a poor job market, then fantastic education will simply mean more educated people who are unemployed. Obviously, if your initial point is correct -- that the job market is the problem -- then curing that seems like the first issue. Then, people who are considering education might have more of a reason to do so, and demand for good education will be higher, and the benefits of money spent on education would be obvious. Right now, in case you missed it, college graduates (great education) cannot find work. From a purely economic sense, then, we are spending too much on education and too little on job creation. You would ideally have education of any type exactly calibrated to create enough of each field to meet demands. Hence, if we have too many educated people and too few jobs, we are spending too much on education and/or too little on jobs. So, then what about the question of incentives and the poor job market? These seem like two sides of the same coin. To pay for entitlements, we tax. Tax reduces profits and thereby reduces jobs. Hence, the more the entitlements, the worse the job market. If Johnny could be paid $30K to make $50K worth of stuff, that would be great. If Freddie also could be paid $30K to make $50K worth of stuff, even better. But, if Freddie can be paid $20K to do nothing and likes that plan, the profit for Johnny's work is taken to pay Freddie to do nothing. The employer ends up with nothing unless he reduces Johnny's pay. Using the same percentages (which is unfair, but stay with me), Johnny now gets only $18K for his work. That makes him lose -$2K for working, because he would make more if he did not work. So, Johnny cannot stand it and quits also. Now, no one makes anything. The point, then, is that we started with x% of the population unemployed and figured that the economy could handle that percentage of people having benefits. But, then we made the benefits better and better for the unemployed, such that more and more Freddies started opting for the benefits. That reduced the number of Johnnys while also reducing the profits. So, Johnny's pay went down, more Freddies ended up on benefits, and the education ended up meaningless. That is bad. We decided to fix this my changing the value of the dollar. We threw a bunch of new bills at the employer, figuring that somehow this would trickle down. However, more and more of those bills were grabbed back for Freddies, and less went to fewer and fewer Johnny's. Plus, the employers on paper started gaining more and more wealth, not as a function of true wealth (because the money supply was arbitrary) but as a function of ratios, meaning who had what percentage of the pie. Sometimes you might have a theory and be seeking proof. Looking out your window is not proof, but it sure makes you think you are on to something. I look out my window and see what appears to be assurances that I am thinking right, because in fact more and more people are on entitlements, fewer and fewer educated people are finding jobs, more and more people are taking pay cuts, and a larger percentage of the pie is in the hands of the asset-holders. What do you see out your window?

Congratulations to Frances Hinden and her team who won the A division of the English Premier League, an achievement all the more praiseworthy because they were the only team in the division with only four players, so played all 420 boards.

These forums are crammed with threads/posts ranging from the mundane to the bizarre. The Non-Natural Forum in particular contains a number of truly interesting/unusual systems. That has already been looked at (no need to go there again). Instead, this thread is all about elaborate/scientific continuation structures versus natural bidding. You can start off by reading this. These forums contain plenty of elaborate/scientific continuation bidding structures for many common/popular conventions/methods. Some examples: 1. Multi (both offence and defence) 2. Jacoby 2NT 3. Puppet Stayman 4. Inverted Minor Suit Raises 5. Flannery/Kaplan Inversion 6. Canapé openings and continuations 7. Agreements on bidding on after an artificial strong 2♣ opening 8. Defence to a 1NT opening bid 9. Defence to strong artificial Club Systems The more elaborate/scientific your agreements are, the more you are adding to the memory load. The memory load gets compounded by the number of these elaborate/scientific methods forming part of your agreements. At the end of the day, when you sit examining the traveller (at match points), how many times did you end up in a superior contract versus the rest of the field using scientific methods? The greater the field, the more meaningful the end result. I am not referring to making an additional trick through superior declarer play and/or inferior defensive play. This is solely about landing in a superior contract. Now for the corollary: How many times did you end up in an inferior contract when either one or both partners couldn’t remember all the continuation bids? I will be open an honest enough to admit that it has happened to me more than once (either myself or my partner who forgot the continuation bidding). When we landed in the same spot as everyone else using fancy methods, the red flags went up. Why bother when it costs us when we forget? What about you?

Mike, no. Forget about that other thread. We’ve been there and there is no need to dig it up again. This is about scientific continuation bidding agreements. I have seen a couple that really get lengthy. Some of the Jacoby 2NT continuations is a good example. My former partner (he was forced to leave the club due to medical problems) was actually a fairly decent player but the laziest learner I have ever known. We actually did have a set of typed notes on our system agreements but this guy was just too lazy to ever read them. Instead he tried to remember everything through “botching the bidding” at our local club and then trying not to repeat the mistake again. Certain agreements (which I regarded as simple to remember) had to eventually be dropped because this guy NEVER got them right. An example here is 2-Way Reverse Drury. When the partnership is getting elementary agreements wrong, how many of the more elaborate/scientific agreements are you getting wrong?

This thread got me wondering: Does BWS2001 (Bridge World Standard) need to be revised. It is now 11 years old. New gadgets and new trends keep evolving. We have plenty of experts in these forums. The revised BWS2001 gets our name attached to it “BBO2012 Expert Standard.” If there is sufficient interest, suggestions can be made how to tackle the project. Possibly the easiest would be deciding what needs revision and just revisit that leaving the rest unchanged. Once the task is completed, I am willing to create a summary CC of what THE MAJORITY agreed upon. From there I can send the summary CC to Inquiry and he can create a default convention card for use in the MAIN BRIDGE CLUB for any wishing to use it.

I didn’t know that ZAR Points had already spent so much time on the treadmill. Some of those threads go all the way back to 2004. What I enjoyed about this thread is that ZAR himself spent a lot of time in it defending his brainchild. Thanks a zillion (or should that be a ZARllion?) :unsure:

BBO developed its own convention cards in 2005. We have a BBO Advanced 1.3 Convention Card and a BBO Advanced 2/1 GF Convention Card. Both CCs still contain certain conventions that others have questioned e.g. Cappelletti. So we already have our own CC which may just need some tweaks. I am definitely part of the camp which would like to see Cappelletti replaced with something more effective. I support others who have suggested Multi-Landy. Is it worth the effort to revisit these two CCs and the thread above? Or just dump it?

The opening lead is invariably the most difficult decision as it is made before dummy is exposed on the table. Once the opening lead has been made, partner can signal a continuance or discontinuance of the suit. Additionally, a poor opening lead is often the deciding factor whether declarer makes his contract or not (or makes an overtrick or not). So how does one decide what to lead from amongst the myriad options available? In no order of preference, below is a list of some options available. Kindly add others not currently listed here. 1. Ace, for Attitude: ...a. What would the suit typically look like when leading the Ace for Attitude? ...b. Does it differ when leading against a suit contract versus a NT contract? 2. King, for Count: ...a. What would the suit typically look like when leading the King for Count? ...b. Does it differ when leading against a suit contract versus a NT contract? 3. When partner has bid: ...a. The highest card in partners suit when holding a doubleton ...b. The lowest card in partners suit when holding 3-cards topped by an honour (Queen or higher) ...c. The middle card in partners suit when holding 3-cards without an honour, then up, then down (MUD or Middle/Up/Down) 4. Singleton (I often hear BBO commentators say, “the only reason not to lead a singleton is because you don’t have one”) 5. Top of nothing: The problem here is declarer is given the same information as partner allowing him to play the suit better as the hand unfolds 6. 2nd highest of a weak 4-card suit, followed by the lowest. Partner needs to workout whether you started off with 4 or only 2. 7. Against a NT contract: 4th best or the Rule of 11 8. 3 / 5 lead: ...a. When and why do you lead 3rd / 5th in a suit? ...b. Probably only against a NT contract? 9. Top of touching honours or top of a sequence 10. Top of an interior sequence, typically against a NT contract 11. Dummy’s first suit bid or an unusual lead after a Lightner Slam Double from partner 12. Journalist Leads: What are they/how do they work? 13. Slavinsky Leads: What are they/how do they work? 14. A trump lead when the bidding suggests declarer will be cross-ruffing the hand 15. The “Sucker-Punch” Lead: Sucker-punch is the only name I could come up with here for this lead. So, what is it or how does it work? Against a 6NT contract the player on lead holding an Ace in any of the 4-suits and a small doubleton in any unbid suit e.g. 32 in an unbid suit, leads the 2. Normally declarer would read this as 4th best; small card from dummy, small card from RHO and declarer winning the trick with the smallest card necessary. To make the contract, a finesse is required in the suit led. Declarer was suckered by the opening lead, taking the finesse through LHO, and horror upon horrors when RHO produces the card setting the contract by one trick. On BBO I have already been suckered 5 or 6 times by this lead; always by someone labelled an expert in their profiles. Which leads me to this question: Has the sucker-punch lead become expert standard against a NT contract or were these guys just having fun against a less experienced player? Murphy’s Law says the next time I need a finesse to make a 6NT contract, remembering past bad experiences, I will take the finesse through RHO only to find out that this time LHO did in fact lead 4th best. Down one again. What are the most common or most effective methods for partner to signal a continuance or discontinuance of the suit led? How does partner signal which suit to switch to if a discontinuance of the suit led is required? This is probably even more important when defending a NT contract? Thank you. This post has been edited with the following lead possibilities: 16. Busso (added, see post below) 17. Rusinow (added, see post below)

Can someone kindly explain to me what an "Alarm-Clock" lead is? I saw reference to this type of lead elsewhere and have no idea what is being referred to.

I wanted to post this in the Novice Forum to avoid embarrassing myself, but then decided to go ahead and embarrass myself anyway. Mike 777’s reply here made me realise just how little I understand the differences between similar yet different conventions. Can someone kindly explain the differences between these conventions at Novice level for me please? 1. Checkback Stayman 2. New Minor Forcing 3. Two-Way New Minor Forcing 4. XYZ 5. Fourth Suit Forcing 6. Roudi (added, I found this in a different thread and then looked it up here) 7. Crowhurst (added, I found this in a different thread and then looked it up here) 8. The Weak 6-4 Method (added, I found this here) To me there appears to be a certain amount of overlap between these conventions. I have never played Two-Way New Minor Forcing, nor XYZ before so I have absolutely no idea as to their effectiveness. That said, I am repeating my request a second time: 1. Can someone explain the differences between these conventions to me at Novice level (maybe there are more similar conventions that can be added to this list)? 2. Can you kindly include some example auctions accompanied by a typical hand for each partner for each convention? 3. Which one is better to use and why? WHAT SCARES ME NOW IS THE NUMBER OF VARIATIONS AVAILABLE IN THIS WONDERFUL GAME OF OURS FOR SIMILAR BIDDING SEQUENCES!! Thank you. This post has been edited.

I was watching a BBO Live Broadcast some time ago when the commentators were discussing Lebensohl versus Rubensohl. I never understood a word of it. I know the basics of Lebensohl. But what the heck were these commentators talking about? What is Rubensohl? Which is better?

In the thread titled Preempt 1st/2nd seat http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/topic/50281-preempt-1st2nd-seat/ I raised a question which never received an answer. The question is now repeated in a new thread. In the above mentioned thread the_dude posted: “Remember preempting is essentially accelerating the auction, giving less room for accurate hand description. Second seat is important because it presents least opportunity to disrupt the opponents communications and the greatest opportunity to disrupt your own. When you preempt in first seat, you may be tripping up your partner, but you are also tripping up TWO opponents. But in second seat, your RHO has already communicated SIGNIFICANT information to his partner by virtue of his pass. Accelerating the auction now often does just as much damage to your partner as it does to the opponents.” I found this thread fascinating when read alongside awm’s thread, “Shape First!” http://www.bridgebas...14-shape-first/ Here are just two extracts from awm’s thread: • Looking at the CCs of Bermuda bowl pairs, you see a lot of wildly different stuff. That's one of the great things about bridge. But one thing that seems almost universal in bidding trends is that showing shape early is good. • I like most auctions to emphasize shape and not high cards though, since shape is really what’s important. Both threads contain convincing arguments when to bid (2nd seat pre-empt versus showing your shape). The range of shape showing bids in any partnership is limited by your own imagination (and partnership agreements). Some popular shapely bids which immediately come to mind are: • Muiderberg • Multi 2NT showing 5-5 minors • Canape Whose advice is better here? Think twice before pre-empting in 2nd seat? Or get into the auction and show your shape?

This thread has been started to hear others thoughts on bidding minor suit 2-suited hands. Obviously a minor suit is going to be outgunned by the majors, so I am looking for suggestions on how to bid these hand types more effectively. Hand Type 1: 5-5 minors and 5-10 HCP Players who play Multi happily open these hand types with 2NT. The effectiveness of this has often been questioned. All you have succeeded in doing is convey the hand layout and HCP distribution to the opponents making it easier for them to balance and/or the subsequent play of the hand. Defending against this is also easy. One method I have seen used quite often is this – • Double = both majors, majors equal in length • 3♣ = both majors, longer ♥ • 3♦ = both majors, longer ♠ Opening these hand types probably originated from the Unusual 2NT convention. Once the opponents have opened 1 of either major, 2NT shows 5-5 in the minors, either weak (5-10 HCP) or strong (16+). Question: Do we continue opening these hand types with 2NT? Is it better to pass instead and await further developments? What are alternate more effective uses for 2NT (20-22 balanced is obviously a popular choice)? Hand Type 2: 5-5 minors and 11-13 HCP I don’t see any problem here. These hand types are opened 1♦ and over partner’s (expected major suit) response, 2♣ is the rebid. If need be, the ♣ suit is repeated a second time on level 3 to convey the message of a 5-5 minor suit holding. Question: Is there any need to change this agreement? I don’t see any. Hand Type 3: 5-5 minors and 14-17 HCP This is similar to hand type 2 but with this exception. These hand types are also opened 1♦ but after over partner’s (expected major suit) response, opener happily rebids 3♣ at his first opportunity. The message is an attempt to convey distribution and HCP holding. Question 1: If you are quite happy to rebid 3♣ at your first opportunity with these hand types, won’t it be more effective to dump the 5-5 minors and 5-10 HCP from your Multi opening bid and replace it with these hand types? Now your 2NT Multi opening is less likely to be interfered with by the opponents. You have shown real values and partner’s holding in the major suits is unknown. Question 2: When the opponents bid 1M-P-4M-? Holding 5-5 minors and a reasonable HCP holding (16+?), many happily bid 4NT as a takeout of the major in this bidding sequence. If you are happy to do this for takeout, is it not an argument in favour of opening these hand types with 2NT as suggested in question 1? Hand Type 4: 6-5-2-0 minors and 14-17 HCP Here you don’t want the opponents to find a major suit fit at all. Question: How about opening these hand types with 3NT? Partner has the following options over these opening bids – • Pass = stoppers in both majors to play • 4m = shut-up bid to play (bust hand) • 5m = to play • 4M = slam interest in either minor (you can assign any meaning you want to the 4M bid) Hand Type 5: 6-5-1-1 minors 16+ HCP What do you suggest opening with this? Hand Type 6: 6-6-1-0 minors 16+ HCP What do you suggest opening with this? Hand Type 7: As responder holding 5-4 minors and game invitational values For those who play Minor-Suit Stayman, over partner’s 1NT opening bid, 2♠ = 5-4 minors and 10-12 HCP. Question: How do you bid these hand types if you don’t play MSS? (e.g. playing minor suit transfers) Hand Type 8: As responder holding 5-5 minors and game going values Over partner’s 1NT I have seen players bid 3♣ to show 5-5 minors and game going values. I have seen others use the 3♣ bid for Puppet Stayman (2♣ being standard Stayman). And yet others using 3♣ for a ♣ bust. Question: Which treatment is better and why? Hand Type 9: As responder holding 5-5 minors and slam going values. Over partner’s 1NT I have seen players bid 3♦ to show 5-5 minors and slam interest. Question: Do you agree with this treatment or is there a better one? Please add other thoughts on bidding minor suit orientated hands e.g. what do you do with this 2X♠2X♥4X♦5X♣ and 12-13 HCP?

With the myriad of conventions available to any partnership to pick from, is it any wonder that “standard systems” quickly deviate from the original? Once enough people have deviated from the original to something different, should the deviation not become the new standard? Let’s look at two well known systems: 2/1 and Precision. In 2/1 an opening bid of 1♣ or 1♦ promises 12+ HCP. Now for (some of) the responses – • 2♦ over 1♦ = natural, non-forcing raise with 6-9 HCP and 5+ ♦ (some allow only 4). The bid denies holding a 4-card major • 3♦ over 1♦ = limit raise with 10-12 HCP, 5+ ♦, no 4-card major • 2NT over 1♦ = 10-12 HCP, no 4-card major or 5-card ♦ suit, balanced or semi-balanced • 2♣/3♣ over 1♣ = the same as over a 1♦ opening • 2♦ over 1♣ = game force artificial raise of ♣, 12+ HCP, 5+ ♣, no 4-card major (Criss-Cross) • 2NT over 1♣ = the same as over a 1♦ opening • 2♣ over 1♦ = game force, 12+ HCP (compare with Precision below) • 3♣ over 1♦ = game force artificial raise of ♦, 12+ HCP, 5+ ♦, no 4-card major (Criss-Cross) (Can anybody supply the detail as to what the latest official ACBL SAYC booklet says regarding minor suit openings and responses?) In Precision an opening bid of 1♦ is the “catchall bid” for opening hands that don’t fit anywhere else in the system. We will again only look at some of the responses – • 2♦ over 1♦ = 11+ HCP, 5+ ♦, no 4-card major (Inverted Minor Raise) • 2NT over 1♦ = 11-12 HCP, no 4-card major or 5-card ♦ suit, balanced or semi-balanced • 3♦ over 1♦ = weak preemptive raise with 6-9 HCP, 5+ ♦, no 4-card major, usually includes a singleton or void (Inverted Minor Raise) • 2♣ over 1♦ = natural, 5+ ♣. The bid can either be game-forcing or limit bid showing 10-12 HCP according to partnership agreement. No problems thus far until we start clouding the basic system through the introduction of conventions. To start off this thread, the following 3 are introduced: Inverted Minor Raises, Criss-Cross and Flip-Flop (please add others). Definitions: Inverted Minor Raises: http://www.bridgeguys.com/Conventions/inverted_minors.html Criss Cross Raise: http://www.bridgehands.com/C/Criss_Cross_Raise.htm In general, those partnerships using Limit Raises in responding to a minor suit opening encounter bidding problems; if the responder also holds opening values, balanced distribution, and no other suitable bid after a minor suit opening by partner. Several solutions have been invented and devised. One is the Criss-Cross Raise, or Criss-Cross Jump Shift, as it is sometimes called. The bidding sequence: 1♣-2♦, shows (a) opening values, and (b) a forcing raise in Clubs. The bidding sequence: 1♦-3♣ shows (a) opening values, and (b) a forcing raise in Diamonds. Flip-Flop: A reversal of the usual meaning of a 2NT response, normally agreed as a Jordan 2NT raise, when a minor suit opening is doubled. The concept is to use the bid preemptively, thereby using the jump raise to show invitational values. An example clarifies this concept: North East South West Meaning/Description 1♦ X 2NT Flip-Flop or a preemptive raise in ♦ (6-9 HCP) 1♦ X 3♦ A jump shows a limit raise in ♦ (10-12 HCP) Inverted Minor Raises (as used by Precision) must surely be an improvement on the natural (6-9 HCP) and limit raise (10-12 HCP) (as used by 2/1). For players learning and playing more than 1 system, standardising responses such as this will surely make memorising the continuation bidding of different systems much easier. What are your thoughts on this? The example introduced here is very likely already being used by many 2/1 players. I am of the opinion that blindly following system rules and conventions must never be allowed to override judgement and experience built up over years of play. As an example here consider the response of 2NT over a minor suit opening from both 2/1 and Precision. With these sorts of hands the auction is steering towards 3NT. But from which side will it be better played? The fact that responder does not hold a 4-card major increases the probability that opener does. Depending on responders holding in the majors, it will probably be beneficial for 3NT to be played by opener. An Inverted Minor Raise could possibly convey this message to opener. On the other hand where responder holds e.g. AQx in either major, it will probably be better for the lead to come up to responder. Playing 3NT from responders side now looks more attractive.

Your post here seems to support both of my suggestions – 1. Once enough people have deviated from the original to something different, should the deviation not become the new standard? To start off this thread I used Paul Thurston’s “The Pocket Guide to 2/1.” It was published in 2005 and no doubt considered “standard” back then. Your post suggests that the standard has changed creating a “new standard.” 2. For players learning and playing more than 1 system, standardizing responses such as this will surely make memorizing the continuation bidding of different systems much easier. Your post suggests support for this proposal as well. Where there is overlap between different systems opening bid and continuation bidding structures, choose the better (best?) one and standardise the bidding sequences. Memory load is reduced.