daveharty

My first instinct was to start with 2H to get both suits in at once, but that could lead to awkward auctions, e.g. (1H)-2H-(4H)-p-p, now 4S seems to distort your relative lengths too much. So I think I would try 2C, planning on following up with 4S at my next turn if possible.

Maybe that is true in this particular case, but I would qualify it by saying most control bids require a delayed alert, since most take place above the level of 3NT and at the opener's rebid or later in the auction. (I have no idea what the actual percentage of control bids that take place above 3NT is, but at the club/sectional level I would guess it's north of 90%.)

Partner heard you open in 4th seat, so he knows you have something, but declined to take action over 1H. Your hand suggests partner doesn't have a penalty pass. Why then must we have half the deck? Maybe the opponents forgot to eat their Wheaties. Or maybe nobody can make anything. You aren't going to be outbidding them if partner can't bid spades, and you rightly described your heart holding as tenuous. I agree with agua and Frances, pass.

I was kibitzing some friends when this one came up. I would have led a spade, so that should be a clue that it's wrong. The NS pair was one of the best in the room, even if their bidding doesn't look very credible here; I think they were having a rough night and were taking a shot. 3NT is a fairly silly contract but if you lead any black card, declarer has 9 tricks: [hv=pc=n&s=sat9h3dj53cqt8754&w=s7432hak84dq74c92&n=skjhj9652dt92cakj&e=sq865hqt7dak86c63&d=w&v=0&b=8&a=p1hp1np2cp3cp3nppp]399|300[/hv]

Only if you play a style where there is a "no-man's land" of hands that can be passed between 1S and 2S, which I personally hate. For me the OP's hand is a choice between 1S and 2S; I would never consider pass. I would usually open 1S unless my partner was really into "old school" weak 2s, in which case this looks like an obvious 2S.

I just perused the GCC and I believe the answer is "no, not legal."

Haha, sorry Brian, I accidentally showed the East hand instead of the West hand. You are exempt from the poll now since you've seen both hands. Also could you modify your post, as you've revealed what's in your hand! :P

[hv=pc=n&w=s7432hak84dq74c92&d=w&v=0&b=8&a=p1hp1np2cp3cp3nppp]133|200[/hv] Matchpoints. 1NT=F1, 2C=2+. Your lead? Edit: hand is now correct.

What agua said. Also, when the auction threatens to become competitive, it's important to tell partner as much about your shape as possible so he will be able to make better competitive decisions later. Extra trump length is an important message. By "free bid" what you are usually referring to is an auction like 1S - (2C) - 2H, and there are different schools of thought about how strong a hand that should show. But if you are using the term more generally to mean "a bid which I don't have to make in order to keep the auction open for partner", I think there are just too many possible scenarios to make any kind of blanket statement.

FYP

Requiring newbies to agree to an End User Agreement is a fantastic idea! Imagine the possibilities for creative mischief. I have no idea what I agreed to on page 79 of the EUA I signed when I activated my new iPhone.

[hv=pc=n&s=sa43hkqj95dkqjc95&w=skqjt9hadt8cakqt7&n=s52h8742da9754cj3&e=s876ht63d632c8642&d=n&v=n&b=5&a=pp1ndpp2hdppp]399|300[/hv] Unfortunately, my partner, who was West, either forgot our meta-agreement that after a penalty double, all subsequent doubles are for penalty; or else he thought it didn't apply here. Obviously 2HX wasn't the best spot for us.

Partnership Bidding at Bridge: The Contested Auction by Andrew Robson and Oliver Segal. The .pdf version is freely available on the internet. It's not SAYC but the methods the authors advocate are largely natural, and it's the most comprehensive treatment of the subject that I've come across.

It's pretty standard for a new suit bid after a transfer sequence to be natural and forcing. In the absence of any discussion, I would continue with 3D with the hand given (I would choose this over 3C because I want partner to highly value honors in the diamond suit later in the auction, whereas his specific holding in clubs isn't as important). In response to your earlier question, yes, I would still think about slam even though partner didn't superaccept, because it's very easy to construct minimum 1NT hands that wouldn't superaccept where slam would be either cold or excellent. Kx QJxx AKxx Qxx for example is a decent 6D, and that has a lot of stuff wasted; or AQx Kxx KJxx Qxx, etc. One of the best pieces of advice I've ever been given (I think it was originally formulated by Culbertson) is: if you have a close decision about whether to make a game or slam try, think about what it requires from partner; if it would be a good contract if partner has a perfect MINIMUM, go ahead and make the try. If it needs partner to hold a perfect MAXIMUM, don't bother.

I'd like to see that auction! :)

"As many tricks as possible" is a slippery concept. Say you are declaring 3NT and you have eight top tricks, with two alternative lines for getting more. You judge Option 1 to have a 90+% chance of success (say a finesse through someone who made a vulnerable preempt in the suit), and if it wins, you will have nine tricks. You judge Option 2 to have a 25% chance of success (say a double finesse in a side suit), and if it wins, you will have ten tricks. Ten tricks are "possible" but I would hardly say you should choose Option 2. Of course it's often hard to judge these things with any precision at the table; that's part of what makes bridge fun, in my view. As others have noted, the answer is partially dependent on the form of scoring. At IMPs or rubber bridge scoring, overtricks are far less important than simply making or breaking a contract (although anyone who has ever lost a match by one IMP will tell you they aren't exactly meaningless). Your goal is normally clear, whether you are declaring or defending. At matchpoints it's much trickier to identify your goal on many hands; it might be the case that you must take a big risk to get an overtrick in a cold 3NT, because you think that the field will be in a making 4H contract, so your +400 will score poorly against the +420 everyone else is likely to get. Or you might cash out on defense, giving up on defeating a contract that it might still be possible to beat, because you judge that it's more likely that trying for the set will present declarer with overtricks. In general, aguahombre is exactly right: counting is probably the single most important skill you can develop as a bridge player. That means counting winners and losers, high card points, and the distribution of each suit. It means counting both as declarer, and as a defender. If you develop that skill to the point that it is second nature on every hand, you will eventually be an excellent bridge player. EDIT: LOL in the time it took to type this I see others have made similar points!

There is nothing "wrong" with bidding 3S with North's hand in your problem, as long as South understands what is meant by the bid. A lot of people seem to think you should automatically force to game with a 12-count opposite a 1M opener, but if your agreement is that it shows 10-12 points and 4 trumps, then go ahead and make your system bid. Partner will (should) bid the fourth with a full sound opener. That being said, it's not such a common agreement any more; it's more common to use 1M-3M as a WEAK bid. There is an emphasis in modern bidding to put immediate pressure on the opponents when you have a weak hand with a fit for partner by jumping immediately to the level to which you are willing to compete; so jump raises of partner's suit are usually used as preemptive fit-showing bids, rather than value based fit-showing bids. This leaves you with a need for a bid that immediately forces to game while establishing a fit, and 2NT is most commonly used for that (at least here in ACBL-land). This also allows for additional descriptive bidding below the game level (as opposed to after 1M-3M) in case a slam investigation is warranted. For example, after the old standard auction 1S-3S-4S, responder, even holding extra values, might be awkwardly placed to bid above game not knowing much about opener's hand other than that they failed to make a control bid; if responder had been able to bid 2NT rather than 3S, extra information might have been exchanged. Also, when playing J2NT, people use a variety of bids to show 4-card raises of other strengths (i.e. Bergen raises, or several other options). I would have to see the hand in question before I could say whether it was a game-forcing hand or an invitational hand, but as you can probably gather from what I wrote before, I don't view a 12-point hand as an automatic GF raise. Of course nothing is free; playing Jacoby 2NT, you give up the old standard "balanced game force" meaning for 2NT, which is significant in some people's eyes. Various ways to deal with THAT have been devised, like having 1M-2C be "either a natural club 2/1 OR a balanced 13-15", etc. It also affects what a jump shift shows. A good example of how adding a convention can have far-reaching effects on the rest of one's bidding system.

3. I've never heard of "Anti-Flannery" either. "Reverse Flannery", at least in my neck of the woods, refers to the treatment wherein jumps to 2H/2S after a 1m opening show, respectively, 5+ spades/4+ hearts and constructive values, and 5+ spades/4+ hearts and invitational values (I think this is also called "Meckwell" in some areas and maybe goes by other names). This is useful because it allows the auction 1m-1S-1NT-2H to be game-forcing, an awkward auction in standard bidding.

[hv=pc=n&w=skqjt9hadt8cakqt7&d=n&v=n&b=5&a=pp1ndpp2h]133|200[/hv] Matchpoints. !NT was 15-17. Double was penalty. Opps have no agreements over a penalty double other than "systems on". What now?

That IS a lot a bridge.

LOL yeah I saw that after posting, I meant to title it second seat of course. Since nobody had brought it up I have no idea if it would affect anyone's vote.

Maybe that should have been my question, since there seems to be some disagreement on what is optimal. I would have thought along the lines of what aguahombre suggests: that the double shows a hand that would have rebid 2S absent the cuebid. But FrancesHinden suggests either "good spades" or "good hand", and apparently opener agreed with one of these interpretations, if not both. There was no discussion, so 1S-2S was not "constructive" per se.

Judging from opener's hand it could have been either/both: AQJ9x x T9x AKJx.

Double is a convenient way to get into the auction. I would open 4S myself but let's not fool ourselves that it necessarily makes it tougher on LHO when he does have a good hand.

Three tricks are surely easier than twelve.