gszes

X Its MP live a little if we get slaughtered its only 1 hand and there is a very nice chance for a top here. We could end up in 2h 2s 3h 3s or even game. Note that most of our triumphs will be part scores and that is not a good thing when weighing risk vs reward at IMPS. At MP there are enough good things that can happen that will more than make up for the occasional horrid. Pass if you are leading the event:)

one week and 2 days to go we have Keylime-PrecisionL I will be around in case of emergency but I am on the back of the seniority list due to loss last week. ANY OTHER VOLUNTERS?????

off topic IMO next time just make the safer 4s bid and you will probably have far fewer ulcers in the long run. P bid 2s they need have a competitive hand and their spade length makes your spade AK far less likely to be winners and your club K certainly looks l much more likely to be pickupable. The worst case scenario for 4s should be around down 2. It is a decent form of insurance with little downside and lots of upside if the opps stretch too far going to 5h.

sorry for the partial quote lots of good material. The alarm clock signal works well when playing 4th best when the bidding promises 5 or more in a suit. The lowest card can be a great lead director. Unfortunately if playing 3/5 the lowest card is far too often nothing more than 5th best from 5. I totally agree with the high spade spot (not the J) to ask for a dia return.

just to make certain is this larry and if so is this your bbo player name???

first things first do we really want to play in a heart contract opposite a p with a max of 3 hearts and probable dia taps for the defense wiping out their top trumps? Once you realize hearts will make a poor contract we should not comptete with 2h but with 3c. this will leave us much better placed should the bidding continue since we could then bid 3h over 3d for ex. At this point it looks like your best bet is 4c but it carries far less weight this way than a 3c bid would have if we bid it immediately

a 3c cue bid here can mena many different things but the general principles of bidding do not change game or no game majors/nt/minors We assume the simplest explanation of the cue bid and allow p to correct our assumption if it was incorrect. FOR ex here the first duty of responder is to bid 3n with a club stopper. Opener can always make some other bid after 3n to show us it meant something else. What does opener do with a hand like QJx A AKQJxxxx x? If you are allowed to x with extra values and no clear direction that allows for a more focused use of 3c. The main thing is to essentially ignore the interference when opener can adequately describe their hand with support for responders suit.

I always worry about misfits and the damage that may result from overbidding. Here seems to be a classic case. We are not prepared for clubs and would have no idea what to do over 3s if we X here. I might be tempted at favorable at MP to x because its only a board. At IMPS we are extremely unlikely to be missing a game if p cannot act over 3h. That alone convinces me to not worry too much about having to stick my neck out immediately. A pass is no surefire path to success since p could have a dia fit a stiff heart and 5d or even 6 make easily but that is a rather small % chance where p would feel uncomfortable backing in with an over 3h. X is optimistic and fails to take into consideration the 3h bid making opener's hand worse.

my lack of entries to the strong hand convinces me to go for my game hoping to lose 2 spades and the dia A. Playing 4 clubs off the top will generally fail only with severe club distribution coupled and/or severe spade distribution (even then probably only if rho has the long spades). Thats a combination I can live with as all the other choiced risk abandoning winners and hoping they get lucky enough to get back to them when the odds of being stuck in dummy look overwhelming. Where do I get instincts like that Dustinst22??????

Im happy as a clam we arent playing 3sx down who knows how many at unfavorable. The opps have guessed and we have not a clue if they have guessed right or wrong and and x will help for 50 points only if there is no way for them to make 6. An x may help them divine the only way to make their 6 level contract passsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss quielty

i would use 2c bid 3d then 5c exclusion setting for 6/7 diamonds on the theory it will be difficult for the opps to hold 4 hearts on the run of the diamonds aside from the easy ones where its cold off the top

This is based on the theory that if you need to ask about trump suit quality at the 5 level there is a realistic chance your side is already too high. It is a very reasonable interpretation to play 5s to set the trump suit and ask p to focus on what is probably the main deterrent to bidding slam ie hearts.

Best of all worlds. P will not x 6h "with no further interest which can be a pile of nothing" the 3s x promises spades not the worlds fair. If p x 6h we expect them to be able to take at least 2 tricks since we do not promise any. Second what special circumstances would allow lho to "know" their p suit was hearts and not diamonds (a suit not mentioned yet) ??? It is unreasonable to assume from looking at your hand the bidding will continue as before:)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

as long as you recognize the 3c bid is forcing you are off to a good start. You have already told p you do not have 2 spade stops and a simple 3n would show p one stop. This leaves 3s available for a partial spade stop K Qx Jxx Txxx. P should then be in much better position to decide if 3n is a good contract. Many will consider Qxx a spade stop but they fail to take into consideration their p is avoiding bidding nt and did not bid 3s themselves to ask for a stopper. While the Q might be a stopper I would hate to miss 5c because I lied:)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) QTx I would try 3n.

Immediately bid 4n asking for aces using PODI PORI Dopi ropi sigh its certainly popular and it works most of the time but IMHO PODI PORI is hugely more flexible under a wide array of circumstances including those situations where DOPI ROPI or DEPO REPO fail. For ex if p has zero aces and the opps bid say 5h over my 4n p Passes to show zero and we are no longer forced to take any action depending on the circumstances. I would also bid 4n here knowing that 5c should make even if I only find p with the stiff club J or maybe even 9x and a complete bust elsewhere. The 4n bid also has the advantage of being highly preemptive it gives us the information we need to investigate slam and hinders the opps. I have never seen a hand where 4n was needed to describe a 1 or 2 suited hand but I have seen many where immediately asking for aces was all I needed to do.

2c is natural non forcing and I wont even say encouraging just merely thinks 1n is a poor idea (especially vul at imps) Axxx x Axxx Axxx is a good example. The range here is quite wide and that is because if 3N is not a good contract 5 of a minor is a long way off after this start and will need a big fit from p. If p has a big fit they will jump somewhere (hopefully) 3c also nf is natural and highly encouraging AKxx void AQJxx Kxxx essentially a strong nt with short hearts should have good reason to think 3n is ok if p has a couple of heart stops and a side card. Whenever p makes a bid that sounds impossible think about the bidding and try to imagine what they are trying to tell you. The best partnerships know but just exercising your judgement shows you are trying to be a good partner. I also use this jump (3h above) but for me it shows a huge club fit and the heart A. With this hand I would jump to 3s to show the huge trump fit deny the heart A and show a side spade control. This is also based on the principle that 3s cannot be an actual invite for spades many other jumps work as well for the same reason while 3d is natural 4d is similar to 3h/3s showing huge club fit denying heart A or spade control. The key is recognizing impossible bids from the previous bidding.

great hand real trouble now---so is there anything reasonable?? I use 5n here to show 2 suits Major/dia 6c to show both M. IMO I would try 6c here mainly because p might be able to bid 6d if they have long diamonds and no strong major fit. This leaves us in position to possibly benefit from all three side suits. We will never have a decent shot at bidding 7 of anything but just merely arriving in our best small slam will surely gather a 7c bid from the opps and I would much rather defend 7c x vs the almost certain 5cx we face it we opt to x. 5s is not only dangerous it will almost never ever get us to a slam. At least going for slam has a reasonable risk/reward ratio. 6s gets us to slam and has some merit but it is also totally ignoring the other possibilities for no really good reason.

I see no reason why we cannot x 3s (an artificial bid) to show spades. We can always jump to 6d later if needed. for now why not hope p can raise spades and we can then nicely key card looking for 7s????? We will never know how the bidding might have gone after x so having hung ourselves out to dry I see little recourse but to pass and hope against hope 7s does not make,

While there are several possible viable contracts 3n is the stand out especially at MP scoring. I remain unconvinced that we should just blast to 3n however. P is a passed hand so most of the dangerous bids that might come from p (4h for ex) have a much lesser frequency of probability. It takes very little from p to make 3n or even 5d but will p raise us with that very little if we bid 2d and they are short in diamonds? certainly not so bidding 2d is way too dangerous here. At least if we x we will most likely have a chance to introduce 3d and now even if p has a misfit sitting with 5/7 power they will probably bid 3s to let us know they aren't broke. A direct 3n has the merit of being our main game but it is just too unilateral when by starting with x we can discover if 3n is a decent contract or not and along the way maybe even end up in 5d vs a doomed 3n. Go with flexibility when able.

4/29/13 PhilKing-Cameron_1 Nige1-Gszeszycki(gszes here)----------lost by 29 (lost 16 on last board trying to score a miracle)<br>5/11/13 PhilKing-Cameron_1 Keylime-PrecisionL ------------------------lost by 31 (picked up 16 over last 6 boards)<br>5/25/13 TylerE-TheArb Abcxl-Gszeszycki -----------------------------------lost by 60<br>6/1/13 gszeszycki/abcxl/glfolgy artk78/guymath---------------------------lost by 9 (JEC picked up 19 over last 4 boards)<br>6/8/13 SylviaFay/Francine21 Gfitz/gszeszycki-----------------------------lost by 10 (JEC picked up 11 with 4 boards left when trumps broke 41)<br>6/22/13 The_clown/jfaria gszeszycki/Abcxl ---------------------------------lost by 95 a thorough slaughter only 8 pushes and 2 positive boards<br>6/29/13 Kristen33/Jillybean Rathia/Greenman -----------------------------lost by 53 lots of modest imp losses 3-7 too much to overcome<br>7/27/13 Kristen33/Jillybean Artk78/Guymath -------------------------------lost by 69 lots of pushes but 6 10+ imp swings all went to JEC<br>9/7/13 Kristen33/Jillybean gszeszycki/Abcxl/kfitz-------------------------lost by 59 a hot start poofed when JEC won imps on 14 hands in a row<br>10/5/13 tatorcoup/columbo91 asensi/gszeszycki---------------------------lost by 75 many close hands but 6 large swings for JEC sealed victory<br>10/12/13 greenman/krivents Jillybean/Kristen33---------------------------lost by 87 fair amount of close hands but most big swings went to JEC<br>10/19/13 Awm/Sieong Elianna/Mbodell---------------------------------------lost by 89 JEC exceptionally strong today few places to win imps<br>10/26/13 DianaEva/Hrothgar Phoenix214/Naeospsy----------------------lost by 27 (top 10 all time vs JEC?) great effort for first timers phoenix214/Naeospsy<br>11/16/13 Jeffford76/CSgibson 2 world class partners---------------------WIN BABY 14 GLORIOUS IMPS no monster swings good solid play ---1/25/14 javabean/mbodell ibraves/broze

a close match throughout a couple of bidding miscues btn gszeszycki-nige1 and a final board xx by Philking-cameron1 to try and pull off a 13+ point swing on the last board. Final score -28. As you can guess from the topic we have another shot at JEC SAT 5/11 2pm EST come one come all and lets put together a great team and have some heated discussion on how to decide who is going to play if we have too many I KNOW not everyone likes my idea so lets hear others:)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

PhilKing/Cameron_1 and TylerE/Nige1 are the 4 names i sent to JEC I also noted the possibility that TylerE/Nige1 might give up their spot so Jallerton/Finch can take their place. WE HAVE INTEREST We were 0-33 before the last session (6 weeks ago when we won) I do not think anyone can make a case that the strongest pair from our forums should be representing us any given week. The writers on these forums are trying to show new and advancing players how to improve. We do not all agree with each other but those reading will decide for themselves which ideas have the most merit. I think these matches with JEC should be a form of reward for posters. Fomr that point of view any poster that has not had a chance to play against JEC should have the highest priority followed by those that ummm actually won (a tiny number i am afraid to say) then we can argue over who is best. When i chose the team I did not see wher any of the chosen four had ever played against JEC and that was how I decided on those 4. Why they never had a chance before was unimportant. There was a sudden surge in interest in the final 48 hours (out of 3 WEEKS notice) and a lot has been written in those two days. We can continue this discussion and maybe come up with a workable system. IT takes INTEREST and maybe we have some now even if its mostly controversial:))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

good to see everyone agrees p must be near top with clubs/hearts essentially wide open I would also make that bid if I were 3343 not just the other balanced options. I think 3n is the best choice here mainly because it is highly unlikely p has 5 diamonds. It was too easy for p to bid 3d if they were concerned about 3n. If this is correct we are very unlikely to score 10 tricks and have a great shot at 9 tricks. 3n save the moysian for hands where 3n is definitely wrong.

A good goal BUT We had a 0-33 record and most of the matches were not close we finally won one 6 weeks ago and haven't been able to field a team since. So tell me what criteria do we use to pick our champions??? Should a player play again until they have lost? Do we want to have a vote listing all of the available players and should it be open for all to see ?? Should we go strictly by number of posts? Should we go by most MP (in which case we all have to keep our number up to date) Should a player that has never had a chance go before one that has tried and lost before??? Do we have all players send in a resume and see which looks the most impressive? The list of ideas is almost endless IMO we will try to field the strongest team possible but using the following "system" gather players from writers (posters who answer questions) gather players from questioners writers with their partners questioners with their partners writers and questioners can form an entire team of non posters but the above will have priority. Now I freely admit I do not know all of the writers (for ex I never saw a post by keylime before last week) so I do not know all of the writers. I can go to the forums to look when they show interest in playing. We should also have a seniority type set up in the sense of if you play and lose you go to the back of the line. Playing and winning (a rare event so far) allows you to keep your current place and indeed you should be allowed to defend your title at least every other session. That way if we do get a ummm errr stammer yeah right winning streak one foursome cant play all the time just half the time. I have no problem with 1 or 2 players going on and on and on as long as they play and win with different partners. So what does all of the above have to do with this week??? Well if the list is the way i noted it earlier we would have a team of Jillybean TylerE Nige1 and myself (all writers) Now the next question does anyone want to defend their recent victory (i do) If there are no others then we go by who has never played TylerE Nige1 have never played partnership philKing and cameron small have never played (as far as i can tell) RIGHT THERE we have enough to form a team I will sit this one out and try next time and intend to submit PhilKing and (cameron small) need bbo name and TylerE and Nige1 can partner one another I will let JEC know about you four and we can straighten out bbo names tomorrow remember game is at 2pm est. jec will invite you.

does this mean cherdano is throwing their hat in the ring also?????