Chamaco

I do not know secifically thge term "structured" reverse, but in Italy quite a few pairs follow the "Mini-Garozzo" , also included in ambra, which means that an "overjumpshift" by opener shows an unspecified reverse, later clarified after a relay. E.g (uncontested) 1C:1X 2D = uspecified reverse, 2H asks (do not remember the relay answers) 1D:1X 2H = unspec reverse, 2S asks etc etc

If you hold such a hand, and bid 2S instead of 3C, you won't miss many slams if pard does not keep the bidding open. You may occasoinally lose, true, but on balance you'll gain to stay in a more affordable game such as 3NT. Using Lawrence's approach you will support responder's minor less often. But when you do, then your hand is much better defined: you should have a non-minimum hand, and your support should have at least one of the top 3 honors or 2 of the top 5, or be 4 card long. When you have e better defined hand, then responder will be in a better position to decide whether give up the notrunmp game for minors suit slam prospects.

No ? How did spades and trumps split ? It seems that if they underlead KJ of spades, you can make the contract on a 4-2 spades split by cashing 2 spades, going to dummy twice with trumps and ruffing spades in hand discarding H loser on the 5th good spade ?

In my opinion this is the key of the auction and I agree that such agreement should be discussed. Lawrence suggests that if bidding (uncontested) goes 1M:2m:3m, opener should be non-minimum, wheras 1S:2H:3H opener can still minimum because showing the major fit becomes first priority. If South was assuming 3C "à la Lawrence" (e.g. a non-minimum hand, at least , say, 14 hcp), his 4C slam try was not so bad in my opinion.

Since we are talking of "Jacoby Plus" (limit or better- sorry if the name not 100% correct, but easier to address <_< ) , a little question. Assuming to play limited 1M opener (max 15). How to discriminate opener's hand which are: - minimum 2-suiters (at most a bad 12 hcp) - non-minimum 2-suiters = 5/5 from a good 12 to 15 ? The link I have found http://www.pitbulls.shawbiz.ca/Improving%20Jacoby%202NT.htm suggests that after 1M:2NT a 4-level bid shows a minimum 2-suiter, whereas max 2-suiters would go via serious 3NT. However, in limited opener, I believe it better to be able to show the feature when max rather than using serious 3NT. Comments ?

2NT as unspecified bad minor preempt is nice, but is banned from many low-midchart events. For those events, any weak opening (Gambling-type are included) ranging from 2C through 3S should guarantee at least 4 cards in at least one suit. Therefore, investing resources in a system based on such scheme is rewarding for topflight events, not for most "regular" tourneys. Not tht I like this regulations, but here they are, and I (we) have to comply.... <_<

That is right. Among the various approaches, one is described by Max Hardy in his books "The problem of major suit raises" and "Adv bidding for the 21st century". It put strong emphasis on not overloading J2NT, and have a pecise definition of splinter ranges. Minimum forcing balanced 4 cd raises use "Inverted Trump Swiss" (4c and 4d). 1M:? bad 3 cd raise = 2M inv 3 cd raise (or 4 cd low ODR) = 1Nt forcing + jump raise forcing 3 cd raise = 2/1 then raise bad 4 cd raise = 3M inv 4 cd raise (or 3 cd with high ODR) = 3c 12/13-15 balanced 4 cd raise = 4c (with good trumps) or 4d (bad trumps) 16+ balanced 4 cd raise= Jacoby 2NT 12-14 concealed splinter = "under jump shift" (3d for hearts, 3H for spades) 15+ concealed plinter = "over jump shift" (3S for H, 3Nt for spades)

Hi Wayne ! :lol: Using a spreadsheet would be good as long as there is not extra data enetering to do besides entering the scores. The option I look for are: - discarding the outliers results (worst and best score) before calculating average in order to limit the bias due to bad couples; - automatic conversion betwen scoring and IMPS according to the number of played boards (otherwise, if score->IMPS conversion ishard to compute automatically, it would mean I have to enter IMPS for each board for each pair, and that doubles the time). If you have any examples/suggestions, I'll be happy to hear from you ! :D

OK, 4♣ is passable. That isn't a bad thing...if your partner has a singleton heart and four clubs, 4♣ may be the limit of the example hand, depending upon if he has wastage in diamonds. I believe in most hands where 4C is a good spot, 4H or 4S has god chances so it is worth trying game rather than a disappointing 4-level clubs partscore... :lol: With the hand posted it may be dangerous to signoff in 4 spades. I'd personally go via 4th suit forcing, bidding 3D planning to rebid 4S even if pard bids 3NT. This should show an unbalanced hand (you already showed 6 bagger in H) and presumably shortness in diamonds. Still, if pard presses on, I'd be worried for trump quality.

OK, somebody explain that part to me. There's nothing wrong with bidding 4♣ with the Hog's hand...if the 3♣ could possibly be a three card suit then it's definitely the winning bid. But I don't think 4♦ is correct. You have to have a pick-a-suit option that includes spades. Otherwise, if your partner is 5224, how does he know to bid 4♥ and not 4♠? 4C would be passable. If pard has bid 3C on 3-cards values only, he will convert to to 4H in a 6-1 or 6-2 fit or rebid 4 spades if he has a good 6 bagger in spades and hearts shortness.

Just to give my opinion about closing the thread we are taking about (zyx private clubs vs xyz player). Yes, I agree the thread had come to a point that will define as: NOT constructive, silly, and irritating. BUT, in my opinion, it had not become abusive. Such "heated" threads are recurrent on the internet and in a way, part of the life of a Forum, just as well as some bad arguments between pards are a part of bridge tourneys. Most of such "heated" threads naturally fade out, without the need of moderation. In my very personal opinion, the removal of this thread was worse than the posts themselves: it had not reached the point of being really so bad, it was just silly and not constructive. I may be wrong , but this removal leaves me with the impression that it was done more by irritation by the censor than a real need to close the post. Having said that, I must say that in general all people managing the BB Forum are doing an excellent work ! Just my 2 cents ciao Mauro

With a hand that trashy, why not just bid 5♣? You're afraid partner's concealing heart support? 1) I agree that 4D shows clubs. The hand posted by Ron seems quite reasonable 2) Why did not the hand jump to 5 clubs ? a) there is no reason to jump to 5 clubs, since 4 diamonds is NOT a slam invitation; opener has already limited his hand to a minimum by rebidding 2H, so 4D by him cannot absolutely be a slam invitation, but rather a "pick a game" suggestion to partner; b ) besides, jumping to 5 clubs gives up the chance for partner to signoff in 4H OR 4 spades, or even passing 4 clubs could be a winner if the hand is a bad misfit; on the other hand, slam could be on, but opener is not in a position to be able to decide. IMO the best opener can do is bid 4D to describe his hand and leave it up to partner to place the contract.

As far as I know, the main poin of J2Nt is that responder takes control, and becomes the captain of th auction: responder will not describe his hand, but opener will describe. So, a responder too strong for a splinter will not describe his hand to show the singleton, he should not be bothered to find a way to show it. Opener should be the one describing, and responder will place the contract.

Could you elaborate? Was his 4♣ bid an overbid or an underbid, in your opinion? Do you think he should have bid on over 4♥? Eric A useless bid, neither underbid nor overbid. Why describe the hand when you simply need to know about a few aces and trump honors and simple tools to get such info are there ? After 4C the emphasis is on diamond, and west does not need this info. True, it describes the hand, but in this sequience there si no ned to describe, west needs to get info from pard, not give info to pard.

I have seen most posters play spades immediately. My question is: even if we bring the spade suit home, where do we get the 9th trick from ? If it is diamonds, the we have to develop them sooner or later, so why not taking in dummy and run the J, adding the chance of Qx or Kx held by RHO ? ;) It is true that this advertise club weakness but alert defenders will find clubs with any line of play except the deceptive line of winning in hand a heart and ducking a club to conceal club weakness. So I'd either go for the diamond line or, (against opps neither too ggood nor to weak not to be deceived) for the deceptive club duck line).

Pass. Club K is a nice card, but otherwise the hand is rather poor, and in my opinion even 2C drury was probably an overbid suggesting a better hand for a suit contract.

This may or may not be best. The main point of using a splinter is that a splinter *RELINQUISHES CAPTAINCY". Basically the point is: splinter is a descriptive bid, and descriptive bids are used to transfer to pard the decision, letting him know how the hand fits. So, when WE KNOW WE WANT TO BID ON even on pard's signoff, splinter is not a good idea, unless it is the only non-signoff fit-showing bid available. This principle is also the reason why some hands like the following (opps silent): 1♠: ? ♠KQXX-QXX-AKQx-x Here responder should NOT splinter because he is too strong. So the splinter should be limited in a narrow range. Hands too strong for a splinter should use a forcing raise (Jacoby 2NT if you use such method, or whichever way your methods allow for), which have 2 advantages: keep the bidding captaincy and do not waste bidding space. So, IF YOU PLAN TO BID ON, DO NOT USE SPLINTER (unless you have no other forcing bid available). IF YOU USE THE SPLINTER, YOU'LL TRANSFER THE DECISION OF THE FINAL CONTRACT TO PARD.

I think that after 1S:2H if opener splinters to 4C, he should expect that most probably responder has no diamond control (unless he holds the infamous, never occurring "perfect hand"). But even then, his hand is so strong that he should carry on anyways, so the only reason to splinter would be to keep bidding open with a forcing bid, certainly not to describe (you describe when you want pard to take charge, but here the captainship should belong to opener only, responder won't participate except in responding to pard's inquiries). Therefore the main flaw in the reasoning, in my view, is that, sooner or later, is slam is on, it will be anyway opener who will take charge. Opener's hand does not need to "describe", it is opener who shall place the contract once he knows of keycards and the trump queen. The only ones who will take advantage of a descriptive bid by opener, in this case, will be opps, since here it is only useful if RESPONSER describes I believe opener should simply set trumps ASAP, then ask for keycards and then for the trump Q. Quite crude, but I think it works, for exploring either small or grand slam.

CASE 1: 2H is GF If I recall correctly Fred's article on 2/1, he suggests playing splinter here as "well-defined", e.g. it should show missing diamonds controls. Therefore, since we are in a force, better proceed slower by 3H and later use serious/frivolous 3NT to show interest. CASE 2: 2H is NOT gf In any case, I believe opener will risk very little using RKCB, when the number of ace and trump Q will be the needed info

I believe flexibility is a great virtue, as long as pard knows what to expect. I know some people who do not like to support pard's suit even with xxx, they require in most situations Hxx, and they will be happier of Kx support rather than 862. Others will always support holding 432. Some will treat the support as an invitation to take a sacrifice or compete ad won't be happy of a doubleton support. Others will stop in time. Etc etc. (Just a note here to clarify I do not refer to world class nor to beginners/improving players: the players I mentioned here regularly score every year in the top 30/40 pairs at the italian championships, so that they are not world class but no palookas either. So I'd dare to say that this picture is representative of a legitimate part of real world bridge- regardless of whether we like or not such styles.) So I gues the bottomline is that non-standard evaluations should take into account the probable partner's subsequent actions (and reactions :rolleyes: ).

Hi all ! I would like to convince people at my club to start playing - at least once in a while - cross-imps tourney rather than MP. Not that I do not enjoy MP, but I just believe it is instructive for all mid-low players (I am one of them :rolleyes: ) to experience both form of scoring. The most obvious drawback is scoring compuations, so I wonder which CHEAP/freeware/shareware programs are out there to do X-imps. Thanks ! Mauro

Hi all :) I have a question on the BART convention. All sources on BART refer to the sequence: 1♠:1NT* 2♣: ? Where 2♦ is a relay used to describe several hand types. The question is: how do you deal with those hannd types when opener responds 2♦ rather than 2♣ ? If I agreed to play BART, does it mean that 5332 openers always rebid 2♣ even holding a doubleton ? And what should be opener's rebid holding 5 spades and 4/5 diamonds ? A natural 2D (which does not alow for accurate responder's description with BART) or an artificial 2C (to allow responder using BART) ? In both cases, a 2D rebid by opener would make it impossible for responder to differentiate his hand type, when holding a hearts-based hand. Thanks all!

There is some wisdom in these words, but I have to say that any regulation which forbids to the "normal" player to bid like some champions do, must have some elements of perversion in it, even if it is formulated to protect weaker players.

Fred, thanks a lot ! :)

Ron, is it not possible that opener has something like the following hand ? :rolleyes: KJT9xx - QJx- Qx - AKx