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You are correct; my mistake. 3C in balancing seat obviously isn't preemptive the way it is in direct seat. The jump cue in balancing seat doesn't come up very often; I would take it as a running 7-carder asking for a stop in NT or otherwise a description of the hand (cheapest bid being the negative bid). 3C here is very reasonable. I slightly prefer X, because it's more flexible in case partner has a major suit or a huge club stack, but 3C, 3D, and X are all reasonable. Good catch. Mike

3C showing the solid 7-card suit and an outside A is fine if you play it that way; I would say "standard expert" is preemptive (3H over 1H and 3S over 1S are the seven-carder). The biggest problem with 3C is that you're going to go set in 3NT on hands that may make 6 of a suit (partner will bid 3NT with xxx KQJx xx J9xx, where 3NT may go set and 6H is likely cold). 3D is fine, too, but it takes up a lot of bidding room (you might have a slam in any of four denominations). Also, both of these bids give up on playing 1cX. Partner could have xxx xxx void AQT9xxx, you know. Your comment about partner denying a 5-card major is not correct. Partner could have a 7-card major for all you know: xx Kxxxxxx x xxx Partner isn't going to bid anything with this hand, but you can likely make 7H. I think X, 3C (if agreed that it's this hand), and 3D are reasonable; each has its pluses and minuses.

Why would you play jump bids as preemptive when responder has passed? There is no more need to preempt.

If you play it as this sort of hand, then 3C is a good bid here. Many don't, however. If you play 3C as preemptive, X is far, far better than either 1D or 2D. Yes, partner might pass a X, but he is much more likely to pass a 1D or 2D bid. If partner passes a X, that might still be fine (at IMPs, you'll beat 1CX a couple tricks if partner has the expected club stack; at MPs, partner might not have enough stuff outside of clubs to bid over 1D or 2D). But if partner passes 1D or 2D, you are very likely headed for a bad score. 2d doesn't show an "intermediate" 16-17 hand. It's a solid opener with a good 6+ diamond suit. Axx Kxx KQJxxx x would be just fine for that bid. And your hand isn't an "intermediate" hand. It's a rock-crusher. Cheers, mike

2D doesn't show a 16 count. It shows a good opener with a good 6+ card diamond suit. 2D here grossly understates the strength of this hand. If partner has a club stop, you have game. If he has KQxxx of H and out, you may well have 7H. You have little choice other than X.

3C can be one of two things depending on partnership agreement. It can either be preemptive in clubs or else a bid showing a solid 7-card suit and asking for a stop for 3NT. Depends on partnership agreement. I'd say preemptive is more common for clubs against a standard bidding system. 3D over 1D is the same, although I'd say that's more 50-50 in terms of how people treat it. 3H over 1H and 3S over 1S are always showing a solid 7-card suit (usually a minor) and asking for a stop for NT. Usually you'll have the seven-card suit and one outside Ace, so that partner's stop is trick 9. Partner typically bids 3NT with a stop and 4C (pass or correct) without one, but if partner has a game-force hand with no stop, he bids 4D. Cheers, Mike

In real bridge, pass, of course. Vs the bots in an Instant Tourney, pass unless this is one of the final boards and you think you need a large positive score very badly. In that case, you can try 3NT and pray.

Sacrificing is for MPs. With the exception of 4S over 4H, you almost never sacrifice in IMPs unless it's blitheringly obvious. The risk-reward ratio is terrible. There are three reasons to bid 4C here, but with the hand shown, none of them apply. First, we don't have any realistic chance to make 4C (and we might get Xed for 500). Second, we aren't aiming to push the opponents up a level higher to beat them; probably they make their game. Finally, we don't want to encourage partner to bid 5C; we don't have the shape to help him. Indeed, we have the worst possible holding in the opponents' suit for offense (far better to have a stiff or three small, and the Jack is pure waste that means partner rates to have one HCP less somewhere else). Pass seems obvious with no second choice. Cheers, mike

Sorry, but how do you know opener has a balanced hand? If it's 17-19 balanced, then yes, I would pass, because opener's hand is well-defined, and 2C isn't going to get in their way much. But most big club systems use 1c for all 16-17+ hands. It works wonderfully -- so long as the opponents are nice enough never to open their mouths. Interference, however, poses big problems, because it takes a lot of the systemic tools away. In terms of getting doubled for penalty, that's actually more likely to happen when opener (playing a big club system) opens 1 of a major. Now he's 11-15 with 5+ of the major, so that his hand is very well-defined and responder can pass for penalties when it's right. It's very difficult to make a 2-level penalty double after a 1C opener, because responder has no idea what opener has. In addition, your C are good enough you won't get Xed very often, anyway. In most big club systems, X by responder here would be 5-8; there is no way opener is going to pass. So responder will only pass with 0-4 (is he really then going to be strong enough to pass a reopening double?) or 9+ with strength in clubs (Qxxxx and a couple of cards on the side isn't a good penalty pass). Accordingly, it has to be right to interfere with some number of clubs. At this vulnerability, I would bid only 2C; maybe partner can raise to 3. If NV, I would try 3C. Also, the most effective defense against a big club is probably CRASH. It's very important to be able to show all two-suiters right away, and giving up X, 1d, and 1NT isn't a big price (those bids are next-to-useless anyway). Cheers, Mike

Penalty x and pass it. Why can't partner have AKx Axx xx. AJ98x? Partner knows you could be garbage staymaning. If he doesn't have 3c beat easily in his hand he shouldn't x.

No, 3S is not a game try. It's a shutout bid, at least in standard expert. If partner doesn't have a reasonable play for game opposite three cover cards, he probably shouldn't have made a game try.

X and 3NT are both reasonable. If 1D was a normal opener (not the unbalanced one you specified), X would be pretty automatic (partner might want to pass). With the unbalanced convention, it's much closer, because partner is likely to be short in spades and thus less likely to want to pass. I would cross my fingers and X. The main issue at IMPs is to avoid a disaster. On this hand, that means to at least make your game. Each bid has problems here. If you bid 3NT, you might find partner with something like: x Axx KQxxx KJx Now if South shows up with the Ad, you are going set in 3NT when 6D was icy. On the other hand, if you X, partner may bid 4H, in which case you have a nasty guess. Quite likely you can hold up on the first spade, take the A on the second spade, and make 4H, but a 5-1 H split could doom you. Correcting to 5D won't help much if partner is 1444. The reason I like X is that it is less unilateral and more flexible. There are two things that could go very wrong with 3nt: (i) you could easily go down and (ii) you might have an easy slam (and no, partner isn't going to bid over 3NT with a hand like the one I showed above). There are fewer things that could go wrong over X. It's unlikely partner will pass, but I suppose he could have short clubs or even short hearts. If he passes, you are happy enough. If partner bids 3NT, you can raise to 4NT. If partner bids 4C, you can bid 4S to show club support and try for slam. The same is true if partner bids 4D. The only thing that could go wrong is if partner bids 4H, and even there, 4H is probably about as likely to make as 3NT. What happened on the actual hand?

It looks like the high-card strength is roughly equal (you have 7; partner likely has at least 10 for his balance -- any less and LHO might have bid originally). Given that, you should bid 3 over 3 in MPs if the trump count is 17 or more, since with 17 total trump, one contract is likely to make, while the other is likely off one. -100 beats -110, and +140 beats +100. Here, it's likely the trump count is at least 17, if not 18. You have 4 spades; partner has at least 4 and quite possibly 5. You have 2 clubs; partner has a maximum of 4 minor suit cards, so there's a good chance he has 2 or fewer clubs. So you may well have a 9-fit, and the opponents likely do have a 9-fit. Sure, it's possible that the trump count is 16, but the odds favor 17+. So bid 3S.

This is pretty standard, actually. If an auction goes (no opposing bidding) 1any suit - 4NT, that is regular, standard (not keycard) Blackwood. Why is this? First, there may be hands where responder only wants to know about Aces and Kings. For example: 1C - 4NT. Responder has: KQJT9XX AKQ Ax x Aren't you really just interested in how many Aces partner has? If he has none, you'll sign off at 5S. If he has one, you'll bid six spades. If he has two, you'll ask for Kings and bid 7NT if he has one. OK, but what if you want to play with opener's suit as trump and want to use RKC? Well, you don't have to bid 4NT immediately. Just make a forcing raise to set trump (e.g., inverted minor raise for C or D; Jacoby 2NT for H or S). Then you can bid keycard later on. If you tell me you don't have a forcing raise, then you need to change your system so that you do (any system that doesn't have a forcing raise available is nutty).

X is fine. 3s is fine. Sometimes preempts work.

For a variety of reasons, if you play 4 suit transfers, it's best to play 2s as range finder or clubs. That is, you bid two spades on hands with clubs, but also on hands that would have invited game with 2nt or slam with 4nt in old fashioned Goren. Partner bids 2nt with a min and 3c with a max. After 2nt, responder can pass with the invite hand, bid 3c with the weak club hand, bid 3of another suit to show a gf in clubs (usually the bid suit shows shortness), bid 3nt with the slam invite, and so on If partner bids 3c, then responder can pass with the weak club hand and so forth Using this method means 2c guarantees a 4 card major, which eliminates a couple of awkward auctions and permits better treatments for auctions like 1nt 2c 2d/h. 2s Cheers, Mike

Hi Stephen. I used to see you in Sacramento every Memorial day back when I played one live event per year (the two-day Swiss there). At any rate, I think either 3S or 4H is OK. 3S certainly suggests H support, but it's not guaranteed; you could have a powerful club suit and be looking for a stopper. So partner generally bids 3NT with a stop and 4C with a minimum otherwise. Then when you correct to 4H, he'll get the idea. Here, of course, there is the chance that the opponents could bid 4S over 3S (they are less likely to do this directly than over a 4H call), in which case your partnership won't be as well placed to make a decision about doubling or bidding on. If you bid 4H and partner passes (forcing), I think it's a coin flip. You could easily make 6h (AKxxx of hearts and two small clubs might well do it). If 5H is making, you won't score well defending 4SX. On the other hand, you could easily go set in 5H (Axxxx of H in North with KJT offside). Who knows? If you bid 3S; W bids 4S; and partner passes, the pass probably shouldn't be forcing (you could have a pile of clubs and little defense), so I think I would X. Partner would have Xed 4S with a decent hand, so I wouldn't expect much from him. Cheers, Mike

Stop worrying so much about helping the opponents, especially at IMPs. Hands like these are all about finding your best spot and making it difficult for the opponents to find theirs. 2nt succeeds on both counts. It gets you to the right 3level spot quickly and it makes it tougher for the opponents to find spades. Who knows. Partner might have xxx. xx. Axxxx . AJxx in which case 5c imay make and 5s is most likely off one. You won't be happy going minus 420 Cheers Mike

As others have noted, it's a matter of system and partnership agreement. Playing some type of American system like 2/1, it,s generally better to pass these sorts of hands in 1-2 seat. 5332 is poor shape; if your partner doesn't fit you in spades, you'll have a rough go of it on offense. Playing a strong club system, however, this is a fine opener. If you like to bid aggressively in 1-2 seat, consider playing a Precision variant Cheers Mike

There are two logical treatments for 3h in your sample auction. The first is a hand with (i) enough stuff to accept the game invite; (ii) a decent three-card fragment; (iii) a source of tricks in a minor suit; and (iv) a hole (xx) somewhere, either in spades or the other minor. Without (ii) - (iv), it makes more sense to bid 3nt and cross your fingers. The second logical treatment is a hand with a problem in the bid suit (i.e., asking partner to go ahead to 3nt if his 4-card suit was the bid major, but warning about the bid major otherwise). For a number of reasons, I think the first treatment is better, but it's a matter of partnership agreement. I'd never trot this out in a pickup even with a world-class partner. That's just silly. 1N-3N-anything but pass is an auction that doesn't exist. Cheers, Mike

What else can you do but pass throughout? Partner has shown a hand that wasn't good enough to overcall 1h over 1d but has a 2h bid after the opponents stop in 1nt. Probably he has a so-so- hand with a weak six-card heart suit. Maybe something like: KQx xxxxxx Ax xx I wouldn't overcall 1h in sandwich seat with this, but when the opponents stop in 1NT after bidding clubs and diamonds, it seems right to balance with 2h. Yes, that could backfire, but it will gain more often than not (and when opener, who is the one who could penalize you, doubles, much of the time responder will remove to 3 of a minor, anyway). As it happens, your partner had a pretty easy 1h overcall on this hand and chose to pass. C'est la vie.

As others have noted, 2c is poor, although it makes things a lot easier on this hand, especially if you play that 1s. 2c. 3h is a h splinter with c support. After 1s you are likely to end up in 6h, which is shaky, whereas 6c is very much odds on. 5c is poor, of course. The "standard" bid with no-loser one-suites after 2c is 3nt, showing AKQxxxx or longer in one suit and no outside cards. The 2c opener won't have a problem figuring out which suit. Here, opener can raise to 6c comfortably, which is a fine spot. Another fairly common treatment is to play 4c, 4d, 4h, and 4s as showing one loser hands with the suit above the bid suit (4s shows c) and no outside cards. Cheers Mike

I think South and North both took too rosy a view. South has an 8-loser hand with only 4 spades, no Aces, and the Jd wasted. That means you need a 4 loser hand with four key cards from partner just to have a chance. Not great odds. I can't castigate 4h, but I think 4s is probably wiser. After 4h, North has a five-loser hand with a stiff Ace (always better to have a small stiff and values in the long suits) and no outside source of tricks (no five-card suit). It isn't likely that partner has a 7-loser hand as a passed hand. I would go quietly with 4s; maybe partner's hand is good enough to make another move (it isn't).

And when you get the answer "shows hearts," how does that help you?

Doubler could have a 19-20 balanced hand, but in that case 4h is apt to be the right spot, even with a 5-0 break. With the hand doubler hand, he shouldn't pass 2hX, because the auction is likely to get very high very fast. The 2h bid is likely a psyche, and the psycher almost certainly has an escape (diamond support). So the next bid from responder is apt to be 4d, which is not what the doubler's side wants to hear. Doubler probably ought to bid 3d at this point rather than pass. Cheers, Mike