beatrix45

:( Excellent point! I presume you are not thinking of well-placed jacks embedded in a long suit. e.g. AQJxx. Rather that, Jxx or AJx aren't quite worth 'one point'. One additional observation. With balanced hands, the closer you are to having all the high cards, the closer jacks are to parity (i.e. worth 'one point'). Try simulating two balanced hands with a combined 36, 37 and 38 HCP respectively. Play them out to see what your odds are for taking 13 tricks, and I think you will see what I mean.

:P North is at fault - 100% With two balanced/semi-balanced hands, HCP's matter! He made a silly error in bidding 6♦. Partner is asking for a max to bid six NT. He has a min. Pass would be OK, esp at matchpoints where stopping at 5♦ isn't a good idea. His other possible call is 4♦, intending to pull in his horns thereafter. When pard responds 5♣, he must bid 5♦ knowing that his side is off the heart ace. So, play 4NT at matchpoints and 5♦ at IMPs. wtp?

:P 2 NT Looks to me like the only correct bid, excepting only for an optimistic and aggressive 3NT against a certain type of opposition. Not much point in 2♣. Why tell the opponents any more than necessary?

:) PASS wtp?

:) PASS Partner is counting on you for 7 or 8 HCP and a small doubleton spade in order to make 3♠ a playable spot. This is, roughly, what you have.

:) :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D Student: Sir, how do I bid this hand? Teacher: Under an alias

:) I am firmly in the camp of the 2♦ bidders. Get it off your chest now and then shut up except to take a spade push if pard shows a long, powerful spade suit. Partner needs to know that we can compete in diamonds. Opening 1♦ looks fine to me, but raising spades by using a support redouble is seriously wrong IMO. The very thought of playing a shaky 4-3 spade fit with a side seven bagger gives me the willies.

:) 4NT Balanced hands, no long suits, a preponderance of the high cards. These are the conditions in which point count bidding is at its best. USE IT NOW. P.S. I am curious why you bid 2♣ in the first place. With 4-3-3-3 and a jack empty suit, a diamond contract seems dubious. Plus, you have assisted the opponents in the defense AND misled partner about your hand. He is likely to place too much value on KJx in hearts, thinking the jack solidifies four tricks.

:D Dbl. All other calls (except 3♦) ZERO. I expect to hear 4♥ on my left no matter what I do. If I pass, we are likely done bidding. I am guessing that 4♥ will make most of the time despite a horrible trump stack. Positioning myself to defend with a hand that has less than one and one-half defensive tricks and six winners makes no sense to me. If I double and partner has spades, we should be OK. If partner has a good club suit, that's OK too with the heart ruffs coming in the short hand. If partner passes, so can I. If partner doubles 4♥, I am going to have to bid 5♦ and hope for the best. If I bid 3♦, I will lose the spade suit unless I slide with 4♠ when 4♥ comes around to me. Bidding that way is too exciting for me. Now, let's consider what Mike's FTL analysis tells us. With the outstanding high cards split evenly, we figure to take 11 tricks: 13 - 2 (pard's doubleton) - 0 (20 working points). It might be only ten, if pard has wasted heart honors or is the lesser of the two unheard from hands. GOTTA BID What about LOTT? I can see nine diamonds, nine hearts, a two suit fit and a void. That would be 20 tricks for my baseline estimate (of course it could be less, but it might just as likely be more). GOTTA BID As far as what to do over a hypothetical 4♥ -Pass - Pass - ???, I think sheer consistency requires that I make a second really hopeless bid, maybe 4♠

:D I agree 110% with everything said above. The average ACBL tournament players are, IMO, being intimidated by an ethos intended for a few top experts in a handful of elite tournaments. When ordinary bridge players and tournament directors attempt to apply these rules in ordinary tournaments, they make a mess of it all too often. Cheaters just use 'upside down attitude' to steer an ethical, but confused and innocent partner toward the desired action. Even if you disagree with the premise that the UI in this case is too ambiguous to base a ruling on, just where DO you draw the line? Can you EVER pull the double? Just as an exercise, ask yourself if you would bid the same way and then pull with: K952 KQJ95 - Q1094 how about KQ52 KQ10842 - Q103 As I understand it, the policy right now is that any action considered a 'reasonable alternative', in this case a pass, should be substituted for the bid suggested by the UI. This works fine at the elite level since any committee convened is likely to have a dozen world championships between them. They would be able to appreciate (one hopes) the degree of ambiguity in the UI conveyed by the hesitation. At lower levels of the game the elite manpower needed to implement such a system doesn't exist. The old system of identifying and censuring unethical pairs worked fine except at the elite championship level. I, for one, would welcome its return for ordinary tournaments. Let bridge be fun again.

;) Close decision between pass and 3♠. Pass at matchpoints and 3♠ vul at IMPs. If you look at it with Mike Lawrence's FTL analysis, we probably have about 20 working HCP and our two shortest suits add up to four. 13-4-0 = 9 tricks for our working HCP to put us over the top for game, pard needs 19 or 20. Or pard could be 5-5 or 6-4 so that he is looking at both short suits. Still, I hate my QJ of diamonds, the opps have to be bidding on something.

Partner's hand. (Acutally, my hand) Bad luck, bad bidding (us) or good bidding (them)? :D Assigning blame for this fiasco? Your partner 100%, you 0%. Sure, you might have made a very aggressive T.O. double, but so what? The opponents didn't do anything except bid their cards. Passing 2♥ is not insane as a means of creating (for tactical reasons) a swing board, IMO, but when the test tube breaks, the charge goes to the mad scientist sitting opposite.

:D Listen and learn. Justin is telling you exactly how the best players would bid this hand. Cue bidding amongst these folks is conversational, so............... 5♦ indicates a diamond void (or ace), confirms a place to play (20 to 1 it is in hearts), and indicates that at least bidding a small slam is on the table. If pard declines with 5♥, you can bid 6♣ on the way to six hearts to indicate that seven is still in the picture. Given any stronger bid, I guess that 7♥ is worth bidding, even tho we may be looking for the heart queen.

:) To get to 12 I have to have the heart hook or pick up trumps w/o a loser. So, win in dummy and play a heart to the queen. If this wins, then try the diamond ace. With a 2-1 trump split, I am home free with six diamonds, one club, two hearts, two spades and a heart ruff. With 3-0 diamonds, I would play the same way, and hope the four hearts lie with the three diamonds or the KJ of hearts falls in three rounds.. Should the heart hook lose, I will need some luck. Assume a neutral spade back. Now play heart ace and ruff a heart. Hook the diamond (the percentage play). With a 2-1 I'm home. Otherwise, I have to hope RHO has the long heart.

:) I see this hand is an example of why it is better just to bid one's hand rather than masterminding. Responder has a simple 3♣ rebid. Subsequently, the opener can bid 3♦. Responder will squirm and grumble, but will almost have to bid 4♣ w/o three hearts or a diamond card. After that, you ought to get to at least 6♣, either straight away or after another round of cue bidding. Getting to seven with any reasonable confidence of making is probably impossible using SAYC. How can you get the heart queen in the auction?

:) On the first hand it sounds like partner has a slammish hand with the spade ace and w/o the club ace. I would try 5♦ since I do have the missing heart honors. To me, splinters are 'picture' bids. So a splinter ought to be limited (say 9-11 working HCP) and advertise 4-4-4-1. On this hand, your five bagger is weak, so a splinter looks fine to me. Had I not started with a splinter, then starting with 2♣ or using Jacoby 2NT both seem OK. In a pick up partnership bidding 2♣ is probably safer. On the second hand, we likely have six unless there are two top diamonds to lose. So, bid 5♠ to ask for the diamond control. PS In a BBO indy, I favor the KISS system (keep it simple stupid), so I would have bid 2♣

;) 2♠, wtp? Partner is short in hearts, so he is a heavy favorite to have spade support. Plus, opposite: [hv=s=skxxxhxdxxxcaxxxx]133|100|[/hv] we have a game on a dummy reversal given 2-2 spades or 4-3 clubs with 3-1 spades.

:rolleyes: Very close between a heavy one NT and a pushy 2 NT. Partner will have a shapely min with a stiff or doubleton heart too often despite RHOs pass. At MP, one NT is my bid. At IMPs non-vul it's really close, 1 NT still. Vul at IMPs 2 NT. Against aggressive opponents, I might promote 2NT because of the negative inference of RHO's pass.

:rolleyes: You asked for a reply, so.................... My partners don't usually open clubs when they hold diamonds, so it looks to me like they have escaped successfully, and I now have no good bid. All normal bids are misleading (major suits are weak and no diamond stop). I would rather risk the slight (well, I do have TWO aces) overbid of 3♦. At least we will end up in the right strain. To me, this auction is not an analogy to the negative double. I invited partner to take a bite out of 2♦, and she did not do so. Hence, I can't double except for penalties, lest our "system" make it nearly always impossible to penalize the opponents.

:rolleyes: For what it's worth: On #1 I think it is a 33% game. Pard fits diamonds or not. Gotta pass at MP On #2 Have to bid game. The hand looks too good. I even like my ♣ queen. So, 4♥ On #3 the king in the opponent's suit should catch a trick, but I like the security of more than one stopper, so 4♠

:D I always thought this hand was what the 3♦ rebid was intended to show.

:) You have a 2.5 spade bid, and RHO allows you to bid just that. WTP.

:) Play to set up the long club or the fourth spade. Forget 3-3 spades, assuming you can read the lead. Club to ace, ruff club, heart to ace, ruff a club, J of hearts, ace of spades, ruff a spade high, ruff club, I hope. Pull trump, if need be. Diamond, play back to good spade.

:) Oh dear! Here I am playing an obsolete method and getting another top. Let's see, the OLD method is useful to show the ideal TO double pattern: 1-4-4-4 or 0-4-4-5 or 0-4-5-4. It can also be used to show 4-6 in the red suits. For many hands, it can be used with four hearts and 5-3 or 3-5 in the minors. With lots of high cards, we might even have 4-3 or 3-4 in the minors. The NEW method shows 5-6 or 6-5 in the minors. I can also be used with a red hand, 5-6 or 6-5 in hearts and diamonds. Gee, I wonder which bid comes up the more often? I know! I will set up a simulation assuming a 4♠ bid shows an eight bagger or a 7-4 hand. By golly! Distributions biddable under the OLD method come up four times as often as distributions biddable using the NEW method. I do need (usually), on average, about one more useful high card to bid safely using the OLD method, but I still ought to get to bid quite a bit more often. I paid my entry fee. I want to bid! On the other hand, I do so want to be modern. I think I see the light! I will get ahead of this modernity curve and start passing at every opportunity when those rude opponents preempt the auction.

:ph34r: As stated by Walddk, the three card raiser should have a working doubleton and three trumps to one or two honors to (we hope) make pulling trumps a possible option. The whole idea is preemption and fast arrival to the eight trick level. Let the opponents make the last guess. In short, you tend not to bid on opposite a possible three card raise, but your loss of comfort here is more than compensated for by the pressure it puts on opponents earlier in the bidding. Playing 4-3 fits is fun. Don't be faint of heart. Be less aggressive when vulnerable.