david_c

Let's say that on ten hands your chances of making game are: hand 1: 10% hand 2: 20% hand 3: 30% ... hand 10: 100%. Then your best strategy when vul at IMPs is to bid game on hands 4 to 10, right? So that's seven game contracts, and, of those seven contracts, on average you expect 70% of them to make. OK? :unsure:

That doesn't follow, even when vul at IMPs. If you were able to bid perfectly - that is, bid all games with a greater than 3/8 chance of success and none of the others - then you would expect to make much more than half of your games.

The way most people seem to play it, you don't have a choice with KQxx(x) - you always lead the K. If that means you aren't getting the signal you want, then that's just hard luck. It's only when you have AK that you can choose.

I play "system on" with Mark, but that's partly because we play Keri which has fewer redundant sequences than Stayman does in this situation. Before that I liked to play "system on over a minor, off over a major".

hotshot did say that the sample size was very small. I believe that the results are correct in that the break even point is somewhere "between" 24 and 25 HCP, but the difference between 24 and 25 is much bigger than it should be.

It's not that unlikely - let's say about 25% for a jack? That might not sound much to you, but given that we're talking about very close decisions here it could easily be enough to tip the odds one way or another.

Very polite - it seems plain wrong to me, for the reasons that other posters on rgb have mentioned (and in fact awm pointed out the problem here before the thread on rgb even appeared).

It's easier to understand if you look at a different sort of Lebensohl situation: that is, after a double of a weak two. Then if you compare (2X) - dbl - 3X and (2X) - dbl - 2NT - 3C - 3X you want the first of these to deny a stop and the second of these to show a stop, because it makes a difference to who is declarer in NT. From this you get the principle "fast denies", and for consistency people then like to apply it to any other sequence where you have a choice of going through 2NT or not.

Intriguing - I can't work out what these are supposed to be percentages for. Any guesses?

There are plenty of defences to choose from, but in my opinion what is more important is to make sure you know how you are going to bid constructively after your overcalls. For example, let's say you play natural overcalls in the majors. What do you do if partner overcalls 1♠ and you have an opening hand with support for spades? The artificial opening means you no longer have an obvious cue-bid available. However you do want a way to show a decent hand because you might still have a game available. So some people define 1NT or 2♣ as a "cue". But then you need to discuss whether it still applies if they double your overcall, whether it applies at higher levels, etc.

I wonder what it is exactly that you're saying here. If partner opens 1NT (15-17) and you have a random 9 HCP, then I believe it's right to bid game. However, if you bid 3NT and opener turns up with a 15 HCP minimum, then your expectation is now worse than it would have been if you'd passed 1NT (unless you're vulnerable at IMPs, in which case 1NT and 3NT are very close). 24 HCP does not make game good in this sense.

Right. Whereas in your quote, Baze is saying that it is better to use 2NT to show a game invite without a 4-card major. That's a completely different approach to Fred's. It's not a different approach. The point here is that Fred considers inviting using Stayman w/o a 4cM to be so bad (because of the information passed to the defense) that he would rather gamble on the result than invite if a natural 2N is not available! Well, sorry, but your quote from Grant Baze consisted of four sentences, of which only the second makes this point. The first and fourth sentences are things which many experts (including Fred it seems) would strongly disagree with. This is why I objected to you saying that the quote sums up expert opinion.

Right. Whereas in your quote, Baze is saying that it is better to use 1NT:2NT to show a game invite without a 4-card major. That's a completely different approach to Fred's.

No it doesn't - how can you say that when Fred has been quoted in this thread as saying something completely different?

One of the things I really like about PC is being able to stop in 1NT when opener has 18-20 balanced opposite a negative. I wouldn't want to give that up.

I don't agree that the article showed that B) But it's certainly true that 3NT is often the correct place to play even when you have a big major fit. I would assume 3NT was natural here.

Oh dear, I was Mark's partner here; I should warn you that I don't really have my 2♠ bid :( Agree with pclayton that 4♠ is quite likely to be making. At this vulnerability with a known weak spade suit, you can probably play me for 5-5 shape. So there is every reason to want to buy the hand.

Think I can do this one:

The logic makes sense, but I suppose over 1C and 1D people take the view that "majors are more important than minors" and so prefer to have a nice way to show S+H. [You could use a jump-cue to show S+H - I've seen some people doing this.] On the other hand, your system over 1H and 1S is fairly popular.

I don't think anyone has mentioned my preferred method, which is for opener to rebid: 2M = any minimum (but could still be GF if the hand is fairly balanced) 2NT = 6+ major, forcing to game This is very non-standard, but I would try to agree it with a new partner playing SAYC-style 2/1s. It's very easy to play (continuations after 2NT can be completely natural), and it solves a difficult hand type. And it saves all this discussion about whether opener's 2NT is forcing or not.

Well, double-dummy any one of four different plays could be needed at trick two. (i) ♠K. Just draw trumps! (ii) ♠x. Similar to the ♠K, but if one opponent has a singleton club it may be essential to play the right spade from dummy at trick two. (iii) ♥K ruffed (followed by leading a spade from hand). May be the only way to avoid a club ruff. (iv) ♦. It might be necessary to take out the diamond entry immediately. All of these are kind of flashy in one way or another, so I'm thinking any one of them could be the right answer. :rolleyes: Playing the ♠K looks most sensible to me.

You open 1♣ playing Polish Club or some similar multi-club system. LHO makes a natural suit overcall. This is passed back round to you, and you make a reopening double. How high does their overcall have to be before your double denies the weak variant of 1♣? For me, 2♥ feels about right (i.e. a double of 2♦ could still be weak, but a double of 2♥ should promise at least the "medium" variant). But I'd be interested to hear your opinions. It seems like this is something which is very important to agree with partner.

B) I thought silly dress codes were the preserve of golf clubs. Well, golf has enough players to cope with losing a few that way. Bridge doesn't. We desperately want more young players in the game, but bridge has an image problem which puts a lot of people off, and this sort of thing is hardly going to help.

I think the standard for direct seat is really a little bit stronger than the 15-18 quoted (I'd want a very good 15, at least). So my vote is for "slightly weaker" but for me this is still 15-18.

This seems to be the relevant Law. It sounds like the declarer's partner pointed out the revoke in time, so they get their extra trick. The fact that the score was agreed does not make it too late (but it would have been more helpful to point out the revoke at that point!) There may be a problem, however, if the defenders do not agree that a revoke occurred. If the TD is unable to decide what happened, then the defenders may get the benefit of the doubt because dummy could have pointed out the revoke before the cards were put away. You might also like to quote: Your TD seems to be wrong in saying that a revoke can be claimed up to three hands later. In this case it would be too late to apply the one- or two-trick penalty for a revoke. However, if the revoke caused the non-offending side to win fewer tricks than they would otherwise have done, then this Law would apply: