zhasbeen

how do I delete this? Unintentional double post

"...none other than Microsoft owner, Bill Gates, a bridge player himself,...)" you can add that Warren Buffett has been one of his bridge partners for many years (From what I've read, Buffett is the stronger player)

So much for the peace offering. For some reason, merriman, you go out of your way to put me down. It hurts, and I don't know why you do it. I've read several of your posts in the past and know that you are intelligent. I don't think you are being objective. On this thing: "You said yourself that you thought "promises a partial stopper" also means "denies a full stopper". This is true, and I stand by it as does the ACBL. When you make statements like you did it tells me that you haven't read what I said. You just zero in on a part you disagree with and think of a way to pick me apart. I KNOW that the GIB definitions are broader than what we'd use while discussing it before an offline game. I admitted that I was confused. Below is my record for last 7 tournaments, including back-to-back wins yesterday in games of 59 and 34 tables. The 59-table win was a new record, taking out my old record of 54 tables. However, I'm sure you could find plenty of errors if you were to watch all the replays, as could I. As I was playing, I realized that I would go several hands at a time without even looking at a definition. As I said before, almost all my posts here contain hands that I've had problems with, which is the same for most of us. While the great majority of deals are challenging, most of the time GIB is a good partner, or at least acceptable. Sometimes he is great. Here they are in order of date, number of tables, overall placing, MP score: 11/18/2017 20 2 62.7% 11/18/2017 26 2 68.5% 11/18/2017 32 2 64.9% 11/19/2017 25 2 63.3% 11/20/2017 59 1 74.0% 11/20/2017 34 1 66.2% 11/20/2017 22 3 61.4%

Peace, you guys. I’m pretty sure that if we were talking to each other in person, you would understand what I’m trying to say and I would understand you. I seriously doubt that we are as far apart as it appears. For example, you and Merriman are filling out a card at an offline club. You ask him what he promises for a certain bid and he answers, “partial stopper”. Would you think it could possibly include the ace? That was what I meant about the taking a poll—the raw term “partial stopper” without considering GIB, writing programs, or any of that stuff. “Your position here is totally absurd…” Yes, that would be absurd if it was what I thought. Also, what I post here almost always addresses problems I've run into with GIB, which are relatively few considering the number of tournaments I play--600 in less than 3 months. The great majority of the time my biggest problems are figuring how to bid and play the endless stream of tough hands that the robot tournaments dish out. I should probably spend more time studying and play fewer tournaments. I have more to say but am too tired now. I was confused by definitions and tying it in with in with common sense bridge...continued Mon... I was making more out of than it was--like some special GIB treatment rather than what he actually had--a no trumpish hand with spade support and wasted diamond values. The 5th spade was a mild surprise. In many cases my problem is more related to my not having a good understanding of how they work as the definitions themselves. The majority of them the time I just look at what it says and don't go any deeper than that. If I would have just bid it without looking at definition I would have been o.k. although I agree 100% that 4C response to Jacoby 2NT is the correct bid. It was how I played it in past but forgot about it. It could have gone 1S-2NT-3D-3NT-4C-4H and on to 6. However, I ran my cursor over the 3N bid and when the box opened the cursor landed squarely on "Partial stopper:♥" and it threw me off track. I took at face value rather than a blanket description that would be applied to any NT hand. Anyway, I don't fully understand how the definitions work and have more questions. However, I need to look at a few more hand records before bringing them up.

I understand and have an appreciation for what GIB can do, and how complicated it must be to sync the definitions with the thousands of hands it could encounter. I was defending myself from statements like this: "don't think it's reasonable to equate "promises a partial stopper" as "denies a full stopper". All you'd need is a mini-version of: "5)Partial: K, Q-x, J-x-x, 10-x-x-x." You could compress it to less than half that size--I'd even settle for "no ace" Talk about being unreasonable...geesh. Take a Bridgwinners poll asking if a partial stopper could contain the ace. I think you know what the answer would be, and it would probably be unanimous.

Thank you, vrock. You made my day.

http://www.acbl.org/learn_page/bridge-terminology/#P GUARD (STOPPER). An honor holding in a suit that will or may prevent the opponents from running the suit. A guard may be: (1) Positive: A, K-Q, Q-J-10, J-10-9-8, 10-9-8-7-6. (2) Probable: K-J-x, K-10-x, Q-J-x. (3) Possible: Q-x-x, J-9-x-x. (4) Positional: K-x. (5) Partial: K, Q-x, J-x-x, 10-x-x-x.

"I don't think it's reasonable to equate "promises a partial stopper" as "denies a full stopper"" Lesson learned. I thought it did. "You are way more than min and have all the trump honors, can't sign off." True, if I believe that the possibility of ace of hearts still existed at the time I made the decision. I did not.

Thanks for confirming what I just acknowledged. I know that I can always count on you to set me straight. I will refrain from commenting on any further posts of yours, since it is clear that you resent them. However, I might comment on what some of the people who respond to your posts have to say, since you are probably the most active poster here. I’ll take the blame on this one, since I didn’t make the optimum call, and GIB has a tough job. However, my reasoning was not ridiculous. Whether first response to Jacoby 2NT was 3D or 4C, north held the exact same hand that included the ace of hearts. Yet on one sequence the definition says he doesn’t have it, and on the other it says he does. The ace of hearts is not a partial stopper. That said, I now know that GIB will let you know that he holds the ace of hearts if you make the optimum call of 4C, and I’m good with that. The robots have tough job, and 4C happens to be the best call in this case, since it shows shortness somewhere and the second suit all in one bid. With a human you could show the ace of hearts either way, e.g. 1S-2N-3D-3N-4C-4H; or 1S-2N-4C-4H and probably be o.k. While you might become an advanced player someday, you are not there now. I wasn’t trying to put you down when I said that you could improve your game by entering some tournaments, rather than always playing money bridge against a single opponent. The way I understand it, you are matched with a player of equal rank when playing for money. In the MP and IMP tournaments you are competing with players of all levels, including many of the heavy hitters with thousands of master points. In a single session you can compare your actions with 20-30, and often 40 players or more in a single session.

Hi there- I'm looking at Jacoby 2N link and it says 3♦ Singleton or void in diamonds. It's the 2nd line after 3C. BUT...as I look farther down the page it says 4♣ = 5+ clubs!" I'm just glad that my passing didn't ruin a good game; although I would have been in positive territory if not for that one. It was IMPS. I had it in my head that showing singleton or void was first priority after Jacoby 2NT resp, but it's coming back to me now (thanks to you) that there is the other option with 2nd suit. I took a 20-year break before starting back playing earlier this year. However, you'd think it would have come up during the zillion robot tournaments I've played last few months, but if it did I don't remember it. You should come around more.

You see the bidding. GIB's 3N bid definition said "partial stop in ♥ " See "tinyurl..." link if you want to see the whole thing, including definitions etc, but try to imagine what you'd do with this hand after reading the definition and seeing only your hand. I thought about bidding 4C before giving up, but didn't see what good it would do me, even if GIB cue bid hearts. Could a partial stopper possibly include the ace or a void? Anyway, most of the field bid 6 anyway. http://tinyurl.com/yddtnb4a [hv=pc=n&s=sakqj5h973dcaq743&d=s&v=0&b=11&a=1sp2np3dp3np4sppp]133|200[/hv]

Here we go again. I played a robot tournament this morning. I didn't think it was appropriate to do an hv diagram, but I bring it up because it so related to the hands we have been discussing. Partner passed, and RHO open 3H white. I was next (red). This was my hand, S, H, D, C: AKQ4 K85 853 KQ8. True to my word I passed...got 3.3% on the board. I reasoned that I was an under dog to get a plus in this hand--thinking it was unlikely if partner didn't have spade support. I didn't want to double 3-level. However on this one I did have a likely trump trick. Two pairs played in 3S making, 10 bid 4 and went down a trick, and there was one other player who sold out at 3 hearts. Both made 3. GIB had J97653 109 94 A63. We were just talking about a hand where GIB opened a weak 2 with x J10xx 1098765 Kx. It was either yesterday or Weds. Why on earth would he open that hand and not this one?? Anyway, that is beside the point of my decision here, but something to think about. Like the other hand I'm looking for more opinions. I managed to finish 4th with 53.95%, despite having 3 other boards of 16.7, 26.7, and 10.7 to go with this one. More tough hands--I noticed that a couple heavy hitters dropped out. I thought about it when I was 42% at half way but hung in there. The 10.7%s came later.

I meant MPS. Why else would I be talking about study I'm doing about matchpoint tournaments, and estimating what people would be doing at other tables? Isn't it just you and your opponent when you play money bridge? I was defending my judgement--seems like I do a lot of that around here. I would not be surprised at all if your simulation comment turned out to be true. I thought I made it clear that this would be a tough hand for me and that I would have gotten a bad sore by passing. What I said after that is that I'm right more often than not on tough decisions, and that is true. It's still bridge whether you are playing for money or matchpoints. I thought this was an interesting hand so I commented. I'd like to get some more opinions, and this is not to slight you in any way. We've all seen polls where answers vary among experts. Would this be a hand where they were unanimous in support of 4 heart bid, or would answers be split between bidding, doubling, or passing? Would answers have conditions, depending on form of scoring, vulnerability, etc ? If that same situation were to come up later today I'd pass again, but with reservations. The one thing I don't want to do is waver back and forth, on what I do in nearly identical situations because of result I got on the last hand. That just throws me off balance and causes me to lose trust in my judgement. However, if I discovered that most experts would bid 4 hearts on this hand I'd do the same next time on a hand just like this or similar hand. It might not be as close of decision as I thought it was.

Bad board yes, but probably not a zero. The odds could be against me on the pass--not sure. There would be plenty of doubt if I passed there, but I believe that I'll be right more often than not; not necessarily with these cards, but on tough decisions in general. I'm now 77 deep into a study I'm doing of the 373 robot tournaments I've played at matchpoints. It compares my scores when I play the hand vs when I defend. At this point I average 65.1% when I play it vs 57.1% when I defend. I thought it would be a lot worse defending, because my perception is that I'd be below average on defense. It seems like I get a lot of bad boards, but they are the ones I tend to remember the most, which is probably true for most players. I'm thinking of going back to the beginning and breaking it down more by tracking when I double, when I let them play it undoubled for plus score, and when they make their bid. It seems like they make most of the hands I double and and I get a bad score whenever they make something. I still have a long ways to go, and these first 77 average 61.1% compared to 60.5% for all 373. I wish I could do this well in offline tournaments against humans. I average a hair under 54% there, playing fewer boards in a month than I do during 3 days of robot tournaments.

Boy, I tell you; the robot tournaments keep throwing decisions like this at you all day long. I would not have doubled, but had I run those simulations, who knows. I would have bit my lip, passed, and missed a cold game. If I had to bid I'd take as stab at 4 hearts, while risking a cold zero. "Passing a takeout double on points with no trump tricks and possibly a double fit has all sorts of ways to go wrong. I don't care what the simulations say." I agree on this one, although I thought I read that Bergen bases doubles on the "Law" even if he doesn't have a trump trick. Maybe I would too if I was as good as him at estimating trump count for both sides. Plus you know he's going to play the spots off the cards on defense. Before the law became so widely accepted, all the books advised against doubling without trump tricks. Btw, I do believe in the law, but after 2S-P-3S you have a lot of guessing to do. There are 3 things you know: Your hand, that EW have at least 8 spades between them, and that they stopped short of game. East could have a pretty good hand and still pass a weak 2. You can't even be sure that hearts is where you have the most combined trump for your side. If you did take a deep breath and bid 4 hearts it's unlikely that GIB would leave it there with his hand. Anyway, this a tough hand. With your cards there would be a lot of "darned if you do, darned if you don't" floating around in this ol' brain. I'd like to see the traveler if it was MP or IMPS, but as far as I know you only play money bridge. My guess is that most of the field would be playing either 3S or 4H undoubled, with only a few others doing something else. It would have been a bad board for me, but not a zero. Virgos, I think that playing more IMPS and MP would help your game. You get to compare your results with many players, and you are also able to see what the ratings are for those who enter the same tournaments as you. After the round you can see how everyone bid and played the hand, and what their scores were. Only the players who played in the same tournament have access to these clips. You can learn a lot this way, and how you stack up compared to the other players. As you already know, most of these hands will test you, especially in the MP games, that on average have larger fields and more wild hands.

No mention of it, but the 2D bid is awful. It should be the poster child for when not to open a weak 2. It doesn't have a single point in diamonds. While nowadays it's acceptable to have a 4-card major, the 4 hearts should still be considered a flaw. The K5 of clubs is 75% of the hcp of entire hand. Throw in being vulnerable for good measure. I know that's not the issue on this hand, but I felt compelled to bring it up. And Virgos, I know you don't want to talk about the play but I just want to say something. My guess is that you hurried when you returned that spade without stopping to think. Just slow down and ask yourself why he would overtake your king. I think you would have figured it out. He must have the queen and why wouldn't he just cash it if that's what he wanted? The other thing is the double by east. When I saw the auction I didn't like it. Why would HE be the one doubling I thought. I saw the long spades and no other tricks, except possibly a heart ruff. With so many spades I'm not so sure the first round won't get ruffed. This is where I would need to follow my own advice and stop to think. First I'd need to ask myself how likely it would be for first round spade ruff. While possible, it's not likely. After that it gets easier. If west has the ace of hearts for that vul 2-level overcall we've gottem, and even if there was a spade void we still might set them in light of overcall. It probably took Stephen about 2 seconds to draw that conclusion.

Ok, I'll back off to surprised. The SQ is big, knowing that it will normally be part of a 5-card suit. Stephen's simulations have also got my curiosity up, although I'm not so sure the percentages would hold up in actual play. Forget about the hand in the handviewer diagram. To put it mildly, it is not the dummy you'd expect after hearing a 2NT invite and holding that 7 pointer. I'm still a passer at matchpoints on the condition that opener has max of 18. It would be interesting to see how the Bridgewinners panel would vote.

I wonder about the simulations and what effect double dummy has. I'd be shocked if a poll of top match point players would accept the invite with that hand. Btw, I'm not on the same level as the 2 guys I brought up in the the "GIB crappy lead" thread, although I do occasionally have a game with them. You probably figured that out. I seriously doubt if I'll ever catch up to them in this lifetime, but one was a partner was in early 90's. We won a couple sectional open pairs, had high finishes in a few others, and won consistently in club events. They have other partners for the bigger events.

The way I've played, 1H-1S-2NT, 1C-IH-2NT, etc promise 18-19. With 5H 3-3-2 and 16-17 we almost always open 1NT, less often with spades. Then it could go 1S-1NT-2NT with 17. With hearts a spade response could create rebid problems. That leaves a gray area when opening 1S with 18 and NT shape and getting forcing NT response. With 19 you just raise to 3. I hadn't given it much thought...I guess I'd have to choose between inviting or raising directly to 3 with 18. It seems like no problem at IMPS--just bid 3. With GIB I usually look at definitions and take it from there, sometimes with a big grain of salt.

More than anything, I’m afraid that I wouldn’t be able to make good decisions if I played this style. However, just reading your answers to, “As for your questions from earlier…” loosened me up some. One thing for sure is that I have no doubt that you’d be a tough opponent to go up against. It took a minute for LOTT acronym to register, but I’m a believer. The challenge is becoming good at determining how many trumps everyone has. Speaking about getting in there light, last week a lady who has a ton of mp’s opened 1C with a square 11. My partner held a balanced 14 that included AKQ8 of hearts and Q9xx of clubs. He decided to overcall a heart that was followed by a pass. I held: 109xx J AQ10xx Axx. I thought of 1S, before narrowing down to 1NT or 2NT. I finally settled on INT after devaluing my hand slightly because of opening bid on my left. Also, I wasn’t crazy about stiff in partner’s suit, although not so worried with it being the jack. The rest of his hand was QJxx of spades and 2 small diamonds. I made 3 easily, and not surprisingly we got a bad board. Later, while looking at the hand records, I noticed that no trump was always played from the other side, almost surely because west hadn’t opened with a club. Before then I was questioning my conservative 1NT call. It probably would have gone 1C-1S-1NT-2NT-3NT. Partner thought my call was reasonable. Regardless of what you think about our bidding, that seemingly innocuous club opening had a big impact. That’s all she did was open a club and never said another word other than “pass”.

Assuming it shows a normal 17-18. Do you pass or go to 3 with responder's hand at MP? I'm going to pin you down if it kills me. (imagine a smile on my face rather than scowl) "2nt is just a really stupid contract at IMPS. If 2nt was already going down, you only lose extra 1 imp for being in 3. While you gain 10 when you bid and make 3. So it rewards bidding very thin games. You are only truly happy passing 2nt when making exactly 2. So it has to be really wretched before I am going to pass when already in 2." You don't mince your words, and your logic makes perfect sense. "You are only truly happy passing 2nt when making exactly 2." Believe it or not I've run this logic through my head many times, but more than 90% of the time it's while playing match points. At teams I wouldn't have been sure what to do. Although I was introduced to bridge eons ago, there has only been a relatively short period in late 80's-early 90's that I played regularly. During that time it was still match points the great majority of the time. I hope to play them a little more in the future...37% of the robot tournaments I enter are IMPS, a huge difference from regular play. It seems like a purer from of play. You bid the close games, and try to lock up a hand rather than worrying about overtricks. I still play more matchpoints because they tend to attract bigger fields, and results on every hand can create big swings. In IMPS there are more break even hands, without a lot happening. Once you know you have an hand made you don't need to put so much energy into looking for an overtrick. However, every hand feels exciting in either form of scoring during live play. Your feedback appreciated. I probably would have passed at IMPS too, but not quite so quickly. Next time I'll take a deep breath, bid 3, and hope I make it. Even though my defenses often go up when you commment, I pay attention to what you say and give it serious consideration.

Regarding taking a poll, I asked a couple guys I know and occasionally play with their opinions. I asked by email, so there was no bias in my tone. I just gave them the holding, vulnerability, and asked "do you overcall or pass?" Both are gold LM's and competitive in open Flight A events. Their replies: I would pass. Sometimes I will overcall with 9 points (or less). However, there must be some reason to overcall such as lead-direction or preemption. In this case: 1. The diamond suit is weak. 2. It’s a poor 9 points given 2 Qs and 2 Js. 3. A 1D bid has zero preemptive value (in fact it has negative preemptive value considering it allows them to double to show both majors). The other answer: I tend to agree with ***. I don't feel strongly about this tho, so if we had a partnership agreement that we can overcall with 8 hcp, it wouldn't bother me if my partner chose to overcall. The only advantage I can think of is when partner has 3+ diamonds and it is the only suit we can compete with if the auction gets competitive. Even then, a balancing double might do as well. ........................................................ So here we are. Both are strong players who occasionally play with each other, yet they don't feel exactly the same about this hand. The key is that if you are going to overcall on hands like this you discuss it with your partner. I thoroughly enjoy playing with the guy who is more liberal on the light overcall, even though my general approach is more in line with the top one. I'm sure we'd get many different views if we expanded the poll. It's not always a case of right or wrong. I realize I can come on a little strong once I take a side..."you will burn in **** if you don't agree with me!" Need to work on that.

Coulda, woulda, shoulda. I believe that a 5-1 fit is more likely. I don't like the pass, nor the 1H overcall, but what do I know. Btw, I got a couple more opinions on the light overcall on your "GIB overcalls with crap" thread. Will give you details there.