HardVector

Consider updating your system a bit. A lot of the modern precision systems categorize responders action into 1d=0-7, 1h=8-11, higher bids=more and potentially slammish. This gives a 1c opener an idea of how hard to push the slam idea. If you have a minimum 1c opener and partner bids 1h (8-11), then you know that slam is unlikely unless they have the perfect hand. A place you can find this spelled out is in Meckwell precision.

I don't understand why people feel the need to take immediate action with these kinds of hands. If they end up in a major suit contract, you are happy. If they end up in 1n, you are happy. If they end up in 2c, you now may have a problem, but you've gone through a round of bidding and gotten some information. If they end up in 2d, NOW you have the hand that can take action.

It all depends upon what is the strongest bid. This, imo, is not good enough to want to be in game if partner is at a min for what they've shown so far. Additionally, partner may not be balanced. That being said, I'm getting to 3d somehow, it just is a matter of how. You can bid 3d immediately, or you can double then bid 3d. I'd do whatever is the weaker of the two means, and that is going to depend upon your agreements with your partner. With no agreements, I would assume that the slow way was stronger, so I'd bid 3d. Btw, 3d should not be broke, but encouraging partner to bid more. If you are broke, no matter how much you might want to, you should pass and see how things develop.

With 5422 hands of this strength, you can go 2 ways with it. Call it balanced and open 2n(or 2c-2n), or call it unbalanced and open 1d planning to rebid 3c. The quality of the short suits is where I usually make my determination on what I'm going to do. Here, isolated aces cause me to lean toward bidding the suits. Change those holdings to KQ KQ and I will lean toward the nt route.

"Allowed" is different than "Wise". The bid is definitely allowed. Vulnerable with a bad suit and 2 pts makes it not wise, imo.

Really? Switch E and S and look again.

The long clubs can be shown by bidding 4c (or 5c with a weaker hand) if partner comes back with 3n. As has been demonstrated earlier, the auction gets sticky if you bid 3c and hear 3n. Bidding 3c will tend to bury a potential heart fit.

1♦-2♣ 2n-3♥ 4♥-4♠ 5♣(or 5♦depending upon style)-5♠ bidding 7 from here is a judgment call. I don't know why west would rebid clubs instead of showing the 4 card major.

I kind of agree with that, but I'm not going to argue with Larry on it. I'm sure he is more in touch with what is standard than I am. I personally prefer to use 3n for the trash bid so that 3h/3s can show suits, but I also insist that if partner opens 2c then bids 3m they have 9 1/2 tricks in their hand.

Larry Cohen says that after 2♣-2♦-3♦ then 3♥ is the negative bid. https://www.larryco.com/bridge-articles/general-approach-2c-opening-part-2

I'm committed to showing this as a takeout double, so I'm going to continue that. If partner makes a game forcing bid, I'll simply raise spades and hope my extra strength carries through. If they invite, you need to make a judgement call. If it's imps, I'll probably go to game. This is not guaranteed to work. As I said earlier, there are no perfect solutions here. You make your bed then lie in it. I'm making the takeout double bed.

Considering I'm looking at 2 fast heart losers plus a possible uppercut position, I think I'll settle for the part score. If the auction gets that far without any bidding from the opps, it's likely that there are at most 2 hearts on your left. If hearts get raised, I'm going to get more excited.

I'm going to double. I expect this to be unpopular, but there are no really good answers here. I dislike pass, the hand is too good. I also dislike 3d, that is too unilateral and the suit is really not that great. I'm also not prepared to go up to 4c to show this hand. What I'm going to do is a takeout double. If partner bids spades...wait for it...I'm going to pass. This may be bad, yes, but ALL the option could be bad. The nice thing is if they get greedy and try to double 2s, now I can bid 2n to show the really good 2 suiter. If partner has to play in spades, then I have lots of strength to help and they may have 5+ cards there. The next best bid, imo, is a simple pass, see what happens.

The "law" I had heard of postulated that hand patterns repeated in the suits. So if you have a 5332 hand, there will be a suit that is 5332. I heard of it about 30 years ago as hearsay and have never heard it again. It was in conjunction with the idea that if you have a void, there will be another hand with a void out there.

It is a raise that you make not because you think you can make a game or slam, but because the information that you have a fit makes your partner's hand better. For instance, the auction has gone p-p-1c-p-1h-p. Your partner is a passed hand, you've made an opening in clubs and partner has bid a heart suit. You have; Kxx QJxx xx AQxx. A pretty minimal hand and considering that partner couldn't open, game seems unlikely. Passing 1 heart is allowed here but holding a good fit for partner, you should make a "courtesy" raise to let your partner know you have a fit. It may be they have something like; Ax T9xxxx Axxx x and now you can get to the heart game. Notice, this only has 20 combined hcp, but it's a good game. It is also applicable when partner has shown a big hand. The knowledge that a fit exists may make their hand better. For instance: (1s)-X-(p)-2d-(p)-2h-(p). They have opened, your partner doubled then showed a very good hand with a heart suit. You have xxxx xxx Qxxxx x. A truly miserable hand, but you do have a heart fit as well as some value in being able to ruff clubs. A pass is not out of the question, but you should consider a raise in case the knowledge that you have a fit is all partner needs to know.

I'd like to add one comment to what Mikeh stated, and that is that Bergen gets rid of a very useful bid for 2/1 players. That is the invitational jump shift at the 3 level. I personally have been doing that for about 15 years now, and I'm not going back to Bergen. So here, I would make an immediate 3c bid with responder's hand and now getting to the right spot is easier. Without that, you have the bad choices that were already illustrated.

The problem with this specific shape is the lack of vision on the opening bid. The most powerful thing about 1n/2n openers is the idea that it is balanced. Balanced does not mean good. Balanced means less suitable for a suit contract. Unbalanced, on the flip side, is MORE suitable for a suit contract. With the shape in question, you have a number of ways you can bid it if partner bids hearts. A; you can open 1d and rebid 2c (some people really hate this, you are apparently one). B; you can open 1c and rebid 1n (you now characterize your hand as balanced). C; (this is the one most people don't think of) you can open 1c and rebid 1s. OMG, rebid a 3 card suit???!!??? Are you nuts??? If partner had bid 1s and not 1h, what would you have done? You would have bid 2s, would you not? How is playing in this 7 card fit any different tham playing in the 7 card fit if you bid it first? With the hand in question, I would have no problem bidding 1s. Also, if you have discussed this with your partner this scenario, when partner has bid both minors we usually have the agreement to take a preference in the minors. So holding xx xxx you take the 3 card preference. Holding xxx xxx, you take the best 3 card preference. This doesn't always work out, but it works out more often than not. Now, having said that, I acknowledge that opening a 4 card diamond suit and rebidding 5 clubs is a system flaw that requires guesswork and judgement. But what is the worse error, differentiating between balanced and unbalanced hands, or differentiating what your longer minor suit is? This is all a matter of style and what you deem is important in the hand. I'm a big fan of differentiating between balanced and unbalanced hands as it gives my partner more information to work with in determining how many tricks are available. But to say the idea is flat out WRONG I find insulting.

The only place you should be bidding 1n with a singleton, is if it goes 1m-1s-1n and your holding includes a 4 card heart suit and insufficient values for a reverse. Typically, you are 5431 shape with 3 in the other minor if the 5 is diamonds. If it goes 1c-1s-1n, then there are some people who really hate opening 1d with 4 when they have a 5 card club suit, so 1n could have 4 hearts OR 4 diamonds. I personally have no problem opening 1d when 4-5 in the minors, so if I rebid 1n with a singleton after partner bids 1s I will have 4 hearts. Some like doing this with 1-4-4-4 hands as well. My personal preference is to open 1d and rebid 2c if partner bids 1s. I like to reserve the 1n bid for hands that are truly balanced as much as I can. If you have a singleton diamond or singleton heart, you should never rebid 1n, you will always have a more descriptive bid. If you choose to rebid 1n anyway, you shall reap what you sow. If your partner rebids hearts, you better get your apologies ready if partner ends up playing in a 5-1 fit. Even worse is if partner now bids 4h and goes down on the 6-1 non-fit when 3n makes. Only with spades should a little caution be used.

Keep in mind, I don't consider myself conservative or afraid. I just think that aggression has it's place and if you don't have the tools available to differentiate when you are messing around and when you are serious, you should be more conservative. As proof of what I'm saying about being conservative, I point to exhibit A: non-vul vs. vul it goes p-p-? with xx xxx Jxxx QTxx I chose to open 3c...because I wanted a club lead. Notice, in this situation there is no ambiguity about us trying for 3n or game or anything else. It is clearly telling partner I'm not really interested in a constructive auction. It's possible that partner jacks it to 5c as a further preempt and I'm prepared to take full responsibility for that disaster. What I was trying to stress with this thread, was that without the 2n good/bad bid (which I personally like), you put too much stress in making bad 3c bids just because you are afraid of defending 2h. As soon as you are allowed to do that, you and your partner are guessing and flipping coins trying to figure out where to play it. After all, the good/bad 2n bid was developed because the PROS were having a hard time doing it. A little bit of discipline allows you to pass with bad hands and then you can go to town from there. If you are not willing or able to use modern day tools, you should probably stick to old school solid principals.

First of all, I disagree with bidding 4s as the first bid. The hand has way too much potential to give up on a slam just because they threw in a heart bid. If partner's subsequent 3c bid has values, you still are not out of the slam range. It's become narrower because partner is going to need more specific cards, but it's still there. If partner can make a 3c bid on anything, either competitive or strong, you are now throwing darts trying to find the right place to play. You might as well bid 4s...except, WOW, partner has values, gets excited and now you are out of the last making contract. In competitive bidding, it's important to establish who's hand it is. Just because they are both bidding, doesn't mean that it isn't your hand. Of course, they may actually have good hands for their bids and it really is their hand. The reason I think 3c should have values, is you don't know where the auction is going after that. Partner may go for 3n, 5c, 6c. They may bid 3h, 4h and now you are going to wonder about partner's double. A pass does nothing to describe your shape, but does a great job of describing your values. It doesn't say you don't want to compete, it just says you don't have enough to compete NOW. You also give partner room to accurately describe their hand. After 1c-(1h)-1s-(2h)-p-(p)- now partner can safely give up on any idea of slam. Now 2s becomes competitive, 3s invitational and 4s is clearly to play. Partner can double then pull 3c to 3d with minimal hand and bid 3d directly with more. That differentiation is not available if you don't give them the room with 3c. Because 3c elevates the level of the action, you need more to do it. If you pass and they bid 3h, are you sure that is the right place to play for them? Is letting them play 3h (or 4) "selling out"? Imagine the defense if partner has a stiff club. Club lead, cash the spade A, then clubs maybe forcing partner to ruff so you get their (hopefully) spade K and give you a ruff. They are vulnerable, why go for 110 when 200 may be there. Anyway, I'm beginning to tire of this. I can see I'm not going to change anyone's mind, so as I said initially, I'll wait for my next windmill to tilt at.

I'm not talking about discipline with the 3s hand. I agree that bidding a 3s bid that you know partner can pass is silly. My problem with this whole thing is having the agreement that 3s can be passed to begin with. With that agreement in place, you are basically acknowledging that you made an error in bidding 3c to begin with because partner was going to balance with 2s (or 3s). Now, after messing up the auction with 3c, you have to figure out the situation. So you say, in that case, 3s must always be passed. So now they have to bid 4s, but now 4s doesn't show THIS hand, it just shows any hand with GF values that has 6 spades. 2 of the people not in 4s were in 5c. I'm willing to bet the auction was similar to this one, got a 4s bid, and their partner bid 5c. Either they did that as a slam try, or were unsure of partner's spades. Either one of these views caused the bottoms they got. The title of this is what bridge has become. It has become less of a constructive conversation with your partner to determine what we can make, and more of a get your bid in fast and we'll figure it out later.

I kind of disagree with this. For me, the hand in question is the bottom of the range I would bid 3c with. Give me A xx xxxx AKQTxx and I would pass 2h. Yes, I can see that defending 2h is probably a bad idea, but partner is still there. What are they going to pass with? I always like to stress that you should be disciplined in the direct seat and aggressive when balancing. Passing tends to keep the auction in the range that you can deal with. If you can bid 3c with strong hands as well as hands that are not strong, but don't have a great deal of defense, then partner is always going to be guessing what you can make. On those occasions where partner can't balance, one of two things have occurred. Either we have missed out on a part score we could have made, or they have failed to drive to the game they could make. I can deal with the first occurrence if it will enhance the auctions where I don't pass.

I don't think 3s is absurd if you are proceeding under the assumption that it is forcing. I agree that having a good/bad 2n bid in your pocket is nice, this is a club game. I think not having a good/bad bid available, you should pass with the bad, not make partner guess. Most of this auction isn't high quality, I admit. Almost 50% of the field didn't find 4s, however, so I don't think this is isolated. I was astonished that one pair actually played in 2s!

So, I've been on this crusade for people to be more disciplined in their bidding for awhile now. Disciplined does not mean conservative, timid or imply you should underbid your hands. Simply put, if you make a bid that has a certain value to it, then your hand should live up to that valuation through overall strength or through distribution. [hv=pc=n&e=skqt97432ht5dk7c6&d=s&v=b&b=7&a=p1c1h1s2h3cp]133|200[/hv] So now you have this hand. What is 3c? Normally, it should show something like 16-18 with 6+ clubs and be invitational to game. With the interference, however, a lot of people like to play this as just "competitive", which to a number of people is synonymous with minimal (I hate defending). You know you are going to bid spades, but 3 or 4? 4 would tend to kill the auction destroying any chance of getting to a slam, but is 3 forcing? Without the interference, how many would play 3s as forcing? I was asked about this hand and I suggested the auction above, which is what they did, was correct. 3c should show a quality hand. Maybe not the 16 count needed without the interference, but might be shaded with heart shortness. I got the response of, "Well, we actually just play it as competitive, but I didn't know what to do with it". Their partner then bid 3s, which they both agree was weak. East didn't want to overbid in case partner was a minimum, and west didn't want to bury a partner with 4 points. 3s making 5. 8 out of 18 who played this failed to reach the easy 4s game. [hv=pc=n&s=sj5hk943dj432c873&w=sah87dq965cakqt52&n=s86haqj62dat8cj94&e=skqt97432ht5dk7c6&d=s&v=b&b=7&a=p1c1h1s2h3cp3sppp]399|300[/hv] Now, some NS pairs may have bid 1h-3h, I'm not sure how that changed things. Even with the preempt, it shouldn't be too difficult to get to 4s. The whole point of this, is that the lack of disciple in bidding has caused all these questions on how good hands are that bid at higher levels. I admit that if the opponents execute a preempt, you may be forced into guessing how high to go. These kind of scenarios should be easy, however. You just have to have the discipline to pass the 2h bid with minimal hands. Once partner knows that you have a good hand, it gets easy. Then on the flip side, the 3s bid should be forcing and forward going. You need the discipline to pass 3c with 6(or 7) spades and a lousy hand. Yes, it may actually make 3s and be the superior contract. I think it's better to have a constructive meaning to the bid than force partner to guess what in the world you have. See you when I spot my next windmill.

Look up playing a short club with transfer responses. Will solve all these problems.