iggygork

If all you'd like to do is kibitz, CloudBrowse is an option as well, it renders the BBO Flash interface reasonably well.

Actually, this is one of those irregularities that are covered in the Laws of Duplicate Bridge, see Law 67 B 2(a) (Defective Trick, After Both Sides Play To The Next Trick). So yes on 1. As for the penalty card possibility, if the extra card has been exposed, it becomes a penalty card (see footnote to 2(a)). http://www.acbl.org/assets/documents/play/...cate-Bridge.pdf, see page 81.

Although I went for -500 (isn't 4NT auto here once they bounce to 4♠? Guess not.), I ♥ the format. Gorkem

I play them more as a range of attitudes about the suit itself and how much of a shift I can stand to other suits; it is primarily about the suit led but also encompasses some information about the rest of my hand. Hence, I may lead second lowest from T8xxx if I hold a yarborough outside of this suit but second or third highest if I have something like KQx on the side.

Penalty double of diamonds.

Playing IMPs (A/X Swiss), all white, you deal and you and your partner have the following sequence (opps silent): 1♦ - 1♥ 2♣ - 3♦ * invitational, NF. 3♠* - 4♣** *Do you have a spade stopper for 3NT? ** No. Tough. 4♦ - ? Is 4♦ forcing at IMPs? At MPs? You are playing a basic 2/1 with 15-17 NT framework. 1♦ followed by 2♣ showed 5-4 or better in ♦ and ♣, we would open 1♣ with 4-5 in the minors. I thought it was forcing (as the opener showed extras by bidding 3NT and who wants to stop in 4♦ at IMPs anyway?), pard did not. We shopped the auction around and there was a schism of opinion among the local experts, so I am curious as to what the larger expert community thinks. Thank you in advance.

Would it be possible to add an RSS feed option to the forums? I am not even sure if the Invision software has this functionality, but it would make it so much easier to consume my daily dose of bridge news and chat, especially on my mobile. Another good place for a feed would be a "myhands" feed so that one could get all the boards that a favorite BBO player (or a star say) played in the last X days.

When I play a weak NT (10-12 or 12-14), I always alert the single major suit raise by opener when playing in club games and all tournaments except KOs. In the Pacific Northwest most people play a strong NT and I feel that it is my duty to inform them that I will not hold a hand (weak NT with four trumps or three to an honor plus shortness on the side) that they would expect. In KOs, I make a pre-alert and invite the opps to look at the card. As ACBL Alert regulations are permissive rather than prohibitive (i.e. there is an emphasis on alerting although it may not be required or opps might be expected to know) and I would rather have full disclosure than selective disclosure, this works for me. I am yet to be taken to task, of course your mileage may vary.

Playing against a much, much better team in an 8 board a round Sectional Swiss match, you pickup: [hv=d=s&v=n&s=skxxxhkjxxdaxckt9]133|100|Scoring: IMP[/hv] You estimate that you are behind in this match and this is board 6 (out of 8). Playing 12-14 NT and four way transfers by responder, you have the following auction (opps silent): 1NT (12-14) - 2♠ (transfer to ♣) - 2NT (denying as much as Jxx in ♣, a misbid), 3♣ by pard Pard's 3♣ is normally any hand with 6+♣ that cannot force to game, nominally 0-10 HCP, the higher end unlikely with solid or near solid clubs. What now? Pass or bid on?

Thank you very much Fred and Ben, this should be cool!

If I recall correctly, there was an announcement about a BBO members' social at Nashville and Uday and Fred were going to announce some up and coming new features of BBO at this gathering. Unfortunately I did not make it to Nashville but I would love to hear from those who attended about these new developments. Thank you in advance.

You may want to read the Appeal Case 1 in the Nashville Tuesday bulletin before reading the rest... Reading today's (7/24/07) bulletin from Nashville, I was surprised to see that not only was "the Committee very concerned" at the lack of a proper explanation of the 3♦ checkback bid as it related to South's spade holding on N/S's CC, but also that the Committee rejected the appeal of N/S in full yet issued neither a PP (Procedural Penalty) nor an AWMW (Appeal Without Merit Warning). What does it take for a committee to issue these warnings and/or penalties if not something this egregious (a possible intent to deceive by insufficient explanation combined with a rejected appeal)? Maybe the writeup is incomplete, but they are usually pretty good at getting these details right.

Isn't 2♦ over an opp's X not forcing in BWS? Seems like a pretty common agreement here in the Pacific Northwest. If I could, I would bid 2♣ as a transfer, if not 2♦ seems about right, the spade bid and raise problem notwithstanding. It might work as a lead director, too.

I was happy to pass in Part 1 and now am equally content to bid 2♠ in this very strange auction (why is pard silent with almost half the deck?) It sounds like pard has a biggish hand with 5 lousy hearts (at least I hope they are lousy, otherwise I probably just turned a plus into a minus) and we should be able to make something in a black suit. If I get doubled in ♠, I will probably run to ♣ next.

Double. They got me.

I thought the reverse of this was "standard". As opposed to the standard inverter minors, the invitational minor suit hands are handled with the jump to the other minor, so 1♣-2♣ and 1♦-2♦ are pure game forces. 1♦-2♣ is natural, but now probably has to be inv+ even in a 2/1 GF framework. That is one of the most difficult auctions in 2/1 anyway, so overloading the 2♣ response with the inv. club hands probably makes it even tougher to devise suitable continuations after it. When I played this with a partner, the criss-cross never really came up and when it did we were not that better off than those pairs who used "standard" inverted raises of minors. If you have a good structure in place after your inverted minor raises, you can probably dispense with criss cross and have the benefit of 1♦-3♣ as inv. clubs.

I think this is the same hand (from Ulf Nilssen's blog): http://viewsfromthebridgetable.blogspot.co...grave-yard.html His commentary is somewhat different than the consensus here (I doubled, too).

While the 1♥ response with a three card heart suit is certainly a questionable choice, I don't think a 5♠ advance over 5♣ is warranted. As 5♣ takes up so much room, it should probably be a picture bid, denying any useful values in ♠ and ♦. It is just possible that North bid 1♥ due to lack of a forcing minor raise and completed the description of his hand within one card (the missing ♥) with his picture jump.

X followed by NT (1NT hopefully).

I am torn. I convinced myself that pass, double, and 4♥ could all be right, depending on who pard is and who the opps are. I will bid 4♥, expecting it to be a good sac against 3NT (lose 1-2 spades, 2 diamonds, 1 heart).

Thank you to everyone for contributing their expertise and views. Most responders thought that the hand was worth a drive to 6♠. Here's the second part of this little hand: Everything is exactly the same but.... Pard alerts your 3♥ bid as "showing shortness" right before she bids 4♠ after leftie's 4♦. The alert is a misalert, there is no such agreement (except in partner's head). 4♠ was bid in tempo. Now, is there UI for the opener? If so, does it suggest going forward or staying put? What should you do? Does the 4♠ bid suggest whereagles' hand for pard rather than say, Kxx KJxxx x xxxx? Would you factor pard's lack of expertise into the decision? I find these problems too tough to solve in the heat of the moment and am interested in knowing what people do in these situations.

I am not the expert pro either, this hand was given to me under these conditions. If you did not bid 3♥, would you make some other forward going move or make double to end all penalty doubles? :P

Playing in a club MP event, all vul, you hold: [hv=d=s&v=b&s=sajxxxxxhaxxdakqc]133|100|Scoring: MP[/hv] Playing 2/1 with Bergen raises, You open 1♠, leftie passes, pard bids 2♠, and now rightie comes in with 3♦! You bid 3♥ (random game try, the only one available, 3♠ would be competitive, X would be penalty and probably wise :P), leftie raises to 4♦. Pard now bids 4♠, rightie passes. And now you are in the hot seat. Do you go slamming? If so, what is your call? All 5 level suit bids below 5♠ are cues (first round controls first in uncontested auctions, actual situation undiscussed). If it changes your view of the situation, you may assume that you are an expert pro playing with an intermediate client who has about 700 MPs. Gorkem

There lies the problem... Indeed therein lies the problem. I think this hand will partition the responders into the expected three camps: 2C, pass and 1NT (in descending order of popularity). The question is which of these actions will result in a positive IMP expectation (2C and 1NT reaching some game making, possibly through the misdescriptions of suit quality (2C) or hand type (1NT) leading to misdefense in 3NT versus pass and then defending something doubled with no game our way). Of course, there is always the hideous possibility of (1♥)-1NT-(X).... I really do not like the idea of playing some number of spades in our 5-1 or 6-1 fit after 1NT and a transfer and my gut feeling is that pard will look at the colors and bid 3NT with some subminimum hands expecting the clubs to come in. I have nowhere near the experience Justin has, so, absent a simulation, I am passing but am willing to be convinced that action is warranted.

To paraphrase a well known expert or two, I pass as the club suit is too sick for me to overcall and the spade suit is too sick for me to overcall 1NT. There was an exhortation in bridge books a while back to pass with length in opponent's suit(s) unless one had overwhelming strength, but the other comments seem to indicate that that has gone the way of the horse cart and snail mail. I will just hope that I can do something intelligent on the later rounds of the auction.