sathyab

What's interesting about the hand that Jeff offered as an example of one that would bid 4h over 3h is that it's significantly different from any that anyone else has offered so far. In addition to being 5-5, it's a 5-5 containing a stronger side-suit and a Jxxxx of trumps, the presumption being that the heart fit has improved the potential of the hand. In other words a 3-card fit does a lot more to improve the value of a hand with a trump suit of Jxxxx and a side suit of Akxxx rather than a trump suit of Akxxx and a side suit of Jxxxx.

Much better line, as it leaves the option open for a double-threat in either of the rounded suits. The only problem as you said is to guess which suit West has given up on the fourth Diamond. If he was dealt 4-2-2-5, he has two comfortable club pitches and now if you believe that he has given up clubs you will go wrong. But the tempo of the discarding might tell you that he had no problem with his club discards and that he therefore had only two hearts to start with. Or when he was dealt 4-4-2-3. Especially when the clubs don't include the Queen, he pitches one heart and then two clubs, and of course the squeeze wasn't going to work anyway.

I think your question was very poorly phrased Art. It looks like you didn't aim for an answer that would enlighten you, but tried to get an answer that could help you win the argument here. Of these 5 choices "rare, but possible" was probably the furthest away from "suspicious". For next time, how about including: 6) nothing special 7) not uncommon. Anyway, I'm glad Jeff made it clear that there are indeed hands where there are no logical alternatives but bidding 2NT first and then 4H. The wording of the question or the choices that were offered as possible answers didn't seem to affect Jeff's opinion. It's to Art's credit that he forwarded the opinion of an authority which as you youself note, with unconcealed jubiliation if I might add, is at variance with Art's own position. If his aim was to elicit a response that supported his argument why would he do that ?

But the question that was posed was "How do you proceed" and it was after you've already used up the other high spade honor in hand to repeat the Diamond finesse. If you want to take the club finesse before the second Diamond finesse, you have to come to hand with a spade. Now the club finesse loses and back comes a heart, which you have to win in dummy as you need the other heart entry to untangle clubs. The upshot of all this is that you have to cash both heart honors, cash clubs and then take the second Diamond finesse...

Holding off on the first round of Diamonds was good defense, for now you can't make the hand any more when the club Q was on. Regardless of where you win the heart, you can't take the club finesse and enjoy three clubs. It appears as though West led from length in spades. The only chance I think is a double-squeeze for which the defense must co-operate. Cash the Ace of spades and run Diamonds. If the five-card ending is: [hv=n=sxhxdxcaj&w=sxhxdcxxx&e=shxxdcxxx&s=shkxdckxx]399|300|[/hv] the last Diamond wil squeeze RHO out of his club stopper. You throw a heart now and so does West. Now a heart squeezes West in the black suits. But if East had kept clubs and thrown hearts earlier warning his pd that he should look after the majors, West would thow all his clubs and the sqeeze would evaportate unless East was the only one who could guard hearts to start with.

If pard has only a 5-4, then he has an extra black card doesn't he? Construct a hand for pard that you are specifically worried about. An extra black card won't really help as much an additional red card. AQx AQxxx KQxx x, would be a hand, that can definitely cause concern, but I doubt that he'd bid 4nt with that hand. With AQx AQJXX KQxx X, it's closer, although now he should be worrying about whether you have the King of Spades, as King of clubs won't do. But regardless, given the fact he bid 4nt without the King of hearts, he was going to settle for 6D if you didn't show the King of hearts and try for 7D with it.

1NT 2♦ 2♥ 3♦ (or 3♣ which I sometimes play) 3♥ 4♣ (shortness) 4♦ 4♠ 5♣ 6♣ 6♦ 7♥ 7NT Might be biased, you be the judge. But if you believe it through 7♥ then north can certainly convert, he knows the spade king is likely the 13th trick. I still only would at mps though, maybe partner has Axx AKQxxx Qxxx -? South might not introduce the diamonds on that hand but not sure I want to take the chance. A few quick questions about the 4♣ bid: Do you have an explict agreement that the shapely hand will show his shortage in this sequence? For example, would a 3♠ bid have shown Spade shortness? Also, does the cue bid explictly promise a void or could it be made on a singleton? Last but not least, do you have any explict meaning assigned to 4♦? I'm certainly not criticizing the methods, however, I'm not used to this set of agreements and don't really understand the full ramifications of this choice of methods. 1nt 2d 2h 3d 3h 4c ? I was thinking about that 4c bid too. Why 4c bid instead of the space-saving cue-bid of 3s until I saw the explantion. At the table I bid 3s over 3d, which was a spade cue-bid in support of Diamonds, inferentially preferring Diamonds to Hearts. Naturally I hadn't anticipated subsequent developments which worked out really well on this pair of hands, but I just felt that it was more important to show my Diamond support with two top honors rather than heart preference with JTx. Over 3s pd bid 5c, X by RHO. Not having discussed responses to exclusion in detail, let alone intervention over it, I bid 5d which I hoped he'd take as showing two keys outside clubs (ROPI, so XX and Pass would be the first two steps I hoped). Partner probably placing me with the King of Spades, AK of Diamonds, bid 7d ! Once he bid 7d, I had no trouble constructing the hand he was actually dealt, solid hearts and the Ace of Spades in addition of QJxxx of Diamonds. So I "corrected" it to 7nt !

What is a fat-free grand you might ask ? Two 5-3 fits with a combined 150 honors in both, two Aces and a King in the other suits. We got there, but being a first time partnership, the bidding sequences wasn't very convincing. How'd other bid it ? [hv=d=n&v=e&n=sk762hjt3daktcat9&w=sj4h652d93ckqj754&e=sq983h74d876c8632&s=sat5hakq98dqj542c]399|300|Scoring: MP[/hv] Opponents being vulnerable, the ony interference you might get is a double over a possible 5c bid by South.

My perspective of the clues is that RHO is 3=5=1=4 and LHO is 4=2=3=4. It's possible that I'm off by a card. If LHO has the ♣A, I'm not sure I can do anything about it. What I wasn't clear about on Justin's first line was how we are going to get back to hand to collect our ♣K after we've ducked to LHO's now stiff A? I can't see anything better at this point than playing RHO for the ♣A, but I'm still thinking about it. You discard a spade fom dummy retaining AKQ of spades and two clubs in dummy and play a low club to LHO's Ace. LHO has been strip squeezed in the balck suits if he did have four spades and the Ace of clubs.

Had it gone 2c-2d-2nt showing a bigger hand than a 2nt opening showing 20-21, you could make a quantitative raise to 4nt. Partner can suggest playing in a minor suit slam by bidding 5nt or 6m. Over 2nt I'd need a bit more.

How is 3h the most descriptive call unless you were playing a cue-bid of opponents suit at the 2-level as GF ? It has the potential to take you beyond a comfortable level in clubs. When partner has only two clubs, he'll pass out of fear of pushing to the 4-level on a 5-2 fit, not because 3h is the best spot. The fundamental problem here is that the opener needs an escape route when asked to bid again. There has to be an agreement about what to do with a non-descript 5-3-3-2 hand that he has already bid. Bidding 3h now could quite reasonably deny a six-bagger in clubs. I think the solution is to put the idle bid of 3d, which has no natural meaning, to better use. You now have 3c, 3d and 3h all available to bid hands that lack a spade stopper. One agreement might be to play 3c to just show 5 clubs, no 3 hearts, so a 3=2=3=5 hand or a sub-minimum if it does include a six-bagger, 3d to show a six-bagger without 3 hearts and 3h to show a six-bagger with 3 hearts.

What is wrong with a 2♣ rebid on these cards? All partner knows at this point is we have 4+ hearts and 6-7 points. After the 2♠ cue, we are certainly encouraged, but there isn't any reason to go nuts since we are in a forcing auction. Ok, 2c the first time around with AKQxxx and a good 14 HCP is fine. But why would you be bidding 3h with that hand instead of 3s over partner's 2s? 3s definitely suggests very good clubs, not sure whether it's asking for a full stopper or a half stopper. If partner was not interested in NT at all then he must be prepared to play in 4c knowing my 2c rebid denied 4 hearts. The 2s bid by partner is either looking for NT or to play in clubs, I don't think partner is bidding this way with interest in playing hearts. What was he going to do if you merely rebid 3c or bid 2nt when you were dealt fewer than three hearts.

Dwayne, how short do you think pard's spades are? RHO didn't preempt and LHO didn't raise or jump raise. I'd be more concerned about a 3=3=1=6 than get optimistic pard has a 1=3=3=6. 2♠ is fine. Pard might have a partial spade stop: Qx, Kxx, xx, AKQxxx, so I'll try 3♠ with the intention of passing 4♣. How much worse can 4♣ play than 3♥? Unlikely that partner's clubs are as good as AKQxxx. With that kind of a suit and a good hand, he should probably be trying to get to 3nt himself instead of bidding 2c. Over 2s, he'd have bid 2nt holding a full stopper. So I'm ruling out a hand with solid clubs and no stopper, as also a hand with good clubs and a full stopper. The chances of getting to a makeable 3nt are diminishing rapidly here. A 3s bid asking for a partial stop would be consistent with a hand that contained the presumed missing club honor(s).

I disagree with the whole idea. If I have a minimal overcall and 2C comes back to me I pass. The advantage is that partner knows I have something when I take another call, especially when I reverse like here. Extra values. What is a minimal overcall if you did have to balance over 2c ? Most people play that a simple overcall is limited to about 17, so the overcall can be slightly stronger than this hand, but not a lot stronger. You had expressed your opinion quite firmly the first time around. I posted again hoping to elicit the opinon of others. May be you should follow your advice about bidding when it comes to posting too. If you have already bid your values, pass. If you have nothing more to add to your previous post, pass.

How good a hand do you need, to compete over 2c ? In an auction where only minors have been mentioned and it comes back to you at the 2-level, it's practically forcing at MP. I wouldn't pass if my Ace of spades were replaced by the decuce for instance. Having said that, I am not suggesting that I'd bid again with this hand just because I could have made the same bid with a weaker hand. I realize you can't have a bid for every additional Ace. But may be the auction wouldn't have come back to you at the two level, if you were an Ace short. May be someone else at the table would find a bid over 2c. It looks as though your LHO has a 'tweener, not quite weak enough to bid 3c the first time, but not strong enough for an action like say double over 2h showing cards perhaps ? Given that what should your partner expect if you did double 3c ?

Not sure if the word "re-compete" exists, but it'd be useful if it did. Playing in a decent but not terribly strong field, dealer on your right opens 1c. Red/white, you hold A2 AKJ5 KJT84 54 and the bidding proceeds, (1c)-1d-(2c)-p-(p)-2h-(3c)-p-(p). Is it obvious to pass now ? If the vulneraibility were reversed, would it make a difference ? Would a double now tend to deny 3=4=5=1 shape as you didn't double on the previous round ?

Perhaps he told them that that hand is good enough to force to game opposite a 2C response? That brings up an interesting question. What is the "standard" treatment in bidding after a "free bid" especially when the free bid is at the 3-level. If it went 1s-(2h), do people still play 3c/d as only one round force, prepared to pass partner's minimum rebid or is it different because of the higher level of the free bid ?

If you told them it was OK to bid 3d I hope one of them would ask you what you'd bid with QJxx Ax AKQxxx x.

Here's my $0.02. 1) Read anything and everything ever written by H.W.Kelsey about this game. 2) If you haven't already done so, get Larry Cohen's RealDeal CD's. If you aspire to be an expert some day, it'd be a shame if you didn't take advantage of the best interactive lessons in Bridge that's available out there. 3) If you're one of those that unfortunately has a good memory for bridge deals, curb your tendency to rush through the hands in (1) or (2) above, for if you miss the gist of a hand, it'll take you a lot longer to revisit them than your counterpart with 64k memory. 4) "Be a good partner; ask yourself how you could have done better". Sage advice, the bridge-equivalent of "Ask not what the country can do for you but what you can do for the country". Back in the real world, my practical advice is: play with peers, someone who's evenly matched with your abilities. If your parter is a lot better than you, you'll suffer from a feeling of inadequacy. If on the other hand you're a lot better than your pd, it'll frustrate you. 5) Cultivate buddies that you can confess your partner's sins to B) Seriously though, you need someone who has the time to listen to you and is honest enough to tell you if you're the one who screwed up on a given hand. 6) No matter what you do, try to do it thoughtfully at the table. In other words even if you do something that doesn't work out on a hand, if you remember the thoughts you had at the moment that you erred, you can go back, re-examine them and correct them. This is really hard when you play a lot of bridge, even two session events for instance, as you have to conserve your energy for playing. So you have to get into the habit of being able to replay them mentally later. Bottom-line is that making thoughtful mistakes is the first step toward avoiding them eventually. 7) How much to play and how much to study ? The challenge is to transfer as much of your off-line thinking ability to on-line execution. So allow yourself enough time to analyze your performance fairly well before you play the next game, so you can bolster your off-line capability from the last session that you played.

Ok, say you make an RKC bid with 4c. Partner bids 4nt showing 2 key cards with the Queen. Now what ? Aren't you worried partner may have no Diamond control ? What if he held AKQx QJxx xx Axx ! Not that your partner would be that unkind to you, but I was to mine (:- I'd have liked to pose this problem as an interactive bidding problem, offering choices a La Larry Cohen's RealDeal CD's or the BBO Master hand series. I wish I could have hinted that real problem would come after the key card response with respect to Diamond control without tipping you off to bid 6c. But couldn't you still bid 6c after partner's 4nt response realizing that only real danger is when he has no Diamond control ? If pd had the Ace of Diamonds instead of the Ace of clubs, you still make 6c. Unfortunatley the format of scoring being MP it's really tough to give up on 6h. My LHO was dealt a Diamond honor, which was the only picture card in her hand and she led a Diamond. It was good lead but one that a lot of others would make, I thought. But surprsingly 6h off 1 was only about 16% MP in a fairly strong field (it was the finals of the two-day All Western Pairs).

This hand came up in the Santa Clara regional last weekend and gave us a fair amount of trouble, as I suspect it might have a lot of other people. I'd like to know how others might handle this pair of hands. Your partner opens a 15-17 1NT and bids 2h in response to your stayman inquiry. How do you proceed with xx AKxx Kx KQJTx ?

Ok, I got it now. I was confused by your statement that "South has to keep a club and two hearts, so has to throw a spade", which made it unclear as to how many cards were left in your ending. After a spade, Ace of hearts, Ace of clubs and five Diamonds, South must retain the Qx of hearts and the King of clubs. Now the end-play you suggested works reagrdless of South's other cards, as North is the only one for the defense that can win the spade tricks and forced to yield to dummy's heart tenace.

The problem with that solution it works agaianst a different defense, not the one stipulated in the original problem. To repeat, what I stated is that defense started with a high spade lead from South and ducked the first trick. Now if you cash five Diamonds and the Ace of hearts, South has two easy spade pitches, 1 heart pitch and two club pitches. Where's the end-play or squeeze now ?

Of course the spots conspire to force South to win the third spade, if he led the fourth best. But as DF bases its claims on a double-dummy basis, it wouldn't mind if South led the 8 or 7 of spades. Some would lead X from a holding xXxx anyway. Now if declarer tries to return a spade North can cash three spade tricks and return a club which shatters all chances of a tenth trick. Besides, declarer can discard a heart of the third spade from dummy, but what does he do on the fourth sapde ?

[hv=d=s&v=n&n=sak53h7654d8732ct&w=st2hkj32dqt654cq7&e=sqj9hadakj9caj852&s=s8764hqt98dck9643]399|300|Scoring: MP[/hv] Nashville LM pairs 1st session. Quite a few of you may have played/defended this hand. But there were quite a few 14 and 15 table sections, so some of you may have missed it as well. Most likely bidding would go p-p-p-1c-p-1h-p-2d-p-3d-p-3nt. After a spade lead by South, ducked by North it looks like defense can hold declarer to 9 tricks. But Deep Finesse claims EW can make tricks. Can anyone spot a line of play for ten tricks after this start ?