rogerclee

In my experience when a team gets a ridiculous handicap, it's usually not close to being enough to offset how much better you are. Just play normally and let them show you why they're getting 1.5 IMPs per board.

I think 0.2-0.4 imps/board sounds about right, but it depends a lot on who A, B, and C are.

If you think double shows this, then definitely double, but the one thing you definitely cannot do is pass with a hand like this. The upside to bidding is extremely high.

I would pass but I definitely do not consider it "insane" to bid.

I like 4D, not going to commit to 5 but certainly won't mind if partner bids it, which he usually will with 5 diamonds and an acceptable hand.

6C

Yes this is a routine 2N bid to me.

Yes in theory but if I had never discussed it (which to be honest I have not), then I would just bid 4D and expect my partner to understand that I may or may not have a club control. To be clear, the second shows 18-19 balanced (or a hand you are choosing to treat that way) to me with a spade stopper. There are a lot of problem hands that I would choose to bid 2N with due to having no suitable alternative, so perhaps a better description is "invitational to a 3N game". You can play whatever agreements you like, but to the best of my knowledge this is very standard among American experts playing a 2/1 style.

1) I got some diamonds, yo 2) I got some points, yo

I play 2S would be natural and forcing fwiw. Every convention that shows a specific handtype is good when it comes up, it's not that important what your agreements are in a situation like this as long as you both know them. 1) 1S is obvious, spades will usually play better than hearts on a hand like this anytime partner has a doubleton (or singleton Q). On top of this it has lead directional value and is generally a more accurate description than 2D. 2) I like 4D but I think it's close, and 4H is fine. Thinking through his handtypes, 1633 is the shape where slam is usually bad, if he has 2 spades and/or 7 hearts and a good hand I like my chances. Edit: Just saw 1S is not forcing, that makes 4D obvious to me. We have pretty much literally a maximum hand for hearts given the previous action.

Most people would think that 3H shows a better hand than this. OP, did partner's x actually just show hearts, or did it show general values? I would bid 5H in either case.

So let me be clear that this is your chain of logic: 1) There once was a regional pair game that someone thought he had won, but in reality, Barry Crane won it by 2 boards. 2) You never played a single hand of bridge against Barry Crane in your life. Since so little has been written up about his play (since he did not participate much in high level IMP events, which is mostly what the literature covers), I assume that means that you know very little about how he actually played from either first hand knowledge or from study, and you are simply parroting the glamorization of a huge personality in bridge who met a sensational early end. 3) Therefore Barry Crane is the best matchpoint player of all time. 4) Therefore his weird view about 3m preempts that no top player in the modern game would even remotely agree with is worthy of consideration. You are also forgetting that Crane preferred his partners to play like robots, that he was fickle and capricious, and that his partners tried their best to please him even when his rules were illogical, since it was the only way to not have Crane steaming and ruining your game, despite superior bridge judgment saying otherwise.

For better or worse everyone I know now just opens these hands 2N and lives with missing the slams, since honestly, they are pretty hard to bid anyway. If i played an artificial method that allowed me to show a very powerful minor 1-suiter (but not quite a 2C opener) over a 1M response, then I would open 1D. Edit: Deleted some nonsense.

I find it incredibly easy to dismiss a decades-old theory formed at a time when the standard of play, and especially the standard of bidding theory, was much lower, especially when it is such an obviously bad one. Sorry there is a reason that the level of bridge is so much higher now, one of which is that bidding theories that haven't held up have been abandoned. It is also a huge stretch to say he is the best matchpoint player of all time. He might be adjusted for time, but my guess is someone like Meckstroth or Levin is currently better by a substantial margin than he ever was. Calling Crane the best matchpoint player of all time is like calling Schenken the best bridge player of all time, and telling someone they shouldn't be so quick to dismiss the Schenken club as a bidding system.

6D seems odds on to make so I would just bid it.

one time

I think 2N will be easier to play than 3D, seems like LHO will have tough defensive decisions and we know a lot about their hand, and hearts are breaking 4-4 anyway. I'm concerned about a trump promotion beating 3D, which won't be hard to find at all with this dummy.

You would rather pass, telling partner not to save while still giving them the whole 4 level, than double, suggesting that partner bids if he finds his hand appropriate? You are a highly logical guy, surely you can work out that this makes no sense.

I am dismissive of the downgraders because 1) This hand is especially poorly suited for double dummy simulation, I have all my values in two suits and no finesses to take. The defenders have a huge advantage in a double dummy simulation as opposed to in real life. 2) I am a strong believer in the intangible benefits to opening 1N when possible. As far as I know, virtually all top American experts agree with me to varying extents. They have been stated many times, I will not go into the details again. 3) To me, downgrading on this hand is very random. I am not opposed to downgrading 4333 15's, but this one seems absurd, we have concentrated honors in our 4 card suit and the 9's in both red suits are not worthless. 4) Maybe you find this unsatisfactory, but I have studied many hand records of world championship events or their equivalents. I have seen very few of these downgrades at this level and virtually none by the very best players, and certainly not on an above average 4333 15 count (or whatever the bottom end of their 1N range is). There is something to be said for simply emulating what the best players do, instead of thinking that your double dummy simulations and speculative theories on 4333 hands will give you an edge over the aforementioned world class players.

I would just double, it seems like unless partner has some extras that playing a 5-3 spade fit with spades breaking 4-1 is asking for a disaster.

I thought this was the expert forum, is there actually serious discussion about downgrading AKQx 9xx 9xx KQJ?

IMO bidding 3C will result in us getting to 3N down too often. Yes it is easy to construct many weak hands where we can make 5C but look at the actual hand and it will become obvious that it is not so easy to get to 5C when we belong there instead of 3N, unless south takes the (IMO antipercentage) view of always pulling 3N to 4C.

I feel like x and 2S are both better bids than pass.

Haha I saw this on reddit, well done. I ♥ the robodupes.

My favorite win is still my first junior team trials, so much adrenaline, don't think I've ever been that nervous about the outcome of a match, even though we were up about 60 with about 16 boards to play.