SlickRicky

Hi, I think anything but 1H is crazy. Ricky

Hi, I almost always transfer to the 6 card minor. I would not on hands like Qx Qx Qxx xxxxxx or other such contrived hands, but it would be quite rare for me. Ricky

Hi, I think that 4 is the most common number, but that 3 is more likely than 5. I would guess 3.75 on that basis. Ricky

Hi Ken, I pass happily! Ricky

Hi Ken, It's tempting to bid 4D or 5D with a hand like this, but I will go with a pedestrian 4C bid. If partner signs off we won't have a slam. Ricky

Hi, In my opinion 2S and 2N are NF, and 3 level bids are forcing. This is also consistent with new minor forcing, where 2 level bids by responder are NF (not that it need be consistent, just that the same logic applies). Ricky

Hi Roger, This seems like an easy pass. Even if 7H is cold, you will do fine being in 7C. Ricky

Hi Ken, I would bid 2N showing extra values and a diamond stopper with minimum shape. Ricky

Hi, This is a clear double, game is still in play opposite the right weak NT hand type or we could compete for the partscore. Additionally since we're a PH partner cannot get carried away. Ricky

Hi Roland, I disagree, I think it is common (at least in my area) to play this as a splinter for hearts. Of course partner will generally take you for 3 hearts rather than four since you made a delayed splinter, so you can't have everything. I had even thought this was "expert standard" but I guess not. I also think it is superior from a theoretical standpoint to play this as a splinter for hearts rather than clubs; it will be rare to have short diamonds and a club 1 suiter given that you have at most 2 hearts. Shapes like 3217 are possible but rare compared to 4315, 3316, some 3415s, etc. It also seems more likely to be useful information that you have a stiff diamond when you are the short trump hand, and you are more likely to want to be the captain of the auction when you have 7+ clubs. This is not to say that a splinter for clubs would be useless, I just think it would be less useful and less frequent. Ricky

Hi, I think that avoiding a bad grand opposite xxx clubs and getting partner to correctly evaluate the CQ and know about a source of tricks are both important features to this hand, so I will start with 2C. Ricky

Hi Mike, Obviously I just mistyped, and meant play a spade to the jack then pull the last trump rather than pull trump and lead a spade to the jack. I would hope a player of your caliber could see that I just reversed a trick, and would not disregard the whole line of play because of it! :) Ricky Well, given that in my post I made precisely the type of error that I accused you of, it seems to me that you are mistaken in your reference to 'a player of your calibre' :) I suggested winning the trump in dummy and crossing to my K in case I found trump to be 4-1. I then pressed enter and went to lunch.. as I was hitting the elevator button, I realized that if trump were 4-1, my line was hopeless: no diamond miracle is enough. And in fact the error that you made in your post and that I made in mine is precisely the type of error that can be made by a wide range of players, even experts such as I like to think I am, if not focussed... failing to project far enough ahead... in my defence, my error was dealing with a side issue, since I was pretty certain that trump were not 4-1. I could have drawn trump, crossed in diamonds to play spades, but that risks a diamond back, which might complicate matters prematurely, so I stay with my plan. Hi Mike, Indeed your line and my line 2 were the exact same in spirit (except that we both mistyped, but no doubt had the same [good] line in mind), except that you remembered to cash a top diamond first which is a stronger play! Ricky

Hi Phil, Your math is off by quite a bit. I think you can see this if you think of it like this: You go down with both spade honors offside which is 25 %. So if your line is 74 %, you are making almost every single time that both spade honors are offside. Obviously this is not the case as you also are losing to Hx or stiff H on right and DQ on left. That is about an additional 7.5 % of the time, which makes your line 66.5 % However, if you agree with me that LHO is likely to lead from KQ of spades at least some of the time, then the percentage of success for that line becomes even lower. That being said, my suggested line 1 has at least that good of a chance even if they pitch perfectly (more than the 64 % that dburn stated because you can pick up 5-1 or 6-0 diamonds onside so long as LHO has 1 spade honor also, making it about 69 %). If you add in the significant chance of a mispitch, I think that it is clearly the right line Ricky

Hi Mike, Obviously I just mistyped, and meant play a spade to the jack then pull the last trump rather than pull trump and lead a spade to the jack. I would hope a player of your caliber could see that I just reversed a trick, and would not disregard the whole line of play because of it! :) Ricky

Hi Phil, Is it common to play WJS by passed hands? Is this what you play in your partnerships? Ricky

Hi, Two possible lines come to mind immediately. 1) Run off all the trumps and lead a diamond to the jack. Assuming 3-2 trumps (very likely from lead) this will make when the DQ is on or when diamonds are 3-3. It will also make if LHO pitches a diamond from Qxxx, or if RHO pitches a diamond from 4 small which seems very possible given that they know nothing about my hand. If trumps are 4-1 fall back on 3-3 diamonds with Q on. 2) Win the heart ace, heart to king. Assuming 3-2 trumps run spade ten. Assuming it loses and a club comes back we have to win, pull trumps, diamond to hand, and spade to the jack. This line loses with both spade honors off or with LHO having Hxxx(x) of spades AND the DQ. This line is worse than line 1, especially given the opening lead decreasing the chances of the KQ of spades being onside. Line 1 looks to be the best both technically and in giving the opponents a chance to err. Please note I ignored undertricks/overtricks as I expect to be the only one in this slam. Ricky

Hi, 1N and then pass seems clear enough. Sure clubs could play better, but why gamble over 2H when you have at least 7 of them and possibly 8, and no sure fit in clubs which you will have to play one level higher. Ricky

Hi Roger, This seems like an overbid to me. This hand is only worth 18 in my book; the fifth club is offset by the poor honor structure and by being off shape (stiff heart). Additionally, it seems like this could be problematic if the auction gets competitive and partner jumps to 4H (although this is unlikely, it is possible). Ricky

Hi, I think obviously you will have worse results than the field when you have a weak 2 bid. Whether or not you gain enough to compensate for that depends on the system I suppose. Ricky

Hi, Competitive auctions can be extremely difficult after the 1D opener, even with good methods. That is the biggest downside of precision to me. Ricky

Hi, I prefer 1N as the least evil bid. 2C seems offbase, and 1S seems less descriptive and more risky than 1N. The other option, pass, hoping to make a takeout X of hearts later is flawed because we might not get to show how strong our hand is safely, and the auction might not go how we plan. Ricky

Hi Cherdano, Thanks. With 5 hearts and 4 clubs would you tend to rebid 2H or 3C? Ricky

Hi Josh, I don't understand this comment, could you please clarify? ...... Anyway, I agree with your point that this hand is huge uhhhhhh Hi Josh, I suppose I did not make my question obvious enough, so I will try again. Your comment about the 2H rebid seems superfluous, as the 2H rebid limits your hand no more than the initial pass. Did you mean to imply anything about the 2H rebid, or were you merely writing some extra words? Ricky

Not quite sure why partner needs to have extras of any kind to reopen with a double. If you play negative doubles, it's routine to double with balanced minimums in case partner had a penalty double. If partner's reopening with a double does imply extras, it wasn't stated in the original post. What part of "or" do you not understand? The very part of "or" that you appear to be totally clueless about. The way "or" is understood in normal written English. In case you have trouble comprehending it, which I suspect you will, let me elaborate: Partner doesn't need to have either spade length "or" extras to reopen with a double to protect partner's penalty double. The only thing you can infer is that partner doesn't have length in Diamonds. Any pattern such as 2533, 2524, 3523, 3532 will suffice with minimum values for the reopening double. Hi Sathya, You really should not be so aggressive and hostile when you are clearly wrong. Cherdano seem to understand the word or, but he also seems to understand bridge. Cherdano's error in this thread was to assume it was "or" that you misunderstood, rather than fundamental bridge. In case you have trouble comprehending my post, which I suspect you will, let me elaborate: Reopening with a doubleton spade and a minimum is a mistake that not even a beginner would make. Ricky

Hi Josh, I don't understand this comment, could you please clarify? My understanding is that 2H is not limiting your hand at all, and could be bid with as much as you would pass with to begin with. Anyway, I agree with your point that this hand is huge and that slam is possible, for example partner can have Ax x AKQx KQxxxx. However, it seems precipitous to rule out 4H as we have not yet showed a 6 card suit, let alone such a good one (relative to a non 2H opener). I prefer to bid 4C to allow partner to bid 4H if he wants, and otherwise to try for slam with all the hands where slam can make (afterall, 3C is NF, so his hand is limited). Ricky