JLOL

I thought the point of this hand was that 5D might be down 800 against no slam so maybe we ought to bid 4, but I think that the chances of going only 500 down are too great not to bid it. Would never consider anything other than 4D or 5D with this hand.

Guess I'm the only one who plays it as natural NF in auction 1

LOL

I was playing against Gavin at a regional and we had this suit combo and I insta played for 32. Anyways, according to my calculations its about 53.6% to 46.4% without bidding. So if you think that 1 time every 15 they won't play the K from KT doubleton when they have it then you should be finessing. I would expect almost everyone to not play it 1 time every 15. If I knew my opp to be both very expert (truly world class), and also at least somewhat deceptive, and also one who is careful with stuff like this (there are many players who are world class who seem be lazy about things like this which rarely matter). The other thing is you are never making a huge error by finessing even if they are one of the few people who always find the falsecard. If they are one of the many people who never find the falsecard though you have made a really really big error. In those spots is usually better to go for the big win play that sacrifices a little bit against perfect play. All that theoretical stuff aside, on this hand we certainly have clues from the bidding. If hearts are 71 then lefty will have 2 diamonds rather than 1 more than 8 times as often! This means that if lefty will falsecard more than 12.5 % of the time you should play for the drop. I would assume any real expert player, or perhaps a youngish and/or tricky intermediate player or someone who reads forums a lot could find this with that frequency. I would still hook against most club players, but against a random in flight A I would definitely go for the drop. Even if RHO can have 6 hearts it's about 6 times as likely they have 2 rather than one diamond on our left and our cutoff point for their frequency of falsecarding has to be 1 in 6 which is not that often. Edit: I think I did some math wrong, it's 1 in 4 not 1 in 8. That makes it closer and makes their age more important for the read :P

Uhh no I have said the OPPOSITE twice.

Nice auction by gnasher and his pard imo.

It doesnt matter that partner can have some good hands when your hand is terrible. If you have a hand that you think might make game but is not good enough for 3C with this shape you can bid 2D sometimes. Like with a good 7 or 8 I would bid 2D, and with about 9+ I would bid 3C with this shape. Obviously use hand evaluation in conjunction with these numbers.

Seems like a routine 3S bid

Huh? This seems backwards. If your agreement is inv+ and partner said it is just inv then he might have a hand worth a slam try opposite an inv+ 2D bid but no slam interest opposite just an inv hand. This suggests bidding 6 since our hand is the "plus." On the other hand if our agreement is inv then I have no UI if I meant it as inv and am just gambling. I think you really cannot rule against someone if they say they meant it as inv and that is their agreement. The hand is 10 HCP and I could see a lot of bad players not thinking it's worth a GF (partner could have 3C and 12 points!) but then bidding slam. There are a lot of instances in bridge laws where the honor code applies and someone can lie and get away with it, but that's the nature of the game. You can't just say they are lying without a really conclusive example imo.

What exactly is the UI supposed to be? If you are suggesting there was UI from the BIT before opening 1C showing a good hand, well maybe but when they bid 5C they also are showing a good hand anyways and it's not clear to me what a BIT before opening 1C shows (maybe 55 blacks, maybe a marginal opener, maybe a hand that is upgrading from 1N, maybe... etc). Not much there. If you are suggesting there was UI from teh BIT before bidding 5C I disagree, that doesn't really show anything in particular. Maybe they are thinking of trying for 3N, maybe they're thinking about whether to jump to game or just try for game, maybe they're thinking of trying for slam etc... If you are suggesting there is UI from the explanation of 2D=invitational and not inv+ then that is only true if 2D was actually inv+. If the opps can show that their agreement is inv then there was no UI, responder just made a dumb bid (I had only 10 points!). If the opps cannot show that their agreement was inv then you just have to judge it, but depending on the level of the players I don't think treating this hand as inv is TOO outlandish (10 points LOL) to just say that it is impossible that someone did that so they must be lying and you have to give them the benefit of the doubt. So basically I'm not clear what UI there was that people think the player took advantage of that suggested bidding 6C.

Obviously if I meant 2D as inv+ and I had UI I would pass now btw. That wasn't specified though.

Because its face to face and you heard it. LOL

West should lead the right count card but his actual card just makes it look like he has Axxxx. If he has Jxxxx it isn't going to do anything to play the 9. If south had x AKJxxx AQJxx J it would still be necessary to play the king to set this.

This is gonna change our lives and make them even more convenient! :)

Are you serious Roland? How is 1 discard ever going to help declarer? And it's completely auto to underlead your CA on this auction which east should be aware of. And if declarer has the club ace and it's not stiff he is not playing low at trick 1. This is a serious LOL.

Yeah this was a really bad line. Why would you play a diamond to the jack if you are planning to try and squeeze west? This way you get to go down if LHO has KT of diamonds and 5 spades. If you are not trying to squeeze west and want to try an endplay then you should strip out the spades in case RHO has 3 spades and the DT and is endplayed. And the squeeze is a bad line anyways because if LHO has 5 spades they are unlikely to have 4 diamonds, and if they have Kxx you can just ruff out diamonds, and if they have Kx then it's coming down anyways.

I would bid slam but I would never have shown an invitational hand so I guess it's pretty moot. I think slam must be percentage now though, partner is a big favorite to hold a diamond void and 2 (or 3) aces I think.

As far as image goes, if you want to appeal to the true game players (of which there are a lot) the fact that bridge is the most complex and tough card game in the world needs to be actively promoted. This isn't even really disputed, even the poker players who don't play bridge but have heard about it just automatically concede this point lol. Playing the toughest card game would really appeal to a lot of gamer types. To appeal to the average person the fact that big money can be involved in bridge (high stakes rubber bridge, the cavendish, top professionals) should be promoted. People don't know that you can make a lot of money playing bridge. Even if 99.99% are unlikely to ever do so, that's the kind of thing that gets people interested in some games and sports in the beginning. The fact that there are world championships and highly competitive tournaments with great rivalries and upsets and drama should also be promoted. Think about Bobby Fischer, why he made chess way more popular. There has been a great Italy/USA rivalry for a while, some press about that woulda been good etc. Also pictures of any Swedish girl world champions doesn't hurt :)

I was realllly into hearts and spades before I played bridge (and while I was just learning I was still more serious about those games). Learning bridge from scratch is overwhelming I'm sure, but if you've played spades bridge is not nearly as foreign. I would say probably a third of the kids my age and even younger know how to play spades in USA. We played sometimes at school. There are also thousands of people playing on yahoo all the time, most of them are probably teenagers. I have said this for a while but I would love to see some way to tap into that market since it is perfect. Every time Ive taken a spades friend from yahoo to OKB or BBO they have enjoyed bridge. A few still play. For those who don't know what spades is, it is a game where spades is always trumps and you start by bidding however many tricks you think you can take with spades as trumps (so you learn hand evaluation, the power of long trumps and shape, etc). You have a partner who does the same, then your partnership tries to make the total number of tricks that you bid. There is a huge penalty for going set. The card play is the same as bridge and is a trick taking game, the only difference is there's no dummy. I mean it's absolutely perfect. The other thing I think is important is sponsorship. I know it can be very hard to get sponsors, and I would have no idea how to do it, but I know that its happened sometimes here, and happens more frequently in other countries. As far as I know the people working on getting sponsors are volunteers. I think this should be a salaried full time job with at least 1 person aggressively persuing it. Sponsorship could really help bridge in so many ways.

North has a clear jumpshift. You are really counting HCP if you rebid 2D with north's hand. South also had a good strong jumpshift if you play that. The 3N bid...well let's just say LOL does not describe it. I mean, south has never shown a club stopper for starters, secondly you are a completely prime 65 with a spade. At the very least you want to play 4S, and if partner can bid 4H over 4D that's great too. If partner bids 5D thats also great. After 3N south could either bid 4C or 4S. 4S is still a slam try (no 4S bid over 2D, no 4S bid over 3D), so 4C would be the best possible slam try. Since in my world north has shown the CK south has a great hand and makes slam opposite many slam suitable mins like A A K and a spade or AK K and a spade or KQ A K and a spade south should bid 4C. If north bids 4S you can give up. After 4S north had an easy bid, he has a great hand for a spade slam and has an easy keycard bid. North's bidding was basically ludicrous.

Definitely dislike 3C, and I think south should pass it even though the right hands make game ie Txx xx Axx KQxxx. I have the agreements with my partners that if the opps have bid 2 suits and youre trying to get to 3N you cuebid the stopper you have. However, I also have the agreement that if you double and your next bid is a suit that RHO didn't open it's natural regardless of what they have bid. This includes a weak jump since they might psyche it. I understand that north was probably thinking the first part and south was probably thinking the second part so they got confused after that.

I know this is not for everyone, but I would still expect partner to open 2C with almost all 5422/5431 22 counts even with AKxxx of spades. Some 5422s would rebid 2N but I think most should rebid 2S. I used to think you should not do this but now I think it just becomes too hard to catch up later if you open 1S. Also partner can still be 55 on this auction. So basically I think his minimum is not affected THAT much overall. Re responders second bid, I think I like 3C followed by bidding spades strongly because it paints a good picture of our hand and also gives partner more room on his third bid (he might bid 3H on a good day heh). Sometimes our missing 3rd trump is quite important to partner, and also sometimes our 5 card suit is important. The downside to bidding Axxxx in an auction like this is obviously that partner might misevaluate his own holding though, so I think starting with 3S is quite reasonable also.

OMG the horror!

I don't think it should be a problem with anyone. Or let's say, with an even remotely seasoned bridge player. :) Ok, I'll leave you to win the post-mortem while I win at table :) LOL