sfi

What he wrote sounded accurate to me. If American politics were a bird, there's no way it would be able to fly.

Having now actually looked at a writeup that purports to be SAYC, I still am interested in finding out what would happen if a pair being required to use this on a hand uses Roman Key Card, support doubles, or New Minor Forcing for example (even correctly alerting and explaining it to the opposition). It's easy enough to see this happening because I was rather surprised they aren't on the card.

Do you genuinely think this is how this pair will feel, or are you simply playing semantic games?

It's just a practical question - I'm not trying to say the regulation is wrong but it's not clear from a distance that it's workable. If you tell someone they have to play a system and they don't know it, what happens? What if they make a bid that doesn't fit the system - do they get punished for providing misinformation? If they use a bid that they both understand but isn't part of SAYC, what happens? For what it's worth I'm not sure that Australia even has prescribed penalties if the players don't have a system card. The regulations simple don't seem to address the possibility.

That seems fair. Surely someone could "substantially complete" a convention card in a similar amount of time, but the SAYC approach at least provides a standard default approach until one of them winds up as dummy. For what it's worth, the only time I've ever complained about this (in an Australian teams event), the opponents showed up late and were given about 5 minutes to fill it out. It was annoying at the time, but it made little difference in the 20 board match.

What if the side without a convention card doesn't know SAYC? Forcing them to play it doesn't do anybody any good in that situation, and my experience with people who say they play it is that their understanding varies widely.

Precision's One Club Complete by Wei and Radin is an excellent treatment of this. A major rebid is forcing and may be canape. They discuss continuations in detail and adopting their approach fixed lots of issues in our system.

I don't know the hand. What would have worked (or better yet, which board was it)?

Actually, playing for the hand not holding a specific 2 to hold the important card works just as well. However, if you're going to do this you have to decide on your "discovery card" at the beginning of the hand for it to matter. Otherwise you're acting on information you already know. And it really is a vacant spaces calculation. The hand with the previously chosen card only has a 48% chance to hold any other specific card if that is all the information you have on the hand. The only reason people suggest the aces are split is because people notice aces more than twos. Of course it's rarely all the information you have on a hand so while true, it's not terribly valuable.

Aside from the possibility that East is thinking about bidding 7NT, they could easily take up more than 20 seconds simply asking about their agreements. The opponents have just bid to a grand after all, so it's worth taking time to get a good picture of the hand. My feeling is a diamond is marginally suggested by a hesitation. If partner is void in a minor, the opponents have an 8 card fit in it. Missing the queen they might have done a bit more investigation, but that's only a slim clue if valid at all.

Mostly it confirms that people are influenced by trends in bridge, as in other areas in life. The rest of the responding structure is important of course, but the theoretical gains and losses in the different methods being discussed here are fairly small. As a simple example, why haven't all the top american players adopted polish club? Why haven't all the top polish players adopted 2/1? It's much more to do with familiarity than anything else, IMO.

So you're playing pickup with a random player on BBO. Fifth hand in they open something you disagree with and you happen to miss a slam. For this you not only leave the table (probably after some choice comments about their level of play), but post the hand and their name on the forums and suggest homicide? From their results, your partner looks like an intermediate player. Their profile says they are an intermediate player. And it's a meaningless pickup game. Maybe relaxing a bit might help.

Sure. Showing a balanced hand with a narrow range helps our constructive auction so much that you want to look for reasons to do it rather than to not do it. Qxx xx Kxx AKQxx is a fine 1NT rebid. 2S is a good choice, but 2C is much less helpful than either of the other two.

I'm totally against the concept of penalty doubles of weak NT opening bids. But then I play a weak NT and would love it if the opponents give up their best bid to say "I have a strong hand", so it's all a matter of perspective.

To me it's unclear - I would have to be at the table to read what partner was thinking. As a committee member I would be leaning towards a slight suggestion of wanting to bid 4C (despite my earlier questioning of what the hesitation shows). But it's pretty hard to construct a hand that would be genuinely conflicted about either doubling or bid 4C in this auction. I have no idea what this particular East was thinking about - maybe wondering if 2C was Stayman?

Fair criticism - I overlooked that. Still not as good a game as 3NT though :).

IMO, sort of. The meaning of the 3H bid differs in the two auctions. It shows an invitational hand if 2D is a simple raise, but is primarily obstructive over an inverted 2D. Why "sort of"? If E-W had the correct information I would expect the bidding to proceed 2H - 3D - P - P; 3H - All pass. So, same spot but for different reasons. There may be an argument for 9 tricks if declarer's line was affected by the explanation, but that would need to be further investigated.

Because it reduces the decisions partner gets to make. Depending on who partner is that may be the most important factor.

Isn't the chosen action a logical alternative by definition? I'm sure someone on this forum provided case law or a rules committee clarification to that effect.

It can't really be argued that the hesitation suggests 3D specifically, but it pretty clearly shows some interest in further action in general. So I would be inclined to rule against a double by South since it caters to most reasons to hesitate. Here South has taken the least flexible option available. It seems like pass would have to be a logical alternative before adjusting, and that's what I would be looking for from a poll. My first inclination is that passing is a poor option (hence no adjustment), but a poll of experts may suggest otherwise.

It's not so hard to construct hands where he would. Take two of the spades in the example hand and put them into the club suit, for instance. Now 4H is a normal choice but 3NT is clearly better. As you point out, 3NT also wins on many (probably most) hands where partner isn't going to bid a major.

This is not a necessary corollary of ruling that the hesitation does not suggest 4C. If the hesitation clearly suggests passing over bidding then it's right to adjust. But UI does not always demonstrably suggest any particular course of action.

Not so easy to convert 4H to 3NT though. And partner could easily bid that on a 4 card suit.

The contract looks cold after leading the A of partner's first suit. Although it turns out to be a dreadful lead on the actual layout, the choice doesn't seem bad enough defence to deny any potential redress to North-South. To me it's not clear that West knows what East might have been thinking about. Maybe East was contemplating a double, which suggests not bidding 4C? I would rule no adjustment for that reason.

These questions seem to have gotten lost. There's no room to guarantee three card support when raising to 4. If partner has an indifferent 5 card suit I would expect them to find another bid than 3S, so it should be playable opposite a raise (which would be my choice in the sample hand). 4m should be a cue bid, since we have not shown interest in a minor before now. Give me a third spade and 4C looks clear. If my partner bid 4C on the actual hand I wouldn't be upset.