semeai

There's a recent book "The Weak Notrump" by Andy Stark, available from masterpointpress.com or as an e-book from ebooksbridge.com. I don't know much about it. The bridgematters.com interview of Chip Martel here has some interesting tidbits about playing weak notrump.

Wow, it was an actual hand. I totally thought this poll was an attempt to catch forum members as not having Marty Bergen's one true answer from that link you posted earlier. In any case, apparently Marty Bergen opens 3♠ in fourth seat with a 7-(321) hand with AKQJxxx of spades: As far as blame goes, the opponents can cash four tricks off the top. Why would there be blame? As far as opening the hand goes, I can live with 1S, 2S, or 3S. It feels too strong in playing strength for 2S and just a shade weak for 3S to me. I guess that means I think 1S..2S is just right. Notice that in 4th seat, when your partner bids and rebids a major, you have the negative inference that they didn't open 2S, and so they shouldn't be minimum.

Assuming (only that) partner has 7 spades and we're 4-0-6-3, it's 10*(20 choose 5)/(30 choose 6) = 26% that partner has a stiff club.

I think K109xxxx with a decent side 4 card suit is possible, though odds are definitely still with him having AK. Your point about clubs going away anyway is possible, however. I also had this silly idea that by bidding 4♣ (for keycards), if I can get them not to double it, I've gotten to slam in an entirely unsuspicious manner and have slightly discouraged a club lead. Perhaps that's wrong, though, since I probably wasn't going to get a club lead on the hands where I was doubled, since then LHO was the one with club values. The unknown here is how often they double. There's also the problem where if I bid 5♠ after they double (asking for a club control) I've told them how to beat even 5♠ when partner has three small.

Good luck with that. I tend to open 1NT on these hands, and think it is slightly better. I could live with the other way, though. If playing a style where I don't open 1NT on balanced hands, I might also not be opening 11 counts. I think I would rebid 1NT with 12-15/16 and bid 2NT with 17-18/19. Good 16's might be upgraded, or I might occasionally fake a new suit if the hand looked appropriate. The four-and-a-half or five point range for 1NT is not at all ideal, but if responses to 2C include a strength separation (12-13, 14-15/16), then it won't be terrible. If you want to invite slam quantitatively, you should just bid 2C and partner will accept or decline. If you're still uncertain with the now 2-3 point range, I suppose you could now invite quantitatively above 3NT. If I'm supposed to open 11 counts and never open 1NT on balanced hands, I'll rebid 1NT with 11-15, fake a new suit with 16, and rebid 2NT with 17+. See: This fits well enough with a 12-15/16 range for 1NT.

What hand types is this 2♦: anything with exactly 3 card support, plus any balanced hand, plus maybe some others? Do you know follow-ups? Yes, surely the 1C-1H/S;3N hand should be limited to 18-20. I suppose with stronger you choose to bid 2C, 2N, or 3D. The 1C-1S;3H hand can be be unlimited. Dan Neill's systems site has a bunch of write-ups of non-standard Polish club systems. There are several that use 2D for a variety of hands somewhat along the lines Free describes (e.g. one has 5+D or 4+support, another has various other minor suit hands in there), but I didn't find any with 3C for both minors.

You gave a 15 point hand earlier. Don't presume the same bid is made with a 17 point hand. It's nice to make a good faith effort to understand someone else's style, under the assumption that in most cases multiple styles are playable.

Over a pass, I'll bid 4♣ asking for keycards if I play that. I plan to bid 6♠ opposite two and 4♠ opposite fewer. If 4♣ is doubled, I'll bid 5♠ after hearing two from partner. I'll go low over 4♥ and just bid 4♠ I think. If I bid slam confidently (either via keycard or not) they'll expect I have hearts wrapped up and might try something else. Also, partner's expected heart length is now less that it was, so his expected club length is higher. I'll allow myself to be pushed up to 5 or 6 spades, though.

Not at favorable or equal. At unfavorable, yes. This is all assuming a modern but middle-of-the-road style.

Over 3♦ I double. If partner bids 4♣, I'll bid 4♥. It's true I feel quite unhappy over 5♣. Over 4♦ I'll just bid 4♥.

This is a good question. I can see value in natural and in shortness-showing, akin to your stopper verification (you'd only want to do that when you have a singleton/void I'd think). I'd lean towards natural when they bid a minor and shortness when they show a major (or rather, 0/1/2/3/4+ card suit and 5+ card suit respectively). You rarely seem to need the shortness bid systemically since you'll either have a 6 card suit or be 5-4 and be able to introduce another suit (or, over 1N-2C;2D, be 4441).

Ignoring everything else, let me debunk this. When a player holds a long suit, there are more tricks than trumps usually. This is because you make more trump tricks than you seem entitled to given the size of your fit and the way they break. Try some example deals, even with this distribution for partner.

This is a good argument against bidding 1NT on most 17 counts with a 5 card major. Essentially you're upgrading them, which is fine with a 5 card suit. You can still miss a major suit game when opening 1NT with a 15-16 count, but it's much less likely. You'll just invite with these, and most hands that will accept an invite over 1M-2M will move over 1NT, though not your example hand.* Here you might make the decision to open suit-oriented (aces and kings) 15-16 counts with a 5 card major with 1 of the major. Then again, you might not if you figure the various benefits and lack of rebid problems are worth it. Were most of these cases 17 counts or were you already upgrading them? At least were they basically all 17 counts or suit-oriented hands? * Come to think of it, I wonder whether your example hand should move over 1NT. It will play well in a major suit, and has a 5 card suit on the side as well. You might pass over 1N-2C;2H, though, thinking you'd improved the contract enough.

Most Catalan speakers are Spanish, but most Spaniards don't speak Catalan? That said, I don't use the first item on your list.

I prefer a setting in which this 1♠ requires an alert. Online, though, who knows, unless this was one of the ACBL games. A comment on the bidding: I don't think West has a bid over 1S, but as East you might balance 1NT, which should be the same 11-15 range that it is over 1S P P.

Here's a hand Fantoni played in the Spingold. [hv=pc=n&s=sat975hkd6542cqj8&n=sk64hqt43dajcak64&d=e&v=b&b=10&a=ppp1c1d1hp1sp2dp2hp4sppp]266|200[/hv] You probably don't need to understand your own bidding fully but to start 1C was 14+ clubs or 15+ balanced and 1H showed spades. East's 1D overcall was natural. You're declarer in Fantoni's seat, North (sorry for keeping North declarer). West is Chip Martel and East is Lew Stansby. They play UDCA (and standard remainder count, but it doesn't come up here). East leads the ♦K. The play: (Always displayed in the order West North East South. The card led to the trick is underlined.) W N E S ♦8 ♦A ♦K ♦2 ♥7 ♥3 ♥A ♥K ♦9 ♦J ♦Q ♦4 ♣2 ♠4 ♦10 ♦5 At this point Fantoni went into the tank. What's your plan now? [hv=pc=n&s=sat975hd6cqj8&n=sk6hqt4dcak64]133|200[/hv]

Chainat's problem was that it was not originally alerted, which caused damage. Then Chainat clicked for explanation and got an explanation after the auction took a strange turn, but it was too late to help because his side had already passed. The TD then came but couldn't tell when it had been explained, i.e. whether it was alerted at the time the bid was made or after any opponents bid. See this post where Chainat explains more fully. It might be useful to have "alerts/explanations made before any opponents bid" different from "alerts/explanations made after any opponents bid" at least so the TD can tell whether the alert was timely.

I've often wondered whether there would be value in commentators who only looked at one hand. Maybe there could occasionally be the decision to have all commentators commenting from the perspective of, say, the South hand (to have a definite choice) in one of the rooms. If they ever implement channels for the chat (like voice: you can turn on or off some commentators) you could instead have a "south's perspective" channel. You could even already do this by making the other commentators enemies, but that's a bit less elegant. The downside is that there would be some dull South hands occasionally (though even then there's usually something in a dull hand). Maybe on such hands the commentators could say "okay, the hand is dull, let's switch to full view for this one."

Answering my own question: perhaps we haven't agreed diamonds with 1D-3C;3D 1D-1H;3C-3D, which could just be a noise with a hand without direction, so 4NT is keycard for hearts (added: after 1D-1H;3C-3D:3H) as the last bid suit with no agreed suit yet, and we would need to bid 4D to clearly agree diamonds. Do others agree with this?

A very nice discussion and auction. To add one more thing you left slightly implicit: another benefit of bidding 3D and not 3H is that it's the lowest accurate bid, leaving more room for the rest of the auction. Just one point I'm not certain of: why is 4NT keycard for hearts and not diamonds? We've agreed diamonds but not (yet) hearts and I could easily want to bid keycard for diamonds with Axxx KQxx Qxxx x or many other hands. I suppose I can bid 4D and then 4NT if I want to bid keycard for diamonds (assuming we have no minorwood agreements here in B/I), but I'm not sure that's enough to make 4NT direct keycard for hearts instead of diamonds without careful agreements. Even if 4NT is keycard for diamonds instead of hearts, your auction stands up almost as well.

Necro/Addendum (my apologies for the necro): I was looking at some old challenge the champs hands and came across this: (Hands are approximate as I set it aside and don't have it in front of me now, but I think I have it right.) West: Axx x QJxx AKxxx East: Kxxx Txx AK Qxxx Bertheau-Nystrom had the auction 2C* (3H) X (P); 4H (P) 6C end, for top marks. (2C precision) Wooldridge-Hurd had the auction 1C (3H) X (P); 4D (P) 5C end, the second best spot.

This isn't the standard Polish club meaning as far as I know, but it's a reasonable one. I'll explain: Standard 1C-1H followups: 1S: Forcing 1 round, can be strong 1N: weak notrump 2C: forcing 1 round, 15+ with 5+ clubs (or, over 1C-1S, 1-4-4-4, but only if GF) 2D: "fit-reverse" or "odwrotka", GF with 3+ card support for hearts 2H: raise with 12-14 hand 2S: GF with 5+ good spades 2N: GF balanced without 3 card support 3C: GF with long clubs 3D: GF with long diamonds Notice that to show long diamonds, you need to bid all the way up at 3D because of the artificial (and fundamental to polish club) 2D bid. This makes it yet more challenging to show hands with both minors, especially 5D-4C. Polish standard (WJ00, WJ05) doesn't mention what to do with 5D-4C. I assume with 5C-4D you bid 2C playing WJ. The 2C bid is already forcing for 1 round, so it is possible to put the GF with long clubs hands there and put both minors in 3C. Apparently this is what the pair bidding in Challenge the Champs did. I don't know more details of how they play it, but it should deny 3 hearts because otherwise with GF strength you can just bid the artificial 2D. Matula's book on the Polish club has a different solution. He instead keeps 3C as long clubs, but uses 3NT to mean 3-1-5-4 on this auction (and 1-3-5-4 over 1S). In addition, he uses 1C-1S;3H as 1-4-5-3 (with 4-1-5-3 over 1C-1H, you just bid 1S, which is forcing 1 round). With 5C-4D you just bid 2C, forcing 1 round.

I like the style of exchanging distributional information up through 3M and then, if you play serious/frivolous 3NT or 3M+1, at that point sorting out some strength info and starting cuebidding. Either method you have is fine, though a cooperative one like 2M+1 asks (with no shortness usually) is probably better, as balanced & semi-balanced hands will want to hear where partner's shortness is to evaluate their honors. After that, you again have space to use the lowest bid, 2M+2, to show no shortness, and with two (semi-)balanced hands you can switch to showing side suits/values with the remaining space.

I'd say South's double is a typical cards double at matchpoints: extra values, decent trumps given the auction. North should perhaps pull (I'm biased by seeing the result) but was also just unlucky.

On the contrary, I was pleased to have the control. I did listen to both, but I adjusted the volume of Larry up because his microphone was quieter than Roland's.