high level decision

[Blofeld]

5S is more than enough. Pd may have a hand for slam, but if he has it he will bid it. I will be happy if i can make 5S.

Partner will never bid slam if we bid 5♠ now.

 

I think pass is forcing, and am happy to pass. If partner has a weak tactical hand rather than the balanced ~19 count then clearly she won't accept the slam try; no harm done.

[Apollo81]

Pass is clearly forcing in this auction.

On the other extreme, I couldn't imagine ever having an agreement to treat this as forcing. The guy has Xed and bid 5H on his own, he has shown a much bigger hand than partner has. He is even red/white. We have shown about 0+ defensive tricks. Anyways, I would bid 5S this doesn't seem close to a slam try to me (the worst club holding possible and very few HCP).

Since when is 1m-(x)-1M-(p)-4M a preemptive sequence? If we were bidding to make and opponent is bidding to make, it seems like pass should be forcing. It must be right to either double them or bid on. Maybe I am wrong about 4M being "to make." If opener is going to bid this way on some 6-4 12 count, then pass should not be forcing.

[sathyab]

I was the one guilty of bidding 4s with KQxx x xx AKQxxx. Unless "North is a complete lunatic" said one of the posts. Hey don't pre-judge people without knowing them, they could be indeed be totally off the rocker

 

Far too often one makes a bid not totally consciously, but based on some experience and instinct and often we think of reasons to justify the bid later. This was an exception. Of course I could have bid 4c showing 6-4, but given the favorable vulnerability I rejected that descriptive call in favor an obstructive 4s bid. At any other vulnerability I'd have bid 4c. Even as I made that bid, I was thinking "If my LHO now bids at the 5-level, partner should be able to figure out the relative strengths of the hands around the table given the colors". The 4s bid is so much the in-your-face-I-know-am-sticking-it-to-you call. I think of it as the Bridge-equivalent of Dennis Rodman in Magic Johnson's face.

 

The easiest notion for me to brush aside holding the responder's hand is that partner has a balanced 19-20 HCP hand. Whatever else may be happening, that ain't one of them. It's pretty nearly impossible for partner to have 19 HCP outside of hearts and your red/white opponent to have his 5h call. Can someone actually try running this on a simulator ?

 

On the actual hand, x AKJTxxxxx AK x, RHO was covered, he probably had decided he could bid safely upto 5h. But what if he had a slightly weaker hand, say "only" eight hearts topped by AKQ, two black stiffs and AKx Diamonds; may be you would bid 4h or 1h, avoiding the double. But if you did double, would you rather bid at the 4-level at the second opportunity or the 5-level. Over 4c, you bid 4h and now your partner can look at the Queen of Diamonds if he was dealt that card quite fondly and may bid 5h over 4s. But over 4s you don't have any of that luxury. Too strong to bid 1h or 4h, how about trying the 5-level, sir ?

 

Sathya

[Guest Jlall]

Since when is 1m-(x)-1M-(p)-4M a preemptive sequence?  If we were bidding to make and opponent is bidding to make, it seems like pass should be forcing.  It must be right to either double them or bid on.  Maybe I am wrong about 4M being "to make."  If opener is going to bid this way on some 6-4 12 count, then pass should not be forcing.

I never claimed 4M is preemptive. But to say bidding it to make means you will make seems pretty naive, sometimes you bid to make and you are going down. Sometimes, even with a lot of points, you can't make game opposite a 1 level response but you will bid it anyways since usually you will. Your assertion that it must be right to double them or bid on is probably true in this case, you shouldn't be going for 800 in 5S. That doesn't mean it can't be mathematically correct to pass out 5H even in theory. Let's say single dummy you will beat the opponents 1/3rd of the time 1 trick and 2/3rds of the time they will make. Lets say when the opponents are making that layout causes you to go down 500 and when they are making you will go down 300.

 

So passing out 5H gives you an expected value of (-650*.67)+(100*.33)= -402.2

Bidding 5S gives you an expected value of (-500*.67)+(-300*.33)= -435

Doubling them gives you an expected value of (850*.67)+(200*.33)=-502.8

 

So even in theory you would do best PASSING out 5H if you knew partners cards.

 

But the more pressing point is you never know partners hand and only have a very rough idea of their odds of making, your odds of making, etc. Even though it will always be profitable to save IF they are making, and always be profitable to double IF they're going down you simply can't know. Basically if I think they're usually making but will go down a reasonable amount of time and that my save will be pretty costly I will just pass. Bridge isn't so perfect as the equation I gave, and it is impossible to always save when its profitable and yet double them when its also profitable. Sometimes you just compromise and pass and see what happens.

 

Logically I feel that partner has a good hand, i havent shown much at all, lho hasnt shown anything at all, and RHO has shown a mountain. I see no reason why we shouldn't be able to just let them play 5H.

 

edit: just remembered this was a matchpoint hand, but trust me (or try it yourself) that similar EV calcs occur in matchpoints as well.