minor preempts with a side major

[Vilgan]

all at MP's, would you preempt 1st/2nd seat with:

 

♠ 9

♥ Jxxxx

♦ QJTxxxx

♣ <void>

 

My partner and I disagreed on it.. and it is a style/partnership agreement thing. However, to me it seems like a natural preempt at MP's. I would rather mess with the bidding since somebody at the table has spades. If its my partner.. I want him to shut up. If it is the opps, I'd like to make it harder for them to find it.. especially since X might be harder w/o hearts.

 

This can be compared with another hand i held:

 

♠ KT8xx

♥ <void>

♦ 9

♣ QJT9xxx

 

Which first seat I decided not to open. I think with this hand its better to pass.. and if opps have the game going values and find a heart fit.. I'll start bidding clubs and spades.

 

Anyways.. what are the general feelings on preempting with a side 4/5 card major? I think it hurts our competitiveness to refuse to preempt with them, but others have disagreed. Would you preempt the above hands? Does the "thou shalt not with a 5 card major" rule always hold true even at MP's?

 

Thanks for any insights.

 

Eric

[Blofeld]

On the first hand I think I'd open 4 or 5♦ in 1st seat, but might pass in 2nd.

 

On the second hand you might try to show both suits. If you don't want to sell out to 4red you could open 3♣ and then bid 4♠ if you get the chance. But I'm not convinced by this plan.

[the hog]

all at MP's, would you preempt 1st/2nd seat with:

 

♠ 9

♥ Jxxxx

♦ QJTxxxx

♣ <void>

 

My partner and I disagreed on it.. and it is a style/partnership agreement thing. However, to me it seems like a natural preempt at MP's. I would rather mess with the bidding since somebody at the table has spades. If its my partner.. I want him to shut up. If it is the opps, I'd like to make it harder for them to find it.. especially since X might be harder w/o hearts.

 

This can be compared with another hand i held:

 

♠ KT8xx

♥ <void>

♦ 9

♣ QJT9xxx

 

Which first seat I decided not to open. I think with this hand its better to pass.. and if opps have the game going values and find a heart fit.. I'll start bidding clubs and spades.

 

Anyways.. what are the general feelings on preempting with a side 4/5 card major? I think it hurts our competitiveness to refuse to preempt with them, but others have disagreed. Would you preempt the above hands? Does the "thou shalt not with a 5 card major" rule always hold true even at MP's?

 

Thanks for any insights.

 

Eric

The short answer is "No, not with a 5 card Major!" Therein madness lies.

[joker_gib]

I agree with the Hog.

 

A M/4 is not a problem (for me) but M/5 is too much.

 

Alain

[pclayton]

In my regular partnership we will preempt with a weak 5 card major like the 1st hand given - especialy if the side suit is hearts. This approach isn't standard at all its not for those with weak stomachs. :)

 

With the 2nd, I'd pass it, but my pard would still probably preempt it.

[bid_em_up]

In my regular partnership we will preempt with a weak 5 card major like the 1st hand given - especialy if the side suit is hearts. This approach isn't standard at all its not for those with weak stomachs. ;)

 

With the 2nd, I'd pass it, but my pard would still probably preempt it.

I think anybody recommending preempting with a side 5 card major in the Beginner/Intermediate forum should be shot as quickly as possible.

 

:)

 

(I realize you weren't actually recommending it, Phil. Just registering general displeasure at anyone who would.)

[Vilgan]

I think anybody recommending preempting with a side 5 card major in the Beginner/Intermediate forum should be shot as quickly as possible.

I don't know that beginner/intermediate means easybridge style bidding only. I asked here since I consider myself an advanced imp player but an intermediate MP player, and it seems like a reasonably straightfoward % question that I don't have the MP experience to answer myself ;) Obviously there will be times that we miss our major suit fit and a game, but (for people that do preempt with 5 card majors at MP's), what I wasn't sure about was if 51% of the time you get a better result by being willing to preempt with hand 1.. or hand 2.

 

Hand 1 was day 2 of the blue ribbons.. but my partner and I got creamed there (like 120 out of 130) since we are imp players and only starting to do the whole MP thing.

 

Eric

[helene_t]

If we have the specific agreement that a diamonds preempt followed by some number of hearts shows this hand, I will do so. But I'm afraid that is not standard - a preempt followed by a new suit (to the extent that such a bid is possible at all) is usually lead-directing.

 

I would be happy to open this hand with a Muiderberg, though. But otherwise, no. You sometimes here arguments like "if I need a swing". But I'm not so sure if that's a sound line of thinking. Freak hands are likely to create swings no matter what you do. So you might as well bid as disciplined as you can with this kind of hand.

 

I tend to preempt with all hands with which a preempt makes some sense (and some hands where it doesn't) but this one goes too far.

[Free]

I don't really keep track of this, but these hands are REALLY rare! Anyway, I know I've done it with an 8-5 a few months ago, it created some fireworks ;) but it was 8♥-5♣...

 

I don't have problems with a poor 4 card Major, and if I'm 7-4 the quality of the Major isn't that important anymore. 5 card Major is more risky imo, but with a really poor 5 card M I can agree to preempt. With hand 1 I'd probably just get in high, while with hand 2 I'll pass and show my good hand in the next round.

[whereagles]

If pard is a passed hand, the 5-card major isn't that much of a problem. If not, it's a guess. If you want to throw-in some randomness, preempt. Otherwise, pass.

[pclayton]

In my regular partnership we will preempt with a weak 5 card major like the 1st hand given - especialy if the side suit is hearts. This approach isn't standard at all its not for those with weak stomachs. :)

 

With the 2nd, I'd pass it, but my pard would still probably preempt it.

I think anybody recommending preempting with a side 5 card major in the Beginner/Intermediate forum should be shot as quickly as possible.

 

:)

 

(I realize you weren't actually recommending it, Phil. Just registering general displeasure at anyone who would.)

Nice.

 

I think all players need to understand that there are two types of bridge being played on the globe right now; 2 handed and 4 handed. If we are teaching beginners judgement in differentiating between a 12 count that looks like: AKxxx, KQxxx, x, xx and one that looks like: Axx, Kxx, Kxx, Qxxx, then we should also teach them about judgement in preemption as well.

 

There is a big difference between preempting with a hand like: xx, Jxxxx, QJTxxx, void and: KJxxx, xx, QJxxxx, void. To make a blanket statement like,

"I think anybody recommending preempting with a side 5 card major in the Beginner/Intermediate forum should be shot as quickly as possible".

 

takes a lot of gall. Add all the smileys you want, but this comment is offensive.

 

Furthermore, I AM recommending this style, but only if the players are willing to accept some bad results in echange for some great ones.

 

There is no 'right' or 'wrong' method. Neither is close to 'optimal'. 2 handed bridge is to describe your hand to your partner in a relatively narrow range, so that your partner is involved in the decision making process. If a hand doesn't fit within a narrowly defined box, then the green card is appropriate.

 

4 handed bridge accepts that sometimes partner will be left completely in the dark on certain hands, and that sometimes, less than optimal contracts will be reached (sometimed doubled). However, you believe that you do better overall with this method. I've been doing it for over three years, and I am convinced its better. And not just against club players.

 

You may ask yourself, what style would you want your partner to play. This is easy.

 

However, you must also ask yourself, which would you rather play against?

 

If the answer to #1 and #2 is different, then I suggest you rethink how bad it is to teach others this school.

 

I think a lot of the teaching that has occurred is a result of professional players tutoring their clients. I can't think of a single one that would want their partner to make wide ranging bids, because it dulls their decision making ability. As a result, 2 handed bridge has been accepted as dogma for reasons totally unrelated to the results it obtains compared with 4 handed bridge.

[MickyB]

Ok, my take on this...

 

8-5s will very rarely belong in their 5 card suit - pard will need a huge fit or you'll be in the slam zone. Describing your hand to partner just isn't going to happen; you may as well open a high level preempt. To an extent, the same thing applies to 7-5s and 6-5s, and if my hand is 7M5m or 6M5m I'll normally preempt in the major. Obviously, there are more reasons not to preempt when your minor is longer - Firstly, minor games require one more trick; Secondly, major suits outrank minor suits.

 

I think a preempt on the first hand is reasonable; a preempt on the second hand is not. The reason for this is that if you are taking the same number of tricks in either of your suits, then with the second hand you clearly want to be in spades because you will be a level lower than if you were in clubs. With the first hand, if the opponents bid 4S or 5C, it often won't matter whether you compete in diamonds or hearts (and would matter even less often at IMPs, when the difference between 5D making and 5H making is negligible).

[fred]

My (strong) suggestion to beginners and intermediates would be to not even think about such things. Preempt on the kinds of hands you read about in textbooks and Pass (or open at the 1-level if you have enough HCP) with weird hands.

 

Until you have a lot of experience there are much more important things for you to spend your timing learning about. The kind of hands discussed in this thread are rare and preempting with non-classic hands will only serve to impair the judgment of your partner (most likely hurting both his/her confidence and your partnership's results).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[hrothgar]

My (strong) suggestion to beginners and intermediates would be to not even think about such things. Preempt on the kinds of hands you read about in textbooks and Pass (or open at the 1-level if you have enough HCP) with weird hands.

 

Until you have a lot of experience there are much more important things for you to spend your timing learning about. The kind of hands discussed in this thread are rare and preempting with non-classic hands will only serve to impair the judgment of your partner (most likely hurting both his/her confidence and your partnership's results).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

It might suprise some folks, but I pretty much agree with Fred on this one...

 

Personally, I think that beginners and intermediates are best served if they focus on getting a thorough understanding of a single reputable system. I really don't care what system folks want to learn. There are lots of good ones out there. Polish Club, Acol, K-S, Precision, Roth-Stone ... Odds are, your choice will be influenced by where you live and who you have available as a teacher. (I think that you'll have a lot better time focusing on Polish Club if you live in Warsaw rather than Boston). Spend your time learning the ins and outs of your chosen system. If you've selected a good one you should be able to grasp why the system was constructed the way it was.

 

Once you feel that you really understand one system, I'd argue that you should throw away everything that you know and adopt a new system thats diametrically opposed to the one that your currently playing. If you grew up playing Precision, get a copy of Al Roth's Picture Bidding. If you started with Acol give Polish Club a try instead. Hopefully, the contrast in methods will give you some insight that there are a lot of different ways to skin a cat... In an ideal world you'll end up with a much better appreciation for both systems.

 

Back to the subject at hand... As Fred notes, you're rarely going to find beginner / intermediate level texts that deal with freak hands like the one you posted. These hands tend to be quite rare, and frankly almost anything could be right. As a result, its not an especially fruitful topic for study. My own recommendation is the following: There are very different theories about what a preempt should look like. Some people like "classic" weak twos where an opening preempt promises a single suited hand. Other people prefer methods where a preemptive opening explictly promises a two suited hand. For example, they might use a multi 2♦ combined with a 2M opening that shows a 5+ card major and a 4+ card minor.

 

If you really think its that important to show the two suited patterns choose a bidding system that complements your preferences. You might want to consider Polish Club. Alternatively, get a copy of Picture Bidding and learn a systemic approach towards these types of freaks.

[fred]

While it is nice that my buddy Hrothgar agrees with me (I am not being sarcastic - I really like and respect Richard even though we have been known to disagree), my reasons for recommending that non-experts stick to a relatively "classic" preempting style are quite different from his.

 

Preempts offer the best possible opportunity for intermediate players to develop one of the most important skills that they will need if they are ever to advance beyond the intermediate level: making bidding decisions by visualizing partner's hand and projecting how the play and/or defense in various contracts will go.

 

Evaluation tools like 4321 point count, Zars, The Law of Total Tricks, Losing Trick Count... have their place in bridge, but if you really want to get good at this game you need to learn to see the other players' hands and to judge how many tricks each side can take. This is far far more important than learning the flavor of the week in terms of systems or conventions.

 

The reason why classic preempts are useful in this regard is that such bids describe a very pure and simple type of hand. These hands lend themselves well to the process of visualizing what partner might have and estimating your offensive and defensive potential.

 

For example, if your partner openers 3C and you have Axx in clubs and x in spades, you can be fairly confident that your partner's hand will produce 7 club tricks and that you will be able to score a spade ruff (or maybe 2) in your hand. You can also be fairly confident that on defense your side will win 1 club trick at most and that you probably won't win any spade tricks at all.

 

This sort of reasoning can help you decide important things like whether or not you should bid 5C when the opponents bid 4S. This is something that counting your points (or your Zars or total tricks or anything else) in not going to tell you with anywhere near the same degree of accuracy.

 

But this only works if you can picture what your partner's hand looks like when he opens 3C. If he might have 5 reasonable spades and 6 moderate clubs then all bets are off.

 

Please note that I am not suggesting that it is losing bridge strategy to preempt with such a hand (actually I have no strong opinion about this). All I am saying is that, unless you are already a very good player, preempting on such hands will make it difficult for you and your partner to learn one of the few things in this game that is truly important.

 

While I am on the subject of important things to learn, the other skill that intermediate players much master in order to advance is counting the hand as declarer and on defense.

 

Spend your time and energy working on these things and forget about fancy bidding for now. Once you have mastered the basics you will have plenty of time for experimenting with bidding. You will also find that knowing the basics will put you in a better position to draw proper conclusions from your eventual bidding experiments.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[pclayton]

I guess no one should teach beginners that preempting with strange hands is a good idea. I don't like the idea of sheltering anyone from what many believe is a superior way to preempt however.

 

Perhaps the tactical way if a beginner were to ask you what you thought of preempting with a 5 card major on the side would be, "Many good players like this method, but for now lets focus on other areas of your development. There will be a time and a place to show you some alternative ideas in bidding theory".

 

Sometimes its approproriate to teach a certain method, and then show them why they've outgrown it.

[bid_em_up]

In my regular partnership we will preempt with a weak 5 card major like the 1st hand given - especialy if the side suit is hearts. This approach isn't standard at all its not for those with weak stomachs. :)

 

With the 2nd, I'd pass it, but my pard would still probably preempt it.

I think anybody recommending preempting with a side 5 card major in the Beginner/Intermediate forum should be shot as quickly as possible.

 

:)

 

(I realize you weren't actually recommending it, Phil. Just registering general displeasure at anyone who would.)

Nice.

 

I think all players need to understand that there are two types of bridge being played on the globe right now; 2 handed and 4 handed. If we are teaching beginners judgement in differentiating between a 12 count that looks like: AKxxx, KQxxx, x, xx and one that looks like: Axx, Kxx, Kxx, Qxxx, then we should also teach them about judgement in preemption as well.

 

There is a big difference between preempting with a hand like: xx, Jxxxx, QJTxxx, void and: KJxxx, xx, QJxxxx, void. To make a blanket statement like,

"I think anybody recommending preempting with a side 5 card major in the Beginner/Intermediate forum should be shot as quickly as possible".

 

takes a lot of gall. Add all the smileys you want, but this comment is offensive.

 

Furthermore, I AM recommending this style, but only if the players are willing to accept some bad results in echange for some great ones.

 

There is no 'right' or 'wrong' method. Neither is close to 'optimal'. 2 handed bridge is to describe your hand to your partner in a relatively narrow range, so that your partner is involved in the decision making process. If a hand doesn't fit within a narrowly defined box, then the green card is appropriate.

 

4 handed bridge accepts that sometimes partner will be left completely in the dark on certain hands, and that sometimes, less than optimal contracts will be reached (sometimed doubled). However, you believe that you do better overall with this method. I've been doing it for over three years, and I am convinced its better. And not just against club players.

 

You may ask yourself, what style would you want your partner to play. This is easy.

 

However, you must also ask yourself, which would you rather play against?

 

If the answer to #1 and #2 is different, then I suggest you rethink how bad it is to teach others this school.

 

I think a lot of the teaching that has occurred is a result of professional players tutoring their clients. I can't think of a single one that would want their partner to make wide ranging bids, because it dulls their decision making ability. As a result, 2 handed bridge has been accepted as dogma for reasons totally unrelated to the results it obtains compared with 4 handed bridge.

Geez Phil. Get over it. Notice no smiley there, and I find your comment offensive as well, especially when mine was just good natured humor and NOT directed at you, per se. It takes no gall whatsoever to make a comment with a sense of humor. Maybe you need to buy one, only 44.95 plus shipping and handling.

 

The point was that I simply do not think that a question like this really should be addressed in the BIL forum. Its that simple. I dont think its appropriate for anyone to be suggesting OR encouraging beginner/intermediate players to preempt this sort of hand.

 

Also note, I did not say, anyone who preempts this sort of hand should be shot on sight. Nor did I say whether or not there was any merit to doing so or not. You want to do it, knock yourself out. You want to recommend it to others? Go right ahead. But as you reflect in your last post, there is probably a right way and a wrong way to explain this sort of bidding to a BIL player. It may have benefits, but it can also have some serious drawbacks as well, and until the BIL player has a solid grasp on fundementals, I would not encourage this sort of preempting (as Fred reflects).

 

If a beginner/intermediate player wanted to ask this question, fine, but they can do so in one of the other forums. Other beginners/intermediates who happen to be reading this forum shouldnt be reading a question such as this, seeing the answers given and then going back to their "live" partnerships saying, well....this is what it said on BBO forums.

 

Geez.

[jillybean]

This question of suitability for the BI forum comes up every now and then but I think it is preferable for a beginner/intermediate to post their 'advanced' question here and get responses that are hopefully targeted towards BI’s. We don’t need to be protected, I am sure most readers can sort through what is relevant for them and leave the rest.

[whereagles]

My (strong) suggestion to beginners and intermediates would be to not even think about such things. Preempt on the kinds of hands you read about in textbooks and Pass (or open at the 1-level if you have enough HCP) with weird hands.

 

Until you have a lot of experience there are much more important things for you to spend your timing learning about. The kind of hands discussed in this thread are rare and preempting with non-classic hands will only serve to impair the judgment of your partner (most likely hurting both his/her confidence and your partnership's results).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

I don't agree with this. How can beginners feel they're being tought the right things if in practice they see experts doing otherwise and getting away with it? Worse, getting away with it at the beginner's expense! ;) :) :)

 

I agree there are more important things to learn, but preempting with side majors is a judgement thing, and I'm sure you won't disagree that beginners should learn judgement as early as possible :)

[fred]

I agree there are more important things to learn, but preempting with side majors is a judgement thing, and I'm sure you won't disagree that beginners should learn judgement as early as possible :)

I do agree with you that learning good bidding judgment is critically important, but I also think (as I explained) that classic-style preempts represent a class of hands that present excellent opportunities for improving one's judgment. Corrupting this class of hands by including non-classic types makes it harder and slower to for non-experts to learn the judgment-related lessons that are available when partner preempts.

 

Experts do all sorts of things in all aspects of bridge that are not part of the playbook of your average beginner or intermediate. This does not imply that it will benefit the development of such players to try to use these techniques in the early years of their careers.

 

Suppose a beginner witnessed an expert pair arrive at a sensational contract through a series of complex artificial bids. Do you really think it would benefit the beginner to try to include these bids in his regular system?

 

I believe that the issue we are discussing is analogous.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[whereagles]

Suppose a beginner witnessed an expert pair arrive at a sensational contract through a series of complex artificial bids. Do you really think it would benefit the beginner to try to include these bids in his regular system?

 

I believe that the issue we are discussing is analogous.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

Well... I must confess I'm a bit alergic to analogies because they are quite prone to skewness :)

 

Anyway, in the case at hand I don't clearly see where your analogy is trying to get at, though I think I can volunteer the following. If your point is that high levels of complexity are undesirable when teaching a beginner, then I agree. Now, whether or not a preempt with side 5-card major introduces such high a level of complexity, that I'm not so sure.

[hrothgar]

Anyway, in the case at hand I don't clearly see where your analogy is trying to get at, though I think I can volunteer the following. If your point is that high levels of complexity are undesirable when teaching a beginner, then I agree.

I apologize for putting words into Fred's mouth, however, here's my interpretation of what he getting at:

 

Most bidding systems have "holes" in them. There are certain hand types that present very clear bidding problems for specific bidding systems. The "Bridge World Death Hand" is a classic example of a hand type that posses a nasty rebid problem for most natural bidding systems.

 

You can, of course, always sidestep the problem. Its always possible to redefine a few bidding sequences such that you're able to show precisely the hand type that so bedevils those poor sods at the next table. However, this normally created some nasty little ripples elsewhere in the system. That bid that you redefined probably meant something.

 

In some ways, it might be better to confront the problem head on and make the best of a limited set of tools. In an ideal world, it will help you develop judgment that can be applied to a wide variety of issues.

[awm]

Perhaps another point is that these kinds of preempts are extremely high-variance actions. They will often have either a really good result (no one can find a takeout double because they have too many in your side major, and they miss a game) or a really bad result (you're cold for 4M and partner passes your preempt).

 

Of course, sometimes taking high-variance actions is good. This is especially true if you're behind in a short match, or up against superior opposition. And experts can often judge whether the "really good" or "really bad" results are more likely and play the odds.

 

But for beginner/intermediate players, it will be harder for them to improve if they are making decisions (or playing methods) that tend to give their results a very high variance. It's more important to learn to make good decisions on the "normal" hands and to be able to see their scores gradually improve.

 

Notice that the decision of how to bid these hands depends a lot on factors like:

 

(1) The state of the match.

(2) The seat and vulnerability.

(3) Your side's general opening style.

(4) Which particular suits you hold.

(5) The relative strength of suits, and the spot cards.

(6) The distribution of the cards in the side suits.

 

These are a lot of factors to consider, and beginner/intermediate players usually aren't up to it. They need to learn a lot of things before being ready to make accurate decisions on these kinds of hands.

[cherdano]

Richard, I think you still don't get Fred's point. This is not about tools or problem hands etc. Fred wants B/I's to get the chance to develop the skill to make bidding decision based on visualizing partner's hand.

This is easiest if you have some pure bids where you know very exactly what to expect.

 

I always thought that among all the "rule of xx"s, the "rule of 17" is the worst. It says (if I remember it correctly) that you should bid game opposite a 2M weak two if the sum of hcp + length of trump support is 17 or higher. In my mind, it is a disservice to B/I's to tell them such a rule. It maybe improve their bidding in the short term. But they will miss out one of the best opportunities to learn to evaluate their hand based on picturing partner's hand. Instead I would tell them to imagine a few of partner's possible hand (KQxxxx and out, then add a random useful card here or there) and bid game if it looks like 10 tricks more often than not (and maybe teach them feature ask).

 

But then, I have read this "rule of 17" from people waaaaay more experienced in teaching bridge than me. Your mileage may vary, depending on your audience maybe. (And I suppose those who read the B/I forum are part of the audience that does better without rule of 17.)