Double trouble

[Gerben42]

Would you or have you ever considered not making a negative double and thus forgetting about your 4-card ♠ suit in preference of another bid?

 

Okay to the hand, it's MP, vuln. doesn't really matter much, you have [hv=s=skt43hkj42d64c874]133|100|[/hv]

 

1♦ (1♥) ?

[Guest Jlall]

There are certainly hands where I would bid 1N with 4 spades but this is not one of them. The hand isn't good enough for 1N, I have no stopper in clubs, I have decent spades, I have a ruffing value, and I have no heart spot. If partner has 4 spades and 2 hearts I want to play in spades. If partner has less than 2 hearts I really want to play in spades.

 

If I had xxxx AQT xxx KJx I would bid 1N.

[Walddk]

There is a case for 1NT, but I still prefer double if that shows four spades. If you had given me four baby spades, I would be inclined to bid 1NT. K10xx is too good to deny.

 

Roland

[HeartA]

If double shows 4 spades, I would do that (as I voted for). If 1S shows 4 spades, then bid it.

[neilkaz]

Double shows 4♠ where I come from, and 1♠ guarantees 5+ so it is double for me.

 

If my ♠ were all spots and I had a ♣ stopper as well as these ♥, I'd be more inclined to just bid 1NT.

 

.. neilkaz ..

[Gerben42]

I doubled "automatically" at the table, and got a 2♣ rebid from partner. Opponents seemed awake enough to not allow an insufficient 1NT (the best contract by far at MP) so there I was...

 

On hindsight I thought well maybe Dbl was not so obvious as I thought.

Anyway do you now pass 2♣ or correct back to ♦ (this partner does not play that you might open 1♦ on 4♦5♣ so he has 5♦ for sure).

 

If you pass 2♣, you play 2♣.

If you bid 2♦, partner will rebid 3♣ (which you will probably pass, but how strong is this bid?).

[Walddk]

Give preference to 2♦ and pass 3♣. This shows extras (16-17, even a bad 18); if he has a minimum, he must pass 2♦, also with 5-5. However, I do not fancy 3NT with nothing in his suits.

 

Roland

[mikeh]

While one can imagine hands on which 1N might be a better bid than 1♠ holding 4♠s, I agree with the earlier posters that this hand is not one of them.

 

Besides, there is one truism that, on the whole, is dangerous to ignore. You can often get out of a suit and back into notrump after showing ♠s, but it is usually impossible to get out of notrump and back into ♠s.

 

On the actual auction, I am upgrading my hand for positional and tempo reasons: I will almost surely get a ♥ lead and rate to have some play for 9 tricks in notrump after that start. I am playing partner for a GOOD hand: he can be up to just shy of a gf jumpshift, and shouldn't ever be a 5-5 15 count or so.

 

That accords with my belief in heavy moves and light acceptances: 3♣ should NOT be merely catering to the false preference possibilities inherent in the 2♦ bid: it should be a real try for game. Why 3♣ and not 2♥? To allow us to play 3♣ rather than 3♦ when we have a worse hand of the same shape: say the same cards without the ♥J.

[awm]

I'll buck the trend and bid 1NT. Here's my reasoning:

 

(1) Partner doesn't have to have four spades. If she doesn't have four spades, the hand will almost always play best in notrump. Partner could easily rebid 2♣ with 2-3-4-4 or 2-2-5-4 shape, in which case I'm left to guess which minor is better when the obvious best spot (1NT) can never be reached.

 

(2) If partner has four spades and a singleton heart, we may hear a jump raise of spades or a competitive spade bid after the opponents raise hearts. In these cases partner will think she holds a prime hand, when in fact I am about to put down a poor dummy. We'd probably be better off defending 2♥ or 3♥ rather than declaring 3♠.

 

(3) If partner has four spades and length in hearts, then suits are not going to break well. LHO has short hearts. We could easily lose a bunch of top tricks in a 2♠ partial when LHO leads a heart and gets a couple ruffs.

[Guest Jlall]

Partner could easily rebid 2♣ with 2-3-4-4

hmm.....different strokes for different folks ;) I don't think partner should ever rebid 2C with this.

[Walddk]

Partner could easily rebid 2♣ with 2-3-4-4

Then there is something wrong with your system in my opinion. This is a normal 1NT rebid, heart stopper or not. Just show the nature of your hand and let partner investigate if he is good enough (2♥ = are you serious about notrump?).

 

This is also the reason why I have never understood the (American) point of opening 1♦ with 4-4 in the minors. It's not just a European thing to open 1♣. I know that Zia - Rosenberg and Garozzo - Reisig do too, among others.

 

As a matter of fact, Michael Rosenberg has put it like this on many occasions: "1♣ or 1♦; we do not feel strongly about it". Richie Reisig goes a bit further: "1♦ is plain silly."

 

I would be happy to open 1♣ and rebid 1NT with a hand like this:

 

♠ Q74

♥ J8

♦ AQ98

♣ KJ105

 

1♣ (1♥) double pass

1N

 

If you are going to lose any sleep over a 1NT rebid, I suggest you bid 1♠, but I certainly don't recommend that you open 1♦ and rebid 2♣. That should show an unbalanced hand, and you don't have one. It's as balanced as can be, given that 4432 hands come up almost 21% of the times! The number 1 pattern by a mile.

 

Roland

[pclayton]

There are hands that I will bypass spades to do something else.

 

1) I might have a big heart trap; Qxxx, AQT9xx, xx, x;

2) I might have a weakish hand with big diamond support: Qxxx, x, KJTxxxxx, x

3) I might have a hand that screams for NT: Qxxx, AQT, Kxx, QTx

 

Over 2♣, I'll try 2♦ and see where the hand goes. We aren't finished yet.

[the hog]

For me this is a 1S bid. I see very little logic in the argument that a X shows 4S and a 1S bid shows 5. Why should I change my system just because rho intervened. I prefer 1S to 1NT here as this hand is not good enough for a 1NT bid. - see my comment in another thread. It seems to me that some players will bid 1NT on a crappy 7-8 count here - eg see Roland's example hand in the same thread. To be frank, if I didn't have 4S I would MUCH prefer a pass to a 1NT bid on these garbage hands.

[pclayton]

For me this is a 1S bid. I see very little logic in the argument that a X shows 4S and a 1S bid shows 5. Why should I change my system just because rho intervened. I prefer 1S to 1NT here as this hand is not good enough for a 1NT bid. - see my comment in another thread. It seems to me that some players will bid 1NT on a crappy 7-8 count here - eg see Roland's example hand in the same thread. To be frank, if I didn't have 4S I would MUCH prefer a pass to a 1NT bid on these garbage hands.

Me too, but i don't think it matters on the actual hand.

[Codo]

Gerben showed one pro of a 1 NT bid: You may play there.

There is a second one: You describe your point range, your shape and your stoppers.

And a third one: Obviously the double promised 4 Spades and Club tolerance, quite a common treatment. How big is your chance, that pd will rebid Spade and not Club?

And a fourth one: If they have a fit, you MAY find your fit later. IF they don´t have a fit, your chances of a Spade fit will decrease.

 

The cons against 1 NT are: You have problems to find your 4-4 fit in spades, which may fetch a better result then 1 NT and you have more difficults to find a partial whenever they compete to 2 ♥.

 

 

So the question is: Where is the frontier when to switch from a double to 1NT?

Obviously the "Pros" and the majority believe, that you need much weaker spades and/or much stronger Hearts then you have in the given hand to make 1 NT preferable.

 

I would like to see a simulation, how often you can find a spade fit after this bidding looking at 8 cards in the major yourself...

[cherdano]

For me this is a 1S bid. I see very little logic in the argument that a X shows 4S and a 1S bid shows 5. Why should I change my system just because rho intervened. I prefer 1S to 1NT here as this hand is not good enough for a 1NT bid. - see my comment in another thread. It seems to me that some players will bid 1NT on a crappy 7-8 count here - eg see Roland's example hand in the same thread. To be frank, if I didn't have 4S I would MUCH prefer a pass to a 1NT bid on these garbage hands.

Me too, but i don't think it matters on the actual hand.

I also play 1♠ = 4+ spades (and double some competitive hand with 2 or 3 spades), but I do see the logic of the standard treatment. Partner might be faced with a decision over 3♥ or 4♥ at his next turn, and will be much better placed if he know more about our spade length. And that's where some big IMP money lies. Whatever treatment you prefer, you should admit that it's a tradeoff.

 

Actually I am not much interested in these kind of arguments any more, but blanket statements as The_Hog's above just provoke me...

 

Incidentally, this hand shows another small upside of the standard treatment: if partner has 3244, he will bid 1♠ over double, and you can still play 1N. So in fact double=4 spades is more attractive than 1♠=4 spades on this hand.

[EricK]

For me this is a 1S bid. I see very little logic in the argument that a X shows 4S and a 1S bid shows 5. Why should I change my system just because rho intervened?

The argument is not so much that you should change your system because RHO has intervened but that you can use RHO intervention to make a distinction which you would always like to be able to make but can't when RHO doesn't intervene!

[whereagles]

For some reason, I like pass..

[Apollo81]

it's MP, vuln. doesn't really matter much

I disagree. At MPs, all red you want your opps to declare. All white, you want to declare. There's something to be said for passing at all red.

 

If you pass, LHO might bid 1NT, 2♣, or even 2♥. All of these auctions are reasonably good news for you. If they play 1NT, 7 tricks gets you 100 instead of 90, and your side is on lead. If they bid 2♣, you can balance back in with a double if it comes around to you, or RHO might rebid his hearts which can only be good. If LHO raises and pard doubles, you know your KJ of hearts is not fully working and you can get out in 2♠ when you might have gotten to 3 otherwise. Even if LHO passes, I don't see any continuation that would be that bad. You also have a chance to win even if they go +90...the field might be -100 in some contract.

 

All this being said, I would still double most of the time on the given hand.