Rusinow, journalist leads.Why aren't they popular?

[MomoTheDog]

I've read recently about Rusinow and Journalist leads and they seem to have distinct advantages over standard leads in that they clarify a lot of ambiguities. These leads also appear pretty simple. If they are good (with little disadvantages from what I understand) and are theoretically beneficial, why aren't these leads adopted in a more widespread fashion by the bridge players over the world?

[barmar]

Probably the same reason UDCA aren't more popular: it's just not what people are used to. It adds additional memory burden, and the advantages may not seem so obvious that it's worth learning.

[Walddk]

Probably the same reason UDCA aren't more popular

I assume you are referring to North America because in continental Europe (except France) udca is "standard". As far as NA is concerned I believe that most top pairs play udca too. At least that's my impression from watching numerous vugraph broadcasts.

 

As to Rusinow and attitude, it's a bit more complex than choosing between "standard" and udca carding. The latter is simply the reverse of "standard" whereas Rusinow and attitude have more added to it and therefore more difficult to remember.

 

Roland

[cherdano]

Rusinow leads require more discussion. They are dangerous in any situation where you might lead from Hx, e.g. in partner's suit. Hence many agree not to lead Rusinow in partner's suit. Does that include a suit partner doubled for lead direction? I would think yes, but you should better have discussed that. Etc.

 

In short, Rusinow is not a good agreement in a pickup partnership.

[pretzalz]

I've read recently about ... Journalist leads and they seem to have distinct advantages over standard leads in that they clarify a lot of ambiguities.

Yes, for declarer.

 

As for rusinow, I play them. I like them for a couple reasons, none of which is 'clarifying AK vs KQ'. Unsupported aces are led infrequently enough and in specific situations that leading A from AK is just as good. Alarm clock leads[leading the honors in reverse sequence] are more obvious. And it seems more consistent to me when I play 2/4 spot leads. These really aren't huge advantages. You also have the added problem of doubleton/stiff honor leads. This can be partially solved by having rusinow off when leading partner's unsupported suit, but this is another subtlety only for experienced partnerships.

[ArtK78]

I have played Rusinow leads against suit contracts for about 25 years. There have been a very few instances in all of that time when a Rusinow lead caused a problem that a Standard lead would have solved. On the other hand, Rusinow leads have been superior to standard leads many times over that period of time. Most of the time, they are equivalent.

 

A few players in my area play Rusinow leads against notrump contracts. I don't have any strong feeling on that treatment.

 

As for Journalist leads, I played them for some time, but I have gone back to standard leads against notrump contracts. I have rarely seen any advantage to the attitude lead part of Journalist leads. As for J denies, 10 or 9 implies zero or two higher, that works on occasion and helps declarer on occasion.

 

I do use 3rd and lowest against suit contracts (not 3rd and 5th, as it is sometimes referred to). I find that this is superior to 4th best against suits. It is more likely that you will be leading from a shorter holding against a suit contract than against a notrump contract, so you need a way to distinguish the two.

 

As with UDCA (which is clearly superior to standard carding), there is a learning curve and mistakes or memory lapses may occur. After one gets over the learning curve, one wonders why one ever used any other method.

[blackshoe]

If I remember Ruben and Rosler's book correctly, Journalist leads vs. suit contracts are more of an improvement over standard leads vs. suit contracts than are journalist leads vs. NT contracts over standard leads vs. NT contracts.

 

I would love to go back to Journalist leads, but none of my current partners is willing to make the effort. :)

[awm]

There are a number of issues preventing people from adopting various lead styles. Some of them:

 

(1) In the vast majority of cases, none of this matters. It is very rare that there will be a hand where playing/not playing rusinow or journalist leads makes a big difference.

 

(2) While these leads occasionally help partner, they also occasionally help declarer. It's not necessarily clear that playing "more informative" leads is a net winner. Most probably it depends a lot on the hand but few people have agreements to this level of depth.

 

(3) Which lead agreement is best depends a lot on your lead style. If you often lead from doubleton honors then rusinow is probably a poor agreement for you (partner goes wrong too often if you lead jack from Jx and QJx). If you often lead from three small cards against suits, then you might want to consider polish style leads (low from doubleton, high from three small) as it otherwise becomes hard to distinguish a lead from xxx versus xx (if you lead high or middle from xxx) or distinguish a lead from xxx versus Hxxx (if you lead low from xxx). Players (and countries) actually differ a lot in terms of their opening lead style.

[kenrexford]

I echo some of the other posts (like Rusinow in defined situations, dislike journalist).

 

My greater personal WTF is why Smith Echo is so little used. I believe Smith to be almost as important to good defense as Stayman is to good NT bidding, myself.

[mikeh]

I have played both Journalist honour leads and Rusinow, but don't see either as useful and so stopped many years ago.

 

J denies and 9/10 0/2 higher are very informative, but the person who benefits most from the information is declarer. While I agree that the leads will sometimes help partner, they almost always help declarer in terms of early placement of cards.

 

As for Rusinow, you do have to make more complex rules than for standard leads, especially in terms of leading in partner's suit or from shortness and the benefits that I have seen are few and far between. While I am fond of 'science', this is one example where the added memory load, even if small, outweighs the benefits I have seen, and I suspect that this may be true for many, hence the rarity with which one now encounters this carding approach.

[kenrexford]

BTW, my own rules for Rusinow, in case anyone wants a suggestion:

 

1. Rusinow at 5-L or higher

2. Rusinow in own bid/initiated suit (opened, overcalled, transferred to, etc.)

3. Rusinow against notrump contracts if from length.

[fred]

I have a lot of experience with both Rusinow and Standard versus notrump. I think Rusinow is definitely superior there.

 

I have a lot less experience with Rusinow versus suits, but those experiences I have had were not good ones. I remember one particularly painful hand when part led a stiff Queen and I had the Ace...

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[Finch]

I play attitude leads against NT in one partnership. I love them. (We don't play Journalist honour leads.)

 

However, it's true that I see very few other pairs playing them, and I can't persuade my other regular partner to change from 4th highest.

[mike777]

I play attitude leads against NT in one partnership. I love them. (We don't play Journalist honour leads.)

 

However, it's true that I see very few other pairs playing them, and I can't persuade my other regular partner to change from 4th highest.

I also play attitude leads vs nt and love them.

 

Easy to remember, easy to play. I also play Jack denies ten or nine is zero or 2 higher. Rarely comes up but works fine and whatever advantage expert opp may gain seems slight in practice in non blue ribbons bridge.

[dake50]

How about parity signal: hi-lo = 1suit of even length; lo-hi =1 suit of odd length. I played this gem from Vinje and liked it. Only conflicted with Smith echo v NT.

 

Any one else play, or like this? ?

 

I too wonder why proven superior methods are so-o-o slow to catch on. xfer advances, 'known shortage' jumps. Esp. the Swiss raises had 24 routes after 1S to reveal control structure if desired, yet 24 yrs later too few raises complaints. And whole artificial schemes to get what Swiss (J Besse) had. Is it because of the false idiom 'it doesn't matter what system is played, just how well each play that system' ? ? Partnership is about 4+% of winning to system proved 1+%.

[han]

I too wonder why proven superior methods are so-o-o slow to catch on.

Could it be that some of these improvements are not so clearly superior at all?

[SoTired]

I too wonder why proven superior methods are so-o-o slow to catch on.

Could it be that some of these improvements are not so clearly superior at all?

And they have to be known to people willing to change. And they have to be enough better to pay for the cost of learning something new and failing during the learning curve. And players that want to change have to have willing partners.

[Guest Jlall]

I too wonder why proven superior methods are so-o-o slow to catch on.

Could it be that some of these improvements are not so clearly superior at all?

Han usually I would agree with you but I think that in this case it's different since Rusinow is clearly better vs NT. I only recently made the switch despite knowing that rus was better because it was very difficult for me to see QJT9 or whatever and not just fire out the queen lol.

[han]

Did you read the full Drake post that I was quoting from? I also think that Rusinow leads against notrump are superior, but there was a lot more in Dake's post.

[Guest Jlall]

Did you read the full Drake post that I was quoting from? I also think that Rusinow leads against notrump are superior, but there was a lot more in Dake's post.

No I didn't

[CSGibson]

I have not played Rusinow leads yet, so cannot comment on their effectiveness.

 

I like playing the jack denies lead convention. While it is true that it helps declarer, it should help partner as much or more. Defense is harder than declarer play because you cannot see your side's combined assets. Alerting partner to where those assets are or are not early in the play has got to pay dividends in the long run. After all, that's why people have extensive defensive agreements. If it was better in the long run not to have informative agreements for fear of helping declarer, there wouldn't be such a large number of these conventions out there.

 

I also like journalist leads in situations where there is Qxx in dummy, partner leading through declarer to your Axx, as it clarifies the position much better.

[Free]

Does anyone have experience with Slavinski leads (played by Fantoni and Nunes)?

[broze]

I have a lot of experience with both Rusinow and Standard versus notrump. I think Rusinow is definitely superior there.

 

I have a lot less experience with Rusinow versus suits, but those experiences I have had were not good ones. I remember one particularly painful hand when part led a stiff Queen and I had the Ace...

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

 

I have greatly enjoyed playing Rusinow leads versus suited contracts. My partner and I decided that after the lead of an Ace (which at game contracts and below will almost always be a stiff, from AK tight or where leader has no other good lead) we would play that third hand gives suit pref so that he might get in and return the suit for a ruff.

 

However, twice the system has cost us dearly. Once like Fred where p led a stiff Q and I ducked, the other time when he lead Q from KQx and I overtook with the Ace costing us a trick. The ambiguity is so annoying that I'm considering giving it up.

 

Wasn't the leading system of the Blue team similar to Rusinow? And how did they manage to make it work?

[blackshoe]

Hm. I may be misremembering the book, but as I recall it, Rusinow leads vs. NT were specifically deprecated, I think on theoretical grounds. Of course, experience trumps theory, so perhaps the book is wrong. IAC, I'll have to dig it out and review that part.

[JLOGIC]

Rusinow is definitely better against NT. Many experts followed this trend:

 

Standard leads were A and Q ask for unblock, K asks for attitude. Thus, you lead the king from AKTx as well as from KQ9x. This caused many issues when partner had the jack and dummy had 2 small and he didn't know whether he should encourage or not. This was a big issue.

 

At some point, many experts started to play K is the unblock lead, and A and Q are for attitude. This solved the jack issue as KQ9x led the Q, and AKTx led the ace. It created a new problem that partner do with the ten. This was better, but imo the obvious thing to think at that point is why not play rusinow with king as the power lead. It makes things so much easier. If you don't like journalist (I don't) then I highly recommend playing that way.

 

I like rusinow vs suits also, but I also bang down aces more than almost anyone. In fact, I prefer old fashioned king lead rather than A from AK if I don't play rusinow. I also rarely lead Hx in a random suit, so I am probably the ideal style to play rusinow vs suits. If you lead lots of random Hx's and never bang down aces, it's probably a bad thing to play.