Balance?

[rogerclee]

IMPs, Red vs White, Fourth Seat

 

♠A97xx ♥Jx ♦KT97x ♣T

 

(2♥) - P - (P) - ?

[655321]

2♠

[gwnn]

Yuck! No.

[NickRW]

Doesn't this rather depend on opps style at what is, for them, w/r?

 

If they are conservative and usually have a 6 card suit, then I think they rate to make it and that partner likely has enough that we can make 2S.

 

If they are aggressive and quite likely to only have a 5 card suit, then maybe they're off. Or, responder, factoring in that partner may have had only a 5 card suit, when he in fact had six, will now be prodded into bidding a game that they might have otherwise missed.

 

So I think I take a look at the opps card.

 

Nick

[awm]

I think this is a pass.

 

Admittedly it will often be the case that we can make 2♠. But I think bidding 2♠ here gives us too wide a range, and we will often end up going down when partner tries for game holding just about what it takes for 2♠ to make.

[the hog]

2S and I don't think this is close.

[kenrexford]

2♠

[jdonn]

2♠, I won't just give up. I don't think partner is likely to take me to a minus, his most likely bids if he bids are 3♠ or 3♥ or 2NT, none of which bothers me.

[gnasher]

2♠. I'm quite surprised that anyone would consider passing with so much playing strength.

[andy_h]

Sign me up for 2S as well.

[P_Marlowe]

No.

 

With kind regards

Marlowe

[P_Marlowe]

Doesn't this rather depend on opps style at what is, for them, w/r?

 

<snip>

Yes.

 

If you balanced against us, the p of the

weak two bidder may have good opening

strength and will be happy to pull the red

card.

 

I dont fear partner, I fear the guy sitting

oppossite the weak two bidder.

 

With kind regards

Marlowe

[nige1]

IMPs, Red vs White, Fourth Seat ♠A97xx ♥Jx ♦KT97x ♣T

(2♥) - P - (P) - ?

IMO 2♠ = 10, _X = 6, _P = 4.

Protection tactics depend more on your partnership style than the proclivities of opponents. If your agreement is that immediate actions are sound, then you have to protect on this kind of hand.

[han]

Think you have to.

[kfay]

I'd do it.

[neilkaz]

5-5 and two decent suits...I'll risk (and it is a risk) 2♠ here.

[ArtK78]

You have to balance. Partner could have a good hand with long hearts or a strong balanced hand without a heart stop and no good call over 2♥ (i.e, a 3433 15 count with 4 small hearts).

 

You could even have a game.

 

The only problem is that when partner has one of those strong hands he may get a little carried away when you balance. So tread carefully.

[rogerclee]

It was in a Cayne match. Fantoni passed and basically justified it as "I am never balancing with only 8 points and this bad a 5-card suit."

 

I thought it was pretty close and am surprised that some of the 2♠ bidders think it is obvious.

 

Anyway, 4♠ was laydown.

[kenrexford]

It was in a Cayne match. Fantoni passed and basically justified it as "I am never balancing with only 8 points and this bad a 5-card suit."

 

I thought it was pretty close and am surprised that some of the 2♠ bidders think it is obvious.

 

Anyway, 4♠ was laydown.

The first part of the explanation is telling.

 

When a person is talking about a 5-5 hand with another person, both competent bidders, each of them knows that the other is analyzing the hand as to its losing trick count and to the interiors (8 pips plus). So, to lead off with a comment about the HCP holding is obviously going nowhere and is offered as a citation to some hand analysis tool that is not used with hands like this. This is especially the case when claiming 8 while looking at Jx in hearts, which is hardly even worth mentioning.

 

The second half of the comment is worthwhile. But, when your second point, perhaps a good one, is followed by a nonsense point, this screams of the speaker not actually believing his own words.

 

Contrast if the comment been something like, "Although this approaches a seven-loser hand, I wanted a little more in the way of body, and 8 points is 8 points, after all."

 

Think also if the pips and honors were shuffled around a little to yield ♠AJ1097 ♥xx ♦K1097x ♣x. That "just 8 points" would be clearly biddable.

 

The debate here is whether the body is more like that or more like ♠Axxxx ♥Jx ♦Kxxxx ♣x.

 

He knows that he underbid, IMO.

[rogerclee]

I am not sure why you think it makes sense to dissect his reason into two separate ones. Obviously you can construct an 8-count that would be an automatic balance, and you can construct a crappy 5-card suit that would be an automatic balance.

 

I am also not sure what you mean by "he knows he underbid." Are you saying he knew he made an error?

[kenrexford]

Are you saying he knew he made an error?

Yes. I think so.

[awm]

I think he is acknowledging that as the cards lie, he made the wrong call.

 

But I don't think that makes it an error. I will back Fantoni's judgement over most of our forum regulars all day long. I know there is a tendency on forum "problem hands" to always bid, say it is the "most flexible" option, and then blame partner if you end in a bad spot (unless maybe that bad spot is what you bid, doubled). While this kind of reasoning might win bidding polls, it has an alarming habit of backfiring (and leaving the bidder searching for a "better" partner) at the table.

 

Fantoni's reasoning seems sound to me. He's basically just saying "I have a bad hand with a lousy suit, why should I bid?" while acknowledging that he might bid such a suit if he had a better hand overall, or that he might bid with eight points with meaty suits.

[kenrexford]

I mean, sure. In principle the answer might be right. But, these suits do have a lot of body. If body was the iddue, the comment would have been that I wanted the jack in my suit instead, or something like that. Commenting about the 8 points with the comment "I am never balancing with only 8 points" as the lead, though, is patently absurd. It surely is hyperbolic, as surely "never" and "only" are nonsensical as absolutes. This is exactly the kind of phrasing that someone uses when they are a little miffed with the situation, usually because they know that the decision was dubious.

[awm]

I think you're reading too much into this. He has plenty of reason to be miffed at the result regardless of whether he thinks he made the wrong call looking at only one hand.

 

I disagree that there is a difference between "I am not balancing with such a bad suit and only 8 hcp" versus saying "I am not balancing with only 8 hcp and such a bad suit" especially when the comment is made by someone who is not a native english speaker.

[rogerclee]

I think he is acknowledging that as the cards lie, he made the wrong call.

He made this comment during the auction, and did not say anything about missing 4♠ after the hand was over.

 

His English was not fantastic during the commentary, and his comments were relatively terse in general, so I would not read too much into the structure of his words. The "never" may have been an embellishment on my part (apologies), but his tone seemed to be that he was quite convinced pass was right. If I recall, he passed pretty quickly.