What's Standard?

[hrothgar]

Last night I got dealt roughly

 

♠ xx

♥ AKx

♦ xx

♣ xxxxx

 

The auction progressed as follows

 

1N* - (X) - P** - (2♣)

P - (2♥) - All pass

 

Partner opened a 12-14 HCP 1NT

My Pass did not force a redouble

 

What do you expect that X, 2♣, and 2♥ show?

[helene_t]

Standard is certainly that dbl is penalty, 2♣ is a very weak hand with 5+ clubs, and 2♥ is a very good hand with 5+ hearts.

[Finch]

Call the director, you only have 12 cards

 

In a country where the weak NT is common, standard is

 

Double is penalties, usually 16+ if balanced or looking at a probable 7 tricks

2C shows a very bad hand with club length

2H shows a desire to play in 2H opposite a bad hand with club length - I don't think it shows anything more than the original double.

 

One fairly common alternative is to play 2C as artificial, either 'scramble' (a generally bad hand that does not want to defend), or as 'stayman' (a generally bad treatment)

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

 

Without agreements:

X is penalty, 2C a weak bid, 2H to play.

 

With kind regards

Marlowe

[jtfanclub]

Call the director, you only have 12 cards

 

In a country where the weak NT is common, standard is

 

Double is penalties, usually 16+ if balanced or looking at a probable 7 tricks

2C shows a very bad hand with club length

2H shows a desire to play in 2H opposite a bad hand with club length - I don't think it shows anything more than the original double.

 

One fairly common alternative is to play 2C as artificial, either 'scramble' (a generally bad hand that does not want to defend), or as 'stayman' (a generally bad treatment)

I think that if one of the meanings of X is a good long suit and a side entry, then 2♣ has to be scramble. It's more important to get to play at the 2 level than for the running man to be able to show length in clubs.

[helene_t]

But if the dbl can also be a strong balanced hand, 2♣ leads to nothing. Besides, the hands that might want to scramble would be balanced hands, but those can tolerate that doubler leads his long suit so defending should be ok.

[bid_em_up]

I'm curious. Why don't you just ask your opponents instead of attempting to guess what their bids mean?

 

.

[helene_t]

my guess is the opponents answered "we play standard methods" :)

[jdonn]

I'm curious. Why don't you just ask your opponents instead of attempting to guess what their bids mean?

 

.

Maybe the problem is posed more as a trivia or fun format instead of at the table format, just to see if we can actually figure it out.

[brianshark]

As far as I know, standard means that Dbl is 15+ pts and a fairly balanced hand. 2♣ is just ♣s with no desire to defend 1NTx opposite a 15/16 count. 2♥ just showed that the fairly balanced 15/16 count happened to have a decent 5 card suit and is suggesting we play there.