Opening 1NT with a singleton

[barmar]

I've read some bridge columns that suggest opening NT with 4441 when the singleton is an Ace or King (they're far more likely to take tricks than two or three small cards). Is it really "expert practice" to open NT with smaller singletons?

 

Can someone calculate the percentage of 1NT and 2NT openings that fit this criteria? I know I've made these bids, but it's been a while since I had one of those hands when I was in a position to open the bidding, so I wouldn't be surprised if it's around the 1% limit.

[helene_t]

Playing weak NT, I often find it necessary to open off-shape 1NT. For example

Qxx

AQJx

QJxxx

x

 

In a weak-NT context this hand is not good enough to raise spades.

 

Also the 4441-hands with a singleton in a minor are awkward and I prefer to open almost all of the 1NT if in range.

 

Playing strong NT don't think I would construct a hand with a small singleton where I would prefer to open 1NT.

[bluejak]

Of course this is a matter of style. Many English players open 1♦ and rebid 2♦ without worrying. The modern style is probably to open 1♦ and raise spades, which is frequently done with three cards. But it is very rare to open such a hand 1NT, though in England it is perfectly legal to do so so long as you disclose it.

[Cascade]

I've read some bridge columns that suggest opening NT with 4441 when the singleton is an Ace or King (they're far more likely to take tricks than two or three small cards). Is it really "expert practice" to open NT with smaller singletons?

 

Can someone calculate the percentage of 1NT and 2NT openings that fit this criteria? I know I've made these bids, but it's been a while since I had one of those hands when I was in a position to open the bidding, so I wouldn't be surprised if it's around the 1% limit.

I did not take account of the HCP in the hands.

 

If you open 1NT with all 4333, 4432, 5332 hands and 4441 with a singleton honour then the relative frequencies are:

 

Singleton Ace only (or king or queen only)

 

4333 0.220262621

4432 0.450537179

5332 0.324386769

4441 0.004813431

 

Singleton Ace or King

 

4333 0.219207481

4432 0.448378938

5332 0.322832835

4441 0.009580747

 

Singleton Ace or King or Queen

 

4333 0.218162401

4432 0.446241275

5332 0.321293718

4441 0.014302605

 

Singleton Ace or King or Queen or Jack

 

4333 0.21712724

4432 0.444123899

5332 0.319769207

4441 0.018979654

 

So it appears if you only ever opened 1NT with a stiff ace or king (or any two particular honours of your chosing) you would comply with the 1% regulation under this sort of scheme.

 

However only a minor change to the assumptions like not opening all 5332 hands with a five-card major or opening some 5431 hands (these are much more frequent than 4441) would easily take you over the limit.

 

Here for example is one scenario:

 

4333 0.214763085

4432 0.439288128

5332 0.316287452

4441 0.009386498

5431 0.020274837

 

With 5431 I included only five-card minors. For both 4441 and 5431 I only considered a singleton ace or king.

 

You can see we are nearly up to 3%. Including 5-card majors in the 5431s would take us to nearly 5%.

 

On the other hand including some 5422s would reduce these percentages a little.

 

4333 0.197474139

4432 0.403924375

5332 0.29082555

5422 0.099145074

4441 0.008630863

 

No five-card major in 5422.

[barmar]

Thanks for the calculations. In a strong NT context, I think many 5431 hands would be strong enough to reverse, so wouldn't have to be opened 1NT, so that should keep the percentage low.

 

And if some changes in style push you closer to 2%, I'm not sure I'd quibble. The 1% figure seems to be a rough guideline, not a precise line you can't cross, since I doubt most players really know their percentages so exactly. If you ask most players the frequency of any particular action they take, I expect the best you can get is a choice from never, very rare, infrequent, sometimes, frequently, always. Trying to get them to refine very rare into 1% vs 3% is asking a bit much, unless they've gone through an exercise like this.

[Cascade]

Thanks for the calculations. In a strong NT context, I think many 5431 hands would be strong enough to reverse, so wouldn't have to be opened 1NT, so that should keep the percentage low.

 

And if some changes in style push you closer to 2%, I'm not sure I'd quibble. The 1% figure seems to be a rough guideline, not a precise line you can't cross, since I doubt most players really know their percentages so exactly. If you ask most players the frequency of any particular action they take, I expect the best you can get is a choice from never, very rare, infrequent, sometimes, frequently, always. Trying to get them to refine very rare into 1% vs 3% is asking a bit much, unless they've gone through an exercise like this.

The obvious problem with treating rules like that is that at some point someone will quibble.

 

If you don't quibble at 2% do you quibble at 3% how about 4%, 5%, 6% etc

[awm]

I think you're reading the 1% statement too literally. This is just an attempt to codify the difference between having an agreement to open 1NT with a singleton (not allowed) and occasionally violating agreements in order to open 1NT with a singleton (allowed). The distinction between agreements versus calls made at the table is a common one in virtually all bridge authorities (including ACBL).

 

The point is just that if a player does something with extreme frequency, to the degree that an observant partner will notice and come to make allowances for the possibility, it becomes an implicit agreement even if there's no explicit discussion. No director is going to run all Cascade's simulations and distinguish between 0.98% versus 1.01% and say the former is legal and the latter is not. It's going to be more of a judgment call about whether there is something particularly "extraordinary" about the hand, and about whether partner seems to have "fielded" the action somehow.

[barmar]

So after saying that players hardly ever open NT with a small singleton, I've now seen it done at least twice in the 8 sessions I've played so far this week in San Diego. In both cases they got away with it because responder had 5 or 6 of the suit, so we couldn't run it.

 

I don't think I could get away with it, the card gods hate me too much. This afternoon I opened 2NT with AQ KQJTx KQxx Kx, and ended up in 3NT after partner transferred to ♠. Naturally, LHO had ♣AQJxxxx, and I went down 3 (4♥ goes down 1 because the ♠K is offside, too).

[nige1]

So after saying that players hardly ever open NT with a small singleton, I've now seen it done at least twice in the 8 sessions I've played so far this week in San Diego.  In both cases they got away with it because responder had 5 or 6 of the suit, so we couldn't run it.

 

I don't think I could get away with it, the card gods hate me too much.  This afternoon I opened 2NT with AQ KQJTx KQxx Kx, and ended up in 3NT after partner transferred to ♠.  Naturally, LHO had ♣AQJxxxx, and I went down 3 (4♥ goes down 1 because the ♠K is offside, too).

I think that directors should be more suspicious. For putative illegal agreements that surface rarely, I feel that the default legal position should be to treat such bids as illegal.

 

I accept that some partnerships may never have discussed them so they don't have an explicit agreement.

 

And many partnerships may be completely ignorant of the regulation. They just think 1N is the best bid on some hands with a singleton.

 

I disagree with those who advise that the director should normally rule no agreement when a particular hand or hand-type is rare. If that really is the law, however, I would recommend that partnerships independently study such legal interpretations and carefully avoid explicit discussion of such matters.

 

The problem with deviations about which an agreement is forbidden are that appropriate hands and opportunities are rare. If you treat each specific hand or hand-type separately, they are rarer. This means that you rarely have any history to examine. If the partnership are strangers or foreigners, they will have less local history, and are more likely to escape censure.

 

In practice this means, that those who abide by such daft regulations, masochistically suffer a self-imposed handicap.

[blackshoe]

I think that directors should be more suspicious.

I was an anti-submarine warfare operator in the Navy. One of the dicta in that endeavor is "Of course I'm paranoid! The question is, am I paranoid enough?!" But directing bridge is not ASW, and I don't think this dictum should apply to the game.

 

For putative illegal agreements that surface rarely, I feel that the default legal position should be to treat such bids as illegal.

 

Law 101: Players are permitted to use judgment in devising their systemic agreements, provided those agreements are in compliance with applicable law and local regulation. However, once those agreements are made, players are not permitted to use judgment in deciding to deviate from their agreements. After any such deviation the TD shall cancel the table result and award an artificial adjusted score.

 

I don't think so.

 

Perhaps you didn't intend such a wide ranging restriction, Nigel, I suppose one could insert something like "if the deviation would represent an illegal agreement" in there somewhere, but still, this "Law 101" would be a bit too much IMO.

 

As for the rest, I have a suspicion that at some time you either got bad advice on or took your own interpretation of some law or regulation, that interpretation turned out to be wrong, you got shafted by it, and it's left a bad taste in your mouth ever since. I may be wrong, but that's my read on things you've said and the way you've said them. If I'm right, well, I sympathize with you on the poor outcome, but not on the drive to change the rules.

[gnasher]

Perhaps you didn't intend such a wide ranging restriction, Nigel

I don't think Nigel can complain about inaccuracy in paraphrasing other people's opinions.

[nige1]

As for the rest, I have a suspicion that at some time you either got bad advice on or took your own interpretation of some law or regulation, that interpretation turned out to be wrong, you got shafted by it, and it's left a bad taste in your mouth ever since. I may be wrong, but that's my read on things you've said and the way you've said them. If I'm right, well, I sympathize with you on the poor outcome, but not on the drive to change the rules.

Blackshoe seems to be aware that friends and I have lost on boards, where we have slavishly followed our interpretation of the rules -- for example, when opponents took a more liberal view and opened third in hand on 5-7 HCP.

 

When you ask opponents about such actions, they deny any agreement and also deny knowledge of any regulation restricting such agreements.

 

I believe that opponents didn't have any explicit agreement; I suspect many players have what some of us would deem to be an an implicit understanding; but in any case, you rarely encounter more than a couple of such incidents so it would be futile to try to establish a pattern.

[nige1]

Perhaps you didn't intend such a wide ranging restriction, Nigel

I don't think Nigel can complain about inaccuracy in paraphrasing other people's opinions.

I may fail to understand all the subtleties of gnasher's arguments; but at least I make some attempt to address the substance.

[nige1]

Cascade could advise team-mates ...

• To cancel existing partnership agreements about opening 1N with a singleton.
  
• To drop sequences that establish that a 1N opener definitely has a singleton.
  
• To confirm the kind of balanced hands on which to open 1N.
  
• Individually, to study legal advice in this forum by expert directors.
  
• To ignore the views of "paranoid" mavericks (except this post).
  
• To avoid discussion of such matters but
  
• To emphasise the importance of judgement in bidding.
  

:)

[blackshoe]

There was a comment in one of George Rosenkranz' Romex books to the effect that "we treat a singleton A or K as if it were a doubleton". Of course, Romex doesn't have a natural 1NT opening, and most balanced hands are shown by a rebid of 2NT. So perhaps it's less a problem - or a different problem.

[nige1]

I played for many years that 1♦ - 2♣ - 2♦ showed no more diamonds than when it was opened to take care of difficult rebid hands.

Wow! I hadn't thought of that. What an excellent convention!

[Cascade]

This is precisely what my partner and I agreed to play given that we could not open 4=4=4=1 hands freely with 1NT.