classic smolen psych -- acbl illegal?

[karlson]

1n-2♣

2♦-3♥

 

A common psych with 5 spades and 2 small hearts to deflect the heart lead. Someone whose opinions on bridge I don't generally dismiss claimed today that this particular psych was declared illegal by the ACBL. This seems impossible to me, but is it really true? Does it fall under some general rules against psyching artificial bids? (I thought that only applied to opening bids).

[blackshoe]

Item 2 under "Disallowed" on the General Convention Chart is "Psyching of artificial or conventional opening bids and/or conventional responses thereto. Psyching conventional suit responses, which are less than 2NT, to natural openings." But this is neither an opening bid nor a response to an opening bid, so this item does not apply.

 

Ask your informant for more information. Or ask HQ.

[aguahombre]

Classic? Common? Maybe some committee, somewhere got this situation and wondered how responder knew opener was going to bid 2D, and not 2H (certainly 2s would have some conventional meaning in this case); then wondered how responder devined that a heart lead would be bad. After answering (or not answering) those questions, they then decided to make an adverse ruling. Maybe they were on alert about the pair.

 

Just a guess. Failing all that, maybe they ruled that the original 2C response to 1NT was the start of the psyche. It is, in fact, a conventional suit response to a natural opening bid, and responder did not have "drop dead" in mind.

[helene_t]

One could argue that the 2♣ response is already a psyche since without the intend to psyche Smolen, responder would have transfered instead.

 

Also, maybe the issue is that it's a controlled psyche, or that one might suspect that it is not a psyche but rather an undisclosed implicit agreement.

[pooltuna]

Classic? Common? Maybe some committee, somewhere got this situation and wondered how responder knew opener was going to bid 2D, and not 2H (certainly 2s would have some conventional meaning in this case); then wondered how responder devined that a heart lead would be bad. After answering (or not answering) those questions, they then decided to make an adverse ruling. Maybe they were on alert about the pair.

 

Just a guess. Failing all that, maybe they ruled that the original 2C response to 1NT was the start of the psyche. It is, in fact, a conventional suit response to a natural opening bid, and responder did not have "drop dead" in mind.

Do you ever think of using stayman with a 52xy hand? Or do you think the transfer is automatic? IMO it is not!! I will use stayman with a 5 card major suit with what is IMO the right hand. I will have to remember this "tactical bid" and use it for an appropriate but rare hand ;)

[aguahombre]

Do you ever think of using stayman with a 52xy hand? Or do you think the transfer is automatic? IMO it is not!! I will use stayman with a 5 card major suit with what is IMO the right hand. I will have to remember this "tactical bid" and use it for an appropriate but rare hand B)

No, I never think of doing that. But, I am never wired enough to know when it will be sucessful.

[blackshoe]

The whole point to a psych is that the psycher is never "wired enough to know it will be successful". To suggest otherwise is to come dangerously close to suggesting that psyching is cheating.

 

This doesn't look like a "controlled psych" to me, since if opener had bid 2♥ that would have broken any "control" responder had. OTOH, I suppose the idea could have been that 2♣ was a psych, since having only 2 hearts instead of 4 could be considered a gross deviation from suit length. If I thought that, I'd be investigating why responder bid 2♣.

[aguahombre]

The whole point to a psych is that the psycher is never "wired enough to know it will be successful". To suggest otherwise is to come dangerously close to suggesting that psyching is cheating.

 

This doesn't look like a "controlled psych" to me, since if opener had bid 2♥ that would have broken any "control" responder had. OTOH, I suppose the idea could have been that 2♣ was a psych, since having only 2 hearts instead of 4 could be considered a gross deviation from suit length. If I thought that, I'd be investigating why responder bid 2♣.

Yep. Except "....psyching is cheating". I was coming dangerously close to saying that particular psyche is cheating, but actually saying that in order to be successful you would have to know that opener would not have hearts to show.

[jeffford76]

I'm not sure that it's that dangerous if your partner shows hearts. They'll still correct back to spades with both if you now jump to 3NT, and if they only have 3 spades, 3NT might play just as well as 4S.

[kfgauss]

Not exactly what you asked, but a work around if it is illegal and/or if you want to bid it often: Perhaps you're supposed to say 3♥ "asks whether opener has 3 spades". Then there's no psyche (how do you psyche an asking bid?). Of course, you don't get the full effect of a psyche, as your opponents are never told it shows 4 hearts.

 

Similarly, I don't think Stayman can be psyched. It's an asking bid.

[jdonn]

In theory this is not totally safe since partner could choose the 4-3 or (more likely) the 5-2 fit. In practice there are lots of people who never do.

 

Anyway I can't imagine that even the ACBL has deemed this illegal.

[karlson]

Holy !$%*& , kfgauss has come out of retirement?

[kfgauss]

Ah well, I had to post again sometime.

[bluejak]

Not exactly what you asked, but a work around if it is illegal and/or if you want to bid it often: Perhaps you're supposed to say 3♥ "asks whether opener has 3 spades". Then there's no psyche (how do you psyche an asking bid?). Of course, you don't get the full effect of a psyche, as your opponents are never told it shows 4 hearts.

 

Similarly, I don't think Stayman can be psyched. It's an asking bid.

Asking bids often show things. It depends on the partnership agreement. For example, when I use Stayman, my partner knows the sorts of hands I am likely to have, so we have an agreement on such hands, and my partner can rely on these agreements.

 

Perhaps some people play asks with no agreements as to anything shown. But I think this uncommon.

 

It is perfectly possible to psych an asking bid because most pairs have agreements as to when it is used and can rely on them: if a player deliberately asks with a grossly unsuitable hand, that's a psyche.

[campboy]

True, but it is not unheard of to use Stayman on a balanced hand with a 5-card major, looking for the 5-4 fit but ignoring the 5-3; indeed, my normal agreements recognise this possibility. So, since the hand could legitimately bid 2♣-then-3NT, it must be responder's second bid which is the psyche here.

[bluejak]

Oh, certainly: if 1NT 2♣ 2♦ 3♥ shows 4♥s and 5♠s, and the player has only 2♥s, 3♥ is a psyche, and can be made illegal by the ACBL. But I know of no evidence that they have done so: this sounds like yet another rule "invented" by suggestions from player to player which transmute into something different.