Assign the Blame

[VMars]

Two advanced players sit down to play a hand, filling in for a late player. No discussion of methods at all.

 

[hv=pc=n&s=sa6432hdk6cak8742&n=skqj85hk5daq83cj6&d=s&v=n&b=15&a=1c2h2s4h5hp5np6cp6dp6hp6nppp]266|200[/hv]

 

 

How would you distribute the blame between:

1)S

2)N

3)Lack of discussion

 

If you pick S or N mostly, what would you have done differently in the same situation?

[awm]

I'd blame south a little bit more than north. The auction seems fairly clear-cut up until the 6NT call.

 

At that point in the bidding, north is a little stuck. His hand is probably too good to sign off in 6♠, but it's not completely clear that 7♠ is a make. For example, South's bidding seems consistent with a hand like ♠Axxx ♥A ♦Kx ♣AQxxxx and looking for the club king. The 6NT call seems like a nice "compromise" between 6♠ and 7♠, on the reasoning that if south's 6♥ cue was the ace we should be cold for 6NT and it might outscore a spade contract, whereas if south's 6♥ cue was a void there is a good chance he will correct to spades at the seven-level. Certainly north could've "taken the plunge" and bid 7♠ on his own, or could have trusted that the field won't bid grand even if it's there and signed off in 6♠... possibly one of these is advisable in a brand new partnership like this one, but I think the 6NT call is a reasonable action.

 

South should carry on to 7♠; he knows we have all suits controlled (partner's diamond cuebid) and it's very unlikely that north lacks the ♠K given the 5NT cooperation with 5♥ (really lousy spades probably wouldn't be worth cooperating). Certainly south could catch ♣xxx or ♣Jxx opposite and the grand could fail that way, but it's really hard to find out about third round control of clubs in a competitive auction like this one, and it's not obvious why north would've necessarily have bid the grand holding ♣xx or ♣xxxx. In any case, 6NT seems like quite a dubious contract which will rarely make if 7♠ wasn't making too.

[BunnyGo]

I agree with awm. I think after the 6 Diamond bid, it should be clear to south that they have a 10 card fit, a club suit worth a lot of tricks no heart losers, and partner just asked about the diamond king (or showed the A, either way the king is a lot!). I'd almost bypass the 6 heart bid and just bid 7 spades. I think that having bid 6 hearts he should pull to 7 spades.

[VMars]

Perhaps I should also add that N took a full 30s to bid 6NT, so S thought that he probably should pass, and as S was directing, he didn't feel like being called about himself.

[nigel_k]

It looks like South is more to blame. There aren't many hands where 6NT makes and 7♠ doesn't so I don't think passing 6NT is a logical alternative. Maybe AQ of hearts in North and an unavoidable loser elsewhere is possible but surely you aren't ethically bound to play North for that in a situation where he would normally think with many other hands.

 

But it's hard to assign blame without knowing more. Adam says the auction is clearcut but the meaning of North's 5NT is not absolutely clear to me. Was is meant as GSF or choice of slam, catering to South having both minors, or something else? What did South think 5NT meant when he bid 6♣? Was it matchpoints or IMPs?

[VMars]

matchpoints. And N muttered something about it being matchpoints as he bid.

[awm]

I think 5♥ has to be a spade raise. A minor two suiter could bid 5♦ here (obviously strong because of the reverse at the five-level). It seems hard to imagine a club one-suiter that can force to slam and try for a grand opposite a simple 2♠ bid.

 

Assuming 5♥ is a slam try in spades, 5♠ by responder would be "my hand sucks" so 5NT is "I like my hand." An established partnership might have an agreement that it shows good trumps, or that it denies the ability to cuebid clubs... but I wouldn't necessarily assume such a thing without discussion.

[Phil]

5♥ is a spade raise - no doubt about that, since South can bid 4N or 5N to bring diamonds into the picture.

 

5N should be grand slam force, but there is doubt in a pickup partnership about how South thinks what North thinks what 5♥ is. If it is GSF, then 6♣ (edit)is correct with the Ace of trump (but not 2/3) the way I play. However, what if North held Kxxxx of trump? Is North really bidding GSF with Qxxxx? Maybe, but thats a very specific hand, and about the only holding where grand doesn;t have some play.

 

6♦ makes no sense in this context - you ask a question; you get the right answer - what else is there to discuss? All 6♦ does is sow doubt into the auction.

 

6♥ confirms a heart void. Fine.

 

6N is just kinda bizarre to me.

 

50 - North

30 - South

20 - doubt about system / lack of trust in partner.

[mike777]

Two advanced players sit down to play a hand, filling in for a late player. No discussion of methods at all.

 

[hv=pc=n&s=sa6432hdk6cak8742&n=skqj85hk5daq83cj6&d=s&v=n&b=15&a=1c2h2s4h5hp5np6cp6dp6hp6nppp]266|200[/hv]

 

 

How would you distribute the blame between:

1)S

2)N

3)Lack of discussion

 

If you pick S or N mostly, what would you have done differently in the same situation?

 

 

75% south for not bidding 7s after 6d or after 6nt

25% north for bidding 6nt.

[JLOGIC]

Seems like they both lost their mind.

[whereagles]

I don't know what's 5NT, 6♦, 6♥, 6NT etc. I think the players were just trying to push the ball to each other and, since no one had the guts to make a decision, ended up in a silly contract.

 

Just be practical and bid 6♠ over 5NT. You miss the grand but hey, preempts work.

[TWO4BRIDGE]

Two advanced players sit down to play a hand, filling in for a late player. No discussion of methods at all.

 

[hv=pc=n&s=sa6432hdk6cak8742&n=skqj85hk5daq83cj6&d=s&v=n&b=15&a=1c2h2s4h5hp5np6cp6dp6hp6nppp]266|200[/hv]

 

 

5H! could have been ( should have been ) Voidwood for Sp...

 

then 5NT! = even ( 2 key cards ) excluding the Ht Ace..

 

7S ( no need to ask for trump Q with at least 10 combined ) ... but obviously that senario was not the case.

[mikeh]

I suspect that even N doesn't know, to this day, what 5N meant,

 

N made two bad calls...the ambiguous 5N....playing with an unknown partner, this is a recipe for disaster.....5♥ has to be a monster spade raise...so why not 6♦, if one wants to move towards slam? I suspect, based on the 6N call, that N was really confused by the 5♥ call and intended 5N as to play....picturing solid and very long clubs opposite.

 

The 6N was also silly...even if he had been confused by 5♥, partner's 6♠ was a clear message. Ironically, the 6N error actually gave S a chance to redeem the partnership!

 

So we turn to S...I don't think he should bid 6♣, regardless of what he thought 5N was. He should either bid 6♥ (my choice) or, out of concern that partner still doesn't know we live in spades, 6♠.

 

But the biggest blunder came with the final pass. The confused auction to that point actually made it easy to see that the right call was 7♠. I cannot construct a hand on which 6N is the better contract than 7♠, absent an opening club ruff, while it is trivial to see how 6N could be a disaster.

 

I'm not sure I'd go as far as Justin, in saying that both players lost their minds, but I do think that S had his firmly in the 'off' position at the end.

[JLOGIC]

I thought 5N was pretty expert assuming it was a trump cue (sorry to sound like kenrexford, that's just how I'd take 5N there if an expert bid it undiscussed).

[mikeh]

I thought 5N was pretty expert assuming it was a trump cue (sorry to sound like kenrexford, that's just how I'd take 5N there if an expert bid it undiscussed).

Interesting idea....I confess I'd never heard of it. I suspect, however, that the concept might be beyond an 'advanced' player, and even if it weren't, I'd expect that many would be afraid that their 'advanced' player wouldn't understand it either.

 

How do you distinguish between the trump cue bid and the choice of slams meaning? I'm not being argumentative here...the notion of a trump cue intrigues me but, as I say, it's not something I have seen before so would appreciate insight into when it applies. Is it only over a 5 level cue of their suit?

 

Even if intended as a trump cue, that doesn't excuse 6N :rolleyes:

[gnasher]

Without discussion, I'd assume that 5NT was GSF, with responses 7♠ = 2, 6♠ = 0, anything else = 1. Obviously neither player thought it meant that, but it's not clear what they did think.

 

With North's hand over 5♥, it seems obvious to me to bid 6♦, denying a top club and showing ♦A. Then South bids 6♥ confirming first-round heart control and both top clubs, and North bids 7♠.

[JLOGIC]

Interesting idea....I confess I'd never heard of it. I suspect, however, that the concept might be beyond an 'advanced' player, and even if it weren't, I'd expect that many would be afraid that their 'advanced' player wouldn't understand it either.

 

How do you distinguish between the trump cue bid and the choice of slams meaning? I'm not being argumentative here...the notion of a trump cue intrigues me but, as I say, it's not something I have seen before so would appreciate insight into when it applies. Is it only over a 5 level cue of their suit?

 

Even if intended as a trump cue, that doesn't excuse 6N :rolleyes:

 

Hey Mike,

 

Yeah I would not really know what it meant undiscussed tbh, often times people define these 5N bids as "still interested in 7" which is good if say, clubs is our suit (last train or whatever). When spades is our suit and we're just at 5H, this meaning is not useful since we can bid 6C, 6D, 6H all to try for 7. In general I like to be able to "cuebid" trumps so that we don't keep cuebidding and bid 7 off a high trump. Of course good judgement can often avoid that, but it's nice to be on more firm ground whether you have a trump loser or not.

 

I was mainly meaning this in auctions where it would usually be a last train or some kind of grope for 7, unable to cuebid something else, where that would no longer apply since we have enough room (since our suit is spades).

 

Often times last train and good trumps will be similar in the context of the auction anyways (depending on what's been cuebid already) so it doesn't matter what langauge you use.

 

If pick a slam is a possible meaning in some auction, I like it. Here 5H is a pretty strong move in spades and I would assume we're locked into spades and that pick a slam is no longer viable. I guess you could come up with some hands where 6C is best maybe, so if you meant it as that I would see your point (though not really agree that that is the best meaning).

 

I guess an old fashioned way to play would be that it's grand slam force, I don't like that meaning much either.

 

I really meant that I would assume a random expert was making some grand slam try with 5N, and that he probably had good trumps for it (else he would just cuebid). For instance maybe his hand is really good and he just wants to hear 6C before bidding 7, obviously in that case he has good trumps so "generic grand slam try" is really the same thing as "trump cuebid"

[JLOGIC]

With North's hand over 5♥, it seems obvious to me to bid 6♦, denying a top club and showing ♦A. Then South bids 6♥ confirming first-round heart control and both top clubs, and North bids 7♠.

 

This seems inefficient and could run into problems. If you cuebid 6C with both the ace and the king of clubs, what is partner to do with say, no top club, but very strong elsewhere? Can he cuebid 6D with the king? Does 6H promise a top club? If so how do you get to slam when the CK is not a necessary card? I realize that you can not get every hand right, but with this much room I think you should be able to get it right fairly often, and not utilizing 5N for anything other than grand slam force seems like a mistake. Using it to help your cuebidding auctions in some way seems better.

 

Also, you say after 6D, 6H shows BOTH club controls. Again what if only the ace was needed for slam? Surely partner might have a stiff club. It doesn't seem that great to me.

 

I think it is better to just cuebid aces in these spots, surely theoretically no? That way you can use 5N in your scheme and be more accurate.

[Phil]

I've never heard of 5N as a trump cue either but I like it. I also know of a few that play 5N as RKC too.

 

I don't see any reason to play 5N as pick-a-slam here Mike. Don't we already have a fit?

[cherdano]

The only place where I have ever seen anything written about such 5N bids are the BWS example auctions in the Challenge-the-Champs in The Bridge World. In fact Kokish/Kraft seem to like 5-level cue-bidding auctions (in many situation where others would cuebid), so they come up fairly frequently.

Their understanding (or their assumptions about expert understandings) seem to be similar to Justin's. I.e. when there is a clearly agreed trump suit, then 5N has to be a jump to be Grand Slam force, and otherwise it is a sort of waiting bid with grand slam interest. In a club slam auction this is just a generic last train, in other auctions it can just be a matter of timing (giving partner room for a minor suit cue) but does imply good trumps.

[awm]

This meaning of 5NT (forward-going, good trumps) seemed quite clear to me. I am quite surprised that there are strong players who play this 5NT as "grand slam force" -- a convention which I think is quite dated by modern standards and almost useless in this era of keycard auctions and disciplined cuebidding. Personally I don't think I have any partnerships where "grand slam force" is even on the system card!

[mikeh]

I've never heard of 5N as a trump cue either but I like it. I also know of a few that play 5N as RKC too.

 

I don't see any reason to play 5N as pick-a-slam here Mike. Don't we already have a fit?

I agree with this.

 

One can construct unusual hands on which pick a slam makes sense, but one can also do that for GSF. I suspect that most readers would now like to play the sort of agreements that Justin suggested and as Arend referred to in his post.

 

But that wasn't the point of the OP, which simply contained this 5N call with no explanation, and I think we can safely assume that whatever we now think it 'should' mean was probably not how it was taken nor intended, given what transpired thereafter.

[gnasher]

This seems inefficient and could run into problems. If you cuebid 6C with both the ace and the king of clubs, what is partner to do with say, no top club, but very strong elsewhere? Can he cuebid 6D with the king? Does 6H promise a top club? If so how do you get to slam when the CK is not a necessary card? I realize that you can not get every hand right, but with this much room I think you should be able to get it right fairly often, and not utilizing 5N for anything other than grand slam force seems like a mistake. Using it to help your cuebidding auctions in some way seems better.

 

Also, you say after 6D, 6H shows BOTH club controls. Again what if only the ace was needed for slam? Surely partner might have a stiff club. It doesn't seem that great to me.

 

I think it is better to just cuebid aces in these spots, surely theoretically no? That way you can use 5N in your scheme and be more accurate.

Are we still talking about two players who've just met? I wouldn't expect great efficiency when we've had to agree trumps at the five level and we don't have any agreements. Anyway, given that I think the default meaning of 5NT is GSF, I don't think it works for one partner to assume that it means something else.

 

Regarding club cue-bids, most of the time making 7♠ will involve setting up opener's club suit. With a singleton opposite AQ10xxx, and with the suits breaking badly, it is likely to be hard to make 13 tricks, and even harder to know during the auction that you're making 13 tricks. I think the bidding should focus on identifying cards that will make it clear that we can make seven.