Opening with a balanced five-card major

[the hog]

"What is better, to show in two bids a balanced hand outside your NT range, or to show in two bids an unbalanced (5-4+) hand.

 

Isn't one of the major advantages of bidding balanced hands as balanced hands that when you don't have a balanced hand partner will know about it? That applies equally well to 5332 hands inside your NT range, 5332 hands outside your NT range and (to bring in another oft quoted hand) 4234 (etc) hands outside your NT range."

 

Yes, I agree but I don't know if I read an initial comment by you correctly, that you would open a 5332 outside the NT range with 1minor and rebid 1N.

 

To some extent Klinger does this in some of his partnerships. He opens bal 17-19 hands, (including those with 5Ds), with 1C and rebids 1N.

bal 11-13 hands, (including those with 5C) are opened 1D and rebid 1N.

All bal 14-16s are opened 1N.

[EricK]

"What is better, to show in two bids a balanced hand outside your NT range, or to show in two bids an unbalanced (5-4+) hand.

 

Isn't one of the major advantages of bidding balanced hands as balanced hands that when you don't have a balanced hand partner will know about it? That applies equally well to 5332 hands inside your NT range, 5332 hands outside your NT range and (to bring in another oft quoted hand) 4234 (etc) hands outside your NT range."

 

Yes, I agree but I don't know if I read an initial comment by you correctly, that you would open a 5332 outside the NT range with 1minor and rebid 1N.

 

To some extent Klinger does this in some of his partnerships. He opens bal 17-19 hands, (including those with 5Ds), with 1C and rebids 1N.

bal 11-13 hands, (including those with 5C) are opened 1D and rebid 1N.

All bal 14-16s are opened 1N.

I wouldn't do it playing 2/1 (or whatever) in a pick-up partnership. But I think It would be part of a system I would like to play: Polish Club style, but with all weak balanced hands (including 5332s) going into 1♣.

 

I would also reverse the 1S and 1NT responses to 1H, so that opener's rebid after 1H 1S or 1S 1NT is always meaningful. (1H 1S 1NT = Flannery type hand).

 

There is a potential loss on all hands which are exactly 5332, but a potential gain on all other hands with a 5CM. eg 1H 2D 2NT = 5H & 4C, 1H 2D 3C = 5H & 5C etc

 

Eric

[Fluffy]

As so often happens with questions of this nature, some posters frequently respond by "I would do this if...but that if..." without looking at the impact of the decision on the system as a whole. eg Lets take 2 hands:

 

♠ AKT83 

♥  QJT 

♦  KJ3 

♣  Q2 

 

♠ QJT

♥ AKT83 

♦  KJ3 

♣  Q2 

 

If you open the first 1S, what do you bid over 2C?

♣2NT: 15+ Balanced, describes sexactly what I have.

 

If you open the second 1N, what does the auction 1H 2C 2N show?

 

2NT?: 15+Balanced, exactly what I have still.

 

It can't show this hand else you would have opened it with 1N.

 

I never open 1NT with 5 card majors :)

 

 

If you rebid 2D on either or both, then I am sorry but there is little hope for you as an informative bidder as you have totally misdescribed your hand.

 

Have to disagree, I´ve played this methods since I Started playing bridge (11 years ago I started, but I learned this probably later), and I don´t remember a single bad result for doing it, the only time the auction finished on my 2♣ rebid for a dangerous fit it was a 3-3 fit, and I cross ruffed for -50 and a top score.

 

You are missdescribing your hand by showing a 5-4 where you have a 5-3? only at first round, when partner makes his 80% 2 card support I rebid 2NT to show a 5422/5332 15-17 balanced.

 

 

 

In my opinion is a matter of waht you think a 1NT opening is, to me is the worst opening in a natural system after 2NT, because gets rid of many of OUR space making it impossible to find a 4-4 major fit when partner has 5-7, getting rid as well of 5-3 adn 5-4 fits its not a great improvement.

 

Those of you who ike weak NT are tending to open the scope of Strong NT openings, of course you liek to open 1NT, but I hate weak NT even more, because gets rid even more of OUR space. And the less I can open those hands, or at least the most specific they are when I open, the happier I´ll be.

[helium]

1 nt all hands:)but agree whit fluffy, if i open 1♠i bid a minor next.

[the hog]

"In my opinion is a matter of waht you think a 1NT opening is, to me is the worst opening in a natural system after 2NT, because gets rid of many of OUR space making it impossible to find a 4-4 major fit when partner has 5-7, getting rid as well of 5-3 adn 5-4 fits its not a great improvement."

 

And there is the crux of the matter - we totally differ on this point. Personally I believe you should strive to open 1N as often as possible. Currently I am playing a 15-18 NT which is not ideal, but cest la vie.

 

The garbage 12-14 nt including 5 card Majors is amongst the most valuable bids in bridge imo. I am afraid Fluffy that I think you are guilty of 2 handed rather than 4 handed thinking here.

 

Re bidding 2D on the hands I posted. I really think bidding non suits like this is very poor bridge. You state you have never had a bad result doing so; I guess you have never had these auctions -

1S 2C 2D 4D

1S 2C 2D 3H where 3H shows a singleton, very good 4 card D support and a slammish hand. Perhaps these bids are not allowed in your system?

 

I believe its is more important to paint a correct picture of my hand here, and stating I have at least 9 cards in the 2 suits I have bid and an unbalanced hand is a far more informative picture than bidding this way to show a balanced no trump oriented hand with a 5332 distribution.

 

Ron

[Free]

In my opinion is a matter of waht you think a 1NT opening is, to me is the worst opening in a natural system after 2NT, because gets rid of many of OUR space making it impossible to find a 4-4 major fit when partner has 5-7, getting rid as well of 5-3 adn 5-4 fits its not a great improvement.

Fluffy

 

in your first reply you say that you open 1NT with both Majors (still not with a 5 card M). Theoretical this is a poor method of missing many 4-4 fits. And now you're complaining about missing 4-4 Major fits when partner has 5-7!? :) I'm a bit confused here...

 

If you really care about finding that 4-4 Major fit, you shouldn't open 1NT with both Majors as well. Hmmm, I would just not bid 1NT with any 4-card Major anymore, since it also might lose our 4-4 fit. :)

[luke warm]

fluffy:

Those of you who ike weak NT are tending to open the scope of Strong NT openings, of course you liek to open 1NT, but I hate weak NT even more, because gets rid even more of OUR space. And the less I can open those hands, or at least the most specific they are when I open, the happier I´ll be.

 

as you know i have a lot of respect for your abilities and knowledge, however this is hard for me to understand ... maybe it's because i'm *so* dang prejudiced toward the mini/weak nt...

 

i can't see a mini/weak nt preempting our side... maybe it's happened, but truthfully i can't recall when it has... partner always has invitational puppet/garbage stayman and game forcing stayman... yes, it's possible we'll play in 1nt with a 4/4 or 5/3 major fit, but that isn't *necessarily* bad (depends on the field and on declarer play/luck)... even if it does end up badly sometimes, to me the havoc raised on the other side makes it worth it...

 

i know it's easy to remember the victories and forget the defeats, but i'm trying to be as objective as i can... i honestly believe that playing a weak nt, and opening it as often as possible, shows ahead on the scorecard in the long run

[Rebound]

I'm with Fluffy. It's so much easier to just open a 5-card major than to try and convince partner you have one later.

[the hog]

I'm with Fluffy. It's so much easier to just open a 5-card major than to try and convince partner you have one later.

 

More "me tooism" without any attempt to discuss the ramifications involved in opening these hands with 1M.

 

Another one who has never heard of puppet stayman! If you open 1n in what auctions do you need to "convince" partner you have a 5 card suit. Puppet stayman shows the 5 carder. If the opps balance and you bid your suit, will it not be 5?

 

You have also not responded to any comments re the bidding of "non" suits and how you envisage the auction continuing with differing ranges, nor how you handle auctions when responder jumps to 4D or shows a splinter agreeing your non-existent suit.

[mikestar]

For many years I opened 5M-3-3-2 hands with the major. But long experience has taught me that it is often a good thing to miss the 5-3 fit if partner is 4-3-3-3, breaks about even when he's 4-4-3-2 and loses if he's unbalanced with 3M. A method such as puppet stayman can eliminate pretty much all of the losing cases when partner is game invitational or better.

[whereagles]

Actually, now that Hog mentions the 12-14 NT with 5-card majors, I remember I once played this structure (1st 2nd NV)

 

1NT = 8-11 may have weakish 5-card maj. 8 pts only if 5-card somewhere (kinda makes it a 9 count).

2-any suit = 5-10 weak two (including 2C = clubs), 5-card possible but good suit (else open 1NT).

 

That was quite the annoyance for opponents B) We got caught speeding exactly ONCE, vs the best pair of the country, and only because pard forgot the 1NT escape mechanism :P (Opps said later they'd bail us out if pard had bid what he should, lol.)

[luke warm]

I'm with Fluffy. It's so much easier to just open a 5-card major than to try and convince partner you have one later.

hmmm... how does

1nt : 2c

2S

sound? convincing enough?

 

oops, i just read ron's reply, but had already responded to this one...

[Cascade]

All balanced hands in the NT range should be opened with the appropriate NT bid. Shape is all important.

All hand with a five-card major should be opened with 1Maj. Shape is all important.

 

:P

[dogsbreath]

hi ..

..refering to the original post .. 15/18 is too wide a range for 1NT ..y got enough problems already without worrying about 5-card majors.

Apart from that, i'm with the 5-card major/1nt openers on this ..

Rgds Dog

 

dont think twice, it's alright

[Fluffy]

If you really care about finding that 4-4 Major fit, you shouldn't open 1NT with both Majors as well. Hmmm, I would just not bid 1NT with any 4-card Major anymore, since it also might lose our 4-4 fit. :P

I not long ago was playing 15+1/2-17+1/2 NT ranges, wich means when you have 15 or 18 you have to decide to undervalue or to overvalue (same with 20 & 22).

 

And I must say the best about openings whas that I could choice to open 1m always I had 4-4 in the majors regardless of my intermediates& Js, it turned kinda good as I remember.

 

 

To Ron...

 

What I mean is you are losing major fits everytime partner has 5-7 range, pupet stayman has its advantages to find 5 card major, but it gets rid of weak stayman to get a decent part scroe when very weak.

[iscbrooks]

Some people seem to be getting a little off track. I recommend we stick to the topic, using the normal 16-18 NT range.

 

I'm with Fluffy. It's so much easier to just open a 5-card major than to try and convince partner you have one later.

 

hmmm... how does

1nt : 2c

2S

sound? convincing enough?

 

What if he has 4 hearts and 3 spades? What if he doesn't even bid Stayman because he only has 3? Stayman works for 4-4 fits, but doesn't cover 5-3. Probably because you should open 1M with a 5-card major.

[Free]

That's why nobody plays pure stayman anymore, but rather something which starts the same and has a relay to find a 5 card M or some other full relay schemes. Isn't it the original stayman which suggested to bid 2NT with both Majors? Who does that these days anyway? :P

 

The easiest way imo is just to use 3♣ as puppet stayman with GF values...

[luke warm]

Some people seem to be getting a little off track. I recommend we stick to the topic, using the normal 16-18 NT range.

 

I'm with Fluffy. It's so much easier to just open a 5-card major than to try and convince partner you have one later.

 

hmmm... how does

1nt : 2c

2S

sound? convincing enough?

 

What if he has 4 hearts and 3 spades? What if he doesn't even bid Stayman because he only has 3? Stayman works for 4-4 fits, but doesn't cover 5-3. Probably because you should open 1M with a 5-card major.

if he has an invitational hand, 3433 or 3442 (for example), the bidding is:

1nt : 2c

2d : 2h

 

this shows 4 hearts, opener can now bid a 4 card spade suit, pass 2h, bid 3h, bid 2nt, etc... responder showed an invitational strength hand by bidding non-forcing stayman in the first place

 

this is why i much prefer 2d as game forcing stayman.. in free's post above he says he prefers 3c as puppet with game force hand.. i haven't needed that playing 2d, the relay structure finds it.. this is especially true if no 4522 hands are opened 1nt (canape of some kind)

[tysen2k]

This is an area that I've devoted some time and research into studying. Some things I've discovered:

 

For strong NT, including 5cM scores better simply because of increased frequency. 1NT is a pretty effective bid for both constructive and preemptive purposes and so increasing its frequency is a good thing. Taking 5c ♠s out doesn't hurt that much. Taking out the hearts hurts more.

 

For weak NT, it's more of a wash, but including the 5cM is still better than not. The weaker we are the more likely a major partial is going to be better than NT. So we suffer more by not mentioning our major when we're weak, but it's still worth it from a frequency/preemption point of view.

 

If you go weaker than about 12-14, then it's probably better not have the 5cM.

 

Tysen

[pbleighton]

"If you go weaker than about 12-14, then it's probably better not have the 5cM.

 

Tysen"

 

Playing a 10-13 NT when NV, we open 1NT with 5S with 10-11, and 1NT with 5H with 10-12. A reasonable 5cM with a max is too strong for any NT range IMO.

 

1X openers for us are Rule of 18, so 5332 10/11 counts qualify, but...

 

The main reason for the mini is offense - but it's also nice to let it take the balanced trash out of your openings, including 1M. Yes, we do miss fits, but since the field isn't opening these hands...

 

With 12-14 (vul) we open 1NT except for decent 14 pointers.

 

Peter

[Free]

Tysen 2000 B) ,

 

I think there's a flaw in your logic somewhere...

 

- You talk about using strong NT for a part as preemptive, so you allow 5 card Majors to increase the frequency.

- With weak NT (more preemptive) you still allow 5 card Majors, but you seem not to be so sure ;)

- When playing mini (pure preemptive method imo) then you wouldn't allow them for some reason (not specified)

 

It seems to me like the more preemptive you go, the less frequency you want :blink: which is imo the reversed psychology of preempting. Or do you only consider the constructive part of the NT?

 

Anyway, as somebody else said: if you don't include 5 card ♠, no real problems (since we will control the partscore bidding), but if you don't include a 5 card ♥, then you start losing since opps have a bigger chance of having/finding a ♠ fit, and controlling the partscore battle. This is imo completely true!

But note that when opps intervene after your 1NT and you have a 5 card ♠, you can still bid it at 2-level. So I don't see an immediate reason why not to open 1NT with any 5 card M. Ok, we'll lose some 5-3 fits from time to time, or end up in a 5-2 instead of a 3-5 fit (you can solve this by requiring a 3 card OM when you have a 5 card M), but you still end up in a playable contract.

 

Perhaps some more research should be done what methods work best in imps and in MP's, cause there could be a huge difference imo. Research about:

- both 5-card Major allowed

- no 5-card ♠ allowed, only 5-card ♥ allowed

- no 5-card Major allowed, but any other distributions in the Majors allowed

- no 5-card Major or 4-4 ♥-♠ allowed

- no 5- or 4-card Major allowed (so minor-suit oriented and pure anti-Major preempt)

Anyone with lots of spare time? ;)

[helium]

its no problem opening 15-17 nt whit 5 in a major after my experience, we use puppet stayman over 1 nt,(not just over 2 nt), and then responder can check if he want so fint ut if u have 4 or 5 card major... np:))

 

 

 

kenneth

[luke warm]

"If you go weaker than about 12-14, then it's probably better not have the 5cM.

 

Tysen"

 

Playing a 10-13 NT when NV, we open 1NT with 5S with 10-11, and 1NT with 5H with 10-12. A reasonable 5cM with a max is too strong for any NT range IMO.

 

1X openers for us are Rule of 18, so 5332 10/11 counts qualify, but...

 

The main reason for the mini is offense - but it's also nice to let it take the balanced trash out of your openings, including 1M. Yes, we do miss fits, but since the field isn't opening these hands...

 

With 12-14 (vul) we open 1NT except for decent 14 pointers.

 

Peter

this is the "other" way to play 5332 hands... the 12, 13 point hands open 1M and rebid cheapest/best minor over a forcing nt... another problem is the 12, 13 1H bid when partner responds 1S... 1nt now promises 14-16 (playing mini)

 

i've about come to the conclusion that 1nt should be semi-forcing when playing a mini nt, but ONLY if one has opened 1M with a 5332 hand in the nt range... then partner won't go into seizures when 1nt is passed

[luke warm]

its no problem opening 15-17 nt whit 5 in a major after my experience, we use puppet stayman over 1 nt,(not just over 2 nt), and then responder can check if he want so fint ut if u have  4 or 5 card major... np:))

 

 

 

kenneth

true, it is no problem but only if responder has an invitational hand.. i think the ones who are objecting do so because of the superior partscore playing 2M (especially if using a mini nt and especially at matchpoints)

 

i think they are right quite often, but imo not often enough to justify giving up the preemptive effect... just an opinion though

[pbleighton]

"this is the "other" way to play 5332 hands... the 12, 13 point hands open 1M and rebid cheapest/best minor over a forcing nt... another problem is the 12, 13 1H bid when partner responds 1S... 1nt now promises 14-16 (playing mini)

 

i've about come to the conclusion that 1nt should be semi-forcing when playing a mini nt, but ONLY if one has opened 1M with a 5332 hand in the nt range... then partner won't go into seizures when 1nt is passed"

 

We play 1M-1NT as natural, 2/1 as F1.

 

The 1H rebid problem is why we open 1NT with 5H through 12(13). With a decent 13, we call it 14 when it comes to the rebid.

 

I played a semi-forcing NT for a while - it had advantages, but you can miss games once in a while.

 

Peter