Opponent preempts over partner's 1NT

[sty2000]

[hv=pc=n&w=sk85haq7d98c76543&d=e&v=e&b=6&a=1n3d?]133|200[/hv]

 

IMPs

 

What is your bid here? Assume standard methods, i.e. 1NT is 15-17, new suit is forcing, and double is negative.

[frank0]

1NT range? MP or IMP?

 

I assume it's 15-17 NT and IMP. I'll bid 3N because red vs white it worth taking a risk.

 

If you double and partner bid a major you feel unconfrotable.

[gnasher]

I'd like to double, in case partner can leave it in. However, he's more likely to drive the four-level in a major, so I suppose that means I should bid 3NT.

 

I've started playing double here as game-forcing. The idea is to make it safe for responder to double with only one four-card major, but it would reduce the downside of double on this hand too.

[JLOGIC]

3N, and +1 million for X to be GF here.

[JLOGIC]

By the way, what is opener supposed to do with ths shape over a X, or similar shapes like 3334 or (32)35. Always pass? Sometimes 4C? Sometimes 3N?

 

I recently had a hand where I was 3325 and bid 3N over the double. This was down 4 vul, but they make 3D X. The winner would have been 4C. I told my partner that I thought both sides ignoring the issue of a stopper, and just bidding 3N without a 4 card major was my general philosophy. After all, responder would double with most hands he would bid stayman with even with a stopper. And often LHO won't lead his suit anyways.

[gnasher]

By the way, what is opener supposed to do with ths shape over a X, or similar shapes like 3334 or (32)35. Always pass? Sometimes 4C? Sometimes 3N?

 

I recently had a hand where I was 3325 and bid 3N over the double. This was down 4 vul, but they make 3D X. The winner would have been 4C. I told my partner that I thought both sides ignoring the issue of a stopper, and just bidding 3N without a 4 card major was my general philosophy. After all, responder would double with most hands he would bid stayman with even with a stopper. And often LHO won't lead his suit anyways.

 

I think if responder has a Stayman hand containing Axx or Kxx of diamonds, he should often bid 3NT.

 

I'd be reluctant to leave the double in with a doubleton. With 3325 and a diamond stop I'd bid 3NT, obviously. With 3325 and no diamond stop, maybe it depends on how good the clubs are? With Axx Kxx xx AKQxx, a diamond stop is probably all we need, so 3NT might be worth a punt. With AKx KQx xx KJxxx, we need both a diamond stop and a club card or two, so maybe 4♣ is better.

 

With even weaker clubs, like AKx AQJ xx Jxxxx, maybe that's the hand to leave it in on.

 

With 3334 and no diamond stop, it's quite different: there's less room for partner to have a stopper that he can hold up, our chances of making game are so much worse, and our defence is a bit better.

[JLOGIC]

I pretty much agree with you gnasher on all points, expect maybe the 3325 with good but not great clubs hand type. I think that is the one I bid 3N on though, and it was a disaster. But I did have Qx of diamonds at least.

[Zelandakh]

And often LHO won't lead his suit anyways.

They will if you alert your 3NT call as not necessarily showing a stopper...

[JLOGIC]

They will if you alert your 3NT call as not necessarily showing a stopper...

 

lol

[Zelandakh]

Justin, you are a far better player than me but if your philosophy is to "just bid 3NT without a 4 card major" then this bid qualifies as not showing what your opponents might reasonably expect. That makes it a matter for disclosure. Perhaps most of your opps know this already; but if you are playing against 2 little old ladies in Britain they will be most surprised that anyone would consider 3NT normal on this hand.

[JLOGIC]

lol

[robkat]

What are you laughing at?

[JLOGIC]

I just woke up from a crazy dream. Zelandakh was playing with his 3 clones, equally self righteous, in a cut around game. The auction started with south:

 

1D. "Alert!" Said his partner.

 

West inquired about the alert. "10 to 23 high cards, 4+ unless 4432. If balanced, a good 11 to 14 or 18 to 19..."

 

West interrupted, "Then why did you alert?"

 

"With 4-4 in the minors, we usually open 1C, unless our diamonds are much stronger. So you have some inferences available that might become relevant. With 2 suiters or 3 suiters, we might open 1D, even if they are worth a 2C opener, in order to solve rebid problems. So we might have up to 23 high cards. However, with a 3 suiter and a stiff honor, we might have opened 2C and rebid 2N, so I would exclude that possible hand type. With short spades, we might pass good 11 counts that others would open, to solve rebid problems. However with 4 spades and a nice hand, we might open as light as 10 points."

 

West, of course, knew this information as he was a clone of South, but he asked every time to avoid giving away information about his hand (since he sometimes forgets, and doesn't want to selectively ask and appear like he only asks with a good hand, etc).

 

One spade, said west. "Alert!"

 

"Yes," asked north?

 

"It is 5 to 20 high cards, with 4+ spades."

 

North reached for his bidding box, but east realized he had not done an adequate job of explaining the bid.

 

"Wait! That is to say, 5-7 is less common, and will always contain 5+ spades, a good suit, and at least one singleton. It might contain 6 spades if we didn't like our hand for a weak jump overcall. We are sound on those, and just overcall 1 sometimes, which is quite strange. Also, our 4 card suit overcalls are only specifically with an opening bid, 3 of the top 5, and shortness in the other major (else we'd make a takeout double). We double and bid sounder than most people, explaining our upper range. Many 18s we overcall on, and even 19 or 20 if we have a stiff in the other major, or a bad suit, where we think we cannot control the auction."

 

"Thank you very much!" North was extremely pleased with the level of disclosure he was receiving. After all, what they know about their partner, their opponents have a right to know.

 

North now bid 1N. "ALERT!"

 

By this point, I was the only kibitzer left. Was this really happening? East asked.

 

"1N shows 7-12 high cards, is not always balanced, does not promise a stopper, and could contain 4 hearts. "

 

Well, south being a true believer in full disclosure, knew that this was a completely misleading explanation. He had to expound:

 

"OK, it is USUALLY balanced, but with 5314 with pretty bad spades but a pretty good hand, we'd bid 1N, as passing is too flawed. Likewise, with 4315 if our hand wasn't good enough to bid 2C but was good enough to bid, we would bid 1N. So it might be unbalanced.

 

It does not PROMISE a stopper, though it has one 95+ % of the time. With a hand like Jxx KQx Axx Jxxx, we bid 1N. Or a hand like 98xx KQx AJx Qxx. Which, by the way, is why our range is 7-12. With 12 we will probably have a suspect stopper and no source of tricks. But that depends on how well our game has been going (state of the match). Let me tell you more about that..."

 

"No, no, it's ok!"

 

"OK. Also, with 4 hearts we would usually make a negative double. However with 2.5+ spade stoppers, a balanced hand, and scattered values, and bad hearts, we would probably bid 1N."

 

At this point, 3 bids into the auction on the first hand, the director came over to stop the game. "Play resumes at 10 AM tomorrow." I was about to say something, but woke up.

[JLOGIC]

So, any problem with that? Where has Zeldankh gone wrong? Or is my satire not relevant?

 

Zeldankh says:

 

Justin, you are a far better player than me but if your philosophy is to "just bid 3NT without a 4 card major" then this bid qualifies as not showing what your opponents might reasonably expect.

 

Really? When they preempt, the fact that there might be some small set of hand types (many but not all 3325s with no stopper) that some people might prefer to bid 3N with over the double, rather than 4C. Is that what most people would do? I have no idea. But surely the idea is understandable that partner might X 3D with a diamond stopper looking for 4M, and that in that case 3N might be our only game when we don't have a 4 card major. This is bridge logic.

 

Sure, my partner knows my tendency in that auction, and it is something that we can disclose to the opponents. But this is a perfect example of a situation where if the opponents want to know our tendencies, they can ask. If this were never acceptable, because there is always something we might do that "2 little old ladies from britain" might not do, which may or may not verge on non-standard, you could literally alert every bid.

 

And what if I did alert. They would ask and I would say doesn't promise a stopper? That would be completely misleading, as at least 90 % of the time I would have a stopper. My partner would never pull 3N fearing no stopper, we'd have no methods to show that we bid 3N with no stopper, and honestly it would be very unlikely to effect what my opponents did.

 

For instance, you said in response to one case for bidding 3N being they don't always lead a diamond as:

 

They will if you alert your 3NT call as not necessarily showing a stopper...

 

Then that would be a perfect example of how a misleading alert followed by "doesn't promise a stopper" would cause them to overadjust for an unlikely event, because my alert and explanation put undue emphasis on that event.

 

Again, I will say it is general bridge knowledge that in cramped preempted auctions, sometimes you have to guess whether to bid 3N and hope partner has a stopper, or guess whether to go past 3N. However, those problem hands are a small subset of actual hands.

 

No doubt if you alerted 3N, your explanation would give the rough percentage of the time you think partner has a stopper, and the rough judgement he will use in determining whether or not to bid 3N.

 

You really think this is the right course of action? On top of wasting a lot of time, you are undermining the alert system as almost every bid is an alert (which, by definition, makes it more and more useless), you are going to overwhelm your hypothetical little old lady opps and possibly annoy them, on top of basically forcing yourself to teach them about bridge.

 

Real full disclosure is generally impossible. It is certainly impossible when you are forced to explain everything. It comes closer to occurring in practice when only obviously weird things are alerts, and certain stylistic things/inferential things must be asked about by the opponents when they become relevant. Playing weak NT, I am not going to alert my 1D opener as unbalanced 11+ or 15-19 balanced. However, it frequently becomes a relevant inference in the play later, especially if I'm on defense and declarer has to guess something. Unfortunately, the practicalities of the game put the onus on the declarer to then ask what our NT range is. If he doesn't and assumes strong NT and msiguesses, that's his fault for not asking.

 

Alerting for doing something that many people would do when they had a small, unlikely set of hands that gives a problem, even if it might or might not be a minority action to our current opponents, is just a really dumb and impractical idea. It would cause literally every 3N bid in competition to be an alert to most good players.

 

1N 3D 3N - Alert, may not have a stopper.

3S p p 3N - Alert may not have a stopper (xx Ax Ax AKQxxxx.. where do you draw exact lines? Hard to say, but of course you will try!)

1D 2S p p 3N - Alert may not have a stopper.

 

Etc etc.

 

I do greatly despise implications with statements like "the opponents will start leading a diamond if you alert." As if by not alerting, we are somehow cheating the opponents. If 10 % of the time the opps held a broken suit for 3D I did not have a stopper, and 40 % of that time, the other opponent didn't have a stopper, and 90 % of that time the suit isn't blocked (partner doesn't have stiff honor), are you really doing well to greatly alter your leading strategy?

 

Do you think that unless you explain with great care exactly how often that occurs, that the opponent won't overcompensate, and start making worse leads against our entire set of hands? Especially these hypothetical 2 little old ladies from Britain who have no clue about anything?

 

Would you not feel maybe I had cheated them out of something if they led a diamond from AQJxxxx and out, and I had Kx of diamonds, and a non diamond lead sets me, because of this "alert" and explanation they led a diamond rather than something else?

 

I suppose the "correct" explanation is after our 1 minute discourse on when we bid 3N without a stopper and the frequencies etc etc (and it would take that long to explain to these flustered old ladies), they would have all the info we have to make the right judgement, and they will be completely rational so what we said will not have significantly impacted them. And again, we go back to being wildly impractical.

 

Much better is if it actually matters to the opening leader on hand, they can say "do you typically bid 3N without a stopper on the likely problem hands, or 4C." If they can't think to ask that question, they probably will not be benefitting from the alert anyways.

 

Yes, putting some onus on the defense to ask about inferences that will be relevant to their bid/play/lead is imperfect. But yes, it will dramatically speed up the game because 99 % of inferences don't become relevant later, and there are inferences for just about everything and if an inference is relevant to you you can always just ask.

[JLOGIC]

Another problem is this, how does partner know what I do with no stopper and no 4 card major. This situation comes up rarely, even experienced partnerships have probably seen the scenario only a few times in their career together.

 

You might have seen it and forgotten, because it was a few years ago. You might remember, but also remember that it was matchpoints rather than imps, or that the 3D overcaller last time was a very unsound player, or that the vulnerability was different (if they are vul, bidding 3D is less likely to be a winner). How do you account for these things? To be honest, I have no idea how often (from 0 % to 100 %) my 2 most regular partners would bid 3N vs 4C on 3325 no stopper after 1N 3D X p ? The fact that I know they might choose to do it is based on general bridge knowledge, which if my opponents don't have is their own shortcoming as a bridge player. It would not be based on implicit or explicit agreements.

 

Likewise, how do I know what is "standard" or what my opponents "expect" from a game bid by me in a cramped auction. Everyone has different standards. To me, it would be weird if you never bid 3N without a stopper in any auction. This would be contrary to my general bridge knowledge.

 

Should my opps really be alerting, 3S p p 3N, if it promises a stopper every time? I consider it very abnormal to not bid 3N there with Qx Ax Ax AKQxxxx. Should I call the director when I lead from my AKJxxxx hoping to bink Qx on my right, only to later find out they literally always have a stopper? Of course not.

 

Finally, what is the right way to define game bids in competition? It's tough to describe what 3S-3N shows. It is more a function of "I expect to get the best score possibly by bidding this."

 

Likewise bidding 3N here might be hard to describe. I might bid 3N with a 4 card major with slow/soft/long diamonds. I might bid 3N with no stopper and no 4 card major. It is not totally out of line to say 3N is to play, on the basis that I expect to get the best score possible by playing 3N on average than doing whatever alternatives I had (passing, bidding a major, bidding 4C).

 

I mean, do you alert 3C p 3N? Playing against 2 british ladies? Surely they would not bid it with xxx xxx xxx AKxx, but you might. They probably would not bid it with xxx Axx Axx Axxx, but you probably would, even without a SPADE STOPPER! There are other gambling, semi gambling, or just flat out tactical 3N bids possible. You might have a solid 7 card major. You might have a lot of things. But do you alert? And if you alert, how do you describe?

 

Anyways, hopefully you see why both theoretically and certainly practically, alerting 3N here would be grounds for an "lol." Hopefully you can see that I am not cheating my poor british little old lady opps blind every hand by not alerting.

[whereagles]

justin, are you home ill or something? you're spending WAY too much time around here :P

[kayin801]

tl;dr

 

but having to alert that 3NT may or may not contain a diamond stopper is ridiculous, which I think is the condensed form of justin's rant and the long form of lol.

[robkat]

If 3NT by agreement does not guarantee a stopper and you know that, you certainly should alert. If your bidding agreements make a lack of stopper more likely than normal, the opponents have a right to the result of your agreements.

 

If 3NT might not have a stopper due to the situation rather than your agreements, then you do not alert.

 

I suggest that you explain your reason for not alerting instead of a immature lol.

 

In my experience, when someone resorts to rude sarcasm he is unsure of himself for some reason.

[655321]

I suggest that you explain your reason for not alerting instead of a immature lol.

 

According to http://www.wordcounttool.com/ his last three posts used 2230 words (excluding quotes!) to do just that.

[Phil]

 

I suggest that you explain your reason for not alerting instead of a immature lol.

 

In my experience, when someone resorts to rude sarcasm he is unsure of himself for some reason.

 

Oh god, here we go again.

[JLOGIC]

 

In my experience, when someone resorts to rude sarcasm he is unsure of himself for some reason.

 

True dat, +1

[JLOGIC]

According to http://www.wordcounttool.com/ his last three posts used 2230 words (excluding quotes!) to do just that.

 

ya sry

[Zelandakh]

Rob, you may not be aware of this but, of the regular BBO posters, Justin is possibly the highest-rated player that is not a yellow. Therefore his opinion and thoughts are valued here greatly.

 

I think the line here is simple: if you are bidding 3NT because it is the least lie for your hand then it is normal bridge; if you are bidding 3NT because your philosophy is that all hands without a 4 card major should do so then that goes a step beyond this and should ideally be alerted, at least in company that would not expect this. I agree with you that full disclosure in f2f bridge can be difficult and even occasionally self-defeating. I think on bbo a short note would be in order except against opps who know you quite well (it does not waste time and cannot hurt). F2f it probably depends on where you are and who you are playing against.

[gnasher]

Zelandakh must play in a tough game, if he expects his elderly female opponents to bid 3♦ on a broken suit. The ones I play against would have KQJ10xxxx and a side ace.

[rhm]

Zelandakh must play in a tough game, if he expects his elderly female opponents to bid 3♦ on a broken suit. The ones I play against would have KQJ10xxxx and a side ace.

If you wait for such a hand, you can employ the bid about every other leap year. Semisolid suits are not that common, in particular when somebody opened a strong notrump in front of you.

Often people, on opening lead, keep quiet, when they can defeat notrump contracts out of their own hand and most players can not show a minor one suiter at the 2 level over 1NT.

Much more likely is that overcaller has a long broken suit, not too easy to establish in notrump, and this is what let to the s t a n d a r d expert practice not to care about stoppers when responder bids 3NT.

I see no need to alert unless playing in a low level club game, where it might be polite to do so.

 

Rainer Herrmann