Pick your poison

[dustinst22]

If I had reasonable methods after 2N, I would start with 2N. A cuebidding auction seems like it would be great, especially if I know partner is not cuebidding a singleton at any point. I would also like to know if partner has a minimum or not in context of cuebidding.

 

If playing standard jacoby, I would just start with 2H. I would hope to bid 3S next and hear some cuebidding. Partner will probably not cuebid a heart singleton early on so that route should be fine.

 

I think splintering is completely misguided. I think bidding 2H for the reason of showing a source of tricks is misguided, I'm not going to show my hand, I am interested in 4 cards: the CA, HA, and SAK, so I'm going to attempt to get an auction going ASAP where I can find out about those cards.

 

Ok you've convinced me. I guess most experts don't use standard jacoby these days anyway. Any suggestions on a good follow up structure?

[VM1973]

I don't know that hearing 3♥ is such a turn off. It implies that we could have coverage in clubs (where we need it), and we can still get hearts established. Even with a void heart we could have a massive crossruff and make 12-13 tricks, but there may be a few anxious moments if the opponents have a middle trump spot.

 

5 trump + a 4 loser hand is such a powerful holding.

I don't agree that the hand is a 4-loser hand. I mean, if your hand were:

 

♠109872

♥KQ10652

♦(very few)

♣K10

 

then you would still bid it the same way figuring if partner has AKxxx of spades then you have no spade losers anyway. Accordingly the ♠Q is a wasted card.

 

The key is diagnosing how much is wasted in diamonds. Splintering might work with this hand, but I think most people's agreements about splinters are just "yeah we play that" with no fine tuning to try to resolve exactly how a person should respond or why. If the only agreement is 10+ and a singleton then really you've only consumed a lot of space without getting the information you need.

[MrAce]

2♥, thats what i would bid at the table.

[JLOGIC]

Ok you've convinced me. I guess most experts don't use standard jacoby these days anyway. Any suggestions on a good follow up structure?

 

I think many have been written here on the forums (and other places), maybe one of the search wizards can find some of the threads. A common theme of them seems to be to play:

 

3C=min.

 

Over that responder with a min can just jump to game and no info is exchanged, and if opener is interested in slam opposite a minimum he can investigate further with 3D asking, then you can show if you're balanced or have shortness, and still cuebid (solving the problem of jumping to 4M with slam suitable balanced mins and leaving responder to guess).

 

You can do many things with the rest, something simple might be to play 3D=extras no shortness, 3H, 3S, 3N=low/middle/high shortness with extras. Over the balanced reply responder can ask, then opener can show specific 5422s (I think this is really important).

 

Another possibility is to have 3 ranges, minimum, medium, and very good. I don't think the details are important, but I think not showing your hand type immediately with a min but still having room to investigate if you want to is very important, and I think being able to show 5422s is very important. You have an enormous amount of room to sort all of this out.

[phil_20686]

I would avoid a classic splinter, but if I had a void splinter available I would probably do that. Hands with a void are always pretty distributional, so hopefully partner will do the right thing,

1S-3N

4c=ask 4h=diamond void

 

now there is simply no way that partner is passing this with 3 keycards, if he signs off I can be pretty confident that 4S is the limit.

 

Starting with 2N is also likely to work well, however there are some problem hands, If partner shows a min with 3C I am golden in my system, but if it goes 1S-2N-3H=non min with heart shortage, then I do not feel very well placed in that I probably cannot establish to partner that I have a void below keycard.

 

My feeling is that the void splinter will work better in the long run, as when partner has a min with 3 (working) keycards he will make the right decision anyway.