8-card or 9-card fit trump fit?

[SimonFa]

EDIT: Fixed opening bid to 1♥

 

Playing against one of the strongest, if not strongest, pairs last night an interesting point came up. I dealt, MPs both vul.

 

P (P) P 1[♥]

3♣ (P) P (3♠)

P (4♥) all pass

 

Dummy had 4/4 in majors and 3 points (K♠ IIRC)and contract was -1 when we made 3♦ and 1♣. The 9-card Spade fit was cold.

 

In the post mortem* declarer asked partner why they selected the 9-card fit over the 8-card fit knowing he had a monster and wanted to play in game**? That way he would have somewhere to park a loser?

 

I know I, and I suspect many other B/Iers, would have selected the 9-card fit so when the dust had settled I asked about this idea of selecting the 8-card fit and he said it was fairly standard bridge practice. I don't for one second doubt him but I have not come across this thinking (despite reading rather a lot of books and internet articles in the past year) but when I thought about it it did make sense if you are confident trumps are strong and not breaking badly.

 

Are there any guidelines about when to select the 8-card fit over the 9-card? Does anyone have any links to a discussion on this point?

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Simon

 

* I love listening to their post mortems, they are always entertaining and educational as they are both quite tetchy with each other but always extremely courteous and helpful with opps.

 

**Apparently by not doubling me and giving partner the option of playing for penalties it made the hand a bit stronger than a standard reverse.

[Antrax]

Do you mean opener balanced 3♥? Otherwise the 3♠ balancer is the dummy.

[SimonFa]

Do you mean opener balanced 3♥? Otherwise the 3♠ balancer is the dummy.

Sry, fixed opening bid to 1♥

[Cyberyeti]

This is an awkward area.

 

It matters if you need pitches as well as ruffs, if just ruffs, it doesn't matter so much.

 

KQJxx

KQJx

Ax

xx

 

A10xx

A109x

xx

xxx

 

for example is 10 tricks in spades, but 11 in hearts if the hearts break as you can pitch a diamond on the 5th spade then ruff one.

 

Whereas:

 

KQJxx

KQJx

xxx

x

 

 

A10xx

A109x

x

xxxx

 

is 11 tricks in either. The 5-4 fit may be safer if you don't have all the intermediates you have here.

 

Another thing to look at is solidity of trumps. I put a hand up on the boards a while back: something like

 

KQJ10xx

J10xx

x

Ax

 

Ax

AKxx

Jxx

KQJx

 

12 easy tricks in spades, not so in hearts.

[JLOGIC]

Usually the 9 card fit is better. There are hands where the 8 card fit is better, but as a b/i I wouldn't worry about it, especially for game. 4-4 fits often have problems with 4-1 trumps.

[manudude03]

Usually the 9 card fit is better. There are hands where the 8 card fit is better, but as a b/i I wouldn't worry about it, especially for game. 4-4 fits often have problems with 4-1 trumps.

 

This post pretty much said it all. There's an infamous hand on the forums here where a 8 card fit played better than a solid 10 card fit.

[Cyberyeti]

This post pretty much said it all. There's an infamous hand on the forums here where a 8 card fit played better than a solid 10 card fit.

It's not that uncommon, but they can be difficult to recognise, one we had:

 

KQxxxx, xx, x, Kxxx

 

AJxx, Ax, Axx, AQJx

 

2♠-2N-4♣-4N (keycard in ♠)-5♦(1)-5♥(Q♠?)-6♣(yes and K♣)-7♣. We play very wide ranging and possibly short weak 2s so 4♣ is automatic on this hand to get the extra shape and maximum across.

[pio_magic]

In the post mortem* declarer asked partner why they selected the 9-card fit over the 8-card fit

After experiencing losing a slam in a 5/4 ♦ suit where the slam in 4/4 ♣ would have been cold, I tend to select the 4/4 fit if in doubt, which has not proven wrong - so far ;)

 

Peter

[JLOGIC]

After experiencing losing a slam in a 5/4 ♦ suit where the slam in 4/4 ♣ would have been cold, I tend to select the 4/4 fit if in doubt, which has not proven wrong - so far ;)

 

Peter

 

This seems similar to saying "After playing pocket aces once and losing a big pot, I decided to fold them, which so far has not proven wrong." Basing your whole philosophy off of a sample size of 1 hand is incredibly unwise.

[TWO4BRIDGE]

This seems similar to saying "After playing pocket aces once and losing a big pot, I decided to fold them, which so far has not proven wrong." Basing your whole philosophy off of a sample size of 1 hand is incredibly unwise.

Tell that to Phil Helmuth.

He had pocket Aces against Tom Dwan in the first round of a Heads-Up Championship a number of years ago .

Tom had pocket 10's and got a 3rd on the River.... vs. nothing more for poor Phil.

 

Tom was a "nobody" until that match... but as they say, the rest is history.

[Antrax]

20% shots should never pay off, it's simple statistics :)

[VM1973]

The value of the 5-4 fit is that you get a pitch. The value of this pitch increases the more aces you have. If, for example, your only losers are three aces, having abundant pitches is worthless to you.

 

As for the comment about the "sample size of one" there's nothing wrong with Peter's method. He experienced a bad board, drew a conclusion from it which so far has not been proved wrong. Claiming that this is a sample size of one is a gross mischaracterization of the situation.

[JLOGIC]

The value of the 5-4 fit is that you get a pitch. The value of this pitch increases the more aces you have. If, for example, your only losers are three aces, having abundant pitches is worthless to you.

 

As for the comment about the "sample size of one" there's nothing wrong with Peter's method. He experienced a bad board, drew a conclusion from it which so far has not been proved wrong. Claiming that this is a sample size of one is a gross mischaracterization of the situation.

 

lol

[JLOGIC]

 

Tom was a "nobody" until that match... but as they say, the rest is history.

 

lol

[wyman]

In a double fit situation, it's often better to play in the less disparate (say 5-3) fit to take advantage of pitches from the more disparate (say, 6-2). The moral of the story, however, is that most people will agree that 9-card trump fits tend to play better than 8-card fits. One reason you might imagine is that 8-card fits are more susceptible to bad breaks. When a side suit breaks badly, you can often take advantage of other chances (ruffing out a loser to establish the suit, for example), but a bad trump break is worse.

[vuroth]

4-1 splits happen 3x as often as 4-0 splits (not to mention 5-0s). Basically, the difference in likelihood is around 20%, or 1 in 5. If I'm reading that right, it means that 1 in 5 times you choose a 4-4 over a 9 card fit, you've given yourself a trump split problem you didn't previously have.

 

Does needing a pitch as your only hope really come up that often.

 

There are hands where the 8 card fit is better, but as a b/i I wouldn't worry about it,

 

...seems like good advice to me.

[vuroth]

As for the comment about the "sample size of one" there's nothing wrong with Peter's method. He experienced a bad board, drew a conclusion from it which so far has not been proved wrong. Claiming that this is a sample size of one is a gross mischaracterization of the situation.

 

I'll grant that the sample size probably isn't one anymore, but does the method really seem sound?

[pio_magic]

I'll grant that the sample size probably isn't one anymore, but does the method really seem sound?

Right, it isn't one anymore by far, and I surely am not following this empiricism blindly...

 

Peter

[pio_magic]

4-1 splits happen 3x as often as 4-0 splits (not to mention 5-0s)

....

Does needing a pitch as your only hope really come up that often.

Can we "measure" the likelyhood of the latter and compare to the more easily calculable split probabilities? Would really be interesting....

 

Peter

[gwnn]

it's just not the same without caps...

[VM1973]

I'll grant that the sample size probably isn't one anymore, but does the method really seem sound?

What method have you used all your life?

 

When you tried chocolate did you look at it and think, "Wow, chocolate is pretty good" or "Wow, this is crap" or did you say, "This is just one datapoint. I cannot make an intelligent decision based on that. I'd better ask a food expert on whether or not I can like this."

 

Or when you had your first kiss with a girl, did you think, "This is only one datapoint. I must go out and kiss men to see if that works for me better," or did you think, "Wow! Kissing girls is pretty good!"

 

First time you had sex?

First time for pizza?

 

I suppose all of those were just single datapoints that didn't justify you drawing any conclusions about them.

 

Personally I think drawing a conclusion and testing it in future practice and having it never been proved wromg is a very powerful argument in favor of something. Perhaps God (or what passes for him around here) will lol at the thought, but hey!

[JLOGIC]

lol youre such a complete ***** joke dude

[pio_magic]

"Wow! Kissing girls is pretty good!"

Right - and I don't need to kiss all girls every time just because of this ;)

 

 

Peter

[VM1973]

lol youre such a complete ***** joke dude

As chance would have it, I was kibbitzing a bridge game last night and this exact situation came up. It so happened that, there was no functional difference between the two contracts. However, I couldn't resist weighing in and commented, "Justin Lall, man! Don't you know you're supposed to prefer the 5-4 fit?!"

 

To which he responded, "How darest thou blaspheme His holy name!" I quickly saw that the rest of the tables were similarly upset and I figured I'd better get out of there stat. As I was making for the door one of them tripped me and I figured I was a goner. They dragged me outside and readied stones, but a kindly old man there rescued me. He posed the question of whether a man was holier by losing important sums of money on pointless speed bets with friends in Las Vegas while stupidly using a laptop instead of having a mouse or by underleading KJ83 when you see T4 on the board instead of making the obvious surrounding play of the jack.

 

I thought it was a stupid question, but it worked like a charm! The whole crowd divided up on one side or other of the issue, and the man whisked me out of there. "His religion is one of peace and tolerance and they do not truly understand His wisdom," he informed me gravely.

 

"That may be," I said, "but wow man! You saved my life. That was a really bad situation there that I hope never to repeat."

 

"Nay, my son," he said. "Thou canst base thy whole philosophy off of a sample size of one. It is written in the Holy book."

 

And then I realized I was in the presence of a fanatic and I thanked him again, made an excuse, and got the **** out of there.

[mikestar13]

To get back to the technical merits of this question: A 4-4 fit in some types of hands is likely to play better than a 5-3 because of the discard possibilities. This can be true, though less often, of 4-4 vs. 5-4. There is, however, another scenario: the contract is set because searching for the 4-4 when you have already found the 5-4 leads to a more revealing auction which draws a roadmap for the defense. My general rule is "when you've found a trump suit, don't look for another."