High level competition

[ArtK78]

FWIW, I agree that the 5♦ bid is a slam try showing diamond control with hearts and a suitable hand, too good for a mere 5♥ call.

[whereagles]

FWIW, I agree that the 5♦ bid is a slam try showing diamond control with hearts and a suitable hand, too good for a mere 5♥ call.

If responder were not a passed hand that's a possibility. But for the passed hand case 5♦ as lead-directing seems more likely.

[ArtK78]

If responder were not a passed hand that's a possibility. But for the passed hand case 5♦ as lead-directing seems more likely.

With all due respect, the actual hand shows how unimaginitive this argument is. There are many passed hands that partner can have that give good to excellent play for slam opposite a 1NT opener with hearts and diamonds with a spade control.

 

Suppose you opened 1NT holding Ax Axxxx AKx xxx. Admittedly, not everyone would consider this a 1NT opening bid, but let's just assume for the sake of argument that you chose to open 1NT. Now the auction proceeds as stated back to you. Wouldn't you say that this hand is worth more than a mere 5♥? Or, to put it another way, wouldn't you want your 5♦ bid to say more than lead a diamond against 6♣? Opposite this hand, partner needs very little other than long hearts, a club void (a virtual certainly) and a card in one of the pointed suits. As little as Kxx KTxxxx xxxx --- would be a claim. And I am sure there are plenty of players who would not venture a 4♥ call on those cards.

 

Of course, as the actual hand shows, the opening 1NT bid need not be so perfect for a heart contract, and his partner's hand just has to be reasonably consistent with the auction. Still slam is cold.

 

But Mike has already made these arguments and they appear to be falling on deaf ears.

[mikeh]

 

 

But Mike has already made these arguments and they appear to be falling on deaf ears.

 

Some people, when they read or hear reasoned criticisms of their thinking, are grateful for the opportunity to expand their own knowledge, or to correct flawed thinking. In my own case, I sometimes have to wrestle with a bit of ego and/or embarrassment over the mistake that has been identified but, on the whole, I try to learn when others set out detailed and coherent/plausible explanations for the criticism. I think most posters here share that attitude.

 

There are some, however, whose response to criticism is to double down....to repeat and repeat the original argument. Such posts are generally characterized by a refusal to debate the merits of the criticisms, and to, instead, simply repeat the original argument as if the critics hadn't 'got it' the first time around.

 

That's why, when one reads the posts of some posters, it appears that criticisms have fallen on deaf ears. It is sad, because my own view is that these forums have added significantly to my understanding of the game and, I expect, to the understanding of many readers/posters. However the 'stick to one's guns' posters don't seem to learn, or to want to do so. Too bad.

[whereagles]

There are many passed hands that partner can have that give good to excellent play for slam opposite a 1NT opener with hearts and diamonds with a spade control. (...) wouldn't you want your 5♦ bid to say more than lead a diamond against 6♣?

 

Well, it is certainly possible to have a slam opposite a passed hand. Just that it seems more likely to me that lead-directing is commoner in this case.

 

Regardless of passed/unpassed, I would be weary of assuming a precise meaning to a bid like this.. even if there is a "correct" meaning (in absence of agreement of course), people simply think different and act accordingly. Assuming one thing and pard showing up with something else might win you the post-mortem, but that's not where battles are won.

 

By the way, if you ask me what meaning I would define for the bid in the unpassed case, it would be slam invite. Just so you know.

[bluechip10]

I have to agree with Art. I can just imagine the West Hand:

 

X

JTxxxxxx

Qxxx

VOID

 

I would never preempt with this hand. But when pard opens 1NT, I know he has at least two hts. If he passes we probably make 4hts easily. If pard doubles, I know he has a one or two club winners, for he knows I have no defense. The 4cl bidder has a similar hand but with top club honors and probably a void in hearts. I love the 5dia bid from pard. Then I can cuebid 6cl. This gives pard a chance to look for the grand.

[johnu]

The tone of your response is such that I would normally treat it as it deserves - not worth replying to.

 

..........................

 

I dare say you're 'unlucky' a lot.

 

LOL, gotta love those newbies, or maybe not. On the internet, anybody can be anybody, but in this case, mikeh is a somebody, one of the handful+ of posters who have represented their countries in world championships.

[whereagles]

....

[Mr Rat]

Partner is red v white, and I think it fair to say that the odds are that partner has little in clubs. If we hold 15 hcp in the reds, then the odds seem to suggest that our vulnerable partner, even tho acting under pressure, has some cards. Yes, it is possible that he has chosen to act on KJxxxxx(x) of hearts and out, but the odds suggest that he probably has more stuff than that. If so, then the odds are overwhelming that that stuff is in spades. I don't understand why you can't see that. What, pray tell, would you have wanted him to bid with AQxx Kxxxxx xx x??

There is nothing in all of that to disagree with my own analysis. If he has that hand then (in possession of the knowledge that opener has values in the reds) he will see the position and place the contract. I'm not sure if you're suggesting that you want to be in 6♥ opposite this hand when opener has the hand I suggested.

 

As for my taking your posts as suggesting we are paving the way for a 6-level decision over their slam bid, I repeat, probably to no useful purpose as far as persuading you, that it is extraordinarily unlikely that the opps, having pushed us to the 5-level, are about to save. If they do, then so what? Are you suggesting that with your example hand of xxx AQx AKQxx xx, you want partner, a passed hand, to bid 6♥? Why?

No I am not suggesting that, I said that it was possible (in similar situations) that he may do this when he knows it's right.

 

Why would the opposition bid 6♣? Because they've heard the subsequent bids just as much as we have - they are entitled to draw conclusions from our bids as much as we are as the auction develops so presumably they can add 6 hearts to 5 diamonds and diagnose 11 tricks the same as our side can. So if they decide that they don't have 3 fast defensive tricks, then bidding 6C makes sense whether it makes or not (it will be good compared to -650).

 

These high level wars are often about each side bidding the lowest game contract they can get away with, often until one side judges to bid the highest making contract and the other side then try to diagnose that that's happened and decide if they should bid on (likely doubled) to achieve 'par'. Here it may well be that 4♥, 5♣ and 5♥ are all bid in an attempt to play there, and it may well be that they all make, so E/W need to diagnose that and bid 6♣. More on that below.

 

The key thing is that the OP asked "what is 5♦?" and my response is essentially that it shows where his values are along with the known 15-17 balanced so that partner has the captaincy and can make the best possible decision. Whether he can do that or not on this particular hand is moot, we can only give ourselves the best possible chance to get it right.

 

It cannot be simply because we only collect 300 or so against their contract.....because -100 or -200 our way isn't, actually, better than collecting 300.

Of course not. In the hand that the OP provided for West, once he hears that opener's values are in the red suits, there is concern over the location of the spades. AQJ sitting over your king and 8 clubs on your right, 3 on your left is concerning, but we cannot know if hearts are 4-0 and diamonds 4-1, but I am not suggesting that (holding the W hand given) he should play them for, say:

 

[hv=pc=n&w=saqj32hj432d2ck32&e=s4hd9543caqj98765]266|100[/hv]

 

That would be nuts.

 

The point is that when he bids 5♦ opener doesn't know which of the possible hands his partner may have (including hands such as long broken hearts - and yes, I am aware that he needs to have a reason not to have pre-empted but that depends on matters of style, partnership agreements in that area etc).

 

Like you, I also expect W has 1 or more cards in spades, but he may have only the 1 that he does have, so the point is that in order to consider a sac (or an insurance bid) partner will be staring at a case other than the hand we were given for West - likely to be where he has longer diamonds and shorter spades. As more spades migrate to the diamonds he becomes increasingly concerned at the big double-fit scenario in both directions. Now defending 6♣ starts to look a dangerous option, doubled or otherwise.

 

As for my being 'unlucky'.....let's not get into personal attacks. I criticized your reasoning, your post. I did take a shot at whereagles, and shouldn't have, but at least I can say he started it :P

Do you really not understand that your first words quoted below are personally insulting to me?...

anyone who thinks that opener is preparing to direct a red v white save against 6♣, being bid to make (!) is seriously deluded...

I can't see anyone else that would refer to. Or is it that you believe that describing someone as 'seriously deluded' is not going to offend them? Despite the fact that you take offence at being described as 'unlucky'? At least I can say that you started it :P

 

... the odds are that I have been somewhat 'luckier' than you in terms of bridge accomplishments, so maybe (unless you are in the world's top 100-200 players) pick your targets a little more carefully.

There's an expression 'arguing from a position of authority'. Essentially it's something that should never happen - in that any discussion should be conducted on the basis of the strength of the arguments, not 'I'm more famous than you so I win'.

And as I say - I didn't 'pick a target', you did.

 

N.B. As a side note, I see that the OP posted both hands while I was composing my first post in the thread. I would never open that hand with a 15-17 NT. 1♦ seems normal since you can adequately describe the hand via a reverse. Off-shape NT opening bids should be those that are difficult to express by opening normally because the expected rebid does not describe the hand adequately.

 

I think I've had enough of this forum after about 2 threads worth. It simply reinforces my view that bridge players have a social gene missing, probably why I stopped playing for a decade and probably will again soon. Have the last word by all means, I won't be here to read it - I have better things to do than be insulted, misunderstood, preached to and have to write 4,000 painstaking words to clarify what should have been clear enough in the first place. And then to add insult to injury, have someone brandish their great bridge career at me. Goodbye.

[ArtK78]

N.B. As a side note, I see that the OP posted both hands while I was composing my first post in the thread. I would never open that hand with a 15-17 NT. 1♦ seems normal since you can adequately describe the hand via a reverse. Off-shape NT opening bids should be those that are difficult to express by opening normally because the expected rebid does not describe the hand adequately.

 

Ax

AQxx

AQxxx

xx

 

is not my idea of a reverse. Maybe not everyone will open 1NT on these cards, but I certainly would. It is only 1 card removed from a classic 1NT opening (move the 5th diamond or the 4th heart into one of the black suits), and it is well within the required strength parameters. If one is going to open 1♦ on this hand, and one gets the expected 1♠ response, the rebid by opener is going to be either an underbid of 1NT or 2♦ or an overbid of 2♥ or (ugh) 2NT. Opener also has problems if partner responds 1NT. Opening 1NT avoids the rebid problem.

[PhantomSac]

Are we not allowed to open 1N with 6 diamonds?

[ArtK78]

Are we not allowed to open 1N with 6 diamonds?

What's your point?

[PhantomSac]

What's your point?

 

I would certainly want to bid 5D with 6 diamonds and nothing in clubs since we probably belong in 5 or 6 diamonds in that case. We are allowed to infer reasonably that partner has a club void esp if we have 3 clubs (but even with 2 small clubs and 6 diamonds I would almost always want to bid 5D). For an extreme example with Ax Ax AQxxxx Jxx if I had one bid for my life it would be 6D, partner as a passed hand is very likely to be 4630. I mean I would bid 5D with that hand not saying it's right to bid 6, partner can still bid 6 themselves, but to be forced to X or something because 5D is considered artificial would be very sad.

[ArtK78]

I would certainly want to bid 5D with 6 diamonds and nothing in clubs since we probably belong in 5 or 6 diamonds in that case. We are allowed to infer reasonably that partner has a club void esp if we have 3 clubs (but even with 2 small clubs and 6 diamonds I would almost always want to bid 5D). For an extreme example with Ax Ax AQxxxx Jxx if I had one bid for my life it would be 6D, partner as a passed hand is very likely to be 4630. I mean I would bid 5D with that hand not saying it's right to bid 6, partner can still bid 6 themselves, but to be forced to X or something because 5D is considered artificial would be very sad.

You could reserve the 5♦ bid for hands where you opened 1NT with a 6 card diamond suit. This would work when 5 or 6 diamonds was the correct contract. I would guess that would happen once in about 76 years.

 

Or you could use 5♦ for a slam try in hearts, which probably comes up once or twice a year.

 

You choose.

[mikeh]

I don't see where anyone has yet discussed this, but are we in a forcing pass situation here? I would think not, since the 4♥ call was under pressure, but otoh we are red v white and we have bid game. I think this is one of those areas where it can be reasonable to play it either way.

 

If we are in a f/p situation then we may be able to make use of the pass and pull to 5♦ as one hand type and the immediate 5♦ as another.

 

This is a very unusual situation in which we don't need a lot of gradations for opener's hand. In many normal fp situations, one of the strong side is either unlimited or at least wide range, but here the 1N bid narrowly constrains the hand type, and the desire to compete at the 5 level and/or try for slam further refines the hand anyway.

 

We'd need agreement, but my take would be that this is a great situation to play that pass requests a double, while double shows a desire to bid 5♥ and but without slam interest, and bids of 5red show a slam try. With long diamonds, wanting to try 5♦, pass and then pull.

 

It is late, after a long, busy day, and so I may be deluding myself about this idea, and in any event, it seems unlikely that the opportunity to use it (remember it) would rarely arise. The more interesting question is the initial one: are we in a fp situation? If we are, we should be able to have our cake and eat it too, in terms of what 5♦ means.

[helene_t]

I was wondering if pass is forcing here. If it is, 5♦ could say something about diamonds.

I don't see where anyone has yet discussed this, but are we in a forcing pass situation here?

Thinking more about it I think yes. I am not sure about what the general rule is. I think it was Wortel/Michielsen that had some general principle involving game bids r/w setting up an FP. Here, the fact that opps "obviously" don't expect to make 5♣ adds to it, but I don't think that's the point.

[MrAce]

Are we not allowed to open 1N with 6 diamonds?

 

Yes we are of course. The question is, do we really want to spare this (5 dia) bid for it? I personally like what Mike suggested more. On this particular hand you can predict the club void. But in another hand you may not and pd can still have void in their suit.

 

Not only rare to hold 6 carder in a NT opener, but also rare that we will be willing to bid on at 5 level with doubleton in pd's suit. But since I do not have an agreement what 5♦ is, I replied to the question by giving more options other than bidding 6♥ (5 NT or 6♦..)just in case pd may be bidding with natural diamonds. So that we can play diamond slam if pd thinks it is better. But if what you are saying is that 5♦ is passable, I personally do not like it.

[aguahombre]

I don't see where anyone has yet discussed this, but are we in a forcing pass situation here? I would think not, since the 4♥ call was under pressure, but otoh we are red v white and we have bid game. I think this is one of those areas where it can be reasonable to play it either way.

 

If we are in a f/p situation then we may be able to make use of the pass and pull to 5♦ as one hand type and the immediate 5♦ as another.

 

This is a very unusual situation in which we don't need a lot of gradations for opener's hand. In many normal fp situations, one of the strong side is either unlimited or at least wide range, but here the 1N bid narrowly constrains the hand type, and the desire to compete at the 5 level and/or try for slam further refines the hand anyway.

 

We'd need agreement, but my take would be that this is a great situation to play that pass requests a double, while double shows a desire to bid 5♥ and but without slam interest, and bids of 5red show a slam try. With long diamonds, wanting to try 5♦, pass and then pull.

I assumed it was a FP, and I don't have many of those. If it weren't, then all the posts about the Diamond holding expected from the 5♦ bid might be moot. We would have to use the bid as a LT with any array, even 3-4-3-3 with great controls and nothing in Clubs. Opposite that possibility, I would still bid 6H.

[PhantomSac]

Yes we are of course. The question is, do we really want to spare this (5 dia) bid for it?

 

You could reserve the 5♦ bid for hands where you opened 1NT with a 6 card diamond suit. This would work when 5 or 6 diamonds was the correct contract. I would guess that would happen once in about 76 years.

 

Or you could use 5♦ for a slam try in hearts' date=' which probably comes up once or twice a year.

[/quote']

 

To me the weird thing would be that we might have a natural 5D bid, it might be our best spot, and yet we can not make it so that we can make a slam try opposite a passed partner as a 1N opener when partner has not made a slam try. I guess I am of the Fred school that bids that can be natural should be natural, especially game bids. Of course they are all rare, but if I have a good hand with hearts I have a bid for that: 5H. Yes, I might want 2 grades of 5H bids, even though any 5H bid is a pretty big bid, but to sacrifice my one way to show diamonds when we could easily belong in 5D is not a great sacrifice.

 

I guess I disagree that we are unlikely to want to bid 5D with a doubleton heart. On this auction we are likely to want to bid 5D when we have 6 good diamonds, most opps are going to be 8-3 in clubs for this auction. Sure they might be 8-2 or 7-3 sometimes but with nothing in clubs it is likely a 30 point deck and when I have 6 diamonds we are likely to have a good fit there. Not being able to bid 5D is going to be a big loss since we won't be able to play 5D anymore. Yes, I might have a hand that is so big in support of hearts that I am uncomfortable even bidding 5H, but in that case at least I will get to play 5H, I won't get to a miracle slam oh well it is not the end of the world.

 

And ofc I was talking in the case of pass being NF. If pass is forcing then you can pass and pull with a strong hand. Playing normal forcing pass then 5D is obviously natural since you have another way to bid with a slam try in hearts. Mikeh outlined the pass/double inversion, it is slightly superior in all forcing pass auctions since if you want to pass and pull your partner gets in the way sometimes by bidding immediately. Usually with a pass and pull you can just bid slam if your partner bids instead of doubling over your FP but that is not a great solution, you'd like to make sure he doubles hence the inversion. This is fine as long as you always know what auctions are forcing. I know Meckwell and other top pairs play this but you really need to know your ***** well in order to do so.

 

But if you are not inverting pass and double and play standard forcing pass then you really need the 5D bid to be natural and not try to pass and bid 5D naturally, because if you pass you are encouraging partner to bid five HEARTS, as no one has bid diamonds yet!. For instance, with his actual hand, he would bid 5H over a forcing pass, that's not great if you have 6 diamonds and 2 hearts lol.

 

Assuming you do NOT play forcing pass and 5D is your only bid, it is dangerous to think things like "well, I have a huge 5H bid more often than I have a natural 5D bid, thus 5D should be a huge 5H bid." That does not necessarily logically follow, what also matters is how much you gain/lose by having a way to show a huge 5H bid vs a natural 5D bid.

[ArtK78]

Assuming you do NOT play forcing pass and 5D is your only bid, it is dangerous to think things like "well, I have a huge 5H bid more often than I have a natural 5D bid, thus 5D should be a huge 5H bid." That does not necessarily logically follow, what also matters is how much you gain/lose by having a way to show a huge 5H bid vs a natural 5D bid.

I would say that in those rare instances where you want to take a bid over 5♣, you will be doing so MUCH more often because you have a huge 5♥ bid rather than because you have a natural 5♦ bid. On frequency grounds, the comparison of the 2 possibilities will not be close.

 

And if you analyze the potential gain from using 5♦ as a huge heart raise rather than as a natural bid against the converse, I think the huge heart raise comes out ahead.

[mikeh]

.

 

But if you are not inverting pass and double and play standard forcing pass then you really need the 5D bid to be natural and not try to pass and bid 5D naturally, because if you pass you are encouraging partner to bid five HEARTS, as no one has bid diamonds yet!. For instance, with his actual hand, he would bid 5H over a forcing pass, that's not great if you have 6 diamonds and 2 hearts lol.

 

Assuming you do NOT play forcing pass and 5D is your only bid, it is dangerous to think things like "well, I have a huge 5H bid more often than I have a natural 5D bid, thus 5D should be a huge 5H bid." That does not necessarily logically follow, what also matters is how much you gain/lose by having a way to show a huge 5H bid vs a natural 5D bid.

 

My take on this is that at imps it is rarely right to open 1N with a 6 card minor. Yes, it has a preemptive value, but that isn't always a good thing, since if the opps come in on your left, with a major-oriented call, your partner may go very seriously wrong in a competitive situation, and there are other problems as well.

 

I know opening 1N is all the rage, and I understand the attraction, but to me opening 1N with a 6 card suit is taking a position, and if I won't then decide that my subsequent high-level actions should cater to my having taken a position early on. If I have fixed myself through an initial distortion, live with it.

 

It cannot be good tactics to formulate your later actions to cater to having distorted your hand initially when it is also reasonable to play your later actions as showing a hand that is entirely consistent with your initial action.

 

Any other approach requires a huge amount of mind-reading by partner.

 

Now, if in one's chosen methods, it is thought to be routine to open a 15-17 1N with a 13-15 count 6322 hand (surely nobody would do it with a 16-17 count? Such hands are way too powerful in our suit to open 1N), that is a different matter, since now opening that way isn't a distortion. One might have disclosure issues in committee if partner later argues: of course it didn't show slam interest in hearts, because we often open 1N with 13-15 6322 hands, so we need this to be natural. Absent disclosure issues, then I can see that the frequency concerns that Justin has might make 'natural' more palatable.

 

I don't have those agreements and see no reason why I would want them at imps.

[PhantomSac]

Yeah obviously if you don't open 1N with 6 card minors (and I'm guessing if you do it it's a baddish suit and positional/nty stuff outside?) then you don't need 5D natural. I was actually serious in my first post ITT when I asked are we not allowed to have a 6 card minor heh.

 

I don't know about disclosure issues, to me 6322 is similar to 5332 with a 5 card major or 5422 with a 5 card minor, I open it always if I feel I am in range, which 14 almost always is and 15 usually is and 16 rarely is (in general if I'm happy to rebid 3m or 2N I will open 1m, otherwise I'll open 1N). 13 sounds weird unless you're clee :P

 

I do always make an effort to disclose that all of our NT ranges can be upgraded and are almost never downgraded. Should I be making more of an effort to disclose that 6322 with 6m is generally treated as balanced if in range (and how do I do that?) I don't think it's that weird that 14 with a 6 card suit can be upgraded to 15, I doubt a committee would have a problem with that.

 

edit: FWIW I looked at my USBF system summary cards here is what they say about NT ranges...

 

With Joe: "frequently shade all nt's tactically and when have a good 5card suit."

With Kev: "Ranges are flexible and upgrades are frequent, downgrades not frequent."

With Bob: "decent 14-17 NT" which was actually our range since I would never be upgrading 13s when my max was 17 but many 14s were opened 1N so "decent" instead of "good" seemed appropriate.

[mikeh]

Yeah obviously if you don't open 1N with 6 card minors (and I'm guessing if you do it it's a baddish suit and positional/nty stuff outside?) then you don't need 5D natural. I was actually serious in my first post ITT when I asked are we not allowed to have a 6 card minor heh.

 

You're right.....if I ever open 1N with a 6 card minor, and I can't remember the last time I did it, it would definitely be with a bad suit and no completely open side suit. I have a vague memory that I used to do this fairly often way, way back, and then got to play a bit with Alan Graves, who has always had a different (and usually very interesting) take on the game compared to the way I learned it. I don't say that Alan is responsible for any bad decisions I made since then :P But I do think he got me thinking more about minor suit contracts rather than grabbing notrump...which latter was definitely a result of playing too much mps as a non-expert.

 

I don't know about disclosure issues, to me 6322 is similar to 5332 with a 5 card major or 5422 with a 5 card minor, I open it always if I feel I am in range, which 14 almost always is and 15 usually is and 16 rarely is (in general if I'm happy to rebid 3m or 2N I will open 1m, otherwise I'll open 1N). 13 sounds weird unless you're clee :P

 

I don't know how to deal with disclosure in this sort of situation. My guess is that in most of your serious events, there is no need, since I suspect that this sort of valuation/modification/distortion (whatever you call it) is accepted as 'bridge, mister' (one of my favourite lines was when a wanna-be expert challenged a real expert about 'what does that bid mean?', in an auction in which it is extremely unlikely that the expert and his only occasional partner had an agreement, and the answer was "it's bridge, mister")

 

My concern was more theoretical than real, and I can assure you that I would never be looking for a committee, but we've all seen situations that went to committee and the sometimes convoluted outcomes.

 

 

edit: FWIW I looked at my USBF system summary cards here is what they say about NT ranges...

 

With Joe: "frequently shade all nt's tactically and when have a good 5card suit."

With Kev: "Ranges are flexible and upgrades are frequent, downgrades not frequent."

With Bob: "decent 14-17 NT" which was actually our range since I would never be upgrading 13s when my max was 17 but many 14s were opened 1N so "decent" instead of "good" seemed appropriate.

 

 

As for your Bob card, it seems to me that many pairs these days write 15-17 when they mean 'decent 14 to indifferent 17'

 

I think the last time I had serious notes, in a string 1N context, I had 'frequent upgrades into and out of the range', but that was in the notes, not the convention card. I suspect that if I were doing what I seem to say others ought to do, I would be writing 14+ to 17-.