Is this a psyche?

[jillybean]

Dealer: East Vul: NS Scoring: IMP ♠ Q96 ♥ QT972 ♦ K4 ♣ J87

 

West North East South

 

 -     -     1♣    1♠

 

 

 

 

E/W ended up playing in 1nt (4♠ was top) and cried foul of souths 1♠ bid.

I let result stand, what do the experts think please?

 

jillybean2

[scoob]

1 good bid and 1 good director decision.

[fred]

<!-- ONEHAND begin --><table border='1'> <tr> <td> <table> <tr> <td> Dealer: </td> <td> East </td> </tr> <tr> <td> Vul: </td> <td> NS </td> </tr> <tr> <td> Scoring: </td> <td> IMP </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td> <table> <tr> <th> <span class='spades'> ♠ </th> <td> Q96 </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='hearts'> ♥ </span> </th> <td> QT972 </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='diamonds'> ♦ </span> </th> <td> K4 </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='clubs'> ♣ </span> </th> <td> J87 </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td>  </td> </tr> </table><!-- ONEHAND end -->

 

West  North East  South

 

 -     -     1♣    1♠

 

 </span>

 

 

E/W ended up playing in 1nt (4♠ was top) and cried foul of souths 1♠ bid.

I let result stand, what do the experts think please?

 

jillybean2

Yes - that's a psych.

 

The official definition of a psych is something along the lines of:

 

"A bid that is a deliberate and gross distortion of one's high card values and/or distribution."

 

Overcalling on a 3-card suit is a gross distortion in the distributional sense (unless the people in question play a very unusual system in which case they should be alerting their 1S overcalls). Therefore it is a psych.

 

In my opinion this particular psych is an example of very poor bridge judgment. The player who made this call got super-lucky that he got a top instead of a bottom.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[jillybean]

Thanks for the reply.

For my info, change position of psych from 2nd to 4th position (p p 1♣ 1♠)

and now this becomes a good psych?

 

jillybean2

[fred]

I am not sure what you mean by a "good psych".

 

If you mean "a psych that rates to be effective" then I don't think it makes that much difference what seat you are (but this psych is certainly more attractive if your partner is a passed hand). Overcalling a suit you don't have is generally a poor psych before there is too great a danger that your partner will raise you (and that rates to be very bad for your side). There are 2 other reasons why this hand is not the sort of hand you want to psych with:

 

1) You have too much defensive strength. This psych has a better chance of working if you had zero HCP (because the chances would then be better that your opponents could bid and make a slam and this will sometimes make up for some of the huge numbers you go for when you end up getting doubled because your partner took your bid seriously).

 

2) You have nowhere to run. If you had something like a weak 8-card suit on the side you would be able to rescue yourself if necessary. This would reduce the chances of your psych resulting in a disaster.

 

In general I believe that psyching overcalls is not a very good idea (though Gerardo psyched an overcall against me and Uday the other day and earned a great result for his side, not that one result proves anything).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com