Worth a vul accept?

[Jinksy]

Tx

ATxx

xx

Kxxxx

 

Unfav, teams, you dealer. The bidding unfolds thusly:

 

P 1S /

1N 3S

 

Do you raise?

[PhilKing]

Were there a poll, I would expect a unanimous vote for 4♠ - you have 3 positive features, which is easily enough.

[mikeh]

Put it this way: I would accept nv

[whereagles]

"Always ready!!" - shadow voice in warlords battlecry

[rmnka447]

Wouldn't even blink an eyelash before accepting VUL at IMPs.

[The_Badger]

With one-and-a-half quick tricks opposite a 3♠ rebid, and a 5-4-2-2 shape, I believe the game is marginal but certainly biddable. Partner's probably got 6-3-3-2 himself. It might be easier to cobble together 9 tricks in no-trumps, but you must honour partner's suit and bid 4♠.

 

To me, there's an element of too many losers between the 2 hands, and if partner has a mediocre 16 or 17 count without top controls, 4 ♠ may go down, but you don't win bridge matches by passing on such hands in my opinion.

[fourdad]

BID IT!!

[bdegrande]

Yes, not close, I accept even white.

[Jinksy]

To all: what's the minimum change you'd have to make to the hand to make it a pass?

[the hog]

Why is this posted? It is a 4S bid red, white or purple.

[daffydoc]

change club king to queen and I pass as is a clear accept

[Jinksy]

change club king to queen and I pass as is a clear accept

 

That feels like quite a significant change. For eg, you could change the club king to the QJ, and my guess is people would still pass?

 

I think I phrased it misleadingly with 'minimum change'. What I meant to ask is something like 'adjusting the hand so it's as close as possible to the OP hand in playing strength, what is the strongest recognisable version of it on which you'd pass?'

[Trump Echo]

Yes... Kxxxx raise

 

QJxxx pass.

 

MHO

[brettnj]

Are you kidding? An Ace, a King, and an 8-loser hand.

[neilkaz]

I accept as I have an ace and a king and a potentially useful doubleton. Perhaps my 5♣ can prove useful. I'd expect to be near 50/50 to make game vs a typical invite.

[AyunuS]

Why wouldn't you go for it? You have 8 points (counting the doubleton), partner probably has 17, so you have a combined 25. And all of yours are useful so there's no reason to underbid it. Unless maybe if your opponents are using some strong pass system where you know one of them has a strong hand or something like that, but I don't think that's the case.

[johnu]

Pass, RHO has a trump stack and 4♠ is off one. If you hadn't overheard the result from the adjoining table, 4♠.

[Roby]

Bid game. The vulnerability makes the game even more attractive because of the bigger game bonus. Remove one small heart or club and put it in diamonds and I will pass. We could still make a 3NT contract on some hands but to bid all filthy games in sight is losing bridge.

[Phil]

Just don't expect this to be cold.

 

Also, make sure you partner isn't jumping around with 15's.

[mikeh]

Just don't expect this to be cold.

 

Also, make sure you partner isn't jumping around with 15's.

Depends on the 15:)

 

Obviously whether we land in a good game depends on the degree of mesh between our hands, and we have no way of finding that out. However, we have an Ace, a King, the trump 10x, and a potential ruff. The odds are good that our 4 plus features, when partner won't be expecting more than 1 or 2, are enough to give us play.

 

To give one easy example: give partner AQJxxx and our 10 allows us to advance the 10 and remain in dummy should the K be onside (assuming no cover), while xx would mean finding 2 entries to dummy to pick up Kxx onside. Little edges like that have real value.

[Jinksy]

Just don't expect this to be cold.

 

Also, make sure you partner isn't jumping around with 15's.

 

Yeah, after posting it I was thinking about it in relation to this hand, which most of the posters want to bid 3 with. Rotate the suits downwards and it could be the hand you find opposite here:

 

KQJ965

Q7

AQJ

T9

 

vs

 

Tx

ATxx

xx

Kxxxx

 

I think even at this scoring, that's not a game you want to be in - though obviously that's scraping the bottom end of P's set of possible hands (and if you switch opener's round suits it looks much better).

 

I also wonder if Kxxxx isn't a worse holding than eg Kx, since on hands like this with a large disparity in strength, it seems like the weaker hand's values work best when they're supplementing the stronger hand's longer side suits (though maybe that's less relevant here, since he doesn't have a 4-card side suit worth mentioning).

[PhilKing]

Yeah, after posting it I was thinking about it in relation to this hand, which most of the posters want to bid 3 with. Rotate the suits downwards and it could be the hand you find opposite here:

 

KQJ965

Q7

AQJ

T9

 

vs

 

Tx

ATxx

xx

Kxxxx

 

I think even at this scoring, that's not a game you want to be in - though obviously that's scraping the bottom end of P's set of possible hands (and if you switch opener's round suits it looks much better).

 

I also wonder if Kxxxx isn't a worse holding than eg Kx, since on hands like this with a large disparity in strength, it seems like the weaker hand's values work best when they're supplementing the stronger hand's longer side suits (though maybe that's less relevant here, since he doesn't have a 4-card side suit worth mentioning).

 

I'm a big fan of just rebidding 2♠. Look at it this way - you need partner to have three cover cards to make game laydown, which is unlikely if partner passes. And jumping to three will produce a lot of minus scores whether partner raises or not.

[mikestar13]

This is borderline acceptance at match points if partner's jumps to 3♠ tend to be sound (NOT a random 15 with six moth eaten spades). Vulnerable at imps, it isn't even a question. Change ♣K to ♣Q I may gamble 4♠ anyway vulnerable at imps, but I'd be ashamed of it, I'd pass that hand in any other circumstances. A queen in an unbid suit tends to be worth substantially more than 1 point less than the king of the same suit would be.

 

All this is predicated on conservative invites, aggressive game bids. Were I dragooned into playing the opposite philosophy, I always pass the original hand (and complain about being 3♠-1 in a constructive auction too often).

[mikestar13]

I'm a big fan of just rebidding 2♠. Look at it this way - you need partner to have three cover cards to make game laydown, which is unlikely if partner passes. And jumping to three will produce a lot of minus scores whether partner raises or not.

 

Amen. This hand has a good suit, and that's about it. If I said I would bid 3♠ in the assumed 2/1ish context on this crap, I was high at time. For me, on the low end for 3♠ in Precision.