Which raise?

[miamijd]

The funny thing is, Mike, I agree with what you say, but needs must in this auction especially as both players have originally passed. Let's call it a 'pre-emptive strike' as opposed to a 'pre-emptive bid'. The one thing I learnt from Andrew Robson and Oliver Segal's excellent bridge book 'Partnership Bidding at Bridge' many years ago is that these types of bids puts immediate pressure on the opposition. As I said in my original post 'Let the opponents make the last guess'. I'm all for constructive/semi-constructive auctions most of the time, but we already know that the opponents have the majority of the points so let's make their life as difficult as possible. Pure and simple.

 

Except that your partner doesn't need much to make 4S a good shot.

[Joe_Old]

Except that your partner doesn't need much to make 4S a good shot.

 

But he better have those cards, because 4♠ is an easy contract to double, whereas 3♠, at IMP's is not. It's hard to come back to your teammates with -300 or -500 against a partial.

[dokoko]

Opp's suit would be hearts not diamonds here for me. So 2♦=nat, 3♦=Fit Jump. 2♥=Q raise, 3♥=mixed raise.

 

That said I would bid 3♠ to let opps guess and later pass if they bid 4♥. I don't expect to buy it for 2♠ and don't think I should let them play 3♥ as there are at least 17 total trumps.

 

A 3♥ mixed raise might work out better if I want to bid 4♠ when partner doesn't double 4♥.

[rmnka447]

Since most of my partners like to play a jump raise to 3 ♠ as preemptive we had to have some device for showing a limit raise. So we've adopted something suggested by one of them. We play a jump cue of opener's suit as a limit raise.

 

So here I'd use that tool and bid 3 ♦. Partner can convert to either 3 ♠ or 4 ♠ as their hand dictates.

 

But more importantly, I think you want to show some values here as a possible deterrent to the opponent's bidding. Also, if partner has decent values for the 1 ♠ bid, it might help avoid taking a phantom sac in 4 ♠.

 

If you don't have a tool like the jump cue, you might even consider making just a 2 ♦ cue. You only have 9 HCP but all points are working -- ♦ K behind the bidder, ♣ A, and ♠ Q is sure to fill in holes in the trump suit. Plus you have ♥ shortness and 4 trumps. The downside is that partner might decide more and have a tough time stopping at the right level.

[JanisW]

We sacrifice the natural 2NT-bid as showing a sound 4card raise, while 3♠ is preemptive.

Given the fact that everybody has had a bid, how many times will you look at your hand and consider it ideally described by a natural 2NT bid?

Now partner will know, that you have enough to force the bidding to at least 3♠ and will expect some defense when it is his turn to act over a possible 4♥-bid.

I strongly advise not to splinter, as it is possible that you'll end up defending 4 or even 5♥. Why tell the opponents the distribution of the trump-suit, when your partner is often able to deduce your ♥-shortage on his own.

 

regards

JW

[Winstonm]

Pard did not open 1S or 2S so what is left for his overcall other than real good spades and not much else? He probably holds AKJxx and not more than another queen somewhere. Our defensive chances are poor. We can't make a lot on offense - but we have the master suit and a chance to jumble up the auction in relative safety. So why not do it?

 

I would bid 3S as I do not consider that a strength-showing bid in this auction.