[sceptic]

Hi

I would like to know why anyone would open this 3 diamonds, I am trying to think is it a good expert bid, is it a bid an idiot would make, is it something I should be proud of, is it tactical, is it someone that is bored and trying thier luck

what are your thoughts and just as importantly, how do you play against people that bid like this, if it was not what you expected, but I suppose playing against experts you can expect this sort of thing because they think you do not have the tools or ability to cope with this type of bid?

here is the hand

Scoring: IMP

---

West North East South

 Pass  Pass  3♦    Pass
 Pass  Pass  

[Adebisi]

Hi, 3rd in hand after passed pd u want to make life harder for opps ecpessially in fav vulnerability so 3rd level 3♦ could be some 3-12 HCP 6+ suit.Here u lost your 3NT but more likely u win.Some sure would open 1H and reach 3NT but after pass 3D seems right:)

[whereagles]

I wouldn't open 3♦, but I suppose you can blame pard for not bidding 3♥ (3♥ = ♦fit+hearts, what else could it be?)

[helene_t]

You have my sympathy for your funny preempts, Wayne. But you already know that, of course

[sceptic]

my 3 level preempts are sound the 2 level are creative

[mike777]

One vote here for never opening a weak 3 level bid with an outside ace or k.

Even Mr. Roth would open this one D in third seat, I think.

[pbleighton]

I would open 3D.

You are favorable and have only 4 cards in the majors, after all.

This hand's a nice argument for opening 11 counts

Peter

[inquiry]

Experts vary tremendously the stregnth of their 3rd seat preempts. That is, they throw discipline out the window, they can be very weak to a hand, like this one, that might open one of the suit in any other seat. So while 3♦ with this hand in 1st, 2nd, and even 4th seat seems wrong, in third seat it quite ok.

Bidding this way in 3rd seat is designed to give you problems. If you knew RHO was weak, you would know your partner has some values. IF he can have 11, 12 or bad 13 hcp, you could catch your partner with nothing. That is part of the strategy. To make it riskier for you to compete on marginal hands. I would love it if the preempt HAD TO BE WEAK holding the south hand. Now, as it is, you are semi-stuck. You pay your entry fee, you take your chances. With 13 hcp, a doulbeton diamond (bad holding), AQ in short suit, and long suit weak (headed by a queen), I am afraid this is a clear pass. A double is likely to get a ♥ bid from partner and what can I do? 4♣ would be forcing. And to overcall 4♣ on this hand is suicidal.

[brianshark]

I would throw up if my partner bid 3♦ with that hand. I think it's a horrible horrible bid. It goes against the whole concept of what pre-emptive bids are meant to be. Strong suit, weak hand. Good when declaring (in that suit), crap when defending, and usually crap in any other suit without a fit+honours.

The idea of pre-emption is that you make it hard for opponents by taking up their bidding space but easy for your partner by accurately describing your hand. So partner can know when it's right to sacrafice based on your presumed weak defensive hand, or know not to double for penalties unless he has the defensive strength on his own. And the opponents are still guessing because they have no clue as to the combined assets and it's a risk to them to try and inform each other because of the high level, plus the innacuracy caused by lack of bidding space.

This hand has a good hand but a crap suit, it has 3 defensive tricks, and only 4/5 offensive tricks. I would probably open the bidding with it. To me, bidding 3♦ with that hand is closer to 'psyching' than 'pre-empting' as your leaving everyone in the dark, including your partner. ("mysterious 3-level openings").

Having said that, many players that are much better than me, open this kind of hand on the 3-level. So obviously I'm missing something. *shrugs*

[inquiry]

brianshark, on Feb 12 2007, 10:09 AM, said:

Having said that, many players that are much better than me, open this kind of hand on the 3-level. So obviously I'm missing something. *shrugs*

The theory of preempts changes based upon seat.

A second seat preempt should be "text=book sound". The reason, one opponent has already passed, so there is equal chance of the remaing two hands, your partner has the strong one, and your preempt only preempts your side making accurate bidding less likely. If you are disciplined, then if your partner does has a strong hand, he is more likely to bid correctly.

In third seat, if there is a big hand at the table, where is it? Your partner and your RHO have already passed. So here you can be more liberal with your preempt. Also, since your partner is a passed hand, if you have a minimal opener, it is unlikely you can make game, so you can preempt with a little extra values, in an effort to make it harder on your opponents. So in third seat you can be ligther than normal or stronger than normal. Alert these third seat opening bids as "wide ranging" if your opponents don't know your style.

[hotShot]

If you think about a 3rd seat opening, you know that there is a 66.6% chance that opps have the majority of points. Usually the combined strength of 3rd and 4th seat is 24+ HCP. Opps are likely to have a full game if 4th seat has 16+ HCP.
Holding 10 HCP in 3rd seat means that opps usually won't have game and are just fighting for the partscore.

So while in 1st and 2nd seat, i think this preempt is fine, it makes not so much sense in 3rd seat.

So the best strategy seems to be to pass and bid 2♦ later.

[pclayton]

Its never my style to preempt with two outside cards. 6322 is a turnoff too.

[mike777]

hotShot, on Feb 12 2007, 10:33 AM, said:

If you think about a 3rd seat opening, you know that there is a 66.6% chance that opps have the majority of points. Usually the combined strength of 3rd and 4th seat is 24+ HCP. Opps are likely to have a full game if 4th seat has 16+ HCP.
Holding 10 HCP in 3rd seat means that opps usually won't have game and are just fighting for the partscore.

So while in 1st and 2nd seat, i think this preempt is fine, it makes not so much sense in 3rd seat.

So the best strategy seems to be to pass and bid 2♦ later.

Why? If you play Roth Stone partner can have 12-13 hcp yes?

[inquiry]

brianshark, on Feb 12 2007, 10:09 AM, said:

Having said that, many players that are much better than me, open this kind of hand on the 3-level. So obviously I'm missing something. *shrugs*

Let's see if I can point you to something that you may have missed... but first,

hotshot @ Feb 12 2007, on 10:33 AM, said:

If you think about a 3rd seat opening, you know that there is a 66.6% chance that opps have the majority of points. Usually the combined strength of 3rd and 4th seat is 24+ HCP. Opps are likely to have a full game if 4th seat has 16+ HCP.
Holding 10 HCP in 3rd seat means that opps usually won't have game and are just fighting for the partscore.

So while in 1st and 2nd seat, i think this preempt is fine, it makes not so much sense in 3rd seat.

I am somewhat at a loss for words. You would preempt in the first or second seat with this hand (presumably a weak two), but not in third seat? I would open it 1♦ in all seats. But ok.

Back to brianshark's question. Brian, if you go to dan neil's system webpage (system page), you will find a copy of Robson/Segals book entitled "Partnerships bidding at bridge" in PDF format. Read chapter 3 (putting on the pressure), and particularily pages 115-118 to find out more about some of the ideas I expressed above. It will at the very least give you some concept about why "pure preempts" have some disadvantages and varialbe ones work out more often.

[cherdano]

This hand is too sick for me, even for 3rd seat white vs red. Tons of defense, suit about as bad as it gets. I open 1♦, as in 1st or 2nd seat.
But of course, 3♦ may work.

[inquiry]

cherdano, on Feb 12 2007, 11:55 AM, said:

This hand is too sick for me, even for 3rd seat white vs red. Tons of defense, suit about as bad as it gets. I open 1♦, as in 1st or 2nd seat.
But of course, 3♦ may work.

Again, I said I would open 1♦, but for those of you who will not open the PDF I mentioned above, here are two example hands from that book for a thrid seat non-vul opening 3 level preempt....

KJTxx
xxxx
x
Qxx

(yes, five spades, yes a side four card major), and

QJTxx
x
xxx
xxxx

(Yes a five card suit and 3 hcp)

AKJ9853
QJx
Qx
xx

(Yes, 13 hcp and tricks in side suit),

I am not advocate you play this, just it is there with a nice write up for "why" you might consider it.

[SoTired]

Everybody seems to hate this preempt for violating preempt guidelines, but admit it might work. Disregard the "rules" you have fixed in your mind and look ahead in the auction.

With only 11 HCP, you don't have game and even if you can make game, you can't bid it. All partner needs is a 2♦ and diam are your best fit.

If you open this hand 1D, the opps are likely to compete with you in the majors. You will be defending a 3M contract if the opps have the majority of strength, or playing a 3D contract if your side has the majority of strength. The opps will more accurately judge whether to bid to the 2 or 3 level and will more easily find their best fit. If the hand is the opps for game, your 1D opening will hardly block them much.

Now look what happens if you open 3D. You have competed to the highest level that you are probably bidding anyway and you have stopped the opps from accurately exploring their possible fit. After 3D p p, your 10 hcp RHO will be guessing about who owns the hand. If the hand is an game for opps, they must start exploring at the 3-level.

The reason some hesitate to open 3D on this hand has nothing to do with logic and practicality, but only with "rules" and "guidelines".

[jtfanclub]

At my club, I try to open a 3-level pre-empt with a hand like this at least once a year. Make them respect my trash pre-empts for the next 364 days.

If I'm not trying to make a rep, I open 1♦.

[brianshark]

Daniel Neill's excellent system page has been down (at least for me) for quite some time now.

But I do believe I have read that partnership bidding book. I got it from Daniel's site a few months ago and read it through. It was indeed an excellent read. I learned a lot about the theory of competitive bidding and I believe it to have helped my bidding judgement quite a lot.

One little thing I remember was the reasoning behind why it's a misnomer to think that describing your hand accurately helps your opponent as much as your partner. And perhaps I've bought into that concept (and it's corollaries) over-zealously, but I have yet to be convinced why it's invalid.

So, regarding pre-empting, I guess I feel that even if the opponents rate to have the majority of points, your partner still has calls to make regarding doubling a doomed game, sacraficing, or just keeping quiet. Also, your partner knowing your defensive values or lack thereof can be helpful to him every bit as much as declarer, particularly as partner will (initially) be more informed as to which values, and not just how many.

I do know of some of the advantages of being more liberal. When opps have the majority of the points (and therefore "own" the hand), they should be bidding slowly and we should be bidding as high as possible, as quickly as possible.

So yes, I acknowledge that you should be more liberal in such situations, such as when your in third seat, or when the bidding and your holding suggests partner is broke, etc.

However, I think that people jump on the whole "3rd seat" concept way too much. I think people over do it because:
- People love bidding
- People love punting
- People think it's fun to annoy the opponents and generally get the balance wrong between fooling your opponents at the expense of fooling your partner.

[cherdano]

inquiry, on Feb 12 2007, 11:06 AM, said:

cherdano, on Feb 12 2007, 11:55 AM, said:

This hand is too sick for me, even for 3rd seat white vs red. Tons of defense, suit about as bad as it gets. I open 1♦, as in 1st or 2nd seat.
But of course, 3♦ may work.

Again, I said I would open 1♦, but for those of you who will not open the PDF I mentioned above, here are two example hands from that book for a thrid seat non-vul opening 3 level preempt....

KJTxx
xxxx
x
Qxx

(yes, five spades, yes a side four card major), and

QJTxx
x
xxx
xxxx

(Yes a five card suit and 3 hcp)

AKJ9853
QJx
Qx
xx

(Yes, 13 hcp and tricks in side suit),

I am not advocate you play this, just it is there with a nice write up for "why" you might consider it.

All the example hands are IMO way more suited for a preempt than the one in this thread. In fact, I would certainly open 2♠ with the first two, and don't mind 2♠ with the 3rd one.

I won't talk anyone out of the aggressive style to open 3♦ with the hand here. But if someone thinks this is comparable to opening 2♠ with any of the hands cited by Ben above, then I would claim his judgment of the suitability for a preempt, offense/defense-ratio etc. is off. (Of course, it may be that it is my judgement that is off, instead...)