[paulhar]

If any strong pairs still play strong jump shifts by responder,

(1) does it guarantee a 5-card suit? (a strong 5-card suit)?

(2) if opener bids a new suit, do you play it natural?

(3) In a club where 4th suit forcing is banned (!), responder to a 1C opener held:
♠ K J 10 8
♥ K 9 3 2
♦ A K
♣ K 6 5

Responder's plan was to jump shift into 2H (showing 17-19, Soloway style), planning to raise spades or bid notrump otherwise even if hearts are raised (since opener could have three.) Without methods (this being a Class A game where conventions weren't allowed except Stayman and Blackwood), responder's other alternative was to respond 1H and raise 1S to 5S, raise 2H to 5H, and bid 4NT natural otherwise (and hope partner didn't take it as Blackwood.)

(4) Was responder's jump shift plan reasonable?

(5) Am I missing something - did responder have a better plan that I didn't mention, given the lack of allowable conventions?

[the hog]

A strong JS shows a very good 5+ card suit.
Did you say 4sf is banned? What are they playing? It is certainly not bridge.

[blackshoe]

Surely you can find a club with a better attitude towards the game. "Class A" conventions? In today's terms, that means the limited convention chart with, apparently, some additional restrictions. Since the limited chart is designed for novice (<20 Masterpoints) games, it doesn't seem like the kind of place for those who know what 4SF is, much less those who would like to play it.

I would not SJS with the hand given. Remember that 1♥ is unlimited and forcing.

[aguahombre]

Yes, there are strong pairs who play strong jump-shifts by responder. Mike Lawrence advocates particularly two:

2D/1C (showing slammish values with just Diamonds or both diamonds and clubs --a third notrumpish possibility)
2S/1H (Slammish with just spades or both majors)

Slam explorations which start with 1H-1S can get torturous, and these strong jumps eliminate some of that. But, the suit to which responder jumps is always at least 5 cards in length.

Others would rather use these bids as artificial conventions, rather than natural. There are variations of Jacoby raises, Reverse Flannery Responses, etc. which better suit the styles of those folks.

Strong natural jump shifts to the 3-level in a suit under opener's suit are truly wasteful, in my opinion ---especially if 2/1 is G.F.

[Vampyr]

blackshoe, on 2012-July-26, 21:56, said:

Since the limited chart is designed for novice (<20 Masterpoints) games, it doesn't seem like the kind of place for those who know what 4SF is, much less those who would like to play it.

Fourth suit artificial is hardly even a convention -- the fourth suit bid in an auction was always suspect. In the early days of contract bridge they just called it "temporising".

[han]

aguahombre, on 2012-July-26, 23:18, said:

Yes, there are strong pairs who play strong jump-shifts by responder.

Which pairs?

[helene_t]

I don't like the idea of a strong jump shift on a 4-card suit. An SJS shows that there are (at most) three strains possible, namely opener's suit, responder's suit, and notrumps. With this hand all strains are possible. So 1♥ (or maybe 2NT if that is forcing) is the bid.

That FSF is banned is not really an issue with this hand since you can bid a natural 2♠ over opener's 2♣ rebid.

[chasetb]

han, on 2012-July-27, 04:19, said:

Which pairs?

Fantunes uses SJS over the 1-level suit bids, though Strong only in the sense that they are 5+ and Game Forcing. Also, R-M Precision (Meckwell) uses 1♦ - (1♥) - 2♠ as GF. I think 1♦ - (1♠) - 2♥ is also GF, but I have to look that up.

Both pairs are in the minority. I know I play Reverse Flannery JS over 1m in my Precision partnership (my preference), and in all the others (SA or 2/1) some WJS because they want to.

[Cyberyeti]

I play SJSs, but this looks nothing like one.

For me a SJS is always GF, either the old fashioned rock crusher and suit setting, or at least HHxxx in the suit bid and Hxxx in partner's suit, H=AKQ.

[Bbradley62]

So, basically OP is asking what agreements strong pairs would have playing in a Class A only game. I suspect the agreement would be to not play in such a game.

[paulhar]

helene_t, on 2012-July-27, 05:51, said:

I don't like the idea of a strong jump shift on a 4-card suit. An SJS shows that there are (at most) three strains possible, namely opener's suit, responder's suit, and notrumps. With this hand all strains are possible. So 1♥ (or maybe 2NT if that is forcing) is the bid.

That FSF is banned is not really an issue with this hand since you can bid a natural 2♠ over opener's 2♣ rebid.

It might be an issue over opener's 1S rebid though.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

#1 yes, a good 5 card suit
#2 yes, opener makes his standard rebid
#3 FSF is banned, but SJS Soloway Style are allowed?
I would go with 1H, followed by 2S or 4NT - Blackwood.
#4 sure, but it violates the condtion of the contest
#5 lack of conventions means, at one point in time, you
need to make a decicsion / guess, and shoot it out, i.e.
trying to be scientific without tools is not possible.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[P_Marlowe]

paulhar, on 2012-July-27, 18:16, said:

It might be an issue over opener's 1S rebid though.

No - you have a fit, you can either invite with 5S, or ask
for Aces.

[awm]

The way Elianna and I play these:

(1) Jump shift (unpassed hand, not in comp) shows a game force with either a strong 6+ card suit or a 5+ card suit with 4+ in the suit partner opened.
(2) The overall strength is game force, but need not be more.

In my experience the "Soloway" style is more popular (although honestly, strong jumps are not very popular at all), but in my view this is both less frequent (requiring greater strength) and less useful (because the four-card suit with big balanced hand possibility messes up the continuations). Our style fits well with the fact that we play 2/1 as not necessarily game force (meaning that invitational one-suiters that are hard in 2/1 without IJS are easy for us, but GF one-suiters sometimes require us to make up a suit at responder's second turn unless we use the SJS).

Of course, we do play 4th suit (game) forcing.

[TheoKole]

I also play strong jump shifts by responder. For me it would show a strong hand searching for a slam, with a very strong 5 card suit or a self sufficient trump suit. If I insist on the suit later on in the auction you can be sure that I do not need a fit and will have no problem playing the suit against a void in dummy.

Some criticism of strong jump shifts are that they waste space but I have found that they actually SAVE a level of bidding compared to other auctions. if the bidding goes 1 ♣ - 2 ♥ for example, we are automatically looking for a probable small slam and maybe a grand. Usually the bidding is at 3 ♥ or above with other systems (if you use weak jump shifts for example) by the time you can convey your hand strength.

Good luck and keep counting,

Theo

[blackshoe]

Romex has an interesting approach to responder's SJS. First, it shows either an independent but not necessarily absolutely solid suit, or a good suit and support for opener. Second, opener's rebid follows this hierarchy:

With partner's putative missing honor, raise him. Yes, even with a singleton.
Absent that, with a concentration (two of the top three honors) in your suit, rebid it.
Absent that, with a concentration in a side suit, bid that.
Absent that, bid NT.

All of this imparts a lot of information. In particular, a later 4NT bid by responder is not Blackwood