[mike777]

guys another rant

YOu cannot hide 4 card support


partner will never catch up.


often you guys want to hide 4 card support and you have a reason./

[EricK]

 mike777, on 2012-December-31, 01:22, said:

guys another rant

YOu cannot hide 4 card support


partner will never catch up.


often you guys want to hide 4 card support and you have a reason./

When I want you to play a hand, I'll support your suit

[SimonFa]

I couldn't have written it better, I've just faced this sequence:

IMPS, RvR, pickup partner in MBC:

---

Expecting to play a 4:3 ♠ fit with partner something like 3=5=1=4 and about 12HCP or maybe less as a 3rd seat opening I was castigated for passing

Simon

[Cyberyeti]

 SimonFa, on 2012-December-31, 04:50, said:

I couldn't have written it better, I've just faced this sequence:

IMPS, RvR, pickup partner in MBC:

Expecting to play a 4:3 ♠ fit with partner something like 3=5=1=4 and about 12HCP or maybe less as a 3rd seat opening I was castigated for passing

Simon

If partner had the hand you described, he'd have bid 2♠ over 1♠ or passed 2♥. Bidding 2♠ shows extras but it's not clear how many, and he should have 3 spades not 4. I would have bid 2N over 2♠ to indicate I only had 4 and had a diamond stop, but pass is not stupid as I would think this could be a 3514 16 count. When partner then bids 4♦ we'd be off to the races, he should really have bid 4♦ first time.

[kenberg]

It would absolutely never occur to me to bid again over the sequence 1♥-1♠-2♣-2♥-2♠ holding Simon's hand or anything like it. I have taken two bids on a seven count. I have described every feature of my hand. My 2♥ showed only that I would rather play in hearts than in clubs. If partner, after hearing all of this, thinks that the hand belongs in 2♠, who am I to disagree? I do expect partner to have a decent hand, or else he would have passed 2♥ before the opponents found something to double. Decent hand yes, something on the order of what he has, no.

Perhaps there is an argument for why the North hand should be bid in this manner and if the partnership has gone over this and everyone remembers, fine, play it that way. Playing pickup, bidding this way is nuts.

Or, to put it another way, if I am supposed to bid again, what on Earth would that bid be?This next bid should show something that I have not already shown, right?

[blackshoe]

I would open 2♣ with the North hand, but then I don't open 2♣ on the dreck many people seem to have when they do so these days. If I'd started with 1♥, I'd rebid 3♣. There are other options, but they take up a lot more space.

[Cyberyeti]

 kenberg, on 2012-December-31, 08:35, said:

It would absolutely never occur to me to bid again over the sequence 1♥-1♠-2♣-2♥-2♠ holding Simon's hand or anything like it. I have taken two bids on a seven count. I have described every feature of my hand. My 2♥ showed only that I would rather play in hearts than in clubs. If partner, after hearing all of this, thinks that the hand belongs in 2♠, who am I to disagree? I do expect partner to have a decent hand, or else he would have passed 2♥ before the opponents found something to double. Decent hand yes, something on the order of what he has, no.

Perhaps there is an argument for why the North hand should be bid in this manner and if the partnership has gone over this and everyone remembers, fine, play it that way. Playing pickup, bidding this way is nuts.

Or, to put it another way, if I am supposed to bid again, what on Earth would that bid be?This next bid should show something that I have not already shown, right?

Possibly because not everybody bids as you do (although a lot more will bid like you than bid like me). 2♠ shows basically reversing values to me, if I wanted to bid 2♠ to play I would have done it a round earlier. You have still shown no more than a 4-5 count when you bid 2♥ and your hand while not great is better than that and 6 of your 7 points are working.

While I would never bid the N hand like that (1♥-1♠-4♦(exclusion or bust)-4♠(bust)-4N(I still want the exclusion response)-5♦(1)-5N(Anything else)-6♠(no) would be our auction) I still think 2♠ shows a pretty big hand.

[kenberg]

Here is my idea of the North hand, based on the auction:

---

I open 1♥, partner responds 1♠. I figure the hand is too strong for 2♠ and 3♠ promises four card support. So I bid 2♣. Now partner rebids 2♥. very passable and doesn't promise much, but it doesn't deny five spades and he can have somewhat more than a minimum. Game is still possible, so I try 2♠.

If you think that this hand is still within range for a 2♠ direct raise, change the club Jack to the Club Q.

Now back to South: I suppose 4♠ might come in if North has something like the hand shown, but I think I pass. We don't have a surplus of highs, we don't have an eight card fit, we are going to need some luck. And if North does have the shown hand, it sure seems to me that this is the way he would bid it. How else?

One more thought. I don't really regard 1♥-1♠-2♣ as absolutely forcing. Give me, South, something like Axxxx / x/ xxxx/ Jxx

Surely I bid 1♠ over 1♥, and even if the club Jack were another x I bid 1♠. Now partner bids 2♣. I am supposed to bid again? Standard bridge, as I understand it, is that new suits by responder are, with some exceptions, forcing. Non-jump non-reverse second suits by opener are seldom passed but responder can use his judgment. If 2♣ is not totally forcing, South is allowed to consider this when evaluating the situation after the 2♠ bid.

It is not entirely true that forcing bids always help to clarify auctions. If in the posted auction, bith the 2♣ bids and the 2♠ bids are forcing, then very little can be inferred from the fact that partner bid over them. He had to. Leaving the bids as non-forcing gives the advantage that when partner goes on, he has a reason for doing so. This can be useful information.

[Cyberyeti]

 kenberg, on 2012-December-31, 09:37, said:

Here is my idea of the North hand, based on the auction:

---

I open 1♥, partner responds 1♠. I figure the hand is too strong for 2♠ and 3♠ promises four card support. So I bid 2♣. Now partner rebids 2♥. very passable and doesn't promise much, but it doesn't deny five spades and he can have somewhat more than a minimum. Game is still possible, so I try 2♠.

If you think that this hand is still within range for a 2♠ direct raise, change the club Jack to the Club Q.

Now back to South: I suppose 4♠ might come in if North has something like the hand shown, but I think I pass. We don't have a surplus of highs, we don't have an eight card fit, we are going to need some luck. And if North does have the shown hand, it sure seems to me that this is the way he would bid it. How else?

Club J upgraded to Q on that is about minimum for what I'd expect, but can still be a king better than that the way I play, hence 2N over 2♠ (we never bid 1♥-1♠-3♣ on 5-4, 2♣ is all but forcing). We would certainly bid KQx, AKQxx, x, Axxx like this.

[kenberg]

We seem to agree that we would not be bidding the actual North hand in the way it was done, and although I have not thought much about it I tend to agree that 1♥-1♠-3♣ should show five. The "2♣ is all but forcing" reminds me of Gilbert and Sullivan "Never? Well, hardly ever" but in fact anytime that it is passed that might well turn out fine. Providing you don't rebid 2♣ on three cards. With this very strong hand that you show for North I think 1♥-1♠-2♣-2♥-3♠ sounds right. Bidding two suits and then a jump raise of partner's suit is the traditional way of showing three cards, a stiff, a big hand and tradition has its uses. If the combined hands cannot make game somewhere, with your suggested monster North hand, that's just too bad. Games have been made on 4-3 fits.


But no style always works, else we would all be playing it. I understand raising 1♠ directly to 2♠ on the hand I give, with the clubs AJxx, but I would do in on quite a bit less. If I have an opening hand, a stiff diamond, and three decent spades that's near enough unless I really am at a minimum.

Anyway, as the OP says, if I do not raise spades immediatly it will be near impossible to convince partner that I have four of them no matter what I do subsequently. I would like 4♦ to have a stiff diamond rather than a void, as it is I will feel I have not done the hand justice if partner then bids 4[S], but we cannot have everything. I could make another try with 5♣ which ought to encourage him. He can think, I didn't bid 4♥, I bid 4♠, he is still moving on? It should not take much in his hand to get him to bid 6♠. I wouldn't say the cards can be spread after the opening lead, but it certainly is a favorite.

[mikeh]

 mike777, on 2012-December-31, 01:22, said:

guys another rant

YOu cannot hide 4 card support


partner will never catch up.


often you guys want to hide 4 card support and you have a reason./

You can't generalize like this.

I'm not going to take the time to come up with a finely nuanced example, but I will typically avoid an immediate expression of support when I have game or (more commonly) slam hopes and a potential source of tricks.

Thus Kxxx Ax AQxxxx x is to me a 2♦ response to a 1♠ opening bid because, as the auction develops, I want partner to feel optimistic about his hand when he holds the diamond K.

That hand is too good for a splinter, which we play tops out at a minimum opening hand and definitely has no source of tricks as represented here by the small diamonds. I play a reasonably complex version of J2N, but the responses are geared towards showing combinations of strength and shape, rather than specific cards, so I may find out early about short diamonds, but I won't find out until late, if at all, about the diamond K.

So rather than assuming captaincy, leaving partner in the dark as to how well his cards mesh with mine, I'll show diamonds and then make slam moves in spades. 2/1 allows me the luxury of keeping the auction alive at low levels. Now an intelligent partner will be encouraged or discouraged by his diamond holding, which is obviously important.

But if your rant is aimed at opener for refusing to show 4 card support for responder, I would agree whole-heartedly. I suppose there can be exceptions, but it is difficult to think of any that don't involve holding 7+ solid in my own suit.

[gwnn]

I think mike777 also means sequences like

1H-1S
3C

when opener plans to 'bid around the shortness' to show a big big spade raise with a diamond singleton/void. Another tendency that never made sense to me (aguahombre and some others like it but I still don't know how they manage to show this hand type reliably).

[ggwhiz]

 mike777, on 2012-December-31, 01:22, said:

YOu cannot hide 4 card support

I have one exception with something like 4-3-5-1 and a strong hand I may reverse into 2♥ and insist on spades after.

I'm alergic to splinters in general after much abuse by former partners but wouldn't like to make one on say, a stiff Ace anyway.

If that's an acceptable style your pard was worth 3♣ game forcing followed by insisting on spades.

[PhilKing]

Is it OK to hide 5-card support?

[mikeh]

 gwnn, on 2012-December-31, 12:41, said:

I think mike777 also means sequences like

1H-1S
3C

when opener plans to 'bid around the shortness' to show a big big spade raise with a diamond singleton/void. Another tendency that never made sense to me (aguahombre and some others like it but I still don't know how they manage to show this hand type reliably).

I learned to 'bid around shortness' early in my career...we're talking about the mid 1970s now. Fortunately, I eventually learned how to bid more accurately without such needless distortions. I say needless because we have far more bidding tools available to us than were available even to experts 40-50 years ago.

One had to bid around the shortness when one didn't have the splinter in one's arsenal. We now do.

ggwhiz's example of reversing with 4=3=5=1, for example, makes me feel ill.

If we have an invite, we bid 3♠ over the 1♠ response. If we have a gf, we bid 4♣. If we have only a single raise, we make the single raise. Why on earth would we distort our hand?

I once responded to 1♦ on Qxxxx Qxx x xxxx. Partner reversed into 2♥ and I was out of the auction. I was not amused when partner held a powerhouse 4=4=5=0 with 4♠ on ice. Our +140 on misdefence was little consolation. I'm still passing with that hand no matter who bids the reverse. Otherwise I become an enabler

[ggwhiz]

 mikeh, on 2012-December-31, 13:33, said:

ggwhiz's example of reversing with 4=3=5=1, for example, makes me feel ill.

Yeah, I know but a terrible mis-application of splinters in my past did me in, ie. stiff Ace and a few queens outside amongst many others I've mercifully forgotten.

How about a primer on their proper use?

[gwnn]

 PhilKing, on 2012-December-31, 13:19, said:

Is it OK to hide 5-card support?

it is supported by the bidding theorist #1 so...
http://www.bridgebas...irst-then-play/

[ggwhiz]

 PhilKing, on 2012-December-31, 13:19, said:

Is it OK to hide 5-card support?

At mp's I once opened 1♥ on xxx, AKQxx, AKQ, xx white on red, double to pard who bid 3nt on 6 little hearts and out.

Float and the lead was the ♦J from JT9

[blackshoe]

That's the kind of hand where I wonder if I should claim at trick one, or play it out and hope the opponents give me an overtrick.

[1eyedjack]

I once conealed 6 card support.

Having in my student days discovered the joys of opening 1N with a 5 card major, with what appeared to my rose-tinted specs as having resounding success, I naturally assumed that opening 1N with a 6 carfd major would multiply that success proportionately. Well, at least I had the right points and no singleton, so it probably does not qualify as a "gross distortion" worthy of a psych.

Partner Staymaned me, and I figured, the chances of his having 4 card support for my 6 card major is sufficiently remote that I might do better to suggest to the opponents that I had at most 3 of them than to show partner that I had at least 4 of them (in those days, and indeed since, I have not had the inclination to show a 5th card systemically in response to Stayman).

So I rebid 2D in response to Stayman (yup, that was a psych alright) and partner put me into 3N.

Holding a small doubleton in my 6 card suit, and hoping to find partner's length, they then led my 6 card major. With QJxxxx in hand opposite Axxx in dummy, I thought it unlikely that he had led from Kx(x) so hopped up and felled the offside Kingleton for all of the Matchpoints.

Never tried it again. Guess I did not want to sully the memory of a perfect record.

Ah, happy days (and happy new year to all y'all)