[qwyz]

I was playing at a local club recently where I was informed that 'nobody' makes deliberate reverse bids anymore. When playing SAYC with no partnership agreements, the bidding sequence of 1D-1S:2H--- could be from a bare minimum opening type of hand and is no longer restricted to the stronger, reverse bid type of hand. It was further stated that it is now being taught by cruise ship bridge instructors and others at regional and national events that reverse bids are obsolete. The 'new' approach is that any new suit by Opener is forcing upon Responder who must bid again regardless if it appears as if coming from a minimum or a stronger - reverse bid type of hand as the Opener's rebid no longer suggests the strength of the hand.
As I was not aware of this 'trend', I am wondering if this is commom practice elsewhere. If the current trend is reverse bids are obsolete, does one need to alert the bid so that others at the table are aware that it is no longer considered to be a reverse bid and then no longer reflects the strength of the Opener's hand.
Comments appreciated

[RunemPard]

Constructive bidding went out of style in the late 90s to early 00s anyways...just bid game immediately and hope will have to do.

And...no...reverses are still played...at least by anyone who cares if they can consistently play above 40% I guess. As for teachers never introducing reverses...I feel this is just plain wrong. The idea of teaching bidding is to let the players know that the bidding is to be constructive...every bid should say something to partner so that they can choose a safe level and contract. Playing 1D-1S-2H as any values is just wrong.

Here in Sweden the lower level players typically do not play reverses...this is mainly because the wrong people/books are teaching players here. It kinda sucks...

Edit: Lots of edits...whatever

[glen]

When playing SAYC with no partnership agreements on a cruise ship, the 'trend' is anything goes. At regional and national events serious bridge is usually played, with serious bids, like reverses.

[blackshoe]

I suspect the "nobody makes deliberate reverse bids any more' comment was made by someone who does not know how to bid trying to justify his poor bidding.

[Phil]

Fun to participate in the forums where I get to hear about all the new and exciting trends in bidding!

[barmar]

The question about alerting is a good one.

ACBL's Alert Procedures don't mention reverse bids explicitly. They generally fall under this general rule:

Quote

Natural bids that convey an unexpected meaning must be Alerted. This includes strong bids that sound weak, weak bids that sound strong, ...

So this requires you to compare your agreement with how the bid "sounds". If it were actually true that "nobody plays deliberate reverse bids any more", then it wouldn't sound strong, so you wouldn't have to alert it.

EBU's Orange Book also doesn't mention reverse bids. It has this general principle (5B9):

Quote

General bridge inferences, like those a new partner could make when there had been no discussion beforehand, are not alertable, ...

So if most players starts bidding like this you could expect a new partner to play that way without discussion, and you wouldn't have to alert it.

But the player who told you that reverse bids without extra strength are normal is wrong. There may be a large number of players who bid like that, but that's because lots of players don't know how to bid or play well. The extra strength needed for a reverse in natural bidding is not a "convention", it's just a natural result of bridge logic. Unless you pass the reverse, you're almost forced to bid 2NT or take preference on the 3 level, both of which require the partnership to have more than minimum values for their initial bids (about a King more). And if both opener and responder could have minimum values, there's no way to know whether one of them DOES have extra; you're already on the 3 level, so there's no room to make game tries.

[Lord Molyb]

Reversing is fun though!

[TylerE]

Would play against this for money at any stakes.

[Vampyr]

I know of a pair who "pre-alert" (unofficially, since there are no pre-alerts in the EBU) that their reverses do not necessarily promise extra values. I have not played against them enough to know whether they actually alert the reverses; in any case I would, though the regulations are vague, alert such a bid in the ACBL or EBU. But as has been mentioned before, cruise ships are a different manner -- people want to play after a few hours' instruction rather than take lessons the whole cruise, so the bidding methods would necessarily be extremely rudimentary.

[mgoetze]

qwyz, on 2013-January-09, 18:21, said:

I was playing at a local club recently where I was informed that 'nobody' makes deliberate reverse bids anymore. When playing SAYC with no partnership agreements, the bidding sequence of 1D-1S:2H--- could be from a bare minimum opening type of hand and is no longer restricted to the stronger, reverse bid type of hand. It was further stated that it is now being taught by cruise ship bridge instructors and others at regional and national events that reverse bids are obsolete.

There are obviously some misunderstandings here. First of all, "reverse bid" is not the name of a convention. It is simply the technical name for what you are doing when you rebid at the 2-level in a higher suit than the one you opened in. Some examples:

1♥-1NT-2♦: This is not a reverse
1♦-1NT-2♥: This is a reverse
1♥-1NT-3♦: This is not a reverse, it's a jump shift.

Now, what is so special about the reverse bid? Well, let's see what happens when responder shows preference for opener's first suit:

1♥-1NT-2♦-2♥: Everything is wonderful
1♦-1NT-2♥-3♦: Oops, we're at the 3-level

This simple bit of bridge logic is the primary reason why reverse bids require extra strength. It's not just something people thought up as a fancy convention. If you bid 1♦-1NT-2♥ on 12 HCP, you will get into a lot of trouble. There are also a lot of other reasons why this would be a bad idea (notably, you will have a lot of trouble bidding the hands which do have extra strength properly).

Quote

The 'new' approach is that any new suit by Opener is forcing upon Responder who must bid again regardless if it appears as if coming from a minimum or a stronger - reverse bid type of hand as the Opener's rebid no longer suggests the strength of the hand.

"New suits forcing" was surely one of the great inventions of the early 20th century. Having e.g. 1♥-1♠ be forcing laid the foundation for modern bidding systems. Extending this to bids such as 1♥-1♠-1NT-2♣ did wonders for bidding accuracy.

That said, the concept has been known for a long time, yet no serious player plays 1♥-1NT-2♦ (in the context of a natural system) as forcing. Why not? Well, because you could very well be in the highest makeable contract already! If opener has 12 HCP and responder has 6 HCP, being at the 2 level is plenty high already. And if you have a 5-1 heart fit and a 4-4 diamond fit, do you really want to be forced to play in hearts?

Quote

As I was not aware of this 'trend', I am wondering if this is commom practice elsewhere.

This is not common practice anywhere. You have been thoroughly misinformed.

[Bbradley62]

mgoetze, on 2013-January-09, 22:50, said:

qwyz, on 2013-January-09, 18:21, said:

I am wondering if this is commom practice elsewhere.

This is not common practice anywhere.

It certainly appears that it might be common practice in at least one small corner of Canada. Maybe, this "is not common practice among good players anywhere."

[32519]

I’ve seen a few players adopting this style of bidding. The idea is to “bid out your shape,” as well as “any change of suit is forcing for 1 round.” In the auction you posted 1♦-1♠-2♥, typically these players would be showing 5X♦ and 4X♥. Partner has already bypassed the ♥ suit, so with 4X♦ and 4X♥ and a minimum opening, little would be gained in bidding 2♥ now. The hand would be too balanced. Instead 1NT would typically be the second bid by opener. Over the auction posted partner is now better placed as to where the contract belongs. Probably 2NT or 3♦ when responder holds a minimum. With a bigger hand and 4X♦ and 4X♥, the auction 1♦-1♠-2♥ still meets the requirements of a reverse bid.

[the hog]

qwyz, on 2013-January-09, 18:21, said:

I was playing at a local club recently where I was informed that 'nobody' makes deliberate reverse bids anymore. When playing SAYC with no partnership agreements, the bidding sequence of 1D-1S:2H--- could be from a bare minimum opening type of hand and is no longer restricted to the stronger, reverse bid type of hand. It was further stated that it is now being taught by cruise ship bridge instructors and others at regional and national events that reverse bids are obsolete. The 'new' approach is that any new suit by Opener is forcing upon Responder who must bid again regardless if it appears as if coming from a minimum or a stronger - reverse bid type of hand as the Opener's rebid no longer suggests the strength of the hand.
As I was not aware of this 'trend', I am wondering if this is commom practice elsewhere. If the current trend is reverse bids are obsolete, does one need to alert the bid so that others at the table are aware that it is no longer considered to be a reverse bid and then no longer reflects the strength of the Opener's hand.
Comments appreciated

Comments? LOL. I don't now who informed you but they do not know what they are talking about.

[RMB1]

We understand that Andrew Robson (London, England) teaches his beginners that they do not need extras to reverse. (If they get too high, they get too high.)

[PeterAlan]

Vampyr, on 2013-January-09, 21:27, said:

I know of a pair who "pre-alert" (unofficially, since there are no pre-alerts in the EBU) that their reverses do not necessarily promise extra values. I have not played against them enough to know whether they actually alert the reverses; in any case I would, though the regulations are vague, alert such a bid in the ACBL or EBU.

Quite possibly me and my partner, Stephanie. I know that pre-alerts are not official EBU process, but exchanging information on basic system is, and it's always seemed simplest and most effective to sit down at the start of a 2-board round and say "Benji, weak NT, 4-card majors throughout, and please don't assume we have extra values if we happen to reverse". It's also in the "Other Aspects of System Which Opponents Should Note" section on the front of our EBU20B card - we're more scrupulous than most in having a clear, well-formatted, printed card. Having told opponents at the start of the round, we don't subsequently alert such bids if they then arise.

As it happens, the EBU alert requirements are in the process of being clarified (insofar as draft minutes of the L&E Committee can be regarded as public clarification):

Draft Minutes of EBU Laws & Ethics Committee Meeting 19 September 2012 said:

5.8 Alerting a non-strong reverse
The secretary asked whether a sequence such as 1♦ - 1♠ - 2♥, where the 2♥ was bid to show a 5-4 hand in diamonds and hearts but only on a minimum opening hand, was alertable. It was agreed that it was not, although players should be encouraged to disclose that their method was unusual (although it was recognised that many may not know, if that is how they have been taught).

My regular partner and I deliberately chose to play that way when we took up the game a few years ago, mainly because it allowed rather more simplicity and clarity to our bidding structure at a time when we were new to the duplicate game (we'd played enough rubber bridge, albeit of the kitchen sort, and read enough, to know what we were doing in eschewing standard reverses). We don't treat opener's change of suit as unconditionally forcing for one round, however, and we're not totally stupid about it - we pass a lot of 1NT responses rather than bid a second suit. We recognise that it's sub-optimal, but a few years in it's still not our top priority to tackle this aspect of our game. We play 90%+ of our bridge with each other, and our higher priorities have been ensuring that we're both developing other basic skills like counting the hand, signalling effectively, planning the right defence, choosing good opening leads, etc.

In practice, it still seems to us that it's still not the weakest area of our game ( !). Yes, it's sometimes awkward that you're not sure of partner's high-card strength, but there are significant compensations in the clarity about shape. In particular, we know that the immediate re-bid of opener's suit always shows 6 cards, and this has left us able to bid a lot of 6-2 fits with confidence; the extra clarity about shape is also helpful when you're weighing up slam possibilities. The occasions when you get too high are often ones where you're -50/100 against 110 the other way, and you quite often pick up +120 for 2NT when 110 and not 130 / 140 proves to be the limit of the hand in a suit.

[WellSpyder]

PeterAlan, on 2013-January-10, 05:06, said:

Quite possibly me and my partner

Yes, I thought of you and your partner when I read Stephanie's post. I find your approach of pre-alerting extremely helpful, and haven't found it a problem at all when playing against you that the reverses themselves aren't alerted. (If playing such an approach myself I would certainly be tempted to alerted it if for any reason I hadn't had the opportunity to let oppo know in advance, but the pre-alert is clearly more helpful since there are negative inferences, too.)

Like others who have commented in this thread I'm extremely sceptical of the merits of your approach, but I don't recall yet seeing it land you in difficulties. I'm always hopeful that it will next time, though....

[mgoetze]

PeterAlan, on 2013-January-10, 05:06, said:

It's also in the "Other Aspects of System Which Opponents Should Note" section on the front of our EBU20B card

Which, according to my 3 days of EBU experience, is one of the most-ignored parts of it.

[Trinidad]

RMB1, on 2013-January-10, 04:48, said:

We understand that Andrew Robson (London, England) teaches his beginners that they do not need extras to reverse. (If they get too high, they get too high.)

It seems entirely sensible to not say anything about reverses and strength requirements to absolute beginners. Let them (mis)bid the hands and get on with the play. First teach them to show their distribution, locate a fit, etc.

The next step will be to teach them that you need to decide at some point when you stop showing your suits (because otherwise you will get too high).

Once people understand that, you can easily teach them about reverses by pointing out that they will get you higher and that you, therefore, need extra strength to make a reverse bid.

Rik

[PeterAlan]

WellSpyder, on 2013-January-10, 05:16, said:

Like others who have commented in this thread I'm extremely sceptical of the merits of your approach, but I don't recall yet seeing it land you in difficulties. I'm always hopeful that it will next time, though....

I'm sceptical of the merits of our approach, but I don't regard it as our biggest problem ! I'd start with learning how better to avoid most of the frequent obvious mistakes that we continue to make. In the auction, we could usefully spend time on ensuring that we're always in agreement about some quite straightforward sequences (eg whether a bid is stopper-asking or not in such-and-such a category of sequence - as you'll remember!) We recognise that we have a lot of areas of our game that we need to improve substantially, but for a whole range of reasons we don't spend the time we should analysing / practising / studying rather than playing, and we have to prioritise. This detail of our system isn't a high priority, but I don't pretend that it's the best way to play.

[P_Marlowe]

My guess is, that this is due to a mixup, there is a childrens
game in Germany called "Stille Post" (the english call it
"chinese whispers" / "telephone" ... asuming leo.org is correct,
it is quite funny, what comes out after 3-4 stations.

Two sequences

#1 responder made a 1/1 response

1C - 1H
2D

#2 responder made a 2/1 response

1H - 2C
2S

It is quite common to play, that a reverse after a 2/1 response does not show add.
strength, but even, those who play this agreement, would require add. strength, if
responder made simply a 1/1 response.

Forgetting to add the caveat, ... relevant after a 1/1 response / 2/1 response, takes
additional words.

With kind regards
Marlowe