[eagles123]

---

I literally had no idea what to do here

Thanks,

Eagles

[gszes]

The answer will be dependent on other agreements:
If you are using support x your failure to use it over 2h gives you an easy 2s bid now. IMPs or MP.
If you were NOT using support x it is much more entertaining.
MP The 1 board disaster limit allows for much greater creativity so pass 3s 3n 4d all have some appeal. P will realize there is a strong chance you are minimum for your previous pass so their x will most likely not be on minimal values. This brings pass into the picture since we are not favorites to make 3n (our next best option). For the risk averse it is probably better in the long run to just bid 4d.

IMPS much more dangerous situation so pass seems too risky. Similar to MP but 3N now takes a bit more of a back seat to 4d since 4d is far less likely to start us on the road to disaster. Once opps start x 3n it might be all too easy to x 4d. If we bid 4d immediately there is far less of a chance the opps will x since (at least in theory) we could be quite distributional for a 4d bid not a balanced ughhhhhh. 4d also increases our sides chances of generating a large plus score if p has some extra values and we can play 5m (which p will hate trying if we bid 3n.

[P_Marlowe]

Pass.

Can this turn out badly? Sure, but it can also be profitable.

[Jinksy]

I would lead a ♥ and have opened a ♦.

[guinnypoo]

Here is my noob line of thinking.

Partner is almost certainly short in hearts or opp bidding makes no sense. If he has 6 spades he bids 3s instead of x, if he has 4 clubs he could consider 4c, it seems very likely he is 5-1-4-3 or 5-2-3-3 or 5-2-4-2. Or even like 5-0-5-3

Partner must be asking for a descriptive bid since we have 3 hearts.

I bid 4d it finishes describing our hand best imo

However I would have opened 1d and bid 3c after 2h. Can envision many p hands where he wants to compete here but its hard because he knows little about your hand. X could mean pass if you have a mess of hearts but I think we should play 4 or 5m.

[Cyberyeti]

What system are you playing ? Most open 1♦ on this (if not 1N).

What would X have been from you over 2♥.

[helene_t]

This was a blame transfer double so whatever you do you are doomed.

[mikeh]

I know that there are many players, I think primarily European, who open 1♣ with 4=4 minors, and I have never understood why. This hand-type is merely yet another entry in the list of reasons why it makes so little sense.

I am not saying we have a comfortable 4♣ call had we started 1♦ and the auction gone the same way, but I suspect we all see that bidding 4♦ here is a heck of a lot less comfortable than being able to bid 4♣ after a 1♦ opening.

As for what to do, if partner has his/her double, then we pass and it is more of an opening lead problem. I confess, I expect strong opps to make or go down no more than 1, but I have to respect partner's double, which invites me to pass with this sort of holding.

As for the lead....I have a horrible feeling that declarer has the majors, and LHO has some useful minor cards and spade ruffing values. But one is supposed to lead trump on these hands, so trump it is.

Of course, partner will now turn out to be 5=1=4=3 with about 10 hcp and 4D is down 1 into their 730. More to the point, had he held that hand, wild horses wouldn't make him double: he'd bid the routine 4♦.

Maybe next time we'll learn how to open.

[kchatz]

eagles123, on 2015-March-15, 09:11, said:

---

I literally had no idea what to do here

Thanks,

Eagles

I open 1d on 4-4 minor suit hands. Helps a lot here. I've seen the other hand. I think your partner should bid 3s

[inquiry]

Marshall Miles has suggested that in front of the heart suit, your partner should have two hearts for this double. I do not find that rule followed often, but so be it, I would pass the double and lead the spade Jack. This pass would be successful a higher percentage of the time if partner had two hearts and will almost never work if he is void.

Along with everyone else, I would open South's hand 1♦

[kuhchung]

eagles123, on 2015-March-15, 09:11, said:

I literally had no idea what to do here

Something intelligent!

[masonbarge]

eagles123, on 2015-March-15, 09:11, said:

---

I literally had no idea what to do here

Thanks,

Eagles

I hesitate to make a general statement. My partner and I protect each others' hands in these situations.

What are you certain that partner does not have? Hearts. His double is protecting you in case you have something in hearts and you judge that 3H doubled is the right contract. If North were short in spades and had something like KJ10x or K10xxx in hearts, I'd certainly pass the N hand even at IMPs. And personally, I'd probably pass with K10xx.

What are you certain that partner does have? Bid 3S. Again, I hesitate to make a general statement, but my partner will have words for me if I don't support spades with Jx in this situation.

[mikeh]

masonbarge, on 2015-March-16, 11:32, said:

I hesitate to make a general statement. My partner and I protect each others' hands in these situations.

What are you certain that partner does not have? Hearts. His double is protecting you in case you have something in hearts and you judge that 3H doubled is the right contract. If North were short in spades and had something like KJ10x or K10xxx in hearts, I'd certainly pass the N hand even at IMPs. And personally, I'd probably pass with K10xx.

What are you certain that partner does have? Bid 3S. Again, I hesitate to make a general statement, but my partner will have words for me if I don't support spades with Jx in this situation.

I suspect that you would have to play a lot of bridge to ever see opener with K10xxx in hearts! They'd need at least 6 clubs for that, not to mention that it is bad bridge to reopen with a double with a void, so you'd need the opps to have bid to the 3-level on a 7 card fit.

Indeed, I would suggest that the doubler is typically expecting partner to pass with any 3 card heart holding absent a reason not to do so. K10xx would be an entirely unexpected bonus.

The double has a lot of names in expert bridge, but I think the most useful description is that it asks opener to 'do something intelligent, partner', bearing in mind that passing with Jxx and no more than 2 spades would be one of the prototypical actions listed under the 'do something intelligent' part of the dictionary.

[jodepp]

If playing support doubles, this isn't too hard. Pard has invitational values and knows you don't have three spades (or three spades to an honor - some pairs only offer the double with Qxx or better). If you happen to have a strong spade doubleton (or xxx) you can show it with 3♠. Maybe partner will want to try the 5=2 fit in game. Lacking such a doubleton, I'd Pass on general LTT grounds.

It's similar if not playing support doubles. Whether or not playing 'maximal' doubles, pard's double simply sounds like 'I have a good hand and don't know what to do'. Again I would Pass on general LTT principles.

As an aside, I confess to smirking when a player says something like 'If you had opened 1♦ like you're supposed to, you wouldn't be in this pickle'. What to open with 4=4 in the minors has been debated at length over the years (see Kantar and Roth's discussion on the merits of both choices). Even if I had opened 1♦ it's hardly clear to bid 4♣ now (I think I'd still Pass).

[atlantajon]

eagles123, on 2015-March-15, 09:11, said:

---

I literally had no idea what to do here

Thanks,

Eagles

You did put yourself in a bad postion by not opening 1d... but you opened 1c....so you have already denied having 3 spades when you didnt raise...the 1s bid shows 5+...so now the best you can do is bid 3s...showing Jx..or something like that.

[gordontd]

atlantajon, on 2015-March-16, 13:21, said:

.the 1s bid shows 5+..

Where did you get that from?

[mikeh]

jodepp, on 2015-March-16, 13:01, said:

As an aside, I confess to smirking when a player says something like 'If you had opened 1♦ like you're supposed to, you wouldn't be in this pickle'. What to open with 4=4 in the minors has been debated at length over the years (see Kantar and Roth's discussion on the merits of both choices). Even if I had opened 1♦ it's hardly clear to bid 4♣ now (I think I'd still Pass).

Who are you smirking at? Seems most likely to be me, but that requires that you have limited comprehension skills, since when I criticized the opening bid, I was careful to note that had we opened 1♦, we'd still be in a difficult position.

As for what Roth and Kantar, and others, have written 40-50 years ago: I have news for you. Nobody plays the methods which formed the context of their discussion.

IIRC, one of the major arguments for the 1♣ school was that opening 1♣ allowed for a 1♦ response, and the partnership would find its minor suit fit regardless of which minor it was, while opening 1♦ would sometimes lead to never finding the club fit.

That era was remarkable for a number of factors that don't exist or aren't common anymore.

Back in the 1960s and early 1970s the requirements for overcalls were more stringent that now. I am not sure how many people here have access to old bridge records, but I have Bridge World magazines from the late 1930s until I cancelled my subscription a few years ago. World Championships and other high level tournaments featured far fewer competitive auctions back then than nowadays. The main weakness of opening 1♣ on 4-4 minors is that competition can create nightmare scenarios...even worse than the OP one. When uncontested auctions were the norm, that problem wasn't very big...and if the opps did compete, they had real values anyway.

The development of aggressive competition in bidding undercut what was the single most widely presented argument (back then) for the 1♣ choice: that it allowed for responder to bid diamonds, finding the fit at the 1-level, while opening 1♦ made it difficult to find the 4-4 club fit. Once opps started routinely overcalling on 5 card majors with 7-8 hcp, this argument lost a lot of steam (and the invention of the weak jump overcall happened a little earlier, but weak jump overcalls didn't become generally accepted until well into the 60's).

At the same time, almost everyone was a strict up-the-line bidder. Only in the mid to late 1960s did some radical players suggest that one should bypass the 1♦ response in order to show a 4 card major. There are still many players who would respond 1♦ with 4=4 in a major and diamonds, but this is hardly universal anymore, as it was when Kantar and Roth (and others) had their discussions. So even with an uncontested auction, responder will often bypass diamonds, negating the finding of the suit at the 1-level, which had been a main element of the 1♣ approach.


I tend to smirk when I find people advancing arguments based on appeals to authority rather than reasoning, and a fortiori when those appeals cite authorities out of context

[neilkaz]

Nice informative last post by mikeh in this thread. Unfortunately I am old enough to have experienced most of what he said

[dave_beer]

Partner's double can be one of two hand types depending on how you play it:

Action: Partner thinks we have the balance of power but has no obvious bid. That usually means he doesn't have either 4-card ♣ support or 5-card ♦ suit or 6-card ♠ suit. In those cases he can have a singleton ♥ if he is 5=1=4=3 but will usually have a doubleton.

If 3♠, 4♣ and ♦ are forcing then responder has to pass or overbid with invitational values. If they are not forcing then he has to either take a unilateral action (bid game) or make an ambiguous cue-bid and hope we muddle through.

In this case I pass and lead a trump

Takeout: This solves the problem you have if simple rebids by responder are not forcing. Responder can easily have a singleton ♥ and/or 4-card ♣ support. Opener has to show extra values relative to his pass over 2♥ or responder can pass his rebid.

In this case I bid 3♠.

[zillahandp]

Well open 1nt in acol, and problem may not have occurred but otherwise pass p hsa 11ish lead trumps at very opportunity of corse it may not work, at teams I might bid 3s depending on match score, if behind pass if infront bid. At pairs pass