[AL78]

Picked this hand up in fourth seat recently at MPs, no vuln:

♠-
♥AKT9865
♦T
♣AJ863

LHO opens 1♠, partner bids 2NT (unusual), RHO bids 3♠. What do you do now?

[DavidKok]

Interesting hand, I would love to know your agreements regarding the strength of 2NT and RHO's 3♠. But I think most of this can be answered without consulting those.

The opponents seem to have a 10- or 11-card spade fit, possibly even longer. Yet they're only at 3♠. It sounds like LHO has got extra shape. They are definitely bidding 4♠, and probably also bidding 5♠ over our potential 4♥, 5♣ or 5♥ contracts. So the questions are: do we think 6♣ is making, do we think 6♠ is making, and do we need to consult partner?

With two heart tricks that are likely to cash and the minors covered by partner I don't think 5♠ is making. 6♣ looks very good on just the auction thus far - partner's most likely shapes are 3=0=5=5 and 2=1=5=5, and in either case we can draw trumps, try to ruff out the hearts and enter our hand with a late club (or ruff). In fact, if partner has ♠xx, ♥x, ♦Axxxx, ♣Kxxxx 7♣ looks favourite to make, and that's probably a sub-minimum.
So I think we should push to 6♣ at least, and investigate a possible 7♣ along the way. It is possible partner has got something like ♠Kxx, ♥-, ♦KQxxx, ♣QTxxx where even 6 is bad, but I am not sure how to investigate that at a safe level. Since our plan over their 5♠ is now reasonably solid we can afford to take it slow - which bid would be positive with clubs in your system? I have 4♥ 'positive with clubs' here, and I intend to bid on next round to get the message across.
Maybe 5♠ immediately would be better. That wouldn't happen to be double barrel exclusion RKC, now would it?

[mikeh]

I’d be very surprised if AL’s partner would ever work out what’s going on if we tried to bid this ‘scientifically’. Indeed, I think few players outside of WC partnerships would have any agreements that would help. You need to have played a lot of bridge in a good partnership to have even discussed this sort of situation.

So I think efforts to reach grand are a waste of time…I bid 6C. I doubt that opener has the sort of hand on which a nobody vul sac looks like a good idea. He probably has some diamond cards that won’t look good to him and his hearts rate to look bad as well.

[AL78]

Sorry I got the vulnerability wrong, it was NS vuln.

Mikeh has pretty much nailed it, we don't have agreements in this situation and I decided 6♣ must have excellent play opposite the kind of hands I would bid 2NT with, and maybe the grand is on but I am most unlikely to be able to find that out, so I bid 6♣. My LHO bid 6♠ which was passed out.

Partner led the ♣K and it didn't take much thought for me to overtake and cash a heart (the queen coming down from LHO), one down. Dummy had something like ♦AJxxx, three small hearts, four spades, singleton club. Unfortunately the hands were manually dealt so I don't have the deal to hand. Partner had (I think) ♠x ♥Jx ♦9xxxx ♣KQxxx. 6♣ is unbeatable so technically they found a good sacrifice but we still got a top as at the other two tables they played in 5♠ making 12 or 13 tricks.

[mikeh]

AL78, on 2022-December-07, 13:12, said:

Sorry I got the vulnerability wrong, it was NS vuln.

Mikeh has pretty much nailed it, we don't have agreements in this situation and I decided 6♣ must have excellent play opposite the kind of hands I would bid 2NT with, and maybe the grand is on but I am most unlikely to be able to find that out, so I bid 6♣. My LHO bid 6♠ which was passed out.

Partner led the ♣K and it didn't take much thought for me to overtake and cash a heart (the queen coming down from LHO), one down. Dummy had something like ♦AJxxx, three small hearts, four spades, singleton club. Unfortunately the hands were manually dealt so I don't have the deal to hand. Partner had (I think) ♠x ♥Jx ♦9xxxx ♣KQxxx. 6♣ is unbeatable so technically they found a good sacrifice but we still got a top as at the other two tables they played in 5♠ making 12 or 13 tricks.

I would always double 6S

Btw, the reason you gotta top was,I suspect, because your vulnerable partner deserved to be shot (metaphorically speaking) for that hideous 2N bid

[LBengtsson]

mikeh, on 2022-December-07, 11:17, said:

So I think efforts to reach grand are a waste of time…I bid 6C.

My first thought also. Without scientific methods, it is always a good idea to bid what you think you can make. 6♣ looks reasonable on the cards you hold. It is so difficult to find or know whether a grand slam is on in a competitive auction.

[DavidKok]

I think there is a second way to win with a scientific constructive club raise, i.e. that we involve partner in case they bid 6♠. Over a direct jump partner is in the dark whether to bid one more with a good hand, double, or pass.
In this situation we should always double 6♠, so the direct 6♣ saves a lot of headaches. I just really hate jumping when I think it is our hand, and I think having agreements about the followups to an unusual 2NT are not at all WC level (my agreements are rules for competitive auctions where either we or the opponents have shown a 2-suited hand).

[akwoo]

mikeh, on 2022-December-07, 13:51, said:

I would always double 6S

In fact, partner should have doubled 6S, because their pass should be forcing and suggest 7C isn't hopeless.

(But if your partner doesn't understand the high-level forcing pass, then the safe thing is to double rather than bid. You should never pass.)

[DavidKok]

Your partner has no way of knowing that you bid 6♣ to make, not to save. This is not a forcing pass situation.

[AL78]

I did consider doubling but decided to leave it, none of my partners know anything about forcing passes and I am not sure in most situations. I decided to bid what I think I can make and if they bid on, it will be a top if they go off and a bottom if they make whether I double or not as I judged our auction is not going to be repeated. Mikeh: I agree, I would not have bid 2NT on that hand (assuming I have the hand right, I know partner had very little in diamonds other than five of them) but at the clubs I play at, people frequently overcall on rubbish. On another hand I had a vulnerable 2♦ overcall against me with no honor cards for the sake of being a nuisance. You'd be surprised how difficult it is to punish properly when it is reckless.

[AL78]

DavidKok, on 2022-December-07, 15:11, said:

Your partner has no way of knowing that you bid 6♣ to make, not to save. This is not a forcing pass situation.

Out of interest, in a three and a half table field of mediocre standard, can it ever be right to save at the six level when they haven't bid game yet, bearing in mind what you think will happen at the other tables?

[peterb001]

The other option is an initial 5C underbid, which LHO is likely to overcall with 5S. When you later bid 6C, the opponents may think you are overstretching, and might pass or double rather than bid on to 6S. There is a small chance you will be left in 5C (but still a much better score than 6S down a couple). An initial bid of 6C is almost encouraging the opponents to bid on to 6S.

[LBengtsson]

peterb001, on 2022-December-07, 17:54, said:

The other option is an initial 5C underbid, which LHO is likely to overcall with 5S. When you later bid 6C, the opponents may think you are overstretching, and might pass or double rather than bid on to 6S. There is a small chance you will be left in 5C (but still a much better score than 6S down a couple). An initial bid of 6C is almost encouraging the opponents to bid on to 6S.

About a year ago, I was watching online a international standard tournament, and if I remember it had one of England's best players - I knew the name as he had played in some of the best American tournaments. He did just that on one board, deliberately underbid in a competitive auction instead of going straight to slam which made easily. I think the grand slam made on the cards also, not just a small slam. And the opponents passed instead of competing so his partner was left at just game level.

Ok, the cards were different, the bidding was different, the hand was different, the vulnerability probably different also, but it was a deceit that did not work out well. I liked the strategy but it came loose in the mix. The problem, I guess, is that good opponents will work out what you are doing when you bid once at game level, and then bid again to slam.

[DavidKok]

AL78, on 2022-December-07, 17:04, said:

Out of interest, in a three and a half table field of mediocre standard, can it ever be right to save at the six level when they haven't bid game yet, bearing in mind what you think will happen at the other tables?

Personally I would be much more concerned with improving your bridge in general than with scoring well in this field in particular. The two are obviously correlated, but when opponents (and maybe partner) take nonsensical action the former is still live while the latter is near random. I do think it makes sense to preemptively sacrifice at a high level, though the situation is rare. Conversely I also think it is very rare that the best course of action is to jump to a slam to make - as expressed before I hate jumping with strong hands. It is not at all clear to me which has higher frequency, so conditional on partner jumping to slam I am not sure what I should expect.

peterb001, on 2022-December-07, 17:54, said:

The other option is an initial 5C underbid, which LHO is likely to overcall with 5S. When you later bid 6C, the opponents may think you are overstretching, and might pass or double rather than bid on to 6S. There is a small chance you will be left in 5C (but still a much better score than 6S down a couple). An initial bid of 6C is almost encouraging the opponents to bid on to 6S.

Walking the dog is cute but personally I don't think it scores very well. There was one competitive auction, I think it was 1♠-(4♦)-? where I was looking at a 4=7=0=2 with a bunch of aces and kings and I decided I just had to show my heart suit while trying for a spade slam, and I had no good bid available (5♥ was undiscussed, though I think it should be a fitbid for spades). So I bid a NF 4♥, praying the opponents would bid 5♦, and when they did I followed up with 6♦ showing spades (we did have 5NT pick-a-slam). I think that's the worst I've done in terms of walking the dog.

[pescetom]

DavidKok, on 2022-December-08, 05:58, said:

Walking the dog is cute but personally I don't think it scores very well. There was one competitive auction, I think it was 1♠-(4♦)-? where I was looking at a 4=7=0=2 with a bunch of aces and kings and I decided I just had to show my heart suit while trying for a spade slam, and I had no good bid available (5♥ was undiscussed, though I think it should be a fitbid for spades). So I bid a NF 4♥, praying the opponents would bid 5♦, and when they did I followed up with 6♦ showing spades (we did have 5NT pick-a-slam). I think that's the worst I've done in terms of walking the dog.

I pushed things a bit in a recent national tournament, opening a natural weak 2D in first at favourable vulnerability with a semi-solid suit in a 3172. Partner bid a competitive 3D over their 2H and I bid 5D over their 4H: double.
Making the contract was child's play, but in elation I ruffed low for no good reason and went 1 down
From a dubious top to a well deserved bottom.

[Cyberyeti]

Biggest kinda dogwalk I ever had was void, Ax, x, AKQxxxxxxx I passed, heard 4♠-P-P so judged the remaining hands were of about equal strength and the spades were on my left, so partner was likely to have 1 useful card and bid 6♣. Partner had ♥K, made on the nose, doubled at the other table, don't know the auction.