[david_c]

IMPs, none vul, you hold as dealer:

♠ AKQ74
♥ 82
♦ AKT965
♣ -

You open 1♦, which promises 4 cards and is limited to about 18HCP.
LHO (a real expert) overcalls 2♣, which is passed back to you.
You bid 3♠. (OK?)
LHO asks whether 3♠ promises a 6-5 hand (it does), and bids 3NT. This is passed back around to you.
What do you do now?

[pclayton]

Lets start with a double.

3♠ is a reasonable description, although for all pard knows, you have some freak 5-7 hand without a lot of defense (KQJxx, x, KQxxxxx, void).

We are setting 3N even if pard has a missfitting yarb - and I'd like to let pard in on that fact. Its very possible that pard has a club stack and if pard sits, we will crush 3N.

[mikeh]

I suspect that LHO has secondary ♥ and intended 3N as takeout but that his partner was on a different wavelength.

I also expect that partner is broke and should lack 4♠. If so, then doubling turns our small to modest plus into a loss. We are not likely to beat 4♣ when partner cannot double 3N. I doubt they can reach 4♥ anymore, if that is what was going on, and the chances are good they won't reach 5♣ even if that is cold either. But I don't like our chances in 4♠ if the hand is the way I think it is.

I am going to take the bird in the hand with my pass.

I would do this even if I distrusted partner: I am not going to make a dubious bid that depends, for its success, on partner having screwed up. If he has 4 ♠, he should have bid game last time: my 3♠ bid had to mean something

I just read phil's post: partner does not have a ♣ stack, else he'd have hit 3N, and it is not partner who is running. LHO knows he is missing the ♦AK and ♠AKQ, even if his 3N was intended as an offer to play, which seems very, very unlikely. He needs 7 pointed cards to have stoppers and where the heck are the ♥ if that is the case?

[whereagles]

Pass? You have a 3-loser hand. There can easily be 10 tricks for both you and LHO.

[Fluffy]

I don't know if it is right or wrong, what I know is that I would double

[MickyB]

I should know the answer to this, but -

were you using screens, David?

[david_c]

MickyB, on Dec 20 2005, 02:23 PM, said:

were you using screens, David?

Yeah, LHO is your screenmate. This is relevant to MikeH's suggestion of what is going on - the 3NT bid was not alerted, and if you ask what it means you will get a shrug which says, "to play".

Anyway, if you decide to double, what do you intend to do if LHO pulls to 4♣ and this is passed round to you again?

[Kalvan14]

I would expect that LHO is fishing, hoping to be doubled in 4♣.
I agree that pard is broke, or almost broke, but Jxx in spades is almost enough for a game.
I double 3N, and bid 4♦ over 4♣

[pclayton]

Right.

I'm not content with 50 a trick in 3N; pard doesn't need much for a game. While I expect bad splits, there's nothing preventing pard from holding 3 spades and another card.

4♦ seems fine right now.

[mikeh]

I am still undecided, despite the tone of my previous post. All I can be certain of is that LHO does not have his bid. What I don't know is whether he has made an outright psyche. My concern that he intended it as round suits is assuaged by his being my screenmate. At least I hope that I can trust his explanation

I still pass, but even more reluctantly now that I have that explanation.

This is a crap shoot. The reward for bidding, when right, is big. The cost of bidding when wrong is probably not huge, but might be on a really bad day.

But when is bidding right?

We need partner to have 3+♠ and, if he holds 3♠, for the suit to break 3-2: else we are tapped at trick one. It is unlikely that we can counter the tap by throwing our ♥ losers, because they then rate to tap us in ♥.

Of course, he may have enough in ♦ that we can use ♦ as our own tap suit so it gets more and more complicated.

If he has 4♠, he HAD to bid 4♠ unless he has ♣ stopped, in which case he HAD to double. He could not pass 3N with 4♠ because, even if 4♠ failed, it had to be the percentage action lest 3N make.

He cannot have 4 ♦ for similar reasons.

So we are aiming at a very narrow target: precisely 3♠ and 2-3♦ and a good trump break or enough of a ♦ fit that we can use that suit as a surrogate trump suit, tapping the would-be tapper.

I still, reluctantly, think that the chances of hitting that target via a bid are insufficient reason to forgo the small plus on offer.

I am far more interested in this full hand than I am by most weird sequences. Most weird auctions involve an elementary mistake by someone (usually partner) and as such are of comic interest only. This may turn out to be the case (if partner has 4 in either of my suits, then it is going to be boring) but I suspect this is otherwise, even tho I cannot construct a sensible hand for LHO. I would bid if vulnerable (starting with double in case they sit: if they sit and do not go for a number, we probably would not make game).

[Kalvan14]

I'd like to see the full hand too. and to know how it went in RL

Reemember that my bidding decisions are predicated on LHO being a good player

[Gerben42]

I double now. If partner is on the Misfit United team, we'll get richer from 3Nx than from playing ourselves. With 5 top tricks we can be sure they won't make it

[david_c]

Well, I decided to pass it out in 3NT, thereby achieving the unusual score of +350:

Scoring: IMP

---

I was worried that double would effectively commit us to playing in 4♠ or 5♦. But maybe I worry too much! We lost 4 IMPs on the board.

[cherdano]

So the question is, should partner have doubled? I think yes.

Arend

[mikeh]

As I suspected: partner made a foolish call. After your 3♠, showing a powerful 5=6, how could any bridge player pass 3N? He KNEW than ♣ were not running and that he had (in context) a great defensive hand. He had an easy ♠ lead: he had ♥ locked up and sure ♣ stopper and you had, all by yourself, contracted for 9 or 10 tricks, depending on the degree of fit.


From his perspective, he had to either double or bid 4♠. I confess that I am not sure what I would have done, especially since I now know the hand and I do not believe that it is humanly possible in this type of situation to be objective. I do lean towards double, because the ♠ length is dubious and the ♦ stiff is a defensive plus against 4♣ and either neutral or negative in 4♠.

If he doubled, then probably your LHO runs to 4♣ and he is back to the same dilemma: double and collect a reasonable plus score or bid 4♠. Once again, I lean towards double, altho recognizing that knowing all the hands creates a bias.

If he bids 4♠ immediately or after a run, then you make your 480 (you are not misguessing ♥ on this auction). If he doubles, you have to sit for it, and you get at least 500.

Now, had partner held xxx KJxxx x xxxx, my criticism of your partner would be muted: double would be very questionable, and 4♠, while reasonable (as a save if 3N makes) is risky. But had I doubled 3N and heard them run, this hand would likely double for +300 and thus lose imps compared to the pass

[mr1303]

To be fair, David did not have to have as good a hand as he did to bid 3S there. We play a strong club system with strong hands with diamonds going through either 1C or a multi 2D.

And, for another matter, if I led the suit when declarer held a double stopper, the contract would still make despite the fact that the club suit was not coming in. I was much happier them playing a contract that I fully expected to go off, with very little expectation of making anything ourself if declarer did have stoppers in my partners suits as promised.

A final matter: my screen-mate said he didn't know what 3NT was either.

[Kalvan14]

Well, I agree that partner should have doubled 3N without any doubt, once the 6-5 in the pointed suit was shown.
And 3N can only be what it really was, fishing.

[dcvetkov]

Kalvan14, on Dec 21 2005, 07:09 PM, said:

Well, I agree that partner should have doubled 3N without any doubt, once the 6-5 in the pointed suit was shown.
And 3N can only be what it really was, fishing.

Agree with this 100%

Once you showed powerful 6-5, and with clubs not coming home, dbl is a must
He can do it with a jack or two less

Question is.. if they run to 4C and partner doubles again. Do you pass or remove?

[Kalvan14]

Now this is a tricky one: if pard Xs 3N, I have not yet shown my extras.
IMHO, my honors are pretty good in defense too, and pard is showing that he has values (and length) in the rounded suits: everything considered, pass is the best bid.