[microcap]

It's been a while for you fans of TMORAJ-- hope you haven't suffered withdrawal symptoms!

Rex and I had a typically loud disagreement over the following hand. As usual, it is a multi-part question!


Playing one of those pesky 6 board team matches where any one screwup is deadly:

Partner opens 1♦, which promises 4 cards AND denies a balanced minimum. So he has either 17+ balanced, 6+ diamonds any strength, or 5 diamonds in an unbalanced hand any strength. RHO overcalls 1♥ and you are up.

You hold this hard show collection.

---

1♠ promises 5 cards. Is this your call or something else?

1♠ isn't the worst call you'll ever make, so let's assume that's what you bid. Now, LHO raises to 2♥, pass, pass
back to you.

Now what do you do? a)go quietly b) dbl c) bid 3♣, or d) whatever? The critical question: if you bid 3♣, what are you promising partner?

Regards and thanks to all for commenting.

[mike777]

2nt/good/bad

2nt forces 3c and then I pass.

direct 3c shows much more.


I assumed we play support x so pard denies 3s.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

If I play 2C as forcing, I prefer 2C over 1S, but 1S is ok.
The answer to your 2nd question - I am bidding 3C.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[BunnyGo]

I agree with the two previous posters. If you are playing good/bad 2NT then 2NT is a good bid. Otherwise I bid 3C.

[mfa1010]

I would balance 3♣. I don't play good-bad (and don't want to), but I do have a firm agreement with partner that all responder's balances in new suits are nonforcing. Even reverses or at the three-level.

[whereagles]

like the bunny man

[Onedown]

Did anyone consider a negative double? We have the shape, and it may find a spade fit or club fit. If it does go 2♥, then pass by partner, I will bid a quiet 2♠.
If I had a better hand partner should know I would bid an immediate spade with 5+ spades. Partner also knows I have ♣ with my negative double and then free 2♠.

[microcap]

Onedown, on 2011-July-03, 14:34, said:

Did anyone consider a negative double? We have the shape, and it may find a spade fit or club fit. If it does go 2♥, then pass by partner, I will bid a quiet 2♠.
If I had a better hand partner should know I would bid an immediate spade with 5+ spades. Partner also knows I have ♣ with my negative double and then free 2♠.

Yes, double was considered. As noted, there are alternatives to 1♠ that are reasonable for sure, including double. But as mentioned, 1♠ is certainly not crazy and was the call at the table. The trouble comes later LOL

[MrAce]

What Mfa said sounds good to me.

[microcap]

Part 2 and the denouement:

So at the table, the bid was in fact 3♣. LHO passes, now opener bids 3♦, showing at least 6 now. RHO comes back with 3♥, your hand passes gratefully.

But when the bid comes back to opener, he bids 3♠. RHO passes, and now responder decided opener has found a 3rd spade or has some compelling reason to keep going, so 4♠ was bid. Luckily undoubled, it was still an awful mess as opener held:

---

Down 2 and could have been worse as trumps were 4-2 and defense dropped a trick.

As some of you have pointed out, the confusion was caused by the nature of the 3♣ bid. Opener felt it was game forcing and as such he couldn't drop the bidding at 3♥. Responder felt it was just F1 and being competitive and that opener should have respected his pass over 3♥.

Comments?

[the hog]

I play 3c as gf. I agree with Mike's comments regarding good/bad.

[nige1]

Difficult decisions apart from passing 3♠

[han]

Agree that 3C should be NF.

I would start with 2C. Not only do I like bidding my longest suit first, I'd also be much better placed if the opponents bid 2H, 3H or 4H. Actually, maybe I'm better placed because I bid my longest suit first...

[microcap]

thank you all for the excellent responses. As Rex thought 3♣ was game forcing, he felt he had to bid over 3♥. I said he should respect my pass over 3♥ as we have a clear misfit and he has a really bad hand as this auction has proceeded. Even if you add a king to my hand, no game has much chance. My 4♠ bid was wrong, but again, I couldn't figure out why Rex had bid over 3♥ and thought he must have a fitting club honor that might allow me to sneak the vulnerable game through.

Rex will want to play good/bad 2NT as he loves any convention. I will veto it as I hate too many conventions and will never remember it. We will argue about it, and Rex will sulk. It's what we do best!

[han]

He thinks you have a GF hand with spades and clubs, and he has neither. Why didn't he double 3H?

[WrecksVee]

han, on 2011-July-04, 07:01, said:

He thinks you have a GF hand with spades and clubs, and he has neither. Why didn't he double 3H?

The heart of this thread was to determine whether 3♣ was forcing. Everyone who has mentioned that good bad 2NT is needed IMO acknowledges that without further agreement that 3♣is forcing. Since partner has forced twice it is hard to take pass as NF.

More importantly I did not double 3♥because the 3♣ denied interest in defending. We are playing support doubles and I had passed possibly concealing penalty double of 2♥. Partner then denied wanting to defend and forced with 3♣. I showed my ♦ length as it was the cheapest descriptive bid and waited for him to tell me why he forced. While he may have both black suits he could also have a ♠ one suited GF.

The crux is now that having heard two forcing calls I am supposed to assume the pass of 3♥ is now a sign of weakness. What I heard was a request to double if I had the possible penalty double. Surely I should not have less to double. I figured he might have 6♠ that were weak so I tried 3♠ to show my good two card support.

Jay will never agree to play good bad 2NT. So we need to handle this without such an agreement. I think on style/agreement is to fall back on "traditional' natural bidding, whatever that may be. So IMO Jay over bid his hand with 3♣ and then expected me in this case to ignore what I was shown. I hold that you can not blow hot and cold and need to consider what minimum you have promised. So if you do overbid you can not expect partner to be able to figure it out.

For our partnership I think the best suggestion I saw above was to make a negative double with Jay's hand. That gives a good chance of being able to show the weak distributional hand that was held without forcing.

[gnasher]

WrecksVee, on 2011-July-07, 10:28, said:

Everyone who has mentioned that good bad 2NT is needed IMO acknowledges that without further agreement that 3♣is forcing.

Saying that Good-Bad 2NT is needed implies only that you need two ways to bid 3♣. It doesn't tell us which meaning takes priority if you have only one way to bid 3♣.

[microcap]

WrecksVee, on 2011-July-07, 10:28, said:

The heart of this thread was to determine whether 3♣ was forcing. Everyone who has mentioned that good bad 2NT is needed IMO acknowledges that without further agreement that 3♣is forcing. Since partner has forced twice it is hard to take pass as NF.

More importantly I did not double 3♥because the 3♣ denied interest in defending. We are playing support doubles and I had passed possibly concealing penalty double of 2♥. Partner then denied wanting to defend and forced with 3♣. I showed my ♦ length as it was the cheapest descriptive bid and waited for him to tell me why he forced. While he may have both black suits he could also have a ♠ one suited GF.

The crux is now that having heard two forcing calls I am supposed to assume the pass of 3♥ is now a sign of weakness. What I heard was a request to double if I had the possible penalty double. Surely I should not have less to double. I figured he might have 6♠ that were weak so I tried 3♠ to show my good two card support.

Jay will never agree to play good bad 2NT. So we need to handle this without such an agreement. I think on style/agreement is to fall back on "traditional' natural bidding, whatever that may be. So IMO Jay over bid his hand with 3♣ and then expected me in this case to ignore what I was shown. I hold that you can not blow hot and cold and need to consider what minimum you have promised. So if you do overbid you can not expect partner to be able to figure it out.

For our partnership I think the best suggestion I saw above was to make a negative double with Jay's hand. That gives a good chance of being able to show the weak distributional hand that was held without forcing.

Actually, I think Rex has misstated his own position during the original argument. The issue isn't whether 3♣ is forcing, the issue is whether it's GAME forcing or just for one round. Rex felt at the table that is was a game force. I didn't, and still don't. So I had no complaint with his 3♦ bid, but I clearly think he should pass at IMP's over 3♥.

[Free]

mike777, on 2011-July-03, 12:21, said:

2nt/good/bad

2nt forces 3c and then I pass.

direct 3c shows much more.

I assumed we play support x so pard denies 3s.

Playing good/bad, isn't it the point that you can bid 3♣ on an intermediate hand while you go through 2NT with weak or GF hands?

[olien]

I don't really see what the problem with choosing to GF on this hand is. I imagine that most people would open this hand. We are 6-5 with 5 losers and partner opened. I would've bid 2♣ the first time and bid a requisite number of ♠ later on. I think saying that one should bid Good/Bad 2NT and then pass 3♣ is resulting. Imagine partner with something like: x xxx Axxxx AKxx. Now 6♣ is excellent and that's opposite a very minimum hand.