[Trinidad]

han, on 2012-December-21, 05:43, said:

Trinidad, on 2012-December-21, 03:03, said:

And let's not forget that partner is better placed to decide this than I am.

If you typically have a solid 8-card suit when you bid 4S white against red then absolutely.

What does partner know about our hand? He knows we have a 7-8 card spade suit with a decent to great ODR. Admittedly, at these colors this can be wide ranging.

What do we know about partner? Well.. err... well ... he doesn't have 5♦ clearly beaten in his own hand, since he would have doubled. He probably doesn't have a hand that warrants a spade raise... 5♦ could be down on the lead of the ♠AK and an uppercut. Partner could have ♦KQJ and out or he could be broke. The best definition that we have is that, given that we have a 7-8 card spade suit with a decent to great ODR, he (for whatever reason) expects to get the best result if we allow them to play 5♦ undoubled.

No matter how wide ranging our 4♠ overcall can be, the range for partner's hand is much wider.

Rik

[ArtK78]

I would pass.

I can't double - the offensive potential of my hand is good enough for a double, but given that I have no clear defense at all I cannot risk partner passing with 1-2 defensive tricks.

My hand is worth a 5♠ call and I would do that if I knew that 5♠x would be the final contract. But I don't know that. I put the opps under a great deal of pressure with my 4♠ call and they guessed to play in 5♦. I don't want to give them a second chance to bid slam if they guessed wrong the first time.

[Trinidad]

han, on 2012-December-21, 05:43, said:

Trinidad, on 2012-December-21, 03:03, said:

I pass. Passing can only be bad if I will have to write down -600 at the end of the hand. If I will write down -620, -640 or +100 passing is right.

-300 beats -620 and -640. The opponents don't always make the optimal decision you know.

I know, but I don't merely care whether -300 beats -620 or -640. How much is relevant too.

If I pass, and they score 620 I might have lost 8 (or 3-4) IMPs for not sacrificing in 5♠. If I bid 5♠ and they correctly bid 6♦, I will lose 13 IMPs compared to the quiet passer. Those are not good odds for betting that the opponents will make the wrong decision.

Rik

[han]

There are a lot of things that I don't know about partner's hand, but most of these things are not so relevant. There is one really big feature of our hand that partner doesn't know, and that is that we have we have 8 tricks, plus potential for a ninth (compare with AKQxxxxx x xx xx for example, where this potential is much smaller). A quick calculation shows that 5SX won't go for more than 500, which is a really big piece of information. I would also bid 4S at these colors on something like QJ10xxxx x x KQxx, which is a very different hand. My estimation is therefore that we have a better estimate of how well 5S will do than partner does.

While I readily admit that 5D will go down sometimes, perhaps because they have to find the heart queen and won't. But I think it will make quite often. And I really don't think that partner should pass with KQJ of diamonds!

[han]

Trinidad, on 2012-December-21, 11:18, said:

I know, but I don't merely care whether -300 beats -620 or -640. How much is relevant too.

If I pass, and they score 620 I might have lost 8 (or 3-4) IMPs for not sacrificing in 5♠. If I bid 5♠ and they correctly bid 6♦, I will lose 13 IMPs compared to the quiet passer. Those are not good odds for betting that the opponents will make the wrong decision.

Rik

The amount of information that the opponents were able to exchange is very small, there is no reason to think that they will always make it when they bid 6D. Maybe the opponents figure that they won't get rich defending 5SX, and they go down 1 in 6D. In that case we win 12 IMPs. If you assume that the opponents always make the right decisions then you might as well stop preempting.

[JLOGIC]

PhilKing, on 2012-December-20, 12:27, said:

Obviously partner does not know whether Jxxx of hearts turns into a trick either. But as 5♠ bidders we are willing to punt a practical and rather obvious sacrifice, and take the blame when it is wrong. The passers are usually just winning the post mortem.

These kind of comments are not really fair, I would pass since I think it is right (Qx of hearts seems very big defensively, it will often combine for an extra trick with partner if he has any honor, and even if he has no honor it might take a trick. Also, a bad trump split might cause problems even if partner just has Jxxx of diamonds, for instance on the lead of spade spade if he can overruff dummy or something). Saving with a likely spade trick and Qx of hearts and a bad trump split is just not obvious to me, feels like 3 tricks a decent amount of the time.

Usually when we have down 1 partner will have enough to beat them (though he could have good and long clubs and this is not true, as you pointed out). I think our big upside in saving will come from down 300 into their make which is not all that unlikely, and is almost as big of a gain as a phantom save is a loss. It is not obvious to me at all what is right but I'm not trying to win the post mortem, I don't see how I will win the post mortem if our save was going for 300 and they make.

Quote

Why would we take the blame? Isn't it dishonest to take the blame for a decision that you even in retrospect think was right even though it worked out poorly? Do you apologize every time you take a finesse and lose to the stiff king?

If I make an unclear decision and it doesn't work I pretty much always say sorry. This is more of a social thing obviously, otherwise I would never say sorry because presumably I always tried to make the right decision and did my best. Playing in a partnership with you Han with Rationalist Standard I would of course never say sorry in that spot

[JLOGIC]

On that note, I think people save far too often at imps. We beat them when they contract for 11 tricks way more often than most people think imo, especially if we have stray queens or jacks. This hand may not be a good example of that, and perhaps I don't save enough, but just a general thought.

On the actual hand our stray queen was worth nothing combined with partners stray jack because we had an 8 card fit there, and partner had nothing bad lurking in trumps (xx) or clubs (ace empty). And we still were on 2-2 spades to beat them, which is possible given that dummy might have had 6 or 7 diamonds opposite a weak NT system diamond. Oh well.

[han]

You can say sorry when you play with me!

Actually, I've come to a turnaround on this topic. I used to think that it was better not to say sorry even after making a clear mistake, at least not at the table. But I think that perhaps it may be easier for both to get over a bad board after saying a little thing about it. I think that the main thing to avoid is having discussions at the table about who made the mistake.

But anyway, I think we all agree that on this hand passing is just as much a decision as bidding. It's a difficult spot.

[lalldonn]

I would pass because I like my chances of beating them too much. But it's close either way.

[PhilKing]

JLOGIC, on 2012-December-21, 11:49, said:

These kind of comments are not really fair, I would pass since I think it is right

It was more of a general observation which I failed to qualify sufficiently (or at all). I think many players tend to pass automatically in this kind of position because we are taught not to preempt and bid again (or invoke the dreaded "please bid one" double) and just shrug when they lose 8 imps.

Obviously it doesn't apply to you (or anyone else who passed for legitimate reasons).

[JLOGIC]

PhilKing, on 2012-December-21, 13:42, said:

It was more of a general observation which I failed to qualify sufficiently (or at all). I think many players tend to pass automatically in this kind of position because we are taught not to preempt and bid again (or invoke the dreaded "please bid one" double) and just shrug when they lose 8 imps.

Obviously it doesn't apply to you (or anyone else who passed for legitimate reasons).

Fair enough, this is especially a stupid attitude to have for game level overcalls which obviously have a wider upper range (for instance, I would overcall 4S with 10 solid), but I agree people have it.