[jillybean]

MP

---

[ahydra]

<puzzled look>

Surely, pass?

ahydra

[Lord Molyb]

you have no reason to bid.
If partner has 4 spades surely he'll compete to the 2 level.
PASS

[ArtK78]

I can't fathom anything other than pass.

[Hanoi5]

1NT. Might be one of those hands where the first to bid it wins. But I'd pass at the table.

[the hog]

Pass. What else?

[wank]

Lord Molyb, on 2013-June-20, 10:10, said:

you have no reason to bid.
If partner has 4 spades surely he'll compete to the 2 level.
PASS

if partner has 4 spades he's already misbid

[GreenMan]

Hanoi5, on 2013-June-20, 10:55, said:

1NT. Might be one of those hands where the first to bid it wins. But I'd pass at the table.

I thought "first to bid it" at these colors was a vanishingly small target -- it's only right if we have exactly 7 tricks; if we have 6 then we want them to bid it for -90 instead of -100. (I know it's not that simple in practice, but as a baseline ...)

Partner barely scraped up a 3rd-seat opener and they have lots of minor-suit cards, so NT pessimism seems in order. I'm a passer too.

[neilkaz]

GreenMan, on 2013-June-20, 12:03, said:

I thought "first to bid it" at these colors was a vanishingly small target -- it's only right if we have exactly 7 tricks; if we have 6 then we want them to bid it for -90 instead of -100. (I know it's not that simple in practice, but as a baseline ...)

Partner barely scraped up a 3rd-seat opener and they have lots of minor-suit cards, so NT pessimism seems in order. I'm a passer too.

Yes, exactly. 1NT is too narrow a target for me to shoot for Red here. Our hand is a flat 8 count with half of it quacks.

If you buy it in 1NT and things are wrong..ie perhaps a D is lead and PD can't help in that suit and a D comes back thru our Q and we start out losing 4D tricks and end up -2 for something near zero MP. What if 1NTx floats back to us? RHO may have H bottled up from his failure to X immediately (could also be short S) so are we happy to run to 2H? We might, be it could also be awful.

Any -100 we end up with is worse than defending 2m making 8 tricks.

Now if we're white, then 1NT -1 is only -50 and we outscore defending 1NT making and we outscore defending 2m+ making.
Twice in trying to salvage yesterday's pairs game, when White I stuck in this sort of dubious 1NT bid and twice we got good boards. On the first hand the opps can actually make 2NT but defense isn't double dummy and I managed 6 tricks for -50. On the second the opps can make 1NT, but I made an OT by endplaying RHO who ended up PO'ed at his PD and this was a top.

The point is that the first side to bid 1NT when HCP are basically split and hands are rather flat and they're White has an MP advantage as has been discussed here, and a Bridge Winners and countless other sites.

But Red, most certainly all I do with this hand is pass and depending on PD and table feel I'd often pass White as well.

[gszes]

you can always see the young and the optimistic when
they hate getting only 63% on a board. Looking fo help
wondering what they did wrong to deserve such a
"failing" grade. Whatever you are doing bottle it and sell
it to bridge players everywhere because they will pay
big bucks to have 63% rounds:)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

PASS

there is nothing special about your hand your spades are
not rotten and your p has bailed ealy which almost always
indicates a sub minimum hand that took a chance and it
worked. It is possible that your LHO is waiting to pass the
x so it may be a poor choice to consider bidding 2s here
especially vulnerable. You can always back in with 2s later
if it seems appropriate (and so can your partner).

[Lord Molyb]

wank, on 2013-June-20, 11:32, said:

if partner has 4 spades he's already misbid

sorry I thought he opened 1♦
I'm glad that my reading mistakes did not cost us matchpoints.
/ruefulrabbit

[jillybean]

Haha, not young but I surely haven't learnt enough yet. The game was 63%, the board was 21% but should have been a zero.

---

My reason for raising ♥'s? I don't want to give the opp's free run to find their fit at the 2 level, partner knows I am a passed hand and won't take me for more than 2 card support.

[quiddity]

jillybean, on 2013-June-20, 16:52, said:

My reason for raising ♥'s? I don't want to give the opp's free run to find their fit at the 2 level, partner knows I am a passed hand and won't take me for more than 2 card support.

Pretty dangerous to do this with an 8-count and no fit vulnerable opposite a sub-minimum opener. If I were North I would have taken you for 5-3 in the majors.
As for finding their fit, who says they have one? You can be pretty sure that you don't have one so they're not likely to have one either.

[Phil]

jillybean, on 2013-June-20, 16:52, said:

Haha, not young but I surely haven't learnt enough yet. The game was 63%, the board was 21% but should have been a zero.

---

My reason for raising ♥'s? I don't want to give the opp's free run to find their fit at the 2 level, partner knows I am a passed hand and won't take me for more than 2 card support.

Happy to see you've bought a pair of bidding shoes but you really have a POS. I'd be happy with any plus if not a small minus.

Partner has no business bidding 3♥.

[the hog]

-2 x vul, which is what you woud have been against me, is not a good score for you.

[wank]

you know you don't have an 8 card fit, almost assuredly, so why are you so convinced the opps do? partner is 95% to be 3-5 (if he's 36 he can bid himself), so why not 3532? if the opps stop in partner's shortage he should be the one acting.

[PhilKing]

jillybean, on 2013-June-20, 16:52, said:

My reason for raising ♥'s? I don't want to give the opp's free run to find their fit at the 2 level, partner knows I am a passed hand and won't take me for more than 2 card support.

1. Why should they have a fit?

2. Partner might look at it differently. I mean, there is no obvious reason to bid 2♥, so they may infer that you suppressed 3-card heart support in order to show good spades. eg:

♠KQJxx
♥xxx
♦Qx
♣xxx

It's clear from partner's 3♥ bid that they did not "know" you had a doubleton. They thought that, of all things, you were bidding 2♥ because you had some hearts.

[jillybean]

I can't argue that my bid was bad but I cannot understand the responses saying that partner will expect 3 card heart support.
"Support with Support" I will always raise partners major with 3 (and sometimes with 2), unless I hold a gf hand. If I bid my own suit and then later compete or take preference for partners major, I am only promising 2.

[helene_t]

but you were not taking preference to his suit, you were supporting it. Taking preference is what you do when partner offered you an even worse alternative. Here, you had the alternative to play at the one-level in what would be at least a 7 card fit (he is unlikely to pass with less than three spades).

If you have the agreement always to support with 3-card support (which is IMO not such a good idea unless maybe if you play Flannery so that you can be fairly sure not to have a better spades fit if partner passes your 2♥ bid), then the delayed 2♥ becomes a strange bid. Maybe it should show a raise to 2♠ wanting a heart lead, something like five small spades and ♥Ax.

[jillybean]

helene_t, on 2013-June-21, 07:38, said:

but you were not taking preference to his suit, you were supporting it. Taking preference is what you do when partner offered you an even worse alternative. Here, you had the alternative to play at the one-level in what would be at least a 7 card fit (he is unlikely to pass with less than three spades).

If I bid my own suit and then later compete or take preference for partners major, I am only promising 2.