[VixTD]

This hand came up in a recent club duplicate, matchpoints.

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What would you call, and why? (Assume you are playing natural weak jump overcalls.)

[kenberg]

I would just bid 2♣. I am not sure whose hand this is I would rather include partner in the decision making rather making some rough guess of my own. Partner will never play me for my two aces if I bid 3 or 4 clubs, bidding 5 seems off the wall. I see from the votes someone did, maybe he is right, but I wouldn't.

[billw55]

*bonk*

That wall kinda hurts

Anyway, I bid 5♣ because I am white on red and have an 8 card suit. Am I really going to let them play any number of spades (or hearts) below 5 anyway? Are they really going to let me play a club partial - and will I be happy if they do?

[diana_eva]

5c for me too... not too worried about letting partner in, since he passed. And it seems obvious enough to make me wonder what went wrong.

[kenberg]

If partner has xxx / Kxx/ Axx / xxxx I imagine 6♣ plays well. If he has xxxx / Kxxx / xxxx / x then we have a fair chance of beating 4♠ with a club, two hearts, and a heart ruff, while 5♣ is down 1 or 2.

I am not claiming that I can surely discover exactly where the hand belongs, but I think that I can increase my chances by starting with 2♣. Partner can have a lot of other hands besides the two I selected. He will pass 5♣ with all of them, and if they bid 5♠ he will pass most of the time also. Basically, if I bid 5♣ I am on my own. I think there are enough possibilities here so that I am interested in bringing him into the action.

[billw55]

kenberg, on 2014-May-06, 08:22, said:

If partner has xxx / Kxx/ Axx / xxxx I imagine 6♣ plays well. If he has xxxx / Kxxx / xxxx / x then we have a fair chance of beating 4♠ with a club, two hearts, and a heart ruff, while 5♣ is down 1 or 2.

I am not claiming that I can surely discover exactly where the hand belongs, but I think that I can increase my chances by starting with 2♣. Partner can have a lot of other hands besides the two I selected. He will pass 5♣ with all of them, and if they bid 5♠ he will pass most of the time also. Basically, if I bid 5♣ I am on my own. I think there are enough possibilities here so that I am interested in bringing him into the action.

Hm, interesting. On your two example hands, after a 2♣ overcall, partner will raise once with the first hand and do nothing with the second. So that will help distinguish these two hands from each other. But it won't necessarily help me make the winning bid. After a single raise from a passed hand - will I really go investigating slam? And if partner is quiet and ops bid 4M - will I really let it go at these colors, hoping both to beat it and that 5♣ is down? I think both answers are no, and that is before we consider intervening bids by opponents who might have both majors.

Overall, I just don't expect to gain from 2♣ often enough to compensate for the bidding space granted to ops.

[helene_t]

If I preempt and then double them, does it show this hand?

[mikeh]

I am white v red, with a passed hand partner, a RHO who opened 1M, an unlimited LHO, 3 cards in the majors and an 8 card suit headed by the Ace.

I can see very little likelihood that a slow approach will provide me with the information I need to make a good high-level decision, and even less likelihood that partner can ever later read me for this type of hand, absent my bidding 5 all by myself later, so he ain't going to be able to make an informed contribution very often.

Meanwhile, a 2♣ overcall gives the opps an easy auction on a hand on which I have reason to think that that is the last thing I want them to have.

Everything points to 5♣ so 5♣ it is.

It is not impossible that going slow would work out better: it is just that it is extremely unlikely that it would. On many slow auctions we are going to have to bid 5♣ anyway (is anyone defending 4M with a silent partner?), so why let the opps exchange all kinds of information before we do so.

[kenberg]

helene_t, on 2014-May-06, 08:45, said:

If I preempt and then double them, does it show this hand?

It would certainly cause some head scratching, but maybe so.

Double them in what, by the way.

Really I think bidding 2♣ and then going on the 5♣ shows this hand. Quite likely we can beat 5♠.

[y66]

2C planning to bid 5C next.

[akwoo]

Bidding 2♣ followed by 5♣ might help opponents judge whether to bid 5♠ next.

Bidding 2♣ followed by 5♣ definitely helps partner judge what to do over 5♠ if they bid it.

I think it depends on whether you think partner has better judgement than opponents!

If I'm the pro playing with a client, I go directly to 5♣. If I'm the client playing with a pro, I bid 2♣ and then 5♣. (Folks including myself come to the local club without a partner fairly frequently (and director plays if that's what makes an even number of players), so I play with a wide variety of ability levels on a regular basis.)

[kenberg]

I have no interest in being either a pro or a client, but I have always (naively, idealistically, whatever) thought that the purpose of such a pairing is educational rather than to win a few masterpoints. But I take your point.

Another way of looking at it, similar but not quite the same, is this: On some hands you want to make a fast leap and have everyone else guess. On others, you want to make your holding as clear as possible. Sometimes one approach is best, other times the the other is. I see this hand as one where I want to, as well as I can, show what I have. There is no certainty that this show and tell is better than bidding 5♣ and letting everyone deal with it as best they can, but it's my choice.

[VixTD]

I see that 2♣ (my choice) is leading, but perhaps I should have asked how many of those would then bid again over a major-suit game. The full hand was:

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I just thought the North hand had too much defence to pre-empt. I could envisage both 4M and 5♣ going off, but in actual fact 5♣X was a cheap save.

Do you think I should have bid on? [Auction now corrected]

[mikeh]

VixTD, on 2014-May-07, 06:51, said:

I see that 2♣ (my choice) is leading, but perhaps I should have asked how many of those would then bid again over a major-suit game. The full hand was:

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I just thought the North hand had too much defence to pre-empt. I could envisage both 4M and 5♣ going off, but in actual fact 5♣X was a cheap save.

Do you think I should have bid on?

One hand proves little, usually, but it is no coincidence that the actual hand demonstrates that an immediate 5♣ would have worked out better.

Look at how you endplayed yourself in the auction.

2♣ allowed them to find their heart fit at the 2-level, and 3♣ not only took away zero bidding space but allowed responder to better define his hand (altho as the cards lie that didn't matter). Now, having bid twice, to no useful effect, you have to make a decision at the 5-level with the opps having had 2 more rounds of bidding than they ought to have been given.

Not only are you now having to make what may be the last guess but, if you choose to bid, the chances of the opps making the winning decision are hugely increased. Responder, with the spade cards and his minors, might make the winning forcing pass, which would get them to 5♥, which is trivial to play.

Consider the problem the opps have over 5♣. Most of the bridge playing world play that double is penalty oriented, and while East may have qualms about that call, what else can he do? And Opener, unaware of any fit at all and looking at a minimum, will pass.

I understand the concern that 'I have defence', but that is talking yourself out of the correct action, not into it. Bridge bidding is about a lot more than describing your hand. It is about context and being tough to play against.

The context screamed that one should bid to the limit asap: it was surely no surprise that you were faced with a decision over 4M. Being tough to play against means thinking about the impact of your decisions on the opps. Obviously, this becomes a delicate balancing act. I would not, for example, have chosen 5♣ were partner an unpassed hand: altho it would have been close.

Btw, at the risk of seeming arrogant, choosing to rely upon the number of votes an action got in a poll here is silly. Not all opinions, in bridge, are created equal.

Compare this to responder's problem over an immediate 5

[VixTD]

mikeh, on 2014-May-07, 09:16, said:

Look at how you endplayed yourself in the auction.
[...]
Not only are you now having to make what may be the last guess but, if you choose to bid, the chances of the opps making the winning decision are hugely increased. Responder, with the spade cards and his minors, might make the winning forcing pass, which would get them to 5♥, which is trivial to play.
[...]
I understand the concern that 'I have defence', but that is talking yourself out of the correct action, not into it. Bridge bidding is about a lot more than describing your hand. It is about context and being tough to play against.

I agree that it doesn't make much sense to overcall 2♣ and then bid five, that is making the last guess. That's why I didn't. There's little chance that partner will have enough clubs to support me, so perhaps I shouldn't overcall at all.

I didn't bid 5♣ (either immediately or over their game) because I could easily see both contracts failing. After ♣A and a spade switch, if partner had had the singleton club I'd have been right. It's just a question of how likely this is.

mikeh, on 2014-May-07, 09:16, said:

Btw, at the risk of seeming arrogant, choosing to rely upon the number of votes an action got in a poll here is silly. Not all opinions, in bridge, are created equal.

This is a silly comment. I'm not suggesting that poll results prove that any course of action is right or wrong, and I don't suppose anyone else who constructs a poll on these forums is either. I just wanted to hear other people's opinions.

[mikeh]

VixTD, on 2014-May-07, 11:30, said:

I agree that it doesn't make much sense to overcall 2♣ and then bid five, that is making the last guess. That's why I didn't. There's little chance that partner will have enough clubs to support me, so perhaps I shouldn't overcall at all.

The fact that partner will rarely be able to voluntarily raise clubs is a reason to bid 5 immediately, not to refuse to bid. Note that partner won't raise even with 3 card support and an otherwise bad hand. Picture xxx xxx Qxxx Jxx.

Quote

I didn't bid 5♣ (either immediately or over their game) because I could easily see both contracts failing. After ♣A and a spade switch, if partner had had the singleton club I'd have been right. It's just a question of how likely this is.

This is what I mean by talking oneself out of an action. I do it myself all the time: it is (imo) my biggest weakness as a bridge player: I find reasons to be conservative. There is no reason to place partner with a stiff club. Indeed, statistically he and LHO are more likely to have club length than is opener, and partner is statistically most likely of all to have club length. Opener showed 5+ spades, which reduces the spaces for clubs. Partner failed to pre-empt at favourable, thus eliminating a set of hands more likely to have short clubs....imagine he opened 3♦ instead of passing. None of this makes a huge difference, but the reality is that partner is less than 33% to be the one with short clubs, assuming a 2=2=1 0r some 320 break,

Quote

This is a silly comment. I'm not suggesting that poll results prove that any course of action is right or wrong, and I don't suppose anyone else who constructs a poll on these forums is either. I just wanted to hear other people's opinions.

My 'silly comment' was based on you posting your observation that your choice of 2♣ was most popular, in a context that suggested, to me at least, that you saw that as somehow validating your choice. I note that in your post, referencing the popularity of your choice, you made no attempt to deal with the arguments made in the thread. Indeed, you still haven't...all you have done is state that you feared that both games would fail based on what I trust you will now see to be a low-frequency occurrence.

Your posting here so far seems to reveal a very common, human attitude. You posted a good problem. You pretended, even perhaps to yourself, that you were looking for advice. You get advice, including some detailed analysis.

You choose to note none of the arguments against your choice, note that your choice was leading the poll, and try to defend your bad decision (bad in theory and in practice) by referring not to the arguments presented here but to the same erroneous reasoning you used at the table.

IOW, while you may claim to have been looking for advice, you were instead looking for confirmation that you acted reasonably.

You aren't going to learn much with that attitude.

[billw55]

Maybe a little on the harsh side Mike. A poll might be for various reasons. This one does not establish a clear correct action. IMO it does establish that 2♣ is within reason. For example it surely would be considered a logical alternative in a UI decision (if BBFers were peers of the player in question).

[mikeh]

billw55, on 2014-May-07, 12:16, said:

Maybe a little on the harsh side Mike. A poll might be for various reasons. This one does not establish a clear correct action. IMO it does establish that 2♣ is within reason. For example it surely would be considered a logical alternative in a UI decision (if BBFers were peers of the player in question).

Hey, if the issue were whether 2♣ was plausible, rational, a logical alternative, I'd be 100% with you. I said this was a good problem, and that is precisely because I can see the arguments for 2♣. However, I stand by my last post in terms of the attitude displayed by the OP in his (or her) last post.

He or she seems, as I noted and for the reasons I noted, to be looking only for confirmation that his or her choices were correct. That is a common problem/attitude. It is a real obstacle to advancing as a player but it is often unconscious. I am not trying to discourage OP from participating: far from it. I thought it was a good problem, and hope to see more from the OP. However, I also feel free to point out this desire to receive and listen to only confirmatory responses.

[kenberg]

I was one of the 2♣ bidders. Note that on the subsequent auction it becomes clear that there are at least nine cards in the majors on your right. When I bid 2♣ I ws not totally commited, in my mind, to later bidding 5♣. I did, however, expect that on most continuations I would, and this would do it for me.

However. The hand makes 5 in either major. You get your aces, that's it. It's at least possible that an immediate bid of 5♣ would have resulted in you playing 5♣ X, for -500. On this slower auction, your rho will look at his spade fit and his heart fit, along ith his minor suit cards, and probably go on. It's mps, 650 scores better than 500, so he goes on, or at least I imagine he does. if you bid an immediate 5♣ then rho will surely double, and I imagine your lho will stew a bit but leave it be.

So yes, I go on to 5♣, or at least I am pretty sure that I would. Probably I do it as soon as I hear the X on my left and 2♥ on my right. Might well be too late. I don't expect we are beating 4, and it turns out we are not beating 5.

[neilkaz]

I'll chime in here late and stick to my initial feeling that while I think this is a reasonably close decision, I prefer to bid 5♣ now rather than later with my 8 card suit. My hope is that the opps make the last guess, noting that sometimes that guess is wrong.