[PhilG007]

Zelandakh, on 2016-May-20, 03:05, said:

This book was first published in 1995 and the tip about 4441 hands is considerably older than that. The general sentiment is correct but it is easy to take a reasonable idea too far. Looking through the first few entries, I also noticed "You must hold two stoppers in the opponent's suit to bid NTs" and "If three suits have been bid, you must have two stoppers in the unbid suit to bid NTs", which are actually a lot further away from "standard" in 2016 than the 4441 tip. Another, "Open the weaker of two four-card minor suits", is actually against the rules of full disclosure and should certainly not have managed to make it through to the final copy (and especially the re-print) without an appropriate caveat in the text. The tactic loses some of its effectiveness when the opps are alerted to expect it! Moving on, "Keep your pre-empts pure first and second in hand" is older advice that has not stood the test of time. It is generally recognised now that first seat is an excellent time for preempting. The advice still holds true for second seat but is another example of the way bidding theory moves on and sometimes invalidates earlier wisdom.



Well no, actually you are trying to teach us. As I have tried to tell you, you cannot learn to play bridge at a high level only from always/never rules. And I am afraid you are not a strong enough player to teach BBF members. You could learn a lot here if you were oprn to it but I have come over to realising you genuinely believe you are an advanced player and are probably not going to open your eyes to the reality of things.

Mike (an international player) already tried to tell you this. Sadly he is no longer posting here but you should at least be aware that he is a stronger player than Mendelson. When he explained to you that you are really a beginner in the grander scheme of things he did that because it is simply the truth. Think of it as tip #0, to go above all of the other "profi" tips because it is tailored specifically to you. I am sure you have the potential to be a much stronger player if you were to accept that and make the effort to learn and modernise your game. But trust me, no one here is going to take any notice of things you try to teach us.

Speak for yourself,no-one else And I'm too long in the tooth and set in my ways to be "educated"
And I personally don't care about a person's stature. I speak here in the same way as I do in the real
world. I don't care WHO I'm tslking to...I say what I want. If these forums are run on equality,then EVERY
opininion counts regardless of ability Even the "little people" have their story(!)

[PhilG007]

manudude03, on 2016-May-20, 03:59, said:

Did someone ask you to make a topic quoting Mendelson? If not, then you are not a messenger.

Did anyone ask you to give your opinion? If not,then you are not a messenger either...just a mess

[PhilG007]

Cyberyeti, on 2016-May-20, 05:35, said:

No you're not, Paul was a contemporary of mine in schools bridge, and hasn't really been a TOP player since then. Better author than player.

Really(?!) I'm sure he'll be delighted to know that(!) Can I pass on your comment to him(?!)

[manudude03]

PhilG007, on 2016-May-20, 06:38, said:

Did anyone ask you to give your opinion? If not,then you are not a messenger either...just a mess

By making this topic, you are asking for opinions from anyone.

[PhilG007]

fourdad, on 2016-May-20, 03:33, said:

only open 12 pt hands in 1/2 seat that have a 5 card suit and you will not have a problem.

And what if you don't have a 5 card suit? That is what the OP was about

[Cyberyeti]

PhilG007, on 2016-May-20, 06:41, said:

Really(?!) I'm sure he'll be delighted to know that(!) Can I pass on your comment to him(?!)

By reputation a decent teacher and author (I have no experience of either), but the last bridge playing achievement he mentions on his own website is from when he was 19, he also says he rarely plays tournaments these days. My school and his were fighting out the London schools league in the years before that, his usually winning as John Hobson and Ian Pagan were seriously good at that time.

[Zelandakh]

rhm, on 2016-May-20, 06:32, said:

I am not convinced this holds true.

As I recall, this is something that came out from the zar point debate a few years back. One of the big differences between the distributional scales of zar points against 5/3/1 is that they rate 5422 distributions as more valuable than 4441 and 5/3/1 values 4441s more highly. It was only after a fair amount of analysis that it was shown that the 4441 shape is theoretically the better in terms of trick taking ability. Despite this, it is still very much the case that most players, myself included, would far prefer to open a borderline (10 or 11 point) 5422 hand than an "equally strong" 4441 one. Whether that is really correct in the grand scheme of things I cannot say though.

[PhilG007]

manudude03, on 2016-May-20, 06:45, said:

By making this topic, you are asking for opinions from anyone.

Yes I'm glad somebody remembered that (!)

[The_Badger]

I can see Paul Mendelson's point. There is a simple way of evaluation in my view. Don't open 12 or 13 point 4-4-4-1 hands that don't have two and a half quick tricks in them and a few good intermediates too. The hand given is weak structurally and should technically be passed. (Although probably 99.99% of players including myself would open in some way as that's the norm these days.)

[PhilG007]

Cyberyeti, on 2016-May-20, 07:21, said:

By reputation a decent teacher and author (I have no experience of either), but the last bridge playing achievement he mentions on his own website is from when he was 19, he also says he rarely plays tournaments these days. My school and his were fighting out the London schools league in the years before that, his usually winning as John Hobson and Ian Pagan were seriously good at that time.

Indeed he is a decent teacher and author....and as such he deserves respect. I confess that,although I've been playing bridge for
a good deal of my life,I picked up some very useful advice from his tips. It's been said that bridge assists logical thinking
and playing it is great fun,. What better reasons can there be for taking up this fascinating game(?)

[1eyedjack]

Playing a weak 1N system I have no objections in principle to opening the hand 1N.

The main problem being not, in my view, any theoretical weakness in the method, but rather the licensing restrictions likely to be in place. And it would irritate the hell out of the opponents. Come to think of it, maybe that is a plus point.

[Tramticket]

rhm, on 2016-May-20, 06:32, said:

I am not convinced this holds true.

If you look at

http://bridge.thomas...l.html#patterns

Under suit contracts (pattern has not much influence in notrump contracts):

You get for 4441 distribution: Offense 8.61 tricks and for Defense 4.85 tricks. If we look at the ration we get 1.78
The respective numbers for 5431 would be 8.68 and 4.70 or a ratio of 1.84, a difference of 0.06, hardly earth shattering.
Balanced hands have a worse ratio.

A general observation I find interesting:

The Offense / Defense ratio of distribution tends to increase with suit length.
Shortages tend to increase your trick potential in both defense and offense and therefor have not that much impact on the ratio.

So you can claim the Offense / Defense ratio is no better for 4441 than for 5332, but all else being equal you will on average make more tricks in offense and defense with 4441.
So it makes no sense in my mind to say I will open a 12 point hand holding 5332 but will pass such a hand if holding 4441. You are passing a better hand with more trick potential.

Rainer Herrmann

I have followed your link. There is a lot of data there and I'm not sure that I understand it all. I certainly don't understand what is the source of the data (so I'm taking that on trust).

But if I understand correctly the table shows that a 4441 hand will take 8.61 tricks on average playing the contract (in the partnership's best suit?) on a double dummy basis and 4.85 tricks in defence (in the defender's best suit?) on a double dummy basis. I may have mis-interpretted - if so I apologise.

The table certainly makes interesting reading and I am interested and surprised that the 4441 shape has a relatively high trick taking potential playing the contract. I guess that the tricky part of this is identifying the correct strain.

The data also seems to support my assertion that 4441 hands have a lot of defensive strength. the figure of 4.85 appears to be higher than for any other hand shape (except 10-3-0-0 shape but I suspect rogue data there!!). So I do think there is some evidence to support the suggestion that there is less rush to dive into the auction on this shape.

If we perform a simple calculation [Tricks playing the contract] less [tricks in defence] it appears that the value is lowest for the three shapes that we treat as balanced (4333, 4432 & 5332), which is no surprise. That's why we open these hands 1NT (or rebid 1NT - depending upon NT range). 4441 hands sit somewhere in between these balanced hands and the rest of the unbalanced shapes - which is what I would intuitively expect.

All very interesting - some of this surprises me and some fits my expectations. Thank you for this link.

I'm still not rushing to open 4441 hands. I will open nearly all 12 counts, but very few 11 counts.

[notproven]

Advice is nice, but where's the proof?

I don't know the answer, but is is possible for someone to run 1,000 hands through a computer simulator? Say, 250 hands for each possible singleton. I'd like to know how often you go plus (just don't put any restrictions on responder's hand in first or second seat, but see if there is a difference when partner is a passed hand). Also, does the simulator say that it matters which singleton you have?

[wank]

fromageGB, on 2016-May-19, 07:24, said:

Always open a 12 count 3-suiter. It is an extremely powerful shape that finds a fit if there is one, and is playable in NT if not.

4441 is a very weak shape - no long suit to establish without being balanced which allows you to make no trump contracts on high cards alone.

for the first time in my life i agree with something philg posted. pass marginal 4441s. 13 counts of course aren't marginal though.

and opening 1D and rebidding 2C is pretty disgusting. you'll play 2D on a 42 fit instead of 2H on a 44 fit. if i opened that shape i'd rebid 1NT, but that has issues too. if i were unfortunate enough to be playing weak and 4 i'd be properly screwed.

starting with a pass doesn't preclude you from bidding later. if you get a chance to double 1 or 2 spades later you'll show your hand much better than you could hope to achieve by opening.

[fromageGB]

I'm sure the willingness to open depends very heavily on bidding methods employed. I would hate to open 1♦ and rebid 2♣. However, if you have a rebid that says "I have a 3-suiter but you have hit my shortage" then it is a wonderful hand type to find a fit in any suit. And once you have found your fit, the shortage can make the hand powerful in almost immediate ruffs.

[wank]

fromageGB, on 2016-May-20, 10:19, said:

I'm sure the willingness to open depends very heavily on bidding methods employed. I would hate to open 1♦ and rebid 2♣. However, if you have a rebid that says "I have a 3-suiter but you have hit my shortage" then it is a wonderful hand type to find a fit in any suit. And once you have found your fit, the shortage can make the hand powerful in almost immediate ruffs.

which bid are you thinking of which says that? ok, if you're playing an unbalanced diamond you're obviously in a superior , but still dubious, position, because you can play a 2D or ideally 1NT rebid as showing hearts, so at least you'll not miss your 44 heart fit.

[hrothgar]

FWIW, playing MOSCITO, I require more strength to open a 4441 or 5440 then I do other unbalanced hands.

Holding most unbalanced hands, I require 8+ HCP to open
Holding 5440s and 4441s I prefer to have 11+ HCPs

In a similar vein, when I am playing assumed fit preempts, I typically try to avoid opening with three suited hand patterns.

I'll open 2♦ with a hand like the following

♠ KQ83
♥ 87
♦ KJT8
♣ 832

but I prefer not to make the same opening with

♠ KQ83
♥ 8
♦ KJT8
♣ 8732

(In my experience, the 4441s play sufficiently better on defense that its not worth the risk of opening)

[kuhchung]

It's just one example, but I had a 1444 13 count in 3rd seat and just passed it. They had a strong NT, transfer to 2S, I doubled for takeout and we reached a making 3 level partial. I've been itching to pass with the stiff spade 1444 hands and try to get more data points.

[Caitlynne]

Sorry, but I think it is losing strategy to fail to open hands with above average honor values that also include a distributional feature that can deliver notable length tricks or ruffing tricks.

You think it best to quietly hide a 13 HCP hand with tremendous ruffing potential when playing in any of 3 suits such as

x
AJxx
KQJx
Qxxx

but you would gleefully stick your neck out when holding a flat 13 HCP with limited source of tricks potential like

xxx
AJx
KQJx
Qxx ?

Really?

I think a strategy that hopes the opponents conduct an auction that gives you an opportunity to make a relatively safe yet descriptiive bid is a losing one.

I don't care whether you are playing SAYC or ACOL or 2/1. I am opening your example hand 1D every day of the year regardless of the vulnerability or position/seat. And, if I am playing a 15 to 17 NT opening and partner responds 1S in an uncontested auction, I will rebid 1NT as ugly and uncomfortable as this may be. In my mind, the benefits of bidding far outweigh the rebid risk.

[1eyedjack]

Shares in popcorn have just jumped.