SAYC now has a forcing 1N!

Playing in a pick up match on BBO with a 'World Class' partner, I held the following hand NV vs Vul. KQ954 AT3 742 KQ in 1st seat. I opened the hand 1S, and it went (P) 1N (P) back to me. My partner had stated we were playing SAYC, which meant 1N was limited and non-forcing. I could not see many games available, and this seemed as good a spot as any, so I passed.

My partner proceeded to make 4N on the hand, and then started in on me for passing. According to him, the correct auction was for me to bid 2C (!) over his 1N, then raise his 2H to 3H, so he could then bid 4H. This seemed pretty far-fetched to me, since even if he had bid 2H over a 2C bid by me, I doubt I would have raised. Any hand that could not bid a natural (not 2/1) 2H over my 1S was not going to get a non-vul raise from me.

My partners hand was --- K98642 QT98 A62, just about a perfect fit, with everything co-operating, including the J of Diamonds doubleton onside. I believe I would have bid 2H on this hand, and got to 4H the sane and easy way. As a matter of fact, that is how they got to 4H at the other table, by bidding 2H over the same 1S opener.

Sigh, guess that is why I can never make that 'World Class' level.

That is OK though, I was given a lesson a couple of hands later on how to get to close games by him. He held J942 7 A542 Q852 and over 1H (P), he bid 1S. This now went (P) 2C (P) back to him. I think most people would have chosen a Pass, or an aggressive 3C, but he now made the master bid of 2N. This was raised to 3N by me on 83 AKQ93 J8 AJT6. I thought I had a source of tricks, good Clubs, and help in Diamonds. He got a Diamond lead, so he put up the J and won the K with the A. He now hooked a Club, losing to the K, and a Diamond came back. Due to the spots he had, the opps had no problem cashing 3 more Diamonds. His LHO now cashed the A of Spades, led a Spade to his partners K, and won the next 2 Spades with the 10 and Q, for a quick and merciless down 4, vul, -400. Fortunately, they got to 5C down 2 at the other table, so we only lost 5 IMPS.

As I said, guess I have to study more.

Wild Sets

Just played a set on BBO in an 8 board team match that had a game swing on every hand, and I wasn't even the cause of all of them :) (Much as some of my pards will question that)

First hand you hold AJ74 2 KQ83 AQ92 with no 1 vul and hear pard open 1H P to you. You bid 1S and pard bids 2S. You finally decide to BW, and pard bids 5S. So you sign off in 6S, and get the lead of the K of Hearts to see this dummy. 9853 At765 A64 K. Not sure what the 5S bid was, but you play it out and the 10 of Spades is offside, so down 1 for an 11 IMP loss. This was the first contribution from the opps to the cause.

Second hand you hold KQ953 AK85 AK76 --- and decide to open 1S playing SAYC. Pard bids 2S, so hoping pard has anything actually usefull, you bid the scientific 6S. The opening lead is the 4 of Spades, and dummy appears with T87 J74 J3 AKT93, not the dummy you were praying for, but some hope. The opening lead goes to the A on your right, and the 8 of Diamonds comes back. Since there are no entries for setting up Clubs in time, it looks like you need the J of Spades with the 4th Diamond, so embark on that path, planning to pitch the 2 loosing Hearts on the AK of Clubs, and cross-ruff the hand. There is a little care required to score everything, cashing the AK of Hearts early, but it does not matter, the 4th Diamonds is over-ruffed with the J of Spades on your right. At least this is a push board.

Third hand you hold AJ K95 K76 A5432 Vul vs Not and hear it go P 1H P to you. Even though this is not poker, you decide to bid 2C on your bicycle, and hear it go 3S on your left, 4D by pard, P back to you. Not sure what was going on, but pard should have an OK hand for this, so I jumped to 6H. I think anything much less is an insult to partner. Pard held Q AQ762 AJ83 K86, and when Hearts and Clubs went 3-2, claimed 12 tricks for a 13 IMP win, the opps played in 3N at the other table on the auction (3S) DBL (P) 3N. Think you have a pretty nice hand to bid 3N when partner makes a Vul TO double of 3S, but it would have worked if any rounded suit did not behave.

4th hand you pick up KQJ982 QJ4 T943 ---, all Vul, and hear it go 1C by pard, 1H on your right. You bid 1S and it now goes P on your left, 2D by pard, P on your right. Not sure what is best on this hand, finally decided to bid 3S, trying to show good Spades, since was betting pard was short on this hand. This now went (P) 4C (P) back to me. Sigh, problem is almost anything could be right here, but finally decided to just bid 4D and hope pard could work out what to do, this went all pass. The opening lead was the A of Hearts followed by the K of Hearts which partner ruffed. Partners hand was 6 3 AKQJ7 A96543, I think I would have bid 5D here, and would have been happy not to lose 2 major suit tricks, but whatever. Pard now ruffed a low Club, pitched the Spade on the good Heart, and played a Diamond back to hand, all following. Think a full cross-ruff would have been better, since it turned out Diamonds were 3-1 and Clubs were 5-2 behind you. But the kind person with the Clubs cashed the final Club winner before playing a Heart, and let 4D make. At the other table, they got to 5D, but only got the 2 Major suit Aces, the Clubs going on the Spades and Ruffs. So we lost 10 IMPS on this board, up 24-10.

5th Board, you hold J7 4 AKJ9852 A85 NV vs Vul and hear it go 1C on your right. There are many ideas on what to bid on these hands, anywhere from going very slow to bid lots, to 3N. I have to call it a hunch, but I thought the opps were not happy, so decided to go for the push, and if I missed a slam our way, I could apologize to our pards, so I bid 4D on the hand. This went 4S on my left, 4N on my right, 5D on my left, 6S on my right. Not sure what kind of BW these guys are playing, but this is getting interesting. The opening lead is the 3 of Diamonds, and this dummy hits, AT92 AKQ986 QT Q (HUH!?), precision and no alerts, gotta love it. I would have bid 4D almost for sure if I knew that is what they were playing. Anyways, covered the Q of Diamonds with the K which held, so cashed the A of Clubs, then the A of Diamonds, and declarer claimed the last 10 tricks for down 2 (?). Not sure what the guy on myright is up to, but that is another 11 IMP loss for him, we are up 35-10 now.

6th board I held T52 85 Q8 KJ5432 Vul vs Not. This is a brutal pre-empt even for me, so I passed, and it went 3 Passes to 1C on my right. Now that I know they are playing precision, I have an easy 2C bid over that, and it goes 2S on my left, 4D (cue bid) on my right, 4S on my left, 5H on my right, 5S on my left, all pass. The opening lead is the 9 of Clubs, and this truly amazing dummy tracks. AQ AKQT9742 --- QT6, that is right, a solid 8 card major hit in dummy :) Declarer covers the 10 of Clubs with my Jack and his A, and plays a Spade to the Q, which holds. He now plays the A of Hearts, pitching a Club, and the KQ of Hearts, pitching a Diamond, and now it is my turn, ruff or not? First, I do not like the spot cards in Clubs, that stupid 6 in dummy is setting up, thanks to my wonderfull suit, and if declarer has 6 Spades, overruffs my Spade here, and plays a Spade to board, it will be good. So I pitched a little Club as declarer pitched another Diamond and pard dropped the J of Hearts. Now came the good T of Hearts, I pitched a Club, declarer another Diamond, and pard ruffed with the J of Spades. Pard now played the A of Diamonds, and declarer pitched (!) from board. So partner now played the 8 of Clubs, covered all around, and ruffed by declarer. The 9 of Spades went to partners K and dummies A, but I now had the good 10 of Spades for down 1. Declarers hand was 98643 --- KJ9765 A7. It turns out with the amazing spot cards in Clubs, I think 6H is cold on any lead, since you can lead out the Q of Clubs covered winning the A, Spade hook, and play the 10 of Clubs, pinning everything, with that damn 6 becoming the 12th trick again. Dare anyone to find that line at the table :) Anyways, the Hearts were not put down in dummy at the other table, so we won another 11 IMPS for a 46-10 lead.

The 7th board was about the only one I could have anything but great things to say for my partner. She listed herself as Advanced, but based on her declarer play and defence, she was a lot ahead of most experts on BBO :) I held QJ7 76 AJT93 A94 All vul, and with the opps silent throughout, bid 1D over my pards 1C opener. Pard now bid 1S and I was at the first crossroads. We were playing SAYC, and I sorta had to decide now if this was a game forcing hand, or what. I rejected 2S, since pard will pass on most hands where I would want to be in game. 3S sets the trump suit, perhaps wrongly, and almost always should show 4. 2H sets a GF, one of the times where I would be happy if it set a 1 round force, perfect for this hand. Since all my values were in partners suits and I had good spot cards, I decided to treat it like a GF hand and bid 2H, this also had the advantage of letting partner tell me more about her hand. She now bid 2N and I bid 3S, hoping with only 4 Spades and a good Heart stopper, she might prefer 3N if it looked right. This went all P, and the opening lead was the 2 of Spades. Sigh, so much for forcing. When I saw pards hand, I was not sure I wanted to be in any games, she held AT86 KQ3 K75 765, something even I might have passed unless playing a weak NT. But it turned out almost every card was friendly, with Spades 33 and the K onside, so she made 5 in 3S, losing 10 IMPS to the opps in 3N at the other table, we were now up 46-20.

The last board was a sorta decision, do you open a Strong NT holding J9 KJ5 AQJ96 KQ4 or decide to upgrade it and open 1D, planning to rebid 2N. I finally decided to open 1N, which proved wrong on this hand when it went all P and pard put down K873 984 T83 A32. Everything was friendly, and the opps set up my Spade and Heart tricks right away, so I made 3N on the hand. Fortunately, they played in 3D at the other table, so the final score wound up 46-20 our way.

Still not sure what game my RHO was playing, but he was flying high on a few of the boards. Plus I guess when to jam their auctions correctly, and gave them problems instead of us a minus. The same calls I made here could cost almost the same next time if the hands are a little different. But I will still follow the philosophy that the opps will not make as many mistakes in an uncontested auction as in a lively one. So keep on bidding and let the cards fall as they may.

Happy New Year to all, and may 2010 be a fun time to play bridge :)

A Defensive Problem

Playing IMPS, you hold 4 Q93 Q74 AQT865 with no one Vul in first seat. You decide to open 3C and this goes P P to your RHO who bids 3N, ending the auction.

You decide to lead your singleton Spade and this dummy appears, Q975 J874 K65 J2. Declarer plays the 5 on the first Spade and captures your partners 8 with the 10. Declarer then plays the 3 of Clubs towards dummy, your play.








What is declarer doing, you are looking at stoppers in both red suits, so where are the tricks coming from. Does he really only need 1 Club trick for 9 tricks, or what is he doing.

I think there are 3 main options here, and still not sure what is the best. Option #1 involves ducking this completely, and hoping your partner can get in to lead a (hopeful) 2nd Club through declarers supposed K. Option #2 involves clearing the Club suit with Q, A, and another, and hoping you can win a trick with a red suit Q to set this (if declarer needs another trick and you can survive the Spade discards), and option #3 involves winning this trick with the Q and playing on a red suit.

I have some sympathy with option #3, but that means something strange is going on. Even if we give declarer 5 Spade tricks, an outside AK in a red suit leads to only 8 winners. And if declarer has the other red A, then he has 9 winners in that case and will likely not go down. For that reason, I also think option #1 is out. Once you duck the Club and the J holds, any competent declarer is going to have to go out of his way to allow your partner to win a trick now, really unlikely. And even if you win a Red Q and the A of Clubs, you are essentially back to option #3.

For that reason, as bad as it might prove to be, I like option #2 on the hand. Declarer may guess you to have 1 of the red Q’s on this hand for the play, but may not guess you have both, and may not have anything they can do about it anyways. The biggest option is what discards you are going to have to make on the Spades that are coming next. I am not sure I have an answer for that, will have to depend on what partner signals, but I think it is the least of all evils. And who knows, a nice declarer might not run the Spades before trying to guess what red Q to play you for on the hand. Not perfect, but not sure there is a perfect answer on this hand.

On the actual hand, the person defending with this hand did choose option #3, winning the Q of Clubs and switching to the Q of Diamonds. This was not a success, since Declarer held AKT3 A62 AJ8 K73. On the Spade lead, declarer had 7 tricks, and the Club gave 8, so instead of trying to make an early guess on a red suit to play, started by trying to set up a Club trick (and cutting communications) and got a bonus when the Q of Diamonds came back. This was now 9 easy tricks, on a hand that any other defense would probably beat. The hand was beat in 3N at the other table, for a double digit swing.

Where are we Going?

Had a very interesting hand today in our weekly team game. With no one vul, you pick up a nice hand in 3rd seat K AKJ5 AQ86 AK83 and open 2C after 2 passes to you. This now goes 3S on your left, and 2 more passes back to you. We had briefly discussed that the pass over the interference showed some valus and nothing to bid. So now what?

I had a few choices, but I finally decided that 3N was not one of them. So that left Double, 4C, and the wild 4S. I think double is the most flexible, since you can play in any suit partner bids, but it does not get the strength of your hand across. And I think your hand is strong, since partner should now have a 4 card fit with you, you have a lot of playing strength. So for that reason, I decided to bid 4S, and get most of my hand off my chest.

Partner now bid 4N over that. I assumed this was not to play, or at least I hoped not, but if not, what was it, more values, or 2 places to play. I finally decided that it should be 2 places to play, so I bid 5C. Partner now bid 5D over this. At this point, my hand got better, if partner has Diamonds and Hearts and a few values, my hand is very good. any time partner is 3442, or 2452, with as little as Q of Hearts and K of Diamonds, slam should have some play. So wanting to find out if we were on the same wavelength here, since this had kinda never come up before, I raised to 6D. The opening lead was the 8 of Spades, and the A and Q of Spades were played by my LHO. Partner ruffed this on board, cashed the A of Diamonds, and went into the tank when the 9 appeared from the 3S bidder. His hand was xxx Q9xx KJ8x xx. He finally decided he probably could not make it if his RHO had 2 singletons, so played a low Diamond back to his hand, and his RHO contributed the 10, making the contract a simple claim.

I am not as sure about the problem if RHO has 2 red singletons, since there are some squeeze chances, but it is probably right. On the other hand, it was nice to see that 6H has serious problems on the 4-1 Heart break with the 10 behind the Q9xx. I am not sure that 6H can make since you have to ruff the Spades high. It turns out that 6D can only make since partner has the nice J of Diamonds.

I am not sure how this hand should go after 3S, but it is always tough after the opps pre-empt at a high level. I am glad that we got to this, at the other table they stopped in 5H after the Spade hand only bid 2S.

BBO at it's Best (?)

Playing in a pick up team game on BBO with the host, she picked up this hand Q3 AK764 QJT5 76 All Vul and heard the auction P by her, 1D on her left, Double by pard, P back to her. Now at this time, I think there are a few things available. I personally like 4H with this hand, anytime pard has anything resembling a double, this should have play. But I guess you can test the waters with 2H or something. I kinda think 2D is dangerous, since if partner bids Spades somewhere, you will have a tough time showing your hand.

But almost anything showing a good hand here will work. What really does not work is 1H with this hand. At the table, it now went all pass, and when dummy comes down, guess what, you are claimers for 4H on this hand. Partners hand is KT7 Q853 76 AK85. This is supposed to take another call after making a TO double and hearing partner only bid 1H, sorry, not today.

Anyways, when the hand showed, the host immediately typed in a long series of ?????, perhaps asking about her bid, but I assume asking why I passed. Perhaps because if I really bid 2H on this hand and it ever now goes double on my left, it is going to be bloody. I was then ejected from the game by the host, since I obviously did not know how to play. This is not the first time I have run into this from some US players, I can only guess that the TO doubles have become so bad, that you do not dare bid more than 1H on those hands, and expect partner to do something again with a real TO double. And you write off those occasional -1100's to plain bad luck when the doubler bids again and someone doubles.

So I put another bit of wording beside someone else's name and will politely refrain from playing in a game that person is involved in. And try to get some sanity back into the bidding world :)

Danger, Will Robinson :)

Had a hand on BBO with a pickup partner last night, that I am not sure how you are supposed to handle it, other than hopefully to survive. We did not.

Vul vs Not in first seat, you pick up AQJ542 95 4 AK85 and open 1S. You are playing SAYC and partner bids 2H, which is not GF, but standard. This now goes 3D on your right, and you bid 3S, 4D on your left, P P back to you. You do have a fairly good hand, with shortness in the opponents suit, but partner not bidding 4S here is a bit of a problem, since it means you should not get 3 card support.

It looks like the options are double, 4H, 4S, and Pass. I do not think Pass is a valid option at IMPS, so you can discard that. Double might be right, but you do not have a lot of defense and are you going to get this more than 1 down, if you even beat it. So would rule that out as well, leaving a tough choice between 4H and 4S. Since you have already rebid your 6 card suit, which is not that solid, I think 4H has to be right here, and let partner decide. Anytime he has 2 decent Spades, you will probably get returned to 4S, and with good Hearts, partner will leave it in 4H.

Now for the surviving part, this is not your hand. The idea on this hand is to get out with the least damage, since this is a true nightmare hand. Here is the full hand, in all it’s gory details.

In either major, the taps start right away, and with 5 good cards behind each major, there are a bunch of losers. I had the Heart hand, and decided to bid 2H over 1S, even though slightly under strength, but what else are you supposed to bid, playing SAYC, and not having the agreement that 1S-3H shows this kind of hand (A very good thing to play, in my opinion, since these hands are designed to give you nightmares, and this one in particular). Anyways, at our table, the N hand decided that he should show his Spades again, and this went double behind him, and a Diamond was led and returned. This now got messy, and when the smoke had cleared, we were –800. I think 4H is always destined for down 1, perhaps down 2, but reading the position will allow you to do better, and taking the first Diamond tap in the short Heart hand really helps.

At this point, my partner started in on me for the 2H bid, since that was obviously the source of our disaster, according to him. I did not think I needed to get into the discussion about what constitutes a suit you can bid, and then rebid freely at the 3 and 4 level with no support, since it was obviously irrelevant to the discussion. But I should give some cudo’s to our opps for laying the trap for us. The 3D and 4D bids were well judged, and the opps did not make any mistakes once we had wandered into the danger zone.

Just as an FYI, at the other table, my hand also started the same way, with 2H, but the opps did not find the 3D bid. So N now rebid 3C, and over 3H, bid 4H, which got doubled. This did go down 2, but that is only 500, vs our 800.

Weekly Imps, Back at it

Had a pair of back to back interesting hands yesterday at the Weekly IMPS League. On the first, you hold AK764 KT3 5 AQ84 All Vul and hear partner open a 12-14 HCP NT in 2nd seat. You transfer to Spades and partner accepts with 2 Spades, which has many negative connotations, no 4th Spade from partner (Weak or Strong), no 3 card holdings with good hands. So this is simple, you bid 3C, which we play as a 1 round force, possibly game forcing as well. Partner now bids 3D, saying he likes 1 of your suits, and setting up a full game force. So you bid 3H, and partner now jumps to 4S. Now what?

At the time, I thought partner had a minimum or near minimum 3 card Spade holding with help in Clubs on the hand, hence the jump to 4S. I would need a minimum of xxx AJx Axx Kxx to have any play for slam (it is now on a Heart guess), but even with that minimum, would partner jump to 4S with all primes? I finally decided that partner had too much room to do something between 3H and 4S, especially 3S, if he had anything that would work towards slam, so decided to pass. That was the wrong decision, as partner actually had xxx Axx AKxxx Kx and slam was a claim when Spades went 3-2. Turns out partner was worried that 2N over 2H would promise a Spade honour or 2 (something I disagree with, would rather know partner has a good 3 card raise with a max, this hand, then honours). And then over 3H, was worried that 3S might not be forcing, which I disagree with since 2 cue-bids can not now stop below game. And even if it was non-forcing, 4 of a red-suit would have gotten us there.

At the other table, they had a variant of the same problem to also miss this slam. After a 12-14 HCP NT as well, my hand bid 2D (GF Stayman, not playing transfers) and his partner bid 3D. This now went 3S by my hand and 4S by his partner. Talking to the person that bid 4S after, I said she should have cue-bid 1 or the other of the red suits, since at this point, that must indicate a good hand for Spades. Again, not knowing how good the fit really was, my hand passed for a push board.

On the next hand, you pick up a nice collection with None Vul. AK42 5 AKT73 AKT. This gets even better when partner opens 1S in front of you. I was really tempted here to actually just bid 7S, like c’mon, how often to you really get the possibility of that auction? I actually bid 4N, since there is little I can learn on this hand by bidding 2D first. Partner showed 1 KC with 5C, and I bid 5D asking about the Spade Q. Partner now bid 5H showing the Q of Spades and the K of Hearts, so no Club loser, now what.

At the table, I fell asleep here and made a non-bid, 5N, knowing what partner had to bid over that before he bid 6S, since I am looking at every other card missing. I eventually now hoped for something other than 3 small Diamonds from partner and raised to 7, but I had put myself to a guess for no reason. I really think, after the fact of course, that 6D here has to be taken correctly. I do not think you can want to play in Diamonds on this kind of auction, so it should be asking for 3rd round Diamond control. Partner was nice and had Qx, so this is not a problem hand. But it would be a nice one to stay out of when partner has xxx, even though there are still chances as long as partner is not 3 small in each of the minors.

At the other table, it went 1S-2D and then after KC BW, my hand decided to be pessimistic and settled in 6S, also not thinking of the 6D bid. Although in his case, there would be a lot more ambiguity now, since after 2D, 6D actually could be a place to play.