A Pair of 7S Auctions

Had 2 hands in the last couple of days that involved 7S being an option, 1 of them worked out, the other, not so much.

On the first hand, you pick up the following hand Vul vs Not, A987 KT AJ54 AQ2. With the opps silent throughout, partner opens 1S in 2nd seat. You decide to bid 2D, you have never played with this person before and on BBO, the only discussion you had was playing 2/1. Partner bids 2H, and over your 3S, bids 4D. The fact that partner did not bid 4S and raised Diamonds, has improved your hand, so you cue-bid 4H, and partner now bids 5C.

Couple of things come to mind here, partner did not key-card, but bid 2 suits and cue-bid the other 2, making 2 slam tries. Why? You decide to bid 6C, and partner now bids 6S. The question is, do you have enough and/or know enough to bid 7S. Partner should be something like 5431 on this auction, or perhaps less Clubs to cue-bid 5C. And that makes some sense since partner signed off in 6S over your Club cue-bid, so perhaps that was bad news. And with 4 Diamonds, would he not of raised Diamonds first over 2D? So this kind of implies partner is likely 5530 instead, or perhaps 6430, either of which make your hand better. KQ of Spades, A of Hearts, and K of Diamonds give pretty good play for the grand.

This hand decided that partner had to have 1 of those hands and made a nice bid of 7S. Of course it is easier in a fun rubber game, but still a nicely reasoned auction. Partner actually has the expected hand, KQ642 A9873 KT8 – so there are lots of chances in 7S. And the hand plays pretty easy when Spades go 2-2 and Hearts behave. There are other chances, but they do not have to be even tried. I held the opposite hand, and was very pleased when this partner believed me and raised to 7S. Playing with a regular partner, I should bid 6H over 6C, but with a pickup partner I have played 2 hands with to that point, I did not want to put too much pressure on.

The other hand occurred with a fairly regular partner in our weekly IMPS game. You hold QJ974 A973 KJ9 3 and open 1S in first seat. It now goes P on your left, 5D by partner, P on your right?

Can partner have super long Diamonds and want to play there? And if so, why are both opps silent in this auction. After joking that this must be Exclusion Key Card, partner passed here, assuming it was Diamonds. Problem was, it was EKC in Diamonds, so the hand did not play that well in our 3-0 fit.

At the other table, the auction went the exact same way, except that the opening bid woke up to what the 5D bid was as she was thinking of passing. So they got to the cold 6S. The other hand was AKT853 KJ --- KQT97.

Grands do not come along that often, so to have 2 at least possibles in as many days is kind of fun.