[Trinidad]

whereagles, on 2014-July-02, 01:31, said:

Why should 2♠ show a hand "too good for WJO"? Can't you have something like

JTxxxx
xx
AKJx
x

That hand is an obvious pass. Thinking of bidding 2♠ means that you want to show your hand rather than to listen to what partner is saying.

Partner bids a non forcing 2♥. That means that he doesn't like spades (he could have chosen a very non forcing pass) but he is offering a decent heart suit since he thinks that will play better. So, if you refuse his offer, you need to have a reason. JTxxxx is not a reason.

Just picture partner with a typical:
x
KJTxxx
xx
Kxxx

or even

x
KQJxx
xxx
Kxxx

(which is a hand that should pass 1♠)

It is clear that a heart contract will play better than a spade contract.

Rik

[mcphee]

A rebid of 2S seems what I am worth. I fail to appreciate why 2H is not F to 2S or 3H, pass would have been NF!

[helene_t]

Nf doesn't mean dead. It means semipositive. You bid 2h with a hand too strong to pass yet too weak to force beyond 2h.
If you play wide ranging overcalls and won't consider transfer advances this is the only playable method. If partner routinely overcall on 8-counts what am I supposed to do with a misfitting 11-count if 2h is forcing?

[Zelandakh]

Did you consider a 1NT advance Helene?

[helene_t]

Zelandakh, on 2014-July-02, 05:29, said:

Did you consider a 1NT advance Helene?

Isn't that supposed to be natural NF? I wouldn't do that with six hearts and a small doubleton in opps suit, although 1NT doesn't guarantee a stopper.

[razorsharp]

2H MUST be non-forcing in modern bridge, sinc 1S is 7+. That colors my belief that I have resemblance to a "moose" - perhaps only an "elk."
At matchpoints, I'm barely OK with elking 2S. But at IMPs, I trumpet 3C, channeling my inner MOOSE!

razorsharp

[mghmaine]

Pass. WTP ? He said it was NF, so 2H isn't 10-15 or 7-16 or anything including opening values. You have a minimum opener, know pd does not have 3S cards and have tolerance for Hs. This may well be your last plus score.

[Zelandakh]

razorsharp, on 2014-July-02, 05:40, said:

2H MUST be non-forcing in modern bridge, sinc 1S is 7+.

Must it? It is amazing those old masters managed to play at all back when an overcall showed 6+ and advances were forcing. FWiiW, in modern bridge many play transfers here that mix some of the advantages of non-forcing advances with forcing ones. In a transfer scheme 2♥ is forcing.

helene_t, on 2014-July-02, 05:35, said:

Isn't that supposed to be natural NF? I wouldn't do that with six hearts and a small doubleton in opps suit, although 1NT doesn't guarantee a stopper.

So we are thinking of a hand like ♠x ♥KQxxxx ♦AQxx ♣xx? Yes that is about as awkward as it gets for forcing advances but you just have to suck it up and bid hearts anyway. If partner can make a positive noise over that then game is pretty close and if not, well we play in a difficult part score and hope not to lose too much.

[diana_eva]

mghmaine, on 2014-July-02, 05:47, said:

Pass. WTP ? He said it was NF, so 2H isn't 10-15 or 7-16 or anything including opening values. You have a minimum opener, know pd does not have 3S cards and have tolerance for Hs. This may well be your last plus score.

I don't think a vul game is out of the picture. We do have more than pd might expect for a simple overcall and possibly a fit, in which case we don't need that much from partner. And as helene said above NF doesn't mean dead...

[whereagles]

Trinidad, on 2014-July-02, 02:05, said:

JTxxxx
xx
AKJx
x

That hand is an obvious pass. Thinking of bidding 2♠ means that you want to show your hand rather than to listen to what partner is saying.

You're missing the point. While one can definitely pass on the above hand, one might not want to do it on

JTxxxx
x
AKJx
xx

or even

JTxxxx
-
AKJx
xxx

The point is that 2♠ can perfectly well be a min overcall with 6-card broken suit, i.e. a hand unsuitable for WJO. It doesn't have to be an intermediate hand.

[Trinidad]

whereagles, on 2014-July-02, 07:26, said:

Trinidad, on 2014-July-02, 02:05, said:

JTxxxx
xx
AKJx
x

That hand is an obvious pass. Thinking of bidding 2♠ means that you want to show your hand rather than to listen to what partner is saying.

You're missing the point. While one can definitely pass on the above hand, one might not want to do it on

JTxxxx
x
AKJx
xx

or even

JTxxxx
-
AKJx
xxx

The point is that 2♠ can perfectly well be a min overcall with 6-card broken suit, i.e. a hand unsuitable for WJO. It doesn't have to be an intermediate hand.

You are missing a different point:
On the first of these three hands, you have a minimum hand and somewhat of a fit for partner's hearts. On the the last two hands you don't have a fit for partner's hearts. Lack of fit is more of a reason to pass, not less. Otherwise you will be correcting partner, who, in turn, will be correcting you. The auction will end in a much higher (and doubled) contract in a misfit.

It is a sin to keep bidding on misfitting hands when you know you don't have the values for game. Once you know that game is out of the question (and with these three hands you know that) and you know of the misfit, you stop bidding, before accidents happen. That is a LAW and a lot of bidding inferences are based on this LAW (e.g. the fact that 2♠ shows a hand too strong for a WJO).

Rik

[kfay]

Sorry if there was some confusion, but partner actually isn't broke when he decides to take a free bid. You could actually have game on this hand! Perhaps I should have said "non-forcing constructive" or some nonsense like that, but I thought it might be obvious that when partner has nothing, he says nothing. All that's meant by non-forcing is that if you feel you said your piece with your 1♠ bid, then you don't need to say anything else. If you have something else to say, then you say it. This is just bridge!

Anyone who thinks that a non-forcing advance is a rare bird is really out of touch, it's actually quite common. It's certainly not alertable. In fact, with the overcalls I and everyone else seems to make these days, I fail to see how it's possible to want to play that way ( won't go so far as to say un-playable, since apparently people actually play that way).

[gszes]

Playing 2h non forcing is no more unplayable than a 1s
overcall 8-16. Your partnership can decide to make
always conservative decisions (which will cause a rather
large % of games missed) or be willing to invest a level
to explore for the best possible spot when 1 partner or
the other (or both) has an intermediate hand (like this
hand for ex).

The first problem is that p is short in spades with Hx the
most we can hope for and a void not horribly unreasonable so
repeating our 6 card moth eaten suit seems like a poor idea
from the start and I would opt for pass vs rebidding 2/3
spades.

Our Jx of hearts is fairly reasonable support and might be good
for both a heart or NT contract and since we have a solidly
intermediate hand we should make a decent effort to invite game
and the best bid to do that seems to be

2n.

If p is short in spades right siding NT should not be a problem if p
does not have enough length/quality to insist on a heart contract.

YESSSSSS we will sometimes get too high when p is dead min but the
2n bid will at least keep the bidding alive for game while not totally
dampening team spirit by making p worry needlessly about the hand being
a total misfit (like a 2s or 3s bid might easily do). Would you be excited
about bidding game after (especially a 2s bid) if you held
void KQTxxx AKx Qxx where even 3s would have to give you some trouble?

[bluechip10]

kfay, on 2014-July-01, 00:58, said:

2♥ is non-forcing. Apologies if anyone is offended by that.

---

If pard had a strong hand, he would have cuebid 2 ♣. I play this 2 ♥ bid as a weak hand, a decent 6-card suit and no support for spades (void or stiff). Mom taught me to never "fish" for a partial, especially at IMP's where the losses can be great. At least a MP's, the worst you can score is a zero.

[whereagles]

Trinidad, on 2014-July-02, 08:21, said:

You are missing a different point: (...) Lack of fit is more of a reason to pass, not less.

That's all very fine and dandy, but I'm not as pessimistic as you. In fact, I find it not so impossible to find 2 small spades across. But since I don't bullshitting stuff, I ran a quick sim on the matter. Giving opener a standard 1♣ opening and pard 5+ hearts, 10-13 HCP and at most 2 spades, this is what I came up with after 10 000 hands:


You have JTxxxx x AKJx xx

Pard has 0 spades = 8%
Pard has 1 spades = 37%
Pard has 2 spades = 55%
Pard has 5 hearts = 53%
Pard has 6 hearts = 33%
Pard has 7+ hearts = 14%


You have JTxxxx -- AKJx xxx

Pard has 0 spades = 8%
Pard has 1 spades = 35%
Pard has 2 spades = 57%
Pard has 5 hearts = 43%
Pard has 6 hearts = 35%
Pard has 7+ hearts = 22%


Statistics seem to support that bidding 2♠ is favorable.

[PhilKing]

whereagles, on 2014-July-02, 12:39, said:

That's all very fine and dandy, but I'm not as pessimistic as you. In fact, I find it not so impossible to find 2 small spades across. But since I don't bullshitting stuff, I ran a quick sim on the matter. Giving opener a standard 1♣ opening and pard 5+ hearts, 10-13 HCP and at most 2 spades ...

Quite a lot of the hands where partner has 5H and 0-2 spades are 1NT responses.

[whereagles]

yeah that makes it more likely that 2H is a playable contract.