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Bidding Problems for I/N players Part 18 The Forcing Pass

#1 User is offline   Kaitlyn S 

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Posted 2017-January-02, 20:59

Hi - these problems should be very easy for experienced players but an I/N player needs to think about the right things in an auction. If you get them wrong, don't feel too bad as long as you understand the rationale for the answers. I'll provide the answers later but I'll put a hint as a spoiler. Try to solve the problem without the spoiler. Also, let me know if you would be interested in seeing more of these from time to time.

Assume you are playing Standard American (a natural system with 15-17 1NT openings and 5-card majors), IMPS, and nobody is vulnerable.

Some background. Usually when you pass, you are advertising weakness or the lack of desire to bid or compete higher. However, there are times when a pass says that you want to do something but you don't know what to do. How does partner know the difference?

A pass is forcing when it is clear that your side has a decent majority of strength, and you are in a situation that both partners know that, because you do have the majority of strength, that you are going to win the contract, or that you are going to double their final contract. If you pass and partner passes, that didn't happen; your pass tells your partner he must take some action.

You have to have an agreement with partner on when the partnership thinks it has the majority of strength.

The following situations may be included or excluded by partnership agreement:

(A) One partner has made a bid that forces the side to game.

(B) One partner has shown game-invitational strength and has not shown a fit. (A standard 1H P 2D shows 11 or more points so I would say that is enough to say the side has the majority of strength. 1H P 3H says the same thing but it's much more likely that some of the strength comes from shortness, so opener could easily have 11 HCP and six hearts and responder could easily have 8 HCP and a singleton spade, so most partnerships do not say that this confirms the majority of strength. Also, 1C (P) 1H (1S) 3H shows an invitational hand for opener (17ish) but since 3 points could come from a singleton, there's a decent chance that your side does not have the opponents outgunned in power if responder is dead minimum.

While a lot of the points from 1H P 2D could come from distribution, I believe that you are better off in the long run if you say that confirms a majority of strength. Some pairs will disagree. You should discuss with a regular partner.

© Our side has bid game voluntarily using a strength-showing bid. 1C (1H) 1S (2H) 4S shows about 20 points - maybe some come from distribution but you should still have them outgunned. 1S P 4S, typically a preempt or "weak freak" does not establish the majority of strength because the 4S bid is not strength-showing. 1C (1H) 1S (4H) 4S isn't necessarily strength showing since you had to bid 4S to take it away from the opponents; you could be quite distributional.

(D) One opponent is a passed hand and the other preempted and one of us has shown strength. For example:


Even though East has only passed, the opponents are pretty clearly not bidding 5C to make and it makes sense for East-West to buy the contract or double North-South. If East passes, he is expressing doubt (probably between doubling 5C and bidding 5S; so East is saying he might have a suitable hand for E-W to play in 5S if West so desires.)

There are probably other situations as well. For example, you can say that opening 2C specifies the ownership of the hand and creates a forcing pass situation if the opponents compete.

If you think your partner doesn't know about forcing passes or won't respect the forcing nature of your forcing pass, you might have to act even though it's a pure guess, even when your side obviously has the balance of power.

Also, and I can't stress this enough, each partnership must decide which of the above situations (and any other situations) defines the balance of power and creates a forcing pass situation if the opponents compete. I personally would play all of (A), (B), © and (D) as defining that our side has the balance of power. Many players including experts will disagree. But if you can determine that your side has at least 25 HCP and both partners know that, all partnerships would (or should) agree that passes should be forcing.

1.

Spoiler



2.

Spoiler



3.

Spoiler



4.

Spoiler



5.

Assume your side plays negative doubles so your partner's 1S call shows five spades.
Spoiler

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#2 User is offline   Kaitlyn S 

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Posted 2017-January-03, 17:19

Answers: (Material that is more advanced is in blue.)

1.

Hint: Which side appears to have more strength?

Answer: A forcing pass situation only applies when your side has more strength than the opponents so that you must either play the contract or double their contract. Here, your opponents have made a 2/1 bid showing at least an invitational hand opposite an opening hand, and your partner has made a preemptive bid. Their side owns the balance of power, so partner's pass is not forcing. Be happy you pushed them to the five level and hope you can set them, but I wouldn't be surprised if the opponents could make slam. You should pass.


2.

Hint: What would your pass tell partner? Is that the message you want to send?

Answer: When your partner voluntarily bid game when you could (and do) have six points, he shows about 20. Your side has the balance of power and you are not going to let the opponents play undoubled. You can bid 5H, you can double 4S, or you can pass. Pass says you have doubt about whether doubling 4S or bidding 5H is correct. You shouldn't have any doubt; you have neither any extra strength or any extra distribution to want to play in 5H so you should make your preference known and double 4S. If you pass because you are weak, your partner has to do something and he might guess wrong and bid 5H which probably won't make. On the other hand, your partner's big hand and your A should be enough to set 4S.


3.

Hint: Do you have a vast preference for declaring or defending?

Answer: Although you can't be sure you can make 5H, you have a hand that is much more geared toward offense than defense. You don't want to defend against 5C when your heart high cards are likely to be useless on defense but are golden in a heart contract, and your distribution is great for play in hearts. I wouldn't be shocked if they could make 5C despite your partner's 2/1 response. You don't want to pass the decision to partner, you should just bid 5H.

You might think that your 5H bid would show strength and encourage partner to bid slam, whereas you could make your forcing pass, and then reluctantly bid 5H after partner doubles 5C to show a weak hand that wanted to play in hearts. Common expert practice is to reverse these meanings. If you make a forcing pass and then pull partner's double, you are showing a good hand and encouraging slam. There's another problem with passing with this hand and then pulling the double even if partner won't think it's strong: partner may think awhile and then double. Now you've put yourself in a no-win situation, if you successfully bid 5H, the director may roll it back to 5C doubled.



4.

Hint: Do you know what to do?

Answer: You really don't know what to do. Your partner's jump shift forced your side to game so it is your hand and if you pass, it would be forcing because both partners know your side has the balance of power. If your partner's hand is very distributional, your two minor suit kings are very good for offense. If your partner has almost a balanced hand, you want to double 4S as you have no fit (or possibly a weak heart fit.) It would be better to pass and let partner make the decision. Partner won't pass and will probably guess right based on his hand.

Note that while you are weak like on hand 2, this time your high cards might be just what partner needs so you don't double in a forcing pass situation just because you are weak. If you pass and partner bids 5 of a minor, you will probably make it because of your two minor suit kings. Contrast this hand to the following situation:



This time, even though you have more minor suit cards, you could have a worthless hand for partner's big minor two-suiter. There is no way you want to encourage partner to bid five of a minor with this hand and would double 4S to stop it from happening. If partner bids 5C or 5D, he's done so with the knowledge that you would rather defend and could have no help.


5.

Assume your side plays negative doubles so your partner's 1S call shows five spades.
Hint: Does your partner know you have the power for game?

We have 20 HCP. We know we have the balance of power. It would be so convenient to pass and let partner bid 4S with six or bid 5D with a nice fit in diamonds or double otherwise.

There's one problem with that strategy. Partner doesn't know it's our hand. Partner could have six points and for all he knows, you can have thirteen. A pass is only forcing if it's clear to both partners that your side has the balance of power and you must either play the hand or double the opponents. It is not clear to partner, so your pass would not be forcing. How disappointing would it be to hear partner pass?

Since pass isn't forcing, you must act. Your best call is Double. Partner should know that you don't have a heart stack since the opponents have shown a ten-card fit in the auction (when you double, partner can assume that East was preempting rather than bidding to make.) You may miss a club fit or maybe even a 6-2 spade fit but making a bid on your hand would be pure guesswork as well as misdescribing your hand should partner need to make another decision in the auction.
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#3 User is offline   mycroft 

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Posted 2017-January-04, 11:02

Nice set, and good explanations of why what decisions. All comments below should be considered Advanced.

Agree, need an agreement about pass-and-pull; also agreed that while pass-and-pull shows extras may not be the better agreement, it does have the benefit of defending against "the forcing double" - as you said, a hesitant double that says "I am not sure this is right either, back to you partner." At least with the agreement that pass-and-pull is STRONG, you have the argument that "look, this is clearly a slam try; I'm not just running from a 'don't have it' double."

There are also auctions that are "forcing to..." and there should be agreements about passing vs bidding vs doubling vs bidding to the forced level. Examples:
1) 1NT-X-XX (penalty). Decide how far this auction is forcing on the opening side (and what pass means vs double).
2) 1-p-3 (7-9, 4+spades, Bergen Raise)-3. We're forced to 3 anyway; my belief is that opener's 3 call is the weakest bid he can make and pass is stronger.

Also, even if you think that they can make their call, when you're in a forcing auction by your agreements, and partner forcing-passes to you, pick something. Don't pass. Even if it's right this time and defending undoubled is your best score, it will cause your partner to stop leaving the decisions up to you, and partner will not always make the right decision (that's why she wanted to pass it to you in the first place).
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#4 User is offline   JLilly 

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Posted 2017-June-14, 22:58

Scrolled past everything but the OP, didn't look at spoilers.

Pre-spoilers:

1. N’s bid is not constructive and is based on long . Pass.

2. N’s bid can’t be based on long , since N opened in rather than in . 4-card suit and enough to go to game opposite a minimum response from S. As S, you have nothing extra to offer — bare minimum HCP and only 4 hearts. N should interpret a pass as weak.

3. They should be doubled or you should play in 5 if ptr has a maximum, and partner knows this. Your hand is borderline with 2 1/2 quick-tricks and 4-and-only-4-card support for , so pass and let partner decide whether to double or bid 5. If you were short in hearts that would give you extra cause to double (chance for a ruff).

4. Double. Bad distribution for EW, and your doubleton kings in the minors mesh well with your partner’s minor bids.

5. Them doubled down 2 is 300; Our game is 420. You have to double them for penalty or bid 4 with a likely 5-2 fit. I’d guess that doubling is better.
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#5 User is offline   JLilly 

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Posted 2017-June-14, 23:01

Post-spoilers, haven't changed my mind. Confidence or recalcitrance -- you be the judge.
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#6 User is offline   JLilly 

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Posted 2017-June-14, 23:08

Hmm, I see I didn't get your answers for some of the questions. But it's funny how we got to the same answer on Q5 through very different means!
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#7 User is offline   Kaitlyn S 

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Posted 2017-June-14, 23:46

View PostJLilly, on 2017-June-14, 23:08, said:

Hmm, I see I didn't get your answers for some of the questions. But it's funny how we got to the same answer on Q5 through very different means!
I hope that you at least understand my answers, for if not, I've done a poor job of explaining them!
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#8 User is offline   Tramticket 

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Posted 2017-June-15, 05:13

Nice set Kaitlyn. It got me thinking.

I agreed with your answers and I'm sure that my regular partner would be on the same wavelength ... but there were a couple of things in the commentary worth checking with her!
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#9 User is offline   Kaitlyn S 

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Posted 2017-June-15, 08:47

View PostTramticket, on 2017-June-15, 05:13, said:

Nice set Kaitlyn. It got me thinking.

I agreed with your answers and I'm sure that my regular partner would be on the same wavelength ... but there were a couple of things in the commentary worth checking with her!
I was surprised to see this set pop up - it was posted in January and I've done several others since.
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