[sceptic]

Scoring: IMP

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West North East South

 -     -     Pass  Pass
 3♠    3NT   Pass  Pass
 Pass  

[hrothgar]

3♠ is perfectly reasonable... Its good to muddy the waters in 3rd seat. I'm guessing that it worked well here.

3NT looks pretty normal. Obviously, it didn't work too well.

South's pass also looks reasonable. Correcting the contract to Hearts on a 5 card suit seems pretty unilateral.

Me, I'd congratulate West on his 3S opening and move on

[sceptic]

reason for bid, pard was a passed hand, we wre doing extremely badly at mps and I thought if 4th seat overcalls or x's, I would probably end in 3 spades anyway so why not bid it any way, I had confidence my p would not raise me even with a good passed hand.

was it really a crap shoot Justin?

[hrothgar]

Jlall, on Sep 19 2005, 01:42 AM, said:

just my opinion. some like the bid (like richard). i do not see your hand as one that would force to 3S if you open 1S and partner never bid. having confidence in partner not raising is fine, but what if you ARE cold for 4S?

Not sure if I like the bid per see, but I do like the strategy...

The opponents are often very smart people.
If they can predict what you do, they can optimize arround it.

If you shake things up a bit, you give them a severe case of heartburn. At they very least, they have to spend a lot more time trying to figure out whats going on.

I consider an occasional 3♠ opening with the hand in question part of the cost of doing business. And, once in a while, you even get a nice plus out of it. :-)

[ochinko]

3Sp seems like a good bid here. Your 7 loser hand is actually an 8 loser hand given that you expect the strength in the opps line to be behind your back, so you won't miss a spade game since there can't be one. If you are going to compete to the third level with this hand, now is as good a time as any. Opps could not only misplace their game, they can even go to slam or to a game when they don't have one anywhere for fearing they are being robbed.

You can only go wrong when both of these conditions are met:
1. Opps doesn't have a game or you go down more than 1 doubled.
2. Points in opps' line are concentrated in one hand, and the long spades are in the other, since hardly anyone plays a double for penalties here.

Chances are that even if 3Sp go down and opps don't have a game you'll be ahead of all the pairs that competed to the 3rd level since only you would play it without a double.

Dangerous vulns, yes, but still a good move, since it works out better in more scenarios than this particular deal.

Petko

[Beto]

I totally agree with justin...

One hand from the sydney WYTC :

Scoring: IMP

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You, in east, pass, LHO passes, partner opens 3♠ and RHO bids 4♥.

Do you double 4♥?
In a good day opps will correct to 5 of a minor and will go down 1. On a bad day, they will correct to 6 of a minor and will make. Pass is the best choice here, as maybe opps wont find a possible 5-5 minor fit.

However, in this deal partner had:

AQ10xxx in spades and KQxx in clubs and was void in hearts. So any contract will go down a lot and because you opened 3♠ you cant double them.

[han]

I wouldn't mind 3S with the colors reversed. When vulnerable I would never bid it.

There is a big difference between stretching to bid 3C/3D or stretching to bid 3S. When you open 3S, you are far more often left to play there, doubled or undoubled.

Richard's argument sounds appealing, but does it really hold? If your 3S bid shows a good 7-card spade suit (at these colors) and less than 12 HCP's, will it really be easier for the opponents? Even if they know that you are exactly KQJxxxx x QJx xx, will they know whether it is safe to enter at the 4-level? Will they know whether you will go down? I think there is only one person at the table who knows: your partner.

I agree that preempts can become less diciplined when your partner has passed. However, at these colors you should still bid fairly conservatively with bad hands, and don't give up on games with good hands.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

I dont like the 3S bid, but since it worked,
it was perfect.

3 NT is normal.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[ochinko]

Jlall, on Sep 19 2005, 02:32 AM, said:

ochinko, on Sep 18 2005, 06:02 PM, said:

You can only go wrong when both of these conditions are met:
1. Opps doesn't have a game or you go down more than 1 doubled.
2. Points in opps' line are concentrated in one hand, and the long spades are in the other, since hardly anyone plays a double for penalties here.

What about when it's

A ) your hand and you just get too high. You have 13 points and spades, why could this not be your hand?

B ) You get to the wrong strain. Why is this so unimaginable? Is AKxxxx automatically trumps these days?

C ) You miss a game. Do you always have this hand for a preempt?

D ) You push the opps into a game they would not have bid otherwise.

I also don't agree that you'll be ahead of all the other pairs who competed to 3S anyways because they'll be Xed and you won't. Would you really compete all the way to 3S on this hand opposite no encouragement?

A ) Yes, it's possible that 2Sp is the highest part score that makes but bidding slowly allows the opps to find a cheap sacrifice, or their best defense.

B ) Most of the time I play multi and Muiderberg so partner can't have 6 hearts or 5 hearts with a 4 card minor. We also open 2NT with both minors, weak. Even without those gadgets, though, it really looks like we're going to make the biggest number of tricks if spades are trump.

C ) This is not impossible. Partner can have the perfect hand that makes 4Sp:

with ♦K onside

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or

with ♦K onside

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Yet it's more likely there is no 4♠. I could be wrong.

D ) Yes, I hate it when this happens, especially after a bold preempt from me that won't appear at most tables. But that's bridge. You can't win all the boards. You just try to adopt a winning strategy that gets you good results most of the time.

E ) I certainly won't compete at the third level not encouraged but even if partner bids 2Sp and opps push us to 3Sp there's no guarantee it would make.

Even if you're not shaky as Hrothgar sugests, and all the players at the table know that in 3rd position you could have either 7 spades or 6 good spades with 2 aces, opps are not better off against your methods.

Petko

[Jurek S]

Congratulations for the hunter, sometime it's just happend to me

[mikeh]

I do not understand 3♠, even tho it worked. The argument that it was mps doesn't impress me. Red v white, are we so sure that we belong at the 3-level?

In addition to the comments expressed by others, there is one more matter, which for me is decisive.

These kind of bids take partner out of the game. The argument that 'mixing' our bidding style robs the opps of the ability to bid accurately makes little sense at mps.

You are generally playing 2 boards against each pair. So you do this on the 1st board? This is supposed to affect how they play against you on the next?

Meanwhile, there is one important player at the table who may well be confused by your bidding style and who may well go wrong on this hand or later hands. Your partner

Making bids that have no resemblance to your hand can be very effective in the short term, but partnership-destroying in the long term.

OTOH, I rarely win at mps: maybe my approach is why

[plaur]

Sceptic, were you playing variable preempts Luis Lrargerich style? This is a 6-7 according to Luis. So was this a 6-7 with your partner? 1st hand vul vs vul is also a 6-7 . I think I would not open 3♠ 1st hand with this.

[whereagles]

3S was a bit frisky. 2S is probably better, but hey you can't argue with sucess.

[sceptic]

Quote

Sceptic, were you playing variable preempts Luis Lrargerich style? This is a 6-7 according to Luis. So was this a 6-7 with your partner? 1st hand vul vs vul is also a 6-7 . I think I would not open 3♠ 1st hand with this.

actually I dont play that with this p, I really thought 3 spades was a bid opps would be pushed on, if 4th seat opened I would prob end in 3 spades anyway, but heck I have loads to learn, I do make some real dumb ass bids

[Beto]

Jlall, on Sep 18 2005, 11:16 PM, said:

Welcome to the forums beto

ty justin