[pclayton]

I think its possible after: 1♣ - 1♠ - 2♠ - 4♥ (splinter). With North's primes maybe a positive move could be made.

But its a pretty tough slam to reach. Don't lose too much sleep over this one.

[hrothgar]

FrancesHinden, on Dec 14 2005, 01:22 PM, said:

I'm not entirely clear about the 2S response. It seems it wasn't a strong jump shift (which is lucky for Richard, because if it was a strong jump shift I was about to very rude about North's bidding).

Rude comments regarding my bidding are probably entirely appropriate... (More importantly, I have a pretty thick hide)

Regardless of whether or not Katherine had ab appropriate hand for a SJS, she had it marked on her profile and I was operating under the assumption that we were playing SJS. With this said and done, I we had no agreements regarding serious 3NT or Last Train and I assumed that these were off...

From my perspective, I felt a bit trapped by the 4♦ bid. I was sitting on the AK of Clubs, so I knew that Jilly was denying a Club control. With this said and done, I didn't have any kind of Heart control...

My big question is what would a 5♦ bid say about Hearts and/or CLubs...

[han]

Very good Justin, keep working on those basics. Pm me if you would like some book recommendations.

[mikeh]

jillybean2, on Dec 14 2005, 05:47 AM, said:

Thanks, back to basics again.
I wish this thread would just go away. 

Sorry, jb: I happen to think that this is a great thread. We tend to get a little overboard in this forum with special treatments and weird methods, so getting back to basics is precisely what this section should be about.

In North American 'standard' methods, there are two main uses for the immediate jump shift response by an unpassed hand without competition. Please note that there are minority views in such sequences as 1♣ 2♦ and so on, but I am dealing here with mainstream methods.

One is to play the jumpshift as a weak jump shift: the point range varies... some play very weak, some play 3-6 or 4-7 etc, always with a 6 or 7 card suit.

More common, at least traditionally, was the power-house jump shift. There was a time that it merely promised game values but it has long been more popular, in NA, to play it as substantially more: at least mild slam interest.

More recently still (maybe the last 25 years or so) it has become common amongst more advanced players to use the strong version with one of two hand types: a single-suiter with a very good (6+) suit and some side cards or a two-suiter: at least 5 cards in the bid suit and excellent support for opener's suit. In such a method, the partnership can play in only responder's suit or notrump (with the first variety) or either of opener's and responder's suits or notrump (with the second variety).

This treatment became playable because the bridge community (again, I am speaking of NA here since I have limited experience elsewhere) generally adopted other ways of showing lesser but still game force hands, such as the one you held.

After a 2♠ raise, as would have occurred here, your hand is borderline but does contain modest slam hopes. (BTW, having Jump shifted, you have NO 'blame' for failing to reach the magic slam, and if your partner knew that your jumpshift could be weakish (as it was) then neither does he).

1♣ 1♠ 2♠

4♥ as a splinter is probably the only conceivable way to reach slam, since north now knows that everything he has is working overtime. But even so, he opened a hand that quite a few would pass and his ♠ suit is not great. So I would not blame either side for missing slam.

On your auction, you should absolutely NOT even think about driving towards slam yourself, whether by blasting or using that horribly over-used device known as 4N.

Such mehtods involved a non-jump response of 1♠ (on your hand).

If partner bid a new suit, then 4th suit forcing was available.
Note, however, that a new suit here would require a reverse, and that adds a layer of complexity to the discussion that I will now ignore.

If partner rebids 1N, then you could logically jump to 4♠, because your hand is not strong enough to go slamming opposite a 1N rebid.

If partner rebids 2♣, then most advanced players (I mean truly advanced) would use 2♦ as an artificial force, but if that were not available, you would have to use 3♠ as forcing: this is unpopular, since then you have real trouble with a similar but slightly weaker (invitational) hand. This dilemma is why the artificial 2♦ 'stall' is used after 1♣ 1Major 2♣

If your hand were stronger and/if you held a 5 card ♠ suit, then after a 1N rebid by partner, you would use some form of new minor forcing. I strongly recommend that you (and your partner(s)) study the so-called two way nmf. I did a post on my comprehensive methods some time ago, but many good players play a variant of the method. Old fashione d new minor is still commonly used by most tournament players in your part of the world, but it is markedly inferior to 2-way, and you will impress the heck out of your friends (at least, the smart ones) if you adopt the 2 way treatment