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don't get me wrong, I am talking here just as a student of the game, not as a lecturer, so take all of the following as "thinking aloud", not as lecturing.
We ordinary players are taught many principles, such as:
1. Principle 1: if you invite heavy, then pard accepts light (or viceversa if you wish).
Here the principle is the same: if one is aggressive, the other one should be conservative, *unless the hand has some special feature*.
I simply do not believe that KQJxxx in an unsupported suit, RED vs white is a special feature, but give me the KQJTxx and I will (or if we are white, then even down 1 doubled or -2 undoubled could be a good gamble vs opps likely partscore)
I have seen way too many hands where KQJxxx lost 2 tricks in the suit, when pard did not support in the bidding.
2. Principle 2
Do not play pard for the magic hand.
Here, opener rebids 3D and even if pard produces an 8 count, we are off 1.
And note that pard's hand is among the best 8 count he could produce: think if he had a singleton or a void in diamonds, with a shapely hand.
Really, I am not trying to be "resulting": I do think that responder has a pretty good 8 count and yet we are off 1.
If we allowed responder to bid the same way with just 2 kings, here we would be easily off 2 or 3.
Finally: I know a decent bridge player should not rely on slogans but analyze every single deal, critically.
However, sometimes old, trivial wisdom does work out (after all it is just a set of empirically-derived principles, which - on average - have worked in the past, just as the common thinking that 26 hcp = game).
But here, in my opinion, there are too many "old wisdoms" to violate (including vulnerability issues and the fact that we should be wary to compete at the 3 level in no fit auctions).
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That does not mean that both players did not take correct probabilistic actions. It simply means that they didn't work out.
I agree that sometimes the deck was just dealt in a magic manner by the God of bridge and percentage actions fail. When this happens, I agree that one should just shrug and accept it.
But sometimes bad results could indeed be foreseen in advance, without dismissing them with the motto "***** happens".
I do think that - in this specific instance - the bad result was predictable from the earlier bidding.
However, if double indeed promises a minimum of 8 hcp, it might fall in the "grey area".
But, back to my main point, I meant that, if we indeed allow for superlight negative doubles when red vs white, I think that THIS really increases the chances for such accidents.
But perhaps this is only the influence of my current readings ("Picture bidding" by Al Roth, together to the "Galactic guide for hitchhikers"
)So, Justin, just pass me the crack pipe