[42]

Good morning all! I hope you had a Happy Easter
I found some time to play, and we had different opinions in this hand:

Scoring: IMP

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The bidding went
(1♣) 1♥ (pass) 2♣ = exactly 3 ♥s 10+, or any strong hand without fit
3♣ ??
Wich action is ok with overcaller's hand and why? Are there some "guidelines"?
Thx and sunny greetings!
Caren

[whereagles]

The guideline is to bid game 4♥ thus. This has a fair chance because the spade king is probably as good as the ace and pard rates to be short in clubs.

If you're REALLY worried about going down in 4♥, I guess you can try 3♦ and hope pard understands you're running out of space for game tries.

[mikeh]

I would bid 3♥.

While this may sound merely competitive, partner will know that I did not make a preemptive jump overcall, and so my hand should be stronger than a red v white 2♥ overcall. He should be able to get us to game if we have a decent play for 10 tricks.

In fact, there is, in my view, a greater possibility of 3♥ being an overbid than of our missing game due to being too conservative. One can construct a lot of 10-12 count hands on which we have no play for game... even with a doubleton ♣ over there.

[FrancesHinden]

What mikeh said.

3♥ tells partner you probably have a 6th heart, and thus were too good for a weak jump (in fact, at red, a weak jump wouldn't have been unreasonable).

You aren't worth game or anything like. Just tell partner what your hand is about.

[42]

My bid was 3♥ (it felt natural ), p said 4♥ with
♠ Q92
♥ 842
♦ AQJ9
♣ QJ4 .

He suggested that I should pass, he never lets them play 3♣ and bids 3♥ himself. I said that I wanted to express the more offensive character of my hand with my 6th ♥, he took it for an invitation. I was more and more confused like so often when I start to think deeper: is pass weaker (HCP) than 3♥ in this context? Since the range for an overcall is 8-16: how can I invite opposite a partner who has 3° support and 10+? Perhaps our methods have still some holes

[whereagles]

What a junkish hand to bid 4... lol. Better try for 3NT instead of 4♥, no? Bet that makes (if not, then opps are cold for 4♠!).

[Codo]

I think, that after 3 ♣
pass had shown weakness with normaly 5 Hearts, very seldom with 6.
3 Heart showed your hand, but with a little more playing strength
X shows = ? tolerance for the unbid suits?
3 NT: Stoppers and a little extra. (Enough to play 4 Heart, if pd just has 10 + HCP and 3 Hearts)
4 ♣ strong hand with Club control

So I am with your part. and had believed in additional strength for your 3 Heart bid. And even if you downgrade his 13 HCPS 3343 with too many quaks, his 4 Heart bid was still reasonable.

[inquiry]

42, on Apr 18 2006, 05:44 AM, said:

I was more and more confused like so often when I start to think deeper: is pass weaker (HCP) than 3♥ in this context? Since the range for an overcall is 8-16: how can I invite opposite a partner who has 3° support and 10+? Perhaps our methods have still some holes

Pass is weaker than 3♥. If your parnters bid had force to the 3 level in ♥, then pass would be stronger than 3♥. This is not the case here, presumably over 2♣ if you had been given a chance to rebid 2♥ partner could have passed.

If you pass i am not sure your partner has a 3♥ call, his QJ of clubs are defensive, his spade queen is questionable, his shape is horrible, and if you have only 5 trumps, LOTT is violated, and if you can have four hearts (no longer possible after 3♣ rebid and your partner's 3 card ♣ suit) really violated.

Since pass is the weakest bid, anything else here shows extras by definition. I think 2♥ over 1♣ would have been my choice at this vul.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

3H, wtp?

It tells partner, that you have add. strength,
and no interest in a penalty dbl, ... most
likely it shows a 6th card.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[pclayton]

3♥ is fine, if its agreed as merely competitive, which is how most of the educati play it.

I play 3♦ as non-specific game try here.

[han]

Your 3H seems absolutely correct to me. Once again your partner blames you for mistakes he has made.

2C showed partner's hand. There is no reason to bid 4H, none at all.

The suggestion that your partner never lets them play 3C and bids 3H himself is absurd in my eyes.

[Free]

I agree, 3♥ is the perfect bid: showing extra length but no GF. It's somewhere between Dbl (competitive) and pass (nothing to say). 4♥ is the poor bid in this auction imo, not 3♥.

[mikeh]

Having seen your partner's hand, I suspect that he was attacking your bid to avoid having to admit that he made a bad bid... a regrettable but very human reaction.

Actually, I think that his correct bid, if he is not to pass, is 3N, and, on the hand, 3N is a good contract if ♥ behave: in fact it is almost certainly cold.

If they lead ♣ (and it matters not if they lead low or go AK and clear the suit) you run the ♥ and opener is squeezed, assuming he holds the ♦K and the ♠A: you have to read his shape in the endgame, but if he keeps enough ♣ to beat you, he cannot hold onto both the ♠A and Kx of ♦. So if he holds enough ♣ to beat you, drop his now singleton ♦K and make overtricks

However, regardless of how the ♥ really were, I think that your partner made a mistake by bidding 4♥ on such soft values: his ♥ are so bad that even if you held a doubleton ♣, 3 rounds of ♣ would almost certainly casue a problem... if your trumps were solid, then you must have ♠/♦ losers else you would have bid game.

[HeartA]

42, on Apr 18 2006, 05:44 AM, said:

My bid was 3♥ (it felt natural ), p said 4♥ with
♠ Q92
♥ 842
♦ AQJ9
♣ QJ4 .

He suggested that I should pass, he never lets them play 3♣ and bids 3♥ himself. I said that I wanted to express the more offensive character of my hand with my 6th ♥, he took it for an invitation. I was more and more confused like so often when I start to think deeper: is pass weaker (HCP) than 3♥ in this context? Since the range for an overcall is 8-16: how can I invite opposite a partner who has 3° support and 10+? Perhaps our methods have still some holes

I would bid 3♥ as well. That dummy hand, ugliest shape, useless CQJx, questionable SQ and no honors in H, to bid 2C was enough. 4H was totally out of line.

[Codo]

I got to know, that "all" agree with 3 ♥ and that this bid should show just one single hand type: A bad hand - in the context of the bidding- no GF with a sixt heart.

Ok, so this is how you play it. Please explain me, why do you play it this way?

I see two downsides with this common approach:

Pd may have two different hand types:
1. Strong with a own suit, then you just took away bidding space from him. F.E. with Axx,x,AKQJxx,xxx he now can introduce his suit with 4 ♦. This is no good news, esp. not, if you look at Jxx,AKxxxx,xx,Ax.
2. Or he has 3 card support with about 10 HCPs in which case, he must pass now, hoping that you just have a real weak hand and not
Bxxx, AKxxxx,Kx,x.
If you had played pass shows a weak hand, then he can bid 3 Heart with his given hand and you can bid 4 if you want to with additional distributional strength.

Of course, the upside of the common approach is, that there are other situations in contested bidding, where 3 ♥ exactly shows a 6 card suit and no interest in game, so this is easy to remember. But there must be more upsides, so please share these secrets with me.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

just a couple of comments

- Most likely you play the cards better than me,
but I doubt that opposite a average overcall a
hand like
Axx,x,AKQJxx,xxx
justifies a force to game, and if you bid 2C followed
by 3D, you force the partnership to game

- Sometimes you need to make a decision, if your hand
warrants a move to game or not, i.e. you will need to decide
if your limit raise is min / max.
3H is not weak, it is stronger than pass,
it is encouraging, but non-forcing
simlar to 3H in the seq.
1H - 2H
3H - ...
i.e. it just asks, if the raise is max. or min.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[Codo]

thanks for your comments, now I red the comments again and learned, that most showed something extra with the 3 Heart bid.
Frances mentioned, that red against green, a preempt is close to Carens hand, so when you are just a little bid stronger then a preempt, why do you have to bid with Carens hand again, if this should show something extra?

[P_Marlowe]

Codo, on Apr 19 2006, 06:10 AM, said:

thanks for your comments, now I red the comments again and learned, that most showed something extra with the 3 Heart bid. 
Frances mentioned, that red against green, a preempt is close to Carens hand, so when you are just a little bid stronger then a preempt, why do you have to bid with Carens hand again, if this should show something extra?

Hi,

As always a matter of style.

In my partnership, the hand would qualify for
a red vs. green 2H weak jump overcall, altough
a more precise describtion would be intermediate
jump overcall (6 card suit, min. opening strength).

If you do not play that style, you have to bid 1H, ...
and the hand is better than a min. 1H overcall, ... take
away the 6th heart, and the King of spade and I would still
overcall 1H, but again, a matter of partnership agreement.

Does

xx
AKxxx
xx
xxx

qualify for a 1H overcall red vs. green, if not does

x
AKxxx
xx
xxxx

and so on ...

And if one of the hand above qualifies for a 1H overcall
you have something to spare, when holding the original
hand.

With kind regards
Marlowe