[kgr]

AQTxx
75
Void
AQxxxx

I had a discussion with a good player at the club.
You play some kind of SAYC or SEF.
MP's, your are dealer. (Vul unknown)
What do you open?
Please with comment and %

Thanks!
Koen

[jdeegan]

1♣. I am in a distinct minority these days, but I have found that by starting with 1♣, I can continue bidding spades for two more rounds almost regardless of partner's or the opponents' bids. AND, IT WORKS! because I have so much playing strength. For example:

1♣-1♥-Pass-2♥
2♠-4♥-Pass-Pass
4♠

[mike777]

1C and I feel strongly about this.

I am going to bid my suits in order of length and do not plan to stop short of 4s.

If everyone passes 1c so be it....but I expect p to bid often even with zero hcp

and zero clubs.

If Whereeagle does not open 1S I will be shocked...shocked I tell you.

[Kalvan14]

1♣, without any doubt. clubs/spades is the most difficult 2-suiter to show after opening 1♠ [and normally you are unable to]. Quite likely that opps will show a red suit too. Another reason for keeping spades in reserve

[whereagles]

mike777, on May 31 2006, 12:39 AM, said:

1C and I feel strongly about this.
If Whereeagle does not open 1S I will be shocked...shocked I tell you.

You might be in for an even greater shock than you think... I'm considering opening this 4-loser hand 2♣

But since the weather is cloudy here, I'll settle for 1♠

[hatchett]

1♣ and not particularly close for me.

[lowerline]

kgr, on May 30 2006, 06:40 PM, said:

AQTxx
75
Void
AQxxxx

I had a discussion with a good player at the club.
You play some kind of SAYC or SEF.
MP's, your are dealer. (Vul unknown)
What do you open?
Please with comment and %

Thanks!
Koen

1♣ always. Even opening 1♣ with 55 in the blacks has some technical merit, so why would you want to open 1♠ with 5♠6♣?
I consider it more of a problem with 5♥6minor... Then the strength is important, but I will open a 4LT hand always with the longest suit.

[Free]

Here there will be no problems with rebids, so 1♣ (planning to bid 1♠ and 2♠ after this)

[hotShot]

1♣ , I'm strong enough to bid up to 4♠ next round, if opps force me to.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

I open my 6 card suit.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[P_Marlowe]

jdeegan, on May 30 2006, 07:36 PM, said:

1♣. I am in a distinct minority these days, but I have found that by starting with 1♣, I can continue bidding spades for two more rounds almost regardless of partner's or the opponents' bids. AND, IT WORKS! because I have so much playing strength. For example:

1♣-1♥-Pass-2♥
2♠-4♥-Pass-Pass
4♠

Good luck, if they start to dbl.

2S is fine, but over 4H pass, you
told your story, if partner cant make
a move, 4S will be expensive.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[mcphee]

Some 6-5 hands are problems to be able to show your shape, generally 5H and a 6 card minor, or 5S-6H minimums. When you are not going to be faced with this problem I can't see what the problem is to open 1C.

The advantages to opening 1C are strong, the biggest being you can not get shut out of S. 1C also allows you to hear more things.

The player who opens this hand 1S seems to feel that C will never be the spot to play, really absurd IMO, being kind.

[whereagles]

mcphee, on May 31 2006, 01:59 PM, said:

The player who opens this hand 1S seems to feel that C will never be the spot to play

That's not it, at least not for me. The 1♠ opening is done mainly because it makes pard's life easier if LHO acts.

[bid_em_up]

jdeegan, on May 30 2006, 07:36 PM, said:

1♣. I am in a distinct minority these days,

1♣

These days, I believe you will find more and more top players opening their 6 card suit first, although it didnt use to be that way.

[david_c]

whereagles, on May 31 2006, 03:09 PM, said:

mcphee, on May 31 2006, 01:59 PM, said:

The player who opens this hand 1S seems to feel that C will never be the spot to play

That's not it, at least not for me. The 1♠ opening is done mainly because it makes pard's life easier if LHO acts.

I would say this hand is a two-bid hand, by which I mean that you are intending to take a second free bid in competition even if the auction has got quite high. Thus, your aim is to describe your hand as accurately as possible in two calls. So you are not really very worried about what partner does on the first round, it's more important that you choose the bid which will enable you to complete the description of your hand next time. The way to do this is to open 1♣.

Having said all that, I often play systems where I am forced to open 1♠ on this type of hand (because 1♣ would be artificial) and I don't feel it's a significant loss to do that.

[whereagles]

david_c, on May 31 2006, 02:34 PM, said:

I would say this hand is a two-bid hand, by which I mean that you are intending to take a second free bid in competition even if the auction has got quite high. Thus, your aim is to describe your hand as accurately as possible in two calls.

Well, this bidding strategy is ok, of course. My main problem is how to convince pard you have a 65 in only two bids, e.g.

1♣ (1♥) pass (3♥)
3♠

will pard take this for a 65? Maybe he should, but that's not a certainty. The comparable action in my approach would be

1♠ (2♥) pass (3♥)
4♣

or

1♠ (2♥) 2♠ (3♥)
4♣

Pretty much the same thing, I guess.. except perhaps for the uncertainty of pard reading the original 3♠ as a 65.

[Echognome]

whereagles, on May 31 2006, 02:46 PM, said:

Well, this bidding strategy is ok, of course. My main problem is how to convince pard you have a 65 in only two bids, e.g.

1♣ (1♥) pass (3♥)
3♠

will pard take this for a 65? Maybe he should, but that's not a certainty. The comparable action in my approach would be

1♠ (2♥) pass (3♥)
4♣

or

1♠ (2♥) 2♠ (3♥)
4♣

Pretty much the same thing, I guess.. except perhaps for the uncertainty of pard reading the original 3♠ as a 65.

You don't need to convince partner. He knows you are 46 or 56 or whatever. But he knows one thing for certain and that is that your clubs are longer than your spades. In some cases the bid will be made on 55, but that is up to style of partnership.

Whereas if you start with spades, partner will NEVER believe you have longer clubs than spades. Since spades is your second suit, I don't see what the problem is. I'd have more of an issue if my suits were hearts and clubs.

The other big difference between the two sequences is that you are forcing your partner to choose one half-level higher bidding spades first. That is to say, when your partner corrects back to spades, he will be one level higher, whereas if he stays with clubs, it will be the same. That could be disasterous.

[mikeh]

If we posed this as a problem to the BW for their Master Solvers Club, the hand would be rejected because the answer to the question is obvious. I doubt that one true expert in 100 would open 1♠: this is a classic 1♣ wtp? hand. Note, that I am speaking in terms of a standard type method, not a big club method.

Contrary to some of the minority views expressed here, ths hand is MUCH easier to handle in competition after 1♣ than after 1♠.

By opening 1♣ and rebidding ♠ at whatever level is required (including 4♠ if they bounce) we describe our hand accurately to partner... and this is a heck of a playing hand if we catch any fit at all...bearing in mind that the odds of us having some fit increase as the opposition prempting increases.

Without backing away from that argument, why do we have to assume, when we pick up this hand, that the opps are going to be able to bounce? Maybe partner has a decent hand with the reds. Now look at the havoc we inflict upon ourselves via 1♠. We are NEVER going to be able to show our shape... partner will be unable to ever picture our hand.


Of course, it was easy to predict the poster who chose 1♠...... some people don't need partners

[whereagles]

Echognome, on May 31 2006, 02:53 PM, said:

1.
You don't need to convince partner. He knows you are 46 or 56 or whatever. But he knows one thing for certain and that is that your clubs are longer than your spades. In some cases the bid will be made on 55, but that is up to style of partnership.

2.
The other big difference between the two sequences is that you are forcing your partner to choose one half-level higher bidding spades first. That is to say, when your partner corrects back to spades, he will be one level higher, whereas if he stays with clubs, it will be the same. That could be disasterous.

1. There is a big difference between 64 and 65... much more than between 56 and 55. And if you dump some 55s into the mix, pard would have to be a genious to figure out what you have.

2. That's just half the story. The other half is that pard won't be forced to prefer spades because he would have already supported them at that stage. So almost all of the time pard will have either already supported spades, or a club preference. That makes a 1-level-higher spade preference a minor issue (can be there, though, especially with a weakish hand).

[Echognome]

Mike brings up a good point. I play a strong club system, so have to open 1♠ systemically. I consider this a small loss on these hands. It doesn't mean we will lose on every hand we open 1♠ (and if partner relays he can find out i'm 56). I just feel that on average we are worse off than those that get to open the hand 1♣. I of course, trade it off for the accuracy we get with other bids, but that's a different story.