[Double !]

These are the hands (I mean the times) that try man's souls, aka: drive me nuts.
You are playing Precision with a wonderful partner for the first time in an 8-board online matchpoint tourney. You have had very little time to discuss much. However, you feel that you are having a pretty good game, might be in contention for 1st place. Two boards to go when you pick up the following hand, all red:
Again: both sides are vulnerable. Your are playing basic Precision (1♣ = 16+/ 1NT = 13-15) Scoring format is Matchpoints.

♠ KQJ642, ♥ K, ♦ 5, ♣ KQ962

The bidding has gone as follows:
Partner/ dealer: Pass
rho: pass
you: 1 Spade
lho: 2 hearts

partner: 3 spades (not discussed)
rho: 3 NT*
You: Your call ?

(note #1: you and partner have not discussed jump-raises in competition. I doubt that it really matters on this hand.)
(note #2: what do you make of rho's 3NT bid having initially been a passed hand? What does the bid suggest about lho's hand? Does this impact at all on your choice of action?)

What is your call after rho bids 3NT? (I anticipate that most people will select the same answer for this poll. This is not the end of the story. Guess you sort of already knew that.)

What level do you anticipate the bidding will wind up at? The 4-level, 5-level, 6-level?

No only looking for people's recommended action over rho's 3NT, but rationale behind any anticipated further develops in the bidding.

TYIA----enjoy

DHL:

[whereagles]

3NT is either

a. a genuine overbid on a passed hand
b. a bluff, trying to talk you out of a game
c. a proposal to defend 4♠ if pard's overcall was done on an offensive hand

If it's the case a. or b., the right bid is 4♠. If it's c., then overcaller probably doesn't know it's case c., so 4♠ is still the right bid.

However, if LHO knows he's in case c., then 4♣ is better.

[pclayton]

Your wonderful partner has made a limit raise or better in spades. 3N is just noise, preparing to run to 4♥ if doubled.

Try 4♣, this will help pard make the right decision over 5♥. It also sets up a forcing sequence.

[cherdano]

pclayton, on Jan 21 2007, 10:01 PM, said:

Try 4♣, this will help pard make the right decision over 5♥. It also sets up a forcing sequence.

It also helps them find 5♥. I am not sure what is best here.

[gwnn]

4♠, for all of the following:

-it is not clear why it is not the best technical bid
-it ties for the least misunderstandable call available (with X)
-puts pressure on opps

[helene_t]

pclayton, on Jan 21 2007, 10:01 PM, said:

Your wonderful partner has made a limit raise or better in spades. 3N is just noise, preparing to run to 4♥ if doubled.

Try 4♣, this will help pard make the right decision over 5♥. It also sets up a forcing sequence.

(Flush) No I didn't help me make the right decision, maybe it should have. In any case, it's a good idea.

Why would 4♣ set up a force? Opps bid 3NT after we were in an inv+ situation, so someone is either bluffing or counting ZAR points. Dbl is the way to expose a bluff, 4♣ does not show values, just clubs.

[Double !]

[quote name='helene_t' date='Jan 21 2007, 06:03 PM'] Try 4[cl], this will help pard make the right decision over 5[he]. It also sets up a forcing sequence. [/QUOTE]
(Flush) No I didn't help me make the right decision, maybe it should have. In any case, it's a good idea.

Why would 4[cl] set up a force? Opps bid 3NT after we were in an inv+ situation, so someone is either bluffing or counting ZAR points. Dbl is the way to expose a bluff, 4[cl] does not show values, just clubs. [/QUOTE]




I don't see how a 4 club bid can be setting up a forcing situation. My hand was limited by the fact that I didn't open with a strong 1 club bid.

By the way, I just checked and must apologize as I made an error in my original posting of the bidding on this hand. The bidding had gone pass-pass-1 Spade-2 Hearts-3 Spades (not 3 Hearts) prior to rho's 3NT bid.

My bad

DHL

[Double !]

Jlall, on Jan 21 2007, 10:42 PM, said:

Bid 4D so they choose to defend 4S because they have diamonds...lol.

now, that's a thought!



DHL

[han]

Am I playing precision for the first time, for the first time with this partner, or for the first time in an 8-board online matchpoint tournament?

Anyway, the fact that LHO bid 3NT as a passed hand means nothing. This answers my first question, this must be your first online tournament (I know it's not Don ).

I think that partner has a weak raise, heck, people 4 times my age play it that way. Seeing how partner played in the first 6 boards would help of course.

I can't bid 4♣, someone might write about it in their blog. I didn't think about 4D so I'd bid 4S.

[Double !]

Hannie, on Jan 21 2007, 11:45 PM, said:

Anyway, the fact that LHO bid 3NT as a passed hand means nothing. This answers my first question, this must be your first online tournament (I know it's not Don ).

I think that partner has a weak raise, heck, people 4 times my age play it that way. Seeing how partner played in the first 6 boards would help of course.

I can't bid 4♣, someone might write about it in their blog. I didn't think about 4D so I'd bid 4S.

Han: of course it's not my first online tourney and, yes, I had a reasonably good idea about what was going on, that rho had heart support.
And, to address another issue that you had raised, partner had played wonderfully for the first six boards: it was a pleasure to play with this partner.

I really didn't know whether the 3 spade bid was pre-emptive, mixed, or GI. My problem, as I saw it, was to try to make a bid that could be as flexible as possible and to permit my P to co-operate in the final decision-making process. I thought at the time that 4 clubs would show a lot of black cards and a hand that wouldn't be in a position to make a decision about whether or not to bid 5S should the opps compete over 4S. What I hadn't accounted for was the fact that, by bidding 4 clubs, I had now given lho a chance to bid 4 diamonds (which lho might also have done had I dbl'd 3NT as someone had suggested). I had no aces, and was concerned about not being able to make 5S should the opps bid 5 Y and not be able to make it. I hadn't anticipated that my stiff heart king would be worth much,

In retrospect, just bidding 4 spades might have been the best answer as it would have precluded lho from showing a second suit, and rho might not have felt sure enough about the situation to feel confident about taking the 5H sac. I think that my 4 club bid might not have been the best selection, nor would dbl have been (rho was likely to be running to 4H anyway, and now my P doesn't have much info about my hand). I needed to sock it back to my rho by bidding 4S before rho could obtain more information: I committed an act of self-sabotage. (ain't the first time, won't be the last).

tx
DHL

[han]

Don, if you didn't get the blog reference, check out September 2nd here: http://squeezingthedummy.blogspot.com/.

[jtfanclub]

Double !, on Jan 21 2007, 10:11 PM, said:

I don't see how a 4 club bid can be setting up a forcing situation. My hand was limited by the fact that I didn't open with a strong 1 club bid.

It's a force because you and your partner have agreed upon a major, and you just bid a minor. It cannot be to play, because if you wanted to play at the 4 level you'd surely pick the major.

I know I'm a strange one, but to me 4♣ is a slam invitation. Take the exact same hand, and upgrade the ♥K to the ace. What do you need from partner to make slam? Two out of three aces and some club suit other than xxx. That's a lot to ask for, but it doesn't cost much to ask. What my partner and I call a 'courtesy slam try'. The other choice, bidding 4NT to check on aces, is a bad idea because partner might have 0 and the club suit could have two losers.

[pclayton]

I think the hand that Justin posted and the one Don posted are a lot different.

1. The Opponents have already found a fit if they need to sac.
2. If LHO probes with 4♦, it also helps pard make a decision.
3. Both sides are vul, so the chances they have a cheap sac are diminished.
4. A fundamental to MP's is to avoid the last guess. If LHO or RHO bid 5♥ over 4♠, we really don't have a clue whether or not 5♠ is correct. Does pard have:

♠Axx ♥xxx ♦KQxxx, ♣xx? where defending 5♥ is 100% right

or does pard have:

♠Axxx ♥xxx ♦Qxx ♣Axx where 5♠ is where we belong.

By the way, I agree with Justin's blog about the 5-5 black hand for the reasons he gave.

[Double !]

Hannie, on Jan 22 2007, 08:48 AM, said:

Don, if you didn't get the blog reference, check out September 2nd here: http://squeezingthedummy.blogspot.com/.

Han: I just read the blog that you suggested. And, I agree with phil that the hand that justin gave and the hand that i presented are different, especially in one particular regard. In justin's hand, the black 2-suiter is the responder, making a descriptive bid after the bidding had gone 1S by partner and double by rho. In the hand that I posted, I was the opening bidder with all the black cards. I was thinking at the time that I wanted to make a bid that would let my partner know in which suits to value any honor cards and in which suit honor cards that weren't aces might be of dubious value.

I keep going back and forth on this hand in terms of the better bid to make over rho's 3NT bid. One minute I think I should have bid 4S in order to make it more difficult for rho to know what type of hand lho had. The next minute I think that 4C might be better because it warns my partner about thinking that honors in the red suits that aren't aces might still have offensive value given my 10-11 announced black cards. I still don't know which bid is more likely to work better.

Glad this wasn't one of the hands in the recent BPO-008 set.

yo no se
je ne sais pas

dhl

[the hog]

4C, NOT 4S. Phil has summarised the arguments succinctly, so I won't bother repeating them.