[Antoine Fourrière]

It seems to me that South's hand is worth bidding game, but isn't worth jeopardizing that game with a descriptive process.
There should be a specialized answer (3♦?) showing either a minimum balanced game force or an in-between hand with distributional values (5422, (good5)322, 5431 with a three-card fit), whose main purpose would be to allow opener to bid four if he judges there is more to lose than to win by inquiring further.

[kenrexford]

jdonn, on Jul 19 2007, 12:08 AM, said:

Ken, for all the merits your approach may have, and I tend to be much more open to the idea of them than some people here, I can't even convince myself to read your posts when you have opener rebidding 2♦. That is a joke. It is misdescriptive, will totally mess up your game auctions when responder doesn't have a direct fit, and will pay a huge price every time you actually have a diamond suit worth bidding without an amazing heart suit.

I understand the extreme shock that one might have at this elected rebid. I even debated this myself, as a seven-card heart suit seems to beg us to rebid it. I, personally, believe that end-position auctions work better with that start more often, but I can understand rejecting that choice. It does not really cause problems with actually discussing diamonds as a strain when I really have diamonds, for various reasons.

The simple idea is that you bid 2♦ in my approach with three hand types:

With a balanced hand, you may bid 2♦ as a waiting bid if you have a control in diamonds. So, 2♦ may be 5332. If partner raises to 3♦, you will rebid 3NT, or possibly some higher level of NT. Typically, your doubleton will be clubs.

With the "normal" pattern of hearts-and-diamonds, you bid 2♦ also. If partner raises diamonds, you can rebid a six-card heart suit OR get back to hearts if 3NT is ultimately rejected even when hearts are 5-2.

With a wildly unbalanced hand, you can bid 2♦ and then insist upon playing hearts.

This leaves an end-position of 1♥...2♦...3♥...4♥ as suggesting 7-4. With other sequences, you may show seven hearts, but the 7-4 picture is missed. I♥...2♥...3♥...4♦ would be a simple cue in support of one's own hearts and possibly bid on a stiff.

2♦ is only "misdescriptive" if these types of auctions are not systemic. When they are, there is no misdescription.

[foo]

Myrmidon73, on Jul 17 2007, 07:16 PM, said:

D: N
Vul:  NS

I was sitting as north today, and I was wondering if there is a good way to get to 6H with SAYC.  My partner was a standby guy, and we decided to play SAYC straight-up.  We ended up in 5H, making 6 pretty easily.  Thanks for the help:


North:
S:  AK H:  KQT9654 D:  J653 C:

South:
S: QJ63 H: AJ3 D: 5 C: KT842

Hands like these is actually why 2/1 GF was invented.

In SA, the auction would have to start 1H-2C;3H for Opener to establish a GF.

If Opener does not GF (and with a 4 loser hand containing 7 ♥'s to the KQT9, Opener should GF playing SA IMHO), then Responder has to be willing to reverse into ♠'s (possibly risking that Opener will never believe that Responder has 3 card ♥ support), or splinter with 4D.

Playing 2/1 GF, S's hand is =absolutely= worth a 2/1 unless you are related to Victor Mollo's "The Walrus" (who thought HCP were gospel).
S has 14 playing points in support of ♥'s.
Some players would open S's hand in 1st or 2nd chair and not even consider it "light" (me for instance).

This board =is= a potential problem for some 2/1 pairs. The one's that demand that all minimum openings rebid 2M.
If you are playing that style of 2/1, then N's hand either has to jump rebid 3H or S has to "take a view" and splinter rebid even though N may only have 5 ♥'s.
Both approaches have potential problems systemically when not discussing this exact board.

If you are playing the style of 2/1 where a minimum opener can rebid either 2M or 2N, or if you are playing the style where opener can make any rebid below 2N w/o showing extras, then opener's 2M rebid will much more strongly tend to show 6+M.
Now responder has a much easier time making a splinter that should guarantee a 9+ card fit.

Incidently, playing 2/1 opener's hand is not worth a 3M rebid. The void in pd's 2/1 suit is a severe downgrade; and many would not consider N's ♥ suit good enough (I would, but the ♣ void dissuades me).

So playing 2/1 GF,
1H-2C;2H-4D!;??
Now opener's hand becomes =much= bigger.

4S-4N;blah-6H is the conservative route.
Some N's would bid 4N or 6H immediately after the 4D splinter given their 4 loser hand and a known 10 card fit with 3 of the top honors (remember that S's splinter should show values in =all= of the suits outside the splinter. Therefore N knows that S has the ♥A. Or at the very least the ♥J since ♥'s are trump.)