[MFA]

Imps w/datum score.

S-N are bidding

1♦-1♠
2♦-2♥*
3♣-3♦
4♣-4♦
4♥-6♦

West is on lead and inquries about the 2♥. It's an artificial force, almost GF. West then proceeds to inquire about the rest of the auction, which is natural/cuebids. No alerts at the 4+ level, since no screens were in use.

West leads, and South is looking at a "perfecto" contract, only slight problem being the trumps:
QTxx in dummy to K9xxxx in hand.

"Aha! Didn't West ask a lot? Surely, he doesn't have AJx, then!".

Small to the queen and down 1.
Needless to say, South is annoyed.

What do you make of this, ethically? Did West ask too much, or should South just calm down?

[jdonn]

huh? West was on lead vs a slam where one bid was artificial and alerted and many of them were only not alertable because of the past 3N rule. This is totally standard. Even with AJx of trumps you want to make the best lead, and want to understand the auction. Should he just smile happily to himself and lead without asking any questions or something? What if he can't score the DJ and needs to make a killing lead? South is way out of line.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

South takes interference at his own risk.
He basically assumes West is unethically,
which is an insult, and if West is ..., Iwould
understand this.
If South is ..., I can understand this, but only
if he is ... about himself.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[rogerclee]

I agree that the inference is not really called for.

I'm sort of a question-asker myself and usually go through the standard questions regardless of my hand.

[Walddk]

MFA, on Jan 14 2008, 11:18 PM, said:

Did West ask too much, or should South just calm down?

Calm down.

Roland

[blackshoe]

A couple of points:

if this was played in ACBL's jurisdiction, the regulation does not say "no alerts past 3NT". It says that any alerts that would normally be made shall, if the call is above 3NT and after responder's first call, be delayed until the end of the auction (and made before the opening lead is chosen). Other jurisdictions do have other rules, I know.
I don't see any logic behind South's inference which, as others have said, is generally taken at his own risk.

For myself, generally speaking, if I wait until the end of the auction to ask questions, my first one will be "please explain your auction" or "what do I need to know about your partnership's hands?" If the explanation(s) in response seem adequate, I'll go ahead and lead. If not, I'll ask for further information. Funnily enough, this is exactly the procedure specified in Law 20. Sadly, about 99% of players around here seem ignorant of that procedure.

[barmar]

How experienced is West? Novices and intermediates tend to ask lots of questions about long auctions, since they're not so familiar with cue bidding. More advanced players will just ask things like "were the 4 and 5 level bids cue bids?", just to make sure that nothing unusual was going on.

But even if he's an experienced player, I wouldn't infer anything about his trump holding from the questions. While one is likely to hope that the J in AJx will be a second defensive trick, it's hardly a sure thing. So you still need to defend properly, and understanding the auction is the first step.

[FrancesHinden]

MFA, on Jan 14 2008, 10:18 PM, said:

Did West ask too much, or should South just calm down?

Calm down

[Free]

Calm down, first blame yourself, afterwards you usually can't blame someone else...

[Rossoneri]

I don't think West asked too much, I can easily think of a few expert players I know who would probably ask twice as much =)

South was really making that kind of inference at his own risk.

[MFA]

Ok, thx for the comments.

I was East at the table, and South was a very well-known world star that I admire (hasn't changed )

When I showed out on the ♦Q, South made an annoyed gesture and sound. But he didn't say anything, just claimed 11 and we carried on.

This was obviously a very lucky board for us. This table was the only one out of 8 that played in slam (yes, it was a perfect fit). We won the event, which was very big for us, but we wouldn't have, had this slam made. Not that NS would have won either.

At the table, I thought that South's expressions were all about his bad luck. Our tempo through-out and partner's questioning had been perfectly normal (I swear . I have played with him for 8½ years and he is very constant and average in his way of asking), so it didn't even cross my mind that South could be dissatisfied with anything from our side.

Later I heard that South had been claiming in a postmortem that my partner really shouldn't have been asking so much, when he knew that the ♦AJx behind the suit was going to be the theme of the board. Just lead and get on with it.

Well, maybe my source is exaggerating, or maybe South did say something reproachful. I know what happened and that there was nothing at all to criticise (not this time at least ). So I shouldn't care and I don't. It's just that he (apparently) said it...

[Fluffy]

When opponents start cuebidding I tend to just put passes over the table and think of nonsense suitable for water cooler.

When the auction ends I'd ask whatever I wanna know and then I see my cards, wich I normally do not remember at all .

I miss several lead directing doubles for doing it this lazy way.

[pclayton]

MFA, on Jan 16 2008, 01:19 PM, said:

Later I heard that South had been claiming in a postmortem that my partner really shouldn't have been asking so much, when he knew that the ♦AJx behind the suit was going to be the theme of the board. Just lead and get on with it.

Sour grapes as we say.

South made a bad read, and he's looking for a scapegoat other than his own judgment or ability to guess.