Posted 2008-February-28, 21:46
This is a rather strange start to the auction.
I have, to restate. ♠KQJxx ♥AKQJ ♦Kx ♣xx
I started with a 1♠ response to a 1♦ opening and had that call raised. I then made a forcing 3♥ call, presumably a two-way bid, either a natural game try or a natural start to a slam try.
Partner cannot have evaluated his hand up because of heart cards, but he accepted the game try while causing some problems for the slam try by not cuebidding something useful along the way. Why would he do that?
Well, we can quickly decide why he is not being cooperative -- he has at most one "internal" card. He cannot have any heart honor, and he has at most the spades Ace. So, he has a reason to accept game but does not want to overstate his enthusiasm because of his meager contribution to the majors.
Strangely, we also have the diamond King that we are looking at. So, partner cannot have oustanding diamonds. Sure, he might have AQJx(x) or something, but this looks like hesitant values.
So, what is partner thinking? Partner expects that you have some sort of 5-4 hand, probably, meaning only four cards on the side. If you are in the game territory, you probably have something like 7 1/2 to 8 1/2 losers, meaning that you want partner to be able to contribute about five cover cards. What covers can he have?
We know that he only has one internal cover card -- the spade Ace. So, he seems to need four external covers. It is hard to imagine him not having, therefore, both minor Aces. That gets him to a 12-count. He probably has a hesitant/contingent/geemaybe value in hearts, like a doubleton. That gets him up to three covers and a smidge. One more Queen does not seem like enough. Another King is a problem, because then he starts to look like a 15-count.
Strange.
So, we need to figure out the problem. It seems that the problem must be in the form of even shorter hearts, which could be a negative value in his estimation -- a duplication of values. So, I expect a high likelihood of a stiff heart, which turns out to be of no concern to us.
The first two suits, then, appear to be ♠Axxx ♥x.
Eight more cards. He must have equal or longer diamonds, and he still needs a real good shot at two more covers. It seems fairly likely that partner has something like :
♠Axxx ♥x ♦AQxxx ♣Kxx
♠Axxx ♥x ♦QJxx ♣AKxx
He won't like have a COV (Concentration Of Values) in diamonds, because that would create a COW (Concentration Of Weakness) in clubs, which might be a nice hand opposite 5431 pattern from your hand. So, I'd not expect ♠Axxx ♥x ♦AQJxx ♣xxx. With a hand like that, a really weak mess anyway, he might rebid his diamonds to show how good they are. Plus, I just don't see it.
The bottom line is that I think my overabundance of internal values and his acceptance-without-cooperation yields a conclusion that we must have at least 5-level safety.
So, what to do about that?
You could bid 5♦ to show that card, but I cannot see partner ever valuing up this monstrosity of an apparent lack of help. He will never find any heart cards, no matter how hard he looks, and he will never grow a second spade card. Sure, he will like the 5♦ call if it grows the value of his own suit, and a very trusting partner will find the club control to be huge, but we just have way too much and too strong a feeling that he is stiff in hearts and inconsolable about that.
Whereas, therefore, 5♦ might be the technically right bid, I don't think it is the practical bid. I think that the assumption of a club control is very reliable. So, I would probably bid 4NT with most people and trust my analysis. If I get confirmation of three keys, I'm there.
If I hear two without, I still feel confident. If partner is missing the diamond Ace and has both black Aces, this seems easy. I cannot lose two clubs, and I cannot imagine losing two diamonds.
If partner has the diamond Ace, I feel, again, strong that he has the club King at least. I'll hope that it is protected by the Queen, by the Jack and my brilliant guessing, or by the position behind the Ace because of my good living.
If he shows one (♠Axxx ♥x ♦QJxx ♣KQJx???), I'm out.
I think that 5♦ is still the technically right bid, in case partner has ♠Axxx ♥x ♦AQJxx ♣QJx and cannot stand it. But, it seems that the likelihood of that holding is outweighed by the likelihood that most partners would decline a 5♦ slam try on the many more likely hands that fit well for slam, because of his terrible major contribution and would not make be able to stomacha 5♥ last train call with a stiff heart.
"Gibberish in, gibberish out. A trial judge, three sets of lawyers, and now three appellate judges cannot agree on what this law means. And we ask police officers, prosecutors, defense lawyers, and citizens to enforce or abide by it? The legislature continues to write unreadable statutes. Gibberish should not be enforced as law."
-P.J. Painter.
1♦ - 1♠
2♠ - 3♥
4♠ - ?