[jtfanclub]

jdonn, on Jun 29 2008, 11:38 AM, said:

I think you just have to overcall on this, passing is ineffective.

Effective?

Overcalling 1♠ over 1♥ gives the opponents more space to play with, not less. It gives them all sorts of weapons that they didn't have before, like cue bids.

I like my one-ups to be stronger than this. For example, if the opening bid was 1♣, I wouldn't hesitate to bid 1♠, because there's considerable pre-emptive value.

I think bidding one-ups with crappy hands is more likely to help the opponents than help your side. The mitigating factor is that you do have an ace and a king, which usually end up taking a lot more tricks than random queens and jacks.

I'd advise pass. If you're my partner, and you pass with this, I'm happy. If you're my partner, and I bid 1♠ with this, I disavow any knowledge of this post.

[pclayton]

jtfanclub, on Jun 30 2008, 08:15 AM, said:

jdonn, on Jun 29 2008, 11:38 AM, said:

I think you just have to overcall on this, passing is ineffective.

Effective?

Overcalling 1♠ over 1♥ gives the opponents more space to play with, not less. It gives them all sorts of weapons that they didn't have before, like cue bids.

I like my one-ups to be stronger than this. For example, if the opening bid was 1♣, I wouldn't hesitate to bid 1♠, because there's considerable pre-emptive value.

I think bidding one-ups with crappy hands is more likely to help the opponents than help your side. The mitigating factor is that you do have an ace and a king, which usually end up taking a lot more tricks than random queens and jacks.

I'd advise pass. If you're my partner, and you pass with this, I'm happy. If you're my partner, and I bid 1♠ with this, I disavow any knowledge of this post.

You are looking at this from a linear perspective.

There are many, many good things that can and do happen when you overcall on hands like this. Here's just a few:

--Partner makes a preemptive raise and they miss 3N, or overbid to game.
--Pard gets off to the right lead against 3N.
--Pard has a really good hand and can now compete over 1N on your left, but if you pass, pard will pass.

I remember reading about Kleinman's whole 'undercall' philosophy, but I think thats losing bridge. You have a higher ranking suit - get in there and bid it.

By the way, an overcall gives them LESS weapons, not more. Unless they play 'systems on' over a 1♠ call, you've taken away their normal raise structure. Now, LHO has to cue bid with a limit raise or better (some play 2N, I know). You've taken away their forcing NT. Their 2/1 auctions are geared to be competitive, not GF.

You get in return a negative double and some fit bids. All of these anticipate further action. If fit bids were so effective, people would play them in 1M - 3m. They are great (and necessary) in comp, since frequently the auction is at the four level in the 1st round.

I love it when my opponents pass these hands.

[jtfanclub]

pclayton, on Jun 30 2008, 11:22 AM, said:

You are looking at this from a linear perspective.

There are many, many good things that can and do happen when you overcall on hands like this. Here's just a few:

--Partner makes a preemptive raise and they miss 3N, or overbid to game.
--Pard gets off to the right lead against 3N.
--Pard has a really good hand and can now compete over 1N on your left, but if you pass, pard will pass.

But all the bad things can happen too which I didn't mention, like partner competing over 1NT thinking you have a good hand, when in fact you've got 7 hcp, or leading a spade when in fact he's got a suit that's a whole lot easier to develop.

I don't really want to debate this, since I'm guilty of bidding 1♠ with this myself sometimes. But there are certainly experts and books that advocate passing with this, and I wanted to mention the reasons why.

I didn't catch your edit in time. If your opponents don't know how to use the extra space from a one-up bid, well, that's a good reason to bid 1♠. But it does give them extra room, and certainly some people know how to use it.

[pclayton]

jtfanclub, on Jun 30 2008, 08:30 AM, said:

pclayton, on Jun 30 2008, 11:22 AM, said:

You are looking at this from a linear perspective.

There are many, many good things that can and do happen when you overcall on hands like this. Here's just a few:

--Partner makes a preemptive raise and they miss 3N, or overbid to game.
--Pard gets off to the right lead against 3N.
--Pard has a really good hand and can now compete over 1N on your left, but if you pass, pard will pass.

But all the bad things can happen too which I didn't mention, like partner competing over 1NT thinking you have a good hand, when in fact you've got 7 hcp, or leading a spade when in fact he's got a suit that's a whole lot easier to develop.

My partners don't do this, and yours shouldn't either if an overcall can include hands like this.

Quote

I don't really want to debate this, since I'm guilty of bidding 1♠ with this myself sometimes.  But there are certainly experts and books that advocate passing with this, and I wanted to mention the reasons why.

I didn't catch your edit in time.  If your opponents don't know how to use the extra space from a one-up bid, well, that's a good reason to bid 1♠.  But it does give them extra room, and certainly some people know how to use it.

Yes, I edited this after the fact. Sorry.

The only meaningful bid they gain is a negative double. They also lose a natural 1♠ response. I see this as a wash. If the bidding started (1♣) and we were debating the merits of 1♦ on a similar type hand, I would be more inclined to agree.

Nearly every single partnership I know of uses nothing special over 1♥ - (1♠). Their bidding basically reverts to 1950's standard with a non-forcing 1N and a 10+ 2/1. Some partnerships use NFB's, but these have serious trade-offs. Things like "Switch" will become more common in auctions like this I think.

[TimG]

pclayton, on Jun 30 2008, 11:22 AM, said:

There are many, many good things that can and do happen when you overcall on hands like this. Here's just a few:

--Partner makes a preemptive raise and they miss 3N, or overbid to game.
--Pard gets off to the right lead against 3N.
--Pard has a really good hand and can now compete over 1N on your left, but if you pass, pard will pass.

Bad things can, and do, happen when you make overcalls such as these. In order to do a thorough study of this one would have to consider implications on auction that don't start with an overcall - it's probably impossible to consider everything. The good might outweigh the bad, but I think it is much closer than you make it out to be. And, I don't think either camp can prove their case.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

Most likely I would pass, but mainly because the suit quality
is not good enough, give me AQxxx xxx xx xxx, and I overcall.

Spades will allow you to fight for the part score and if partner
raises, it will test their agreements.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[cherdano]

It is true that overcalling 1S over 1C is more preemptive. But when RHO has 5 hearts and you have 5 spades it is much more likely that your side has to compete in spades to reach par:
1. The opponents are more likely to have a fit in RHO's opening suit and also find it.
2. Even if they have and find a club fit after 1C, there are two more suits available in which we can compete at the same level over their club partial compared to their heart partial.

[the hog]

I would certainly bid 1S with this hand. cf Phil's reasons above.

[Codo]

I really hate these black/white statements. Of course Tim is right, many good things and many bad things may happen after you bid or pass.

And to claim just the pros for the overcall is shortsighted.

1. Of course reasonable opps will use the extra space you give them.
If you overcall 1 Spade, I do not need to bid 1 NT with all 6-9 HCPs hands, I can use the neg. double and NFBs to descirbe my hand much better.

2. Even if the hand belongs to the spade hands, many bad things may happen.
Even after a simple start with (1♥) 1♠ pass:
Pd may have a hard time to evaluate a hand like KQx, xxx,xxx,AQxx.
He will be quite surprised that 2 Spade is the limit. You will end up in many 3 Spade-1 for a 5 imps loss.

And this is just one example. If you play so wide ranging overcalls, other descissions in competetive bidding are hard for partner too. He does not know whether your overcalls have reasonable suits and or a minimum defensive value, or at least some shape. So if he does not have a great fit with you, he may be worse placed after your bid then after a pass.

As written before, I don't rate the 1 Spade bid wrong, I just think that we should share all possible aspects and not just the rosiest views about the overcall.

There are reasons why solid systems demand more then this for an overcall.

BTW: They just had the European championship. I did not notice that many of the pairs I watched did overcall with hands like ♠ATxxx ♥xx ♦xxx ♣K9x.
But I did not care too much about this issue, so maybe I am wrong here.

[joker_gib]

1♠ is clear for me

[rbforster]

Codo, on Jul 1 2008, 02:33 AM, said:

And to claim just the pros for the overcall is shortsighted.

1. Of course reasonable opps will use the extra space you give them.
If you overcall 1 Spade, I do not need to bid 1 NT with all 6-9 HCPs hands, I can use the neg. double and NFBs to descirbe my hand much better.

2. Even if the hand belongs to the spade hands, many bad things may happen.
Even after a simple start with (1♥) 1♠ pass:
Pd may have a hard time to evaluate a hand like KQx, xxx,xxx,AQxx.
He will be quite surprised that 2 Spade is the limit.

I think the biggest gains for this overcall are getting partner off to a good lead and blocking the opponents' auction when partner with 3 card support can now raise to 2♠ frequently. Over a negative double or a pass, a 2♠ raise will put pressure on opener who may not have enough extras to bid freely at the 3 level.

I'm less worried about partner hanging me since his strongest bid is 2♥ (limit+) after which I'll bid 2♠ and if he bids again over that he'll have a good enough hand to justify it.

[awm]

The problem auction that comes up most frequently for bidding here is:

1♥ - 1♠ - 2♥ - ???

Now partner's 2♥ "cuebid" has been taken away. Suppose he has some limit raise style hand with only three trumps. His options are the underbid of 2♠ or forcing the three-level. While partner is surely aware of our overcalling tendencies, it is also the case that we do overcall on good hands, and opponents could easily be bidding on air in a fit auction. I have seen a 3♥ call opposite a hand much like this one lead to 3♠X for quite a number.

I've seen some people play that a double in this auction is a limit raise. This treatment helps on those hands while losing on the "responsive double" type hands.

[Trumpace]

Codo, on Jul 1 2008, 02:33 AM, said:

<snip>
2. Even if the hand belongs to the spade hands, many bad things may happen.
Even after a simple start with (1♥) 1♠ pass:
Pd may have a hard time to evaluate a hand like KQx, xxx,xxx,AQxx.
He will be quite surprised that 2 Spade is the limit. You will end up in many 3 Spade-1 for a 5 imps loss.

<snip>

The scoring is Matchpoints.

[NickRW]

Trumpace, on Jul 1 2008, 11:35 PM, said:

Codo, on Jul 1 2008, 02:33 AM, said:

<snip>
2. Even if the hand belongs to the spade hands, many bad things may happen.
Even after a simple start with (1♥) 1♠ pass:
Pd may have a hard time to evaluate a hand like KQx, xxx,xxx,AQxx.
He will be quite surprised that 2 Spade is the limit. You will end up in many 3 Spade-1 for a 5 imps loss.

<snip>

The scoring is Matchpoints.

Yes. That may be a point that some missed. At MP auctions like 1♥-pass-2♥-all pass can occur and you're looking at -110 when you could have been +110 or likely no worse that -100. Or, even if opps are off for +50 or 100, you could have had +110 yourself. This is disastrous MP bridge. You've simply got to compete whenever possible, especially with spades. True you may miss the odd game through the use of wide ranging overcalls, but the frequency will be less than the times when you get a bad part score result by not competing. And it is frequency of gain that is the main thing in determining MP strategy.

At IMPs the case for overcalling is less clear - but I guess some still would.

Nick

[kenrexford]

NickRW, on Jul 1 2008, 07:02 PM, said:

Yes. That may be a point that some missed. At MP auctions like 1♥-pass-2♥-all pass can occur and you're looking at -110 when you could have been +110 or likely no worse that -100. Or, even if opps are off for +50 or 100, you could have had +110 yourself. This is disastrous MP bridge. You've simply got to compete whenever possible, especially with spades. True you may miss the odd game through the use of wide ranging overcalls, but the frequency will be less than the times when you get a bad part score result by not competing. And it is frequency of gain that is the main thing in determining MP strategy.

At IMPs the case for overcalling is less clear - but I guess some still would.

Nick

Excuse me, but white-v-red I think the auction of 1♥-P-2♥-P-P-? does not require a pass. A late 2♠ seems very reasonable.

[effervesce]

It's close, but I'd need the J of spades to overcall. Maybe even the T9 of spades will do at this vul.

[NickRW]

kenrexford, on Jul 2 2008, 12:49 AM, said:

Excuse me, but white-v-red I think the auction of 1♥-P-2♥-P-P-? does not require a pass.  A late 2♠ seems very reasonable.

Yes, in this example you could play the hand that way.

The point I was trying to make is that you gotta get stuck in at MP. At IMPs a (slightly) more conservative style is OK in the interests of not making partner too worried about our overcalls and therefore keeping more options open for game.