[jillybean]

Scoring: IMP

---

West North East South

 Pass  1♦    Pass  1♠
 Pass  3♦    Pass  3♥
 Pass  4♦    Pass  Pass
 Pass  

can you do any better?

[TylerE]

North hand sure looks like a 2♣ opening to me. 9 playing tricks, basically solid 7 bagger, and legit defensive values.

[ArtK78]

3♦ is an underbid unless you are in the small minority of bidders who play a jump rebid of a minor suit as forcing.

That treatment should have worked out well on this hand, since the bidding should have gone:

1♦ - 1♠
3♦* - 3♥
3♠ - 3NT
All Pass

*Forcing

But for most of us the jump to 3♦ is not forcing. And the hand is too good for a nonforcing call. So, the bidding might go:

1♦ - 1♠
2♥ - 3♥
3♠ - 3NT
All Pass

Or, it might go:

1♦ - 1♠
2♥ - 3♥
4♦ - 4♥
All Pass

3NT is probably the best spot on these cards, but 4♥ certainly has play. Neither is a thing of beauty.

[EricK]

I'd have bid 3NT on the second round with the south hand. Partner is unlikley to have 4 ♥ (he could have bid 2♥ on previous round if he had), and if 3NT is the best contract, partner mightn't be able to bid it after 3♥.

[andy_h]

1D-1S; 3NT-Pass.
3NT = Too good to rebid 3D. South's hand doesn't look that great and with a void in partner's suit, sometimes partner's AKQ-7th is no longer running any more so 3NT it is.

[kenrexford]

1♦-P-1♠-P-3NT sounds about right. I would not be too offended by 1♦-P-1♠-P-3♣ (out there for many, I suppose) or even a reverse to 2♥, but neither seems best when 3NT screams out. I could be persuaded, though, to either of these alternatives.

[mike777]

I can live with opening 2c but then I guess I do it more often than others.
1d=1s=3nt strong second choice.

[fred]

Should you open 1D or 2C? Don't ask me - ask your partner.

If you do open 1D, however, I don't think you should panic on the next round by rebidding 3NT. Agree with everyone that 3D does not do justice to this hand, but I disagree with (almost) everyone in my opinion that 2H is (by far) the best rebid.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[kenrexford]

fred, on Jul 1 2008, 06:51 PM, said:

Should you open 1D or 2C? Don't ask me - ask your partner.

If you do open 1D, however, I don't think you should panic on the next round by rebidding 3NT. Agree with everyone that 3D does not do justice to this hand, but I disagree with (almost) everyone in my opinion that 2H is (by far) the best rebid.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

I thought about and mentioned 2♥, but is that or 3♣ "too much" for B/I? I always catch hell for expressing ideas like that in this area. LOL

[fred]

kenrexford, on Jul 1 2008, 11:55 PM, said:

fred, on Jul 1 2008, 06:51 PM, said:

Should you open 1D or 2C? Don't ask me - ask your partner.

If you do open 1D, however, I don't think you should panic on the next round by rebidding 3NT. Agree with everyone that 3D does not do justice to this hand, but I disagree with (almost) everyone in my opinion that 2H is (by far) the best rebid.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

I thought about and mentioned 2♥, but is that or 3♣ "too much" for B/I? I always catch hell for expressing ideas like that in this area. LOL

You could be right, but I think this is an actually an excellent and solvable problem for an intermediate player.

First thing such a player should consider is "should I force to game?".

I think most intermediate players would answer "yes" to this question (I agree) and so that means that 3D (which is non-forcing) is out.

If the intermediate player then stops to consider his/her options for forcing to game, he/she will realize that this hand has not appeared in any of his/her textbooks. There is a good reason for this - there is no "textbook bid" for this hand (unless your textbook reasonably advocates opening 2C of course).

Options include:

1) 2H - a reverse and therefore forcing. A game force is not created immediately but you can take care of that later.

2) 3C - a jump shift - forcing to game.

3) 3NT - a game contract and therefore forcing to game.

4) 5D - ditto

A bright newish player, not having learned that experts use 4D as a convention, might even consider that call. True that he or she probably has no idea what a natural 4D suggests (neither do I), but it sounds like a forcing bid with long diamonds...

But let's just consider 1), 2), and 3) for now. Of these I think there is a strong case for 1) that I expect any beginner would be able to understand: 1) clearly tells the smallest lie (you are off by one heart but at least your 3 hearts are strong). Both 2) and 3) tell rather more serious lies about your club holding - 2) suggests 4+ clubs and 3) is supposed to deliver at least some semblance of a club stopper for notrump.

This "smallest lie" type of argument should be both compelling and understandable for an intermediate player (I think).

As for 4), it might be more difficult to explain to an intermediate player why that bid is "wrong".

If I am going over the heads of the beginner/intermediates out there, please let me know and I will shut up

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[kenrexford]

No -- makes imminent sense to me.

But, that may be an insurmountable impeachment of your logic -- that I agree. LOL

[dburn]

The only slight problem I have with Fred's arguments is that it would be quite tough for a beginner, or even an "intermediate" player (whatever that means) to understand why the South hand should not raise 2♥ to 4♥.

"Partner has 16+ hcp, five diamonds and four hearts. I have 9 hcp and four-card heart support, so I'm going to bid game in our known 4-4 fit."

"You don't have to do that - you can bid a forcing 3♥."

"A what? Why is that forcing? Surely I would bid that with the same hand without the ace of clubs?"

"Well, you see, there's a thing called lebensohl which..." [Exit beginner in direction of nearest chess club]

Sure, we would all like to have the sequence 1♦-1♠-2♥-3♥-3♠ (a beautiful and delicate bid all by itself) - 3NT. But that kind of bidding is, in my view, for experts only. 1♦-1♠-3♦-3NT is how most intermediates and all beginners would bid, and who is to say they are wrong?

[fred]

dburn, on Jul 2 2008, 12:47 AM, said:

The only slight problem I have with Fred's arguments is that it would be quite tough for a beginner, or even an "intermediate" player (whatever that means) to understand why the South hand should not raise 2♥ to 4♥.

But I wasn't trying to suggest that 2H would be a particularly effective rebid on the actual hand - just that I think it is the right bid

I agree that how the auction might go after 2H, especially when partner is rude enough to have 4-card heart support, is also interesting (and rather "advanced").

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[kenrexford]

The objection by dburn was my concern, as well.

With my wife, who is a beginner/intermediate, I have convinced her that a JS or reverse into the other minor is completely artificial and forcing (reverse to 2♦ one round, 3♣ JS to game). She can live with an artificial "new minor" call like that. Messing with the majors, though, is asking too much.

So, it seems that 3NT is the easiest call, 3♣ the call for those who can accept new minor screwy bids, and 2♥ for a group of people who elect that approach and are extremely qualified to handle that sort of approach.

[the hog]

I am inclined to agree with David. After 3D, which I don't think is that bad a bid at all, I would suggest:

1D 1S
3D 3H
3S 3NT

If you are going to suggest David's delicate sequence, I would suggest that an artificial and gf 2NT rebid is better on the Nth hand. However neither of thse if for this forum.

[onoway]

Being an intermediate, I think most beginner/intermediates I know would have bid 3nt after the 3!d call....figuring that pard's minor suit was self sufficient but pard must have something in the other suits as well to open 1 and then jump, but nothing biddable, so since this hand has goodies in all the other suits and 3nt is only 9 tricks.. ...hope is a strong component in most of our games I agree that most would believe 2!h to indicate 4 !h holding.
One question I have never understood is why oh why is 2nt not forcing one round? It would make life so much easier...

[kenrexford]

Well, checked with the wife. Very surprised, but apparently I taught her better than I thought (or she learned on her own despite me).

She responded that 2♥ was her only good option. She said that she'd bid 3NT after 2NT from me, but that she'd be a tad more excited after any other call.

[jillybean]

I was south here, my expert partner told me my bid was 3nt after 3♦ and that was the end of the discussion.
I can’t think of one auction that has ended successfully after a 1m:1x 3m jump but I can remember many bad ones. I hope that after this thread I will find the 3 card reverse and not put my partner in the same position

[the hog]

Well I disagree with the 3 card reverse. There are better ways to bid the hand imo.

[vuroth]

ArtK78, on Jul 1 2008, 01:50 PM, said:

3♦ is an underbid unless you are in the small minority of bidders who play a jump rebid of a minor suit as forcing.

Wow, that explains my confusion. So what do the majority play 1♦-1♠-3♦? Intermediate diamonds with length? Splinter for spades? Some kind of spade support hand?

...

Excluding 3♦ as strong/forcing, then fred's arguments make sense to me as a B/I. I absolutely want to force, and 2♥ is absolutely a smaller lie than 3NT.

Of course, after partner's 4♥, there are a couple of futher B/I quandries:

1. What would 5♦ mean? (Cue for hearts? Natural? Incoming -X00....)
2. Can you avoid glaring at or lecturing partner when dummy in 4♥ comes down with only 3 trumps?

V