[Phil]

Stephen Tu, on Aug 24 2009, 10:58 AM, said:

Phil, all your criticisms are due to *style* issues, whether one bypasses 1s to rebid 1nt, raise 1h-1s on 3, etc.  None are due to anything being "outdated".

Any player reading the method should be able to easily see what doesn't fit with the partnership bidding style and make the logical replacements.  It's silly to assume that anything should be played verbatim, in a vacuum completely independent of other partnership agreements.

Don't criticize something as "outdated" when it's merely a different *style* of bidding from what you are used to.  You recommend people to seek out a more current source, but (1) you didn't provide a source, and (2) there's no guarantee such source won't have different stylistic choices from the rest of your system anyway.

Stephen, given that:

- Jeff implies that he 'always' raises 1♠ to 2 after 1♥ - 1♠; and

- Jeff implies that he rebids 1N with a 6 card minor often enough that he wants a bid to show this, instead of the more functional (my opinion) use of showing a good five card minor.

I would posit that Jeff's 'style' is a significant deviation from standard. This has nothing to do with what I play.

You stated above:

Some treatments do, but not necessarily all of them. If the method covers all the likely hand types in a reasonable manner, what do you need to change? Maybe there are some third/fourth round wrinkles you can extend but I don't see anything that jumps out at me as bad about using that page as a starting point. Again unless you can point to an actual flaw and how it's been corrected, your criticism is kind of ridiculous.

I believe I did this in my last post.

Further:

Quote

You recommend people to seek out a more current source

Somewhere on here, MikeH has a lengthy discussion about xyz. He might discuss 2-way NMF as well, I don't remember, but the systems function very similarly, and IMO, it is a much better resource than Jeff's.

It is much more current too

[cherdanno]

I don't think you have pointed out flaws Phil, just examples where you have a different opinion, or where you think current majority use is s.th. else.

Just as an example, rebidding 2♠ after 1H 1S 1N 2D with a good doubleton makes perfect sense to me. Your possible shapes are already very constrained, and it seems useful to distinguish between a good doubleton and a weak doubleton, and surely you can show 3-card support anyway? I don't think this treatment implies that you always raise 1S with 3-card support.

[cherdanno]

Phil, on Aug 24 2009, 11:24 AM, said:

Quote

You recommend people to seek out a more current source

Somewhere on here, MikeH has a lengthy discussion about xyz. He might discuss 2-way NMF as well, I don't remember, but the systems function very similarly, and IMO, it is a much better resource than Jeff's.

It is much more current too

I suppose you mean http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?sho...t=0&#entry90802 .
I am not sure though, Mikeh's post agrees with two of Jeff's treatments you don't like, maybe you are referring to a more recent post by Mikeh? It also says nothing about many other sequences that you need to discuss, are you really sure it is a better resource than Jeff's website?

[awm]

cherdanno, on Aug 24 2009, 10:28 AM, said:

I strongly disagree with your view here. I have been playing something similar for a few years now (2N forces 3♣, either to play, or a slam try with 4 in my major and 5-card support) and find it extremely useful. It is a big benefit to distinguish slam tries with 4 in my major from those with 5 in my major. It is extremely useful to show shortness with such hands, sometimes just to pick the right game.
I can't remember a single lead-directing double on such an auction.

The possible lead-directing double isn't over the 2NT auction, it's the auction:

1m-1M-1NT-2♣-2♦-2NT

Here opponents actually have some values, and the artificial 2♣ call gives them the opportunity to double for the lead on hands where overcalling 2♣ in a live auction over 1M might be dangerous. I have seen this one come up a few times. By playing this method, you force all "natural 2NT" invites to use the sequence above. Yes, I have seen this lead directional double made more than once.

I've been playing without this artificial 2NT for many years now and have never missed it. There are a huge number of sequences made available by 2-way nmf already, and in some partnerships I haven't even defined all of them and still don't really miss them.

I've seen my opponents use the version where 2NT is a relay on several occasions. One thing I can say is that I've never lost IMPs on such a hand, nor have I seen any "great auctions" that I couldn't reproduce on such hands. However, on at least three occasions in the last few years I have seen opponents have an "accident" related to this method when a 2NT call is intended as natural and taken as a puppet to 3♣. Any method where the accidents seem to outnumber the wins is a bad method in my book.

[Stephen Tu]

If you want to show strong doubleton spade after 1h-1s-1nt-2d with 2s, what's horribly wrong with 3s with 3 cd support?

"different style from me" is not the same as "outdated". If you want to criticize his style as "horribly non-std", OK (I don't agree, almost all of it can be used in a standard system, with minor tweaks), but "outdated" is not an accurate criticism.

Your first two responses in the thread saying essentially "it's bad because it's old" were totally silly. 15 years old in bridge is practically modern, in comparison with a lot of 40, 50 year old stuff that is still considered standard and used by most players!

Jeff's site is also easier to find than some discussion buried in a forum, even if you may not agree with a small % of his picks, isn't that easy enough to discuss with a partner?