[aguahombre]

"If a substitution is allowed, the LHO may withdraw
any call he made over the first call. Information
from the withdrawn call is authorized
only to his side. There is no further rectification."

O.K., so the Auction:
(1S) 2NT (unusual)...at this point, the director allows a substitution of 2S, opener's intended bid.

Next hand bids 2NT. Everything cool? Consider two situations.

2NT is natural over 2S under normal conditions; OR
2NT is minors, but the range expectation is different over 2S.

Also, the difference in meanings of 2NT surely must be authorized information to the other side as well in this case.

Director ruled no problem, and I agreed because of the wording in 27A4 --but then got to wondering about another regulation on changing one's system after an irregularity.

[FrancesHinden]

I think you mean 25A4?

I don't understand the question. What is the 'difference in meanings' of 2NT, given that he couldn't bid 2NT before the correction?

Are you suggesting that a pair have an agreement that the meaning of 1S (2S) 2NT is different if overcaller made an unintended call first and then changed it to 2S? That is so obscure it really doesn't seem worth worrying about...

[aguahombre]

I don't think you are reading the post correctly.

1S was opened, then 2NT overcall. Then 1S was corrected to 2S (two people bid, but spade bidder's partner had not acted yet--hence 27A4). And yes, 2NT for the minors over 1S is likely to be different than 2NT over 2S in either pattern or strength.

oops...25A4....not a typo, a true failure to notice

This post has been edited by aguahombre: 2011-August-18, 15:33

[FrancesHinden]

sorry i thought the 2NT bidder wanted to change to 2s

[pran]

aguahombre, on 2011-August-18, 14:37, said:

I don't think you are reading the post correctly.

1S was opened, then 2NT overcall. Then 1S was corrected to 2S (two people bid, but spade bidder's partner had not acted yet--hence 27A4). And yes, 2NT for the minors over 1S is likely to be different than 2NT over 2S in either pattern or strength.

The reference to 27A4 is obviously a typo for 25A4. There is no Law 27A4, and if there had been it would apply to insufficient bids which this is not about.

And yes, in the auction 1♠ - 2NT the opener is permitted to replace his 1♠ bid with 2♠ if the Director is convinced that the 1♠ bid was inadvertent and that 2♠ was the intended opening bid.

If opener is thus allowed to replace his 1♠ (inadvertent) bid with 2♠ then his LHO is permitted to replace his 2NT bid with whatever call he wants, and if he so does then all information from the now withdrawn 2NT bid is authorized for the opener's opponents only (and unauthorized for the opener's side).

This implies for instance that if a jump to 2NT would have shown both minors while 2NT over 2♠ would have shown a strong NT then the information that the 2NT bidder shows both minors is authorized for his side (only) even if he doesn't change his 2NT bid! (Technically he may replace his 2NT bid with 2NT!)

[semeai]

pran, on 2011-August-18, 15:28, said:

This implies for instance that if a jump to 2NT would have shown both minors while 2NT over 2♠ would have shown a strong NT then the information that the 2NT bidder shows both minors is authorized for his side (only) even if he doesn't change his 2NT bid!

It seems like changing 1♠ to 2♠ creates problems for the opponents if they repeat the 2NT bid. How should they take 3♣ themselves? If one player guesses it's still Stayman but the other thinks it's choosing clubs, are they entitled to redress?

Also, if advancer bids 3♣ and the opponents ask about the 3♣ bid, what should be said?

Maybe from a strategic point of view it would have been better to change the bid to 3♣ with moderate values (and pass with a light unusual 2NT)? There you just have to decide whether 3♦ is forcing.

[pran]

semeai, on 2011-August-18, 15:38, said:

It seems like changing 1♠ to 2♠ creates problems for the opponents if they repeat the 2NT bid. How should they take 3♣ themselves? If one player guesses it's still Stayman but the other thinks it's choosing clubs, are they entitled to redress?

Also, if advancer bids 3♣ and the opponents ask about the 3♣ bid, what should be said?

Maybe from a strategic point of view it would have been better to change the bid to 3♣ with moderate values (and pass with a light unusual 2NT)? There you just have to decide whether 3♦ is forcing.

As the 3♣ bidder knows (authorized) that his partner originally bid 2NT over 1♠ showing both minors it would be foolish by him to now treat the 2NT bid over 2♠ as showing a strong NT hand. And all this is authorized information to the 2NT bidder as well so it would be foolish by him to treat the 3♣ bid as anything but suit preference.

I agree that as the information from the original 2NT bid is unauthorized for the opening side there might be a problem with disclosure, but I don't see much problem with the eventual 2NT bid being described with the original meaning.

[aguahombre]

semeai, on 2011-August-18, 15:38, said:

It seems like changing 1♠ to 2♠ creates problems for the opponents if they repeat the 2NT bid. How should they take 3♣ themselves? If one player guesses it's still Stayman but the other thinks it's choosing clubs, are they entitled to redress?

Also, if advancer bids 3♣ and the opponents ask about the 3♣ bid, what should be said?

Maybe from a strategic point of view it would have been better to change the bid to 3♣ with moderate values (and pass with a light unusual 2NT)? There you just have to decide whether 3♦ is forcing.

If I were in this situation, I would not have discussed the scenario in advance with partner, but would feel comfortable that both of us would bid as if 2NT were the minors (AI).

So, if I wanted to take advantage of the new-found ability to distinguish between light and heavy I would keep 2NT as the bigger one and use pass for the weak one. Again not previously discussed, so I guess it would not be an "agreement" in anticipation of the irregularity.

But the part about all this being unauthorized to the spade opener's side bothers me a lot.

Since fourth chair with AI from what happened could, for instance, take a sac of 5m over 4S with a 4-bagger -- isn't that little piece of information usable to the opponents while defending? Is the Opening leader supposed to ignore his knowledge that dummy will show up with ten minor suit cards?

[blackshoe]

Law 25A4 is specific - information from the withdrawn 2NT bid is not authorized to the other side. Whether this is a good idea or not is a matter for another forum. For the purposes of this forum, this is the law, and we have to deal with it as is.

It is highly unlikely that anyone would arrange for a different agreed bidding system in this very rare case.

It seems to me the other side aren't even allowed to ask what the original 2NT bid meant. However, they are entitled to ask about the meaning of subsequent bids (including the substituted call over the change). Do the 2NT bidder and his partner now disclose their agreements regarding 2NT and followups over a weak 2S, without saying anything about the original 2NT bid? Or do they disclose their understanding of what the substituted call and followups mean in the context of the original auction? I fear we're going to get into "the other side aren't authorized to know that the overcaller has both minors, but the overcaller's side is required to tell them he has them". That ought to confuse the Hell out of players and directors both.

[barmar]

I think the logic of the lawgivers was that if this situation results in less than full disclosure, they did it to themselves by making an unintended bid, so too bad. You should be more careful.

[blackshoe]

I'm not sure I follow that, Barmar.

[Zelandakh]

Let us say that North opens 1C (precision) and East makes a call showing spades and diamonds. Now North changes their call to 2C (natural). Can East now bid 2H or 3H (natural) as a psyche protected by the AI that partner knows this is a psyche? This interpretation of the rules leaves one feeling a bit uneasy about the creative ways in which it could be used...

[pran]

In order to simplify my comment I assume that South opened 1♠ and was allowed (under L25A1) to change this to 2♠ after West had bid 2NT.

West may now withdraw his 2NT bid and replace it with any legal call at his own choice without further rectification. If he does so then all information available from this 2NT bid is AI to East/West but UI to North/South.

So far there is no problem that I can see, but what if West "replaces" his 2NT bid (showing both minors) with 2NT having a different meaning over 2♠?

My personal understanding of L25A4 is that the effect of L25A4 is unchanged: North/South may not base their auction or play on the knowledge that West has shown 5-5 in minors (before this fact becomes clear from other legal information). East, however, is free to base his calls and play on this knowledge and West is free to base his further calls and play on the knowledge that this information is authorized for East.

What remains is what disclosure should be given to North/South during the continued auction (and play)?

The laws do not give consistent advice for this exceptional situation, and I can see two (three) alternatives:
a: All requests for explanation should be answered with "No agreements".
b: All disclosures should be according to agreements related to the meaning of 2NT over a 2♠ opening bid.

A third alternative is to explain 2NT according to its meaning over 2♠ and later calls with their meanings according to knowledge legally available to East/West, but this seems to be better covered by Law 40B6a: [...]but he need not disclose inferences drawn from his knowledge and experience of matters generally known to bridge players.

I have a feeling that this is the single situation where I shall favour the "no agreements" alternative.

[iviehoff]

Assuming that 2N over 2S is a strong NT, then, unless the bidder has a hand half-plausible to describe as a strong NT, it is a psyche. I thought using a prior irregularity to protect a psyche was Frowned Upon. But regardless of that, adequate disclosure does need to be given. So if the 2NT-bidder's partner intuits that partner does not have a strong NT hand, and does not disclose this possibility to the opposition, then there is a CPU. This would also be the case, even more certainly, if they were observed using bids after the 2NT in the sense of UNT rather than SNT.

[blackshoe]

I suppose some people will cheat. IME, though, cheats are few and far between. I don't know why people seem to worry so much about them.

[pran]

iviehoff, on 2011-August-19, 05:45, said:

Assuming that 2N over 2S is a strong NT, then, unless the bidder has a hand half-plausible to describe as a strong NT, it is a psyche. I thought using a prior irregularity to protect a psyche was Frowned Upon. But regardless of that, adequate disclosure does need to be given. So if the 2NT-bidder's partner intuits that partner does not have a strong NT hand, and does not disclose this possibility to the opposition, then there is a CPU. This would also be the case, even more certainly, if they were observed using bids after the 2NT in the sense of UNT rather than SNT.

This will not be a concealed partnership understanding.

The knowledge that the 2NT bidder has minor two-suiter is AI to his partner and UI to his opponents.

The fact that this knowledge is UI to opponents is a consequence of their own irregularity, not of any partnership understanding.

To what extent this situation shall have impact on the disclosure of later calls is not answered by the laws. I consider it (technically) clear that no agreements can be expected to exist after the 2NT bid, nor can I see any legal reason for restricting that side's use of the knowledge that the 2NT bidder has a minor two-suiter as originally shown rather than the strong NT hand that would be the meaning of 2NT over 2♠.

It might be interesting to see a WBFLC resolution on this question, but the whole situation is so exceptional that I doubt WBFLC will find it worth spending any effort on the case.

[iviehoff]

pran, on 2011-August-19, 06:25, said:

The knowledge that the 2NT bidder has minor two-suiter is AI to his partner and UI to his opponents. The fact that this knowledge is UI to opponents is a consequence of their own irregularity, not of any partnership understanding.

Correct. But certainly the meaning of a subsequent bid to 2NT is a matter of partnership understanding, and is not a matter of information which is UI or AI. Especially if Stayman were now a preference to clubs and a heart bid now showed hearts rather than spades. If they asked and you told them "stayman" when you understood perfectly well it was preference to clubs, and had every intention of passing it on that understanding, that would be misinformation. It is AI to partner that you have a hand that thought of making an (also possibly off-beat) UNT. If you then make a strong NT bid and partner realises and behaves as if you don't have anything like a strong NT, as opposed to an off-beat strong NT that might have thought of making a UNT, that is an understanding, not information. It strikes me that the 2NT bidder would have been on much firmer ground if he had made a take-out double (or whatever similar bid is available to the partnership) instead of repeating the 2NT bid, assuming he doesn't in fact hold an off-beat strong NT or whatever the 2N advertised.

[Coelacanth]

On the assumption that 2NT over 2♠ shows the strong-notrump hand, the only reason for West to make this bid in the revised auction would be that he had a hand describable as both an unusual NT over 1♠ and a strong NT over 2♠. Perhaps something like ♠Kx ♥Ax ♦KQxx ♣AJxxx.

I am not suggesting that 2NT on these cards is a good bid on either auction, merely that it's the only hand that I can imagine that would want to bid 2NT on both auctions.

If West has the minor two-suiter hand without strong NT strength, he has no reason to bid 2NT (or anything else) over 2♠. He wants to show partner a minor two-suiter, and he has already done so, so he would simply pass. If he does bid 2NT with the minors-only hand, he's simply made a bad bid. In any case I don't see any legal issues arising from bidding 2NT no matter what he holds.