[Echognome]

Scoring: IMP

1♥ - 2♣
2♥ - 3♣
?

---

You are playing 2/1 with your regular p. We have agreed that 2♥ shows extra length (and that 2NT is our catch-all bid). What is your plan of bidding after partner has bid his clubs twice?

[mike777]

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

[luke warm]

well hell, i think i'd just bid 3nt... i believe we have 6, maybe 7, club tricks.. with any luck i oughta scratch out 2 or 3 with my hand

[Echognome]

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

[mike777]

Echognome, on Jun 20 2005, 07:57 PM, said:

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

4C
Not by a long shot. Partner is used to me having a junky 11-13 hcp for my bidding. I play 2/1 promises 14+ HCP very often. Partner bid 3c for some reason and not 2nt. 2nt does not have to promise full d, s and club stops. Her 14 HCP are somewhere.

4d is now kickback
4nt is to play

[Winstonm]

For me 3D also, but I pass 3N. In my methods, 3C is non-forcing in this potentially no-fit auction so 3N is all the hand is worth. Other methods would lead to a different problem.

WinstonM

[Echognome]

Winstonm, on Jun 21 2005, 02:16 AM, said:

For me 3D also, but I pass 3N. In my methods, 3C is non-forcing in this potentially no-fit auction so 3N is all the hand is worth. Other methods would lead to a different problem.

WinstonM

Ah. A fair point Winston. We play Hardy rather than Lawrence style, so 3♣ was still GF.

[Fluffy]

3♠ to me.

[flytoox]

I would still bid 3N even 3C is GF. My hand is bad in the context. HKJ and SQ are not very useful playing 5/6C.

[Echognome]

Scoring: IMP

---

The middle road here is interesting though because if partner has a spade stopper, it is not likely to be a slow stopper (given your holding in spades). Thus if partner can show you the Ace or King of spades, this should improve your hand.

That being said, I chose the conservative 3NT on the hand. Slam is actually pretty good being at worst on a finesse.

[P_Marlowe]

Echognome, on Jun 20 2005, 07:57 PM, said:

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

Yes.

Partner does not hold a doubleton,
and my suit is, ... well a 6 card suit.

Marlowe

[HeartA]

Echognome, on Jun 20 2005, 07:57 PM, said:

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

No. I would pull to 4♣ to show slam interest.

[P_Marlowe]

HeartA, on Jun 21 2005, 12:44 PM, said:

Echognome, on Jun 20 2005, 07:57 PM, said:

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

No. I would pull to 4♣ to show slam interest.

Is that not overstating your hand a bit?
You have minimum, and only barely support.

Marlowe

[mike777]

P_Marlowe, on Jun 21 2005, 01:17 PM, said:

HeartA, on Jun 21 2005, 12:44 PM, said:

Echognome, on Jun 20 2005, 07:57 PM, said:

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

No. I would pull to 4♣ to show slam interest.

Is that not overstating your hand a bit?
You have minimum, and only barely support.

Marlowe

Not a minimum, here is a minimum

QTX
KJ9XXX
AXX
X

This is why I need to take a risk and bid on with this hand since P thinks I have the above hand. Note P has only 14HCP with an extra club. Partner's hand is closer to minimum than extra after bidding 3clubs.

[P_Marlowe]

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:31 PM, said:

P_Marlowe, on Jun 21 2005, 01:17 PM, said:

HeartA, on Jun 21 2005, 12:44 PM, said:

Echognome, on Jun 20 2005, 07:57 PM, said:

mike777, on Jun 21 2005, 01:54 AM, said:

3D

Easy so far. Let's give partner a headache for a change.

If you bid 3♦, partner bids 3NT. Is the matter closed?

No. I would pull to 4♣ to show slam interest.

Is that not overstating your hand a bit?
You have minimum, and only barely support.

Marlowe

Not a minimum, here is a minimum

QTX
KJ9XXX
AXX
X

This is why I need to take a risk and bid on with this hand since P thinks I have the above hand. Note P has only 14HCP with an extra club. Partner's hand is closer to minimum than extra after bidding 3clubs.

Hi Mike,

I am not sure, I will follow you here, I am a mouse if it comes to
slam bidding.
Looking at several responses at the forum and not only in this thread,
there are lots of tigers around here, when it comes to slam bidding.

It is always the question, how high do you calculate the risk of going
down on the 5 level opposite the chance to reach a slam, which is
better than 50%.

Looking at the actual hand, the hand is not really good, espescially
if you give responder a singleton, you only hold two valuable cards
for him.
If you think, this enough for the 5 level go ahead, I prefer the 9 trick
game. (... The only question is, is it really safer than 5C, partner
will have a spade stopper, but the diamond stopper maybe very thin.)

Marlowe

[inquiry]

[quote name='P_Marlowe' date='Jun 21 2005, 02:17 PM'] No. I would pull to 4[cl] to show slam interest. [/QUOTE]
Is that not overstating your hand a bit?
You have minimum, and only barely support.

Marlowe [/quote]
I WOULD NEVER call this hand a minimum. It is control rich. This hand is worth, in support of clubs, a lot. Judgement is fairly subjective, and seeing both hands, might make anyone think, yes, this hand is more than a minimum. Is there some indicator that might be applied to determine if this hand is a minimum or not?

It turns out, there are a number of evaluation situations that might help. I like ZAR points (see [url="http://public.aci.on.ca/~zpetkov/TheNeverMiss.html"]http://public.aci.on.ca/~zpetkov/TheNeverMiss.html[/url] ), so lets see what ZAR points say about this hand.

HCP = 14
Control points = 5
Distributional points = 13
In support of clubs, you get +1 for the club ACE. Since partner rebid his club suit, your two card support is adequate.

This comes to 33 points. A minimum Zar opening is 26 ZAR ponts, so this is more than an ACE more than a minimum hand. I will note that Zar recommends subtracting points for inadequate trump support, so you might remove 3 here for having only 2 clubs, but again, club legnth is enough so I don't subtract here. So you have 33 ZAR support points, or maybe 30 depending upon your view of Ax on this auction. But a minimum opening bid is 26 ZARs, and your partner should have a minimum of 26 for this auction. 33 + 26 = 59, this means you are just a measly 3 zar points less than what is needed for slam zone if your partner is minimum. Ifhe has any extra, you will have some play for slam. In addition, you an be sure all suits are controlled for slam (he must have Ace or king of spades)... so a slam try certainly is not out of the question.

Therefore, I think a slam try here is clearly required over 3NT. I would raise to 4NT or 4C, depending on how partner interprets these bids.

What about partners hand?

HCP = 14
Controls = 4
Distribution = 16

Fit points, add one for heart ace, but lose six for singleton, also lose the point for Jx of diamonds. Total then, is 34 + 1 - 7 = 28. But once partner raises clubs (or shows club support), this hand can add back 2 points for the singleton club, bring it to 30. And 30 + 33 = 63, one more than need for slam. That is just about right on these holdings.

[Fluffy]

I wonder if your partner would answer 4 or 5♣ to 3♠. MAybe he jsut bids 4♥, who knows

[P_Marlowe]

inquiry, on Jun 21 2005, 01:43 PM, said:

In support of clubs, you get +1 for the club ACE. Since partner rebid his club suit, your two card support is adequate.

Hi Ben,

I doubt, that a two card suit is adequate fit.

To me, the ZAR points evaluation method is
similar to the LTC evaluation method, and I like
the LTC.

The method emphasises fit and shape.

Using the LTC, a refinement is to add a looser,
if the fit is poor, example for poor fits are 5-3 and
6-2. Since ZAR points are fairly new, the research
leading to the LTC refinements was not made up to
now, but I am pretty sure, that the results will be
similar.
The suggestion to add points or subtract loosers,
is also not new. One fathers of the LTC, Harrison
Gray, did suggest this, he referred to trump control.

With kind regards
Marlowe

PS: Maybe I will have a look at some examples given by
Ron Klinger in his book about the LTC. Those examples
gave the LTC a bad name, because according to LTC slam
was odds on, but already making game was a "challenge".

[inquiry]

I don;t mean to suggest slam SHOULD necessarily be bid or made. What I wanted to suggest, however, this hand is far from a minimum. Zar has a webpage (he really needs to update it) with a "bidding machine". The Zar bidding machine here is flawed in that it does not remove points for singleton or doubleton honors, nor does it do calculations for ZAR misfits. Having said that, you can find the ZAR bidding machine on this page (realize that it never underestimates ZAR points but it frequently overestimates). http://public.aci.on.ca/~zpetkov/.

If you plug the raw data from these two hands into the ZAR bidding machine, it would come back with a combined ZAR fit count of 70, and suggest grand slam. A relality check during auction would discover missing spade ACE and of course you would never bid the grand.

I have had the great pleasure to test a beta website he has that allow the use of real world hands to calculate the contract with a new tool he call something like the zar calculator, but with better fitting adjusments. I have also been able to read his new material on the ZAR BIDDING system (coming out soon), which shows you how he really adjust for fitting and non-fitting points (not so simple as add points for this or that, it takes a holistic apporach to the hand). Sufficient it to say. it is clear the plus minus three point approach is a crude approximation. On this hand, ZAR bidding adjustment would suggests GRAND SLAM (not small slam), but reality check finds missing ACE so you bid only six (if slam at all).

Since you quote LTC, the same logic applies. Here LTC suggest 13 tricks (LTC = 24 - losers in one hand - losers in the other). Here North had 5 losers and south 6 losers. 24-5-6 = 13. So same reality check is needed going that way.

But I didn't mean to argue rather ZAR method is good or bad, just that is was one way to judge this was better than a minimum. And, here I still think after 2♣, 3♣ by partner, doubleton support to ace if fine.

ben