[W Kovacs]

Scoring: IMP

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Playing Precision, the bidding went:

1♣! - (P) - 2♦ - (2♥)
2NT - (3♥) - 3♠ - (4♥)
?

1♣ = 16+ HCP
2♦ = 8+ hcp, 5+ ♦

At this point, you know 4♠ is likely cold, slam is uncertain (and can you explore it safely?), but you're also staring at 6 defensive tricks, and partner might have 2 or 3 more. The questions:

1) What do you bid here?
2) If you double for penalty, what is your opening lead?
3) If you could change a bid, what would you change?

I'll post more particulars after I get some responses.

[Fluffy]

bid blackwood, and ask about ♠Q and ♦K later to play 7

double is ridicoulous when slam is 90% but if oyu pick it you obviously lead a trump

[hrothgar]

Here's a perfect minimum for the original 2♦

♠ Qxxx
♥ x
♦ KQTxx
♣ xxx

Slam looks pretty damn good to me.

Personally, I think that its a lot more likely that partner is sitting on

♠ Qxxx
♥ VOID
♦ AQTxxx
♣ xxx

(Whatever RHO was bidding on, it sure wasn't Heart honors, which means he should be sitting on a seven card suit)

I think that we're almost guarunteed to to make 6♠. We could easily make 7♠. The great mystery is the club suit. If partner has the King of Clubs, we could easily set the opponents by 5 tricks. Maybe even six which pays about the same as a grand.

In contrast, if partner's values are concentrated in Spades and Diamonds, then looking for the grand is a alot more attractive.

Were I to double 4H, I'd start by cashing a top Heart. I suspect that I'd quickly cash two more to kill any ruffs in the short hand.

[hrothgar]

Fluffy, on Sep 2 2010, 04:37 PM, said:

double is ridicoulous when slam is 90% but if oyu pick it you obviously lead a trump

6♠ = scores + 980
4♥X -5 scores + 1100

[ArtK78]

I can construct hands where even 5♠ is not safe. So I don't understand how 6♠ can be 90%.

I double and lead 3 rounds of trump. Let's see how many tricks they can take.

If partner has a distributional freak, he may not sit for the double. We will cross that bridge when we come to it.

[Phil]

I think doubling is very bad. Certainly the opponents have a side club suit. Its probably a tossup whether we get 300 or 500, unless they are known lunatics, where we might get 800.

Partner needs at least 8 points in ♠ + ♦ for the bidding. I cannot imagine the 5 level to not be safe.

I could make a forcing pass, but that just creates headaches, so my inclination is that 4N would be RKC for spades, even though there would be a nagging voice telling me its natural.

[W Kovacs]

I'll post the full hand in a little bit. I was curious what my P would have done had I bid 4NT (I'm not entirely certain myself, though I believe it would be RKC in Spades. I could Q ask after that).

Doubling and leading three rounds of hearts puts the opponents down 5 or 6, depending on how partner discards on the heart leads. If he holds onto all 5 diamonds, then he can run them when no trump are left. Otherwise declarer gets a club eventually.

My biggest error was the 2NT bid. Already forced to game, I was trying to bid slowly to investigate slam, which let the opps into the auction. If I had bid 3NT, showing extra values, partner has already said he bids 4NT, Quantitative, which lands us in 6NT+1.

Those that push to 7♠ go down 1 on the 5-0 spade break. Sorry.

[Fluffy]

as I said, double WTP. Its the obvious bid

[W Kovacs]

Scoring: IMP

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Here's the full hand. On defense, anything except the heart lead gives declarer the cross-ruff, leading only to down 2.

To make a slam (NT or ♠), both the J♠ and Q♦ had to be on the left, or the Q♦ had to be doubleton.

And my partner responded to my e-mail. He would take 4NT over 4♥ as natural, and would leave me there

Only two tables reached 6NTS, and they had little (TO dbl by E!) or no interference. I credit the opps for making life difficult.

[JLOGIC]

hrothgar, on Sep 2 2010, 09:19 AM, said:

Fluffy, on Sep 2 2010, 04:37 PM, said:

double is ridicoulous when slam is 90% but if oyu pick it you obviously lead a trump

6♠ = scores + 980
4♥X -5 scores + 1100

Loved this post lol.

[ahydra]

What about 5♠ (nat and invitational)? (North has an easy raise to 6 with those diamonds.)

I must admit my first reaction was to X, but some more thought reveals trying for slam would probably be better since we have 30+ and 5S almost certainly isn't going off. If you do X, no question about leading a ♥ though.

ahydra

[Free]

A bit late, but I think Dbl is very obvious. We get 6 of their trumps, so they'll have a maximum of 4 tricks in the ♥ suit. Since most of us are thinking of slam, how many side suit tricks do you expect opps to have?

[jdonn]

Lol I wish the original hand wasn't up yet, I definitely double! Obviously one or both of our suits are breaking very badly since rho probably has a void. And I do have, uh, a good lead to make.

I think a really good idea on these hands is to do what your hand tells you. What I mean is it's dangerous to say "if partner has this or this we make slam, time to bid on and cross my fingers", instead say "I am balanced with the AKQ of their suit which really suggests defending."

This thread title is funny. Our hand isn't freakish and there are only 2 options hehe. Bidding game is not an option at all since double is so obviously better than that.