[dickiegera]

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What should the bid be?

[hrothgar]

dickiegera, on 2013-October-27, 09:07, said:

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What should the bid be?

I'd pass.
Any spade call is misrepresenting your hand (note that you are in balancing seat)

If you're tempted to bid, look at the vulnerability

[Trinidad]

Zero

Rik

[ggwhiz]

I make it a max of 19 on my left, 4 on my right leaving pard with 12 at least. To have passed 1♣ they often have a modest to big time trap at least in my partnership where we can overcall on chunky 4 card suits.

So, what to do? I can't bid 2 or 3♠ and 4♠ is way too much but opposite a stiff spade honor and a non minimum trap type hand I can make game.

1♠ here followed by more spades as necessary until pard parks us. I don't promise much with this bid and can tell him it's all offence in one direction and hope to stop in a plus.

[DJNeill]

Pass. I have never seen a hand this weak in the Passout seat.

[MrAce]

Mp or Imp ?
At mp, I prefer going for a phone number over defending 1♣ with this, when they are white.

1 ♠ and then 2 ♠ if i am forced to bid again.

[Cyberyeti]

DJNeill, on 2013-October-27, 10:35, said:

Pass. I have never seen a hand this weak in the Passout seat.

This is a style thing, I've seen them several times but not over a 2+ card club. If the opening bid is known to be a 4+ card suit, we'll pass in a heartbeat with an 18 count and 6 cards in the suit, which means that with a singleton, we reopen always, so I'd bid 1♠.

[gwnn]

1♠. I assume passers had seen something like

♠KJ98
♣652
♥J6
♦963
♣6
(the duplicate 6 of clubs should have tipped them off that we have 7!! spades)

[kenberg]

I am not backing down on my vote for a pass, but I suppose it is relevant to check that partner, if he held a good hand and good clubs, could have bid 3♣ over 1♣? It seems that a good many of the points must be in his hand since they have to be somewhere. Maybe he has a 1=4=5=3 shape and some strength? 1♦ would seem right, planing on doubling later if, as he would see it, the opponents find spades.

Suppose I bid 1♠, suppose lho bids 3♣, and suppose partner doubles. I do what now? My silly partner probably thinks that I actually have something. Maybe not a lot, but something I think I want to avoid being in that spot.

[Winstonm]

The only thing that makes sense is partner holding a big unbalanced club hand, hoping for a reopening double. I don't want to double so I pass.

[ggwhiz]

kenberg, on 2013-October-28, 09:32, said:

Suppose I bid 1♠, suppose lho bids 3♣, and suppose partner doubles. I do what now?

I'm in 3♠ if need be and it may well be down but it's a longshot for the contract to be silly and any losses should be manageable.

♠Q, ♥AQT, ♦Kxxx, ♣xxxxx is (granted) a perfect min for partner to own that may well fetch action from lho and will only get us to a partscore but I learned that if you can come up with a construction like that for a partner with wide ranging values (maybe 12 -16 with the wrong shape to act?) quick enough you should bid.

[gwnn]

kenberg, on 2013-October-28, 09:32, said:

I am not backing down on my vote for a pass, but I suppose it is relevant to check that partner, if he held a good hand and good clubs, could have bid 3♣ over 1♣? It seems that a good many of the points must be in his hand since they have to be somewhere. Maybe he has a 1=4=5=3 shape and some strength? 1♦ would seem right, planing on doubling later if, as he would see it, the opponents find spades.

Suppose I bid 1♠, suppose lho bids 3♣, and suppose partner doubles. I do what now? My silly partner probably thinks that I actually have something. Maybe not a lot, but something I think I want to avoid being in that spot.

You bid 3♠ now. You are about on par on playing strength for a minimum 1♠ overcall but less defence than he'd expect. Pd can raise me or pass. I don't expect to go down.

[dickiegera]

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These were the 2 hands. Spots approximate.

I chose to bid 4♠ which was doubled, down 1 [-200].

They can make 4 hearts, 5 if we don't lead a spade on the go.

Poor result.
Pass would have been best

[kenberg]

Thanks for the hand. Just looking at the two hands, with the added info that most strength is on your left, it would not seem outrageous to think you can beat 4♥. Spade, club, ruff, eventual heart king. I suppose the club ruff is an illusion.

I always like seeing the hands on these problems, but we have to be careful about the conclusions we draw. Here we have 11 points opposite 5 and it makes nine tricks in spades, at least if you pick up the queen. I can't say it's all clear to me if the opening lead is the ♣K.

As with many hands, it is easy to imagine issues. Say rho has the Q and T in ♥. If we stay calm defending 4♥ we may get two trump tricks.

An interesting hand. Looking at both hands, it seems to me I would be willing to play 3♠ and take my chances at beating 4♥.

But I still pass it out after 1♣-Pass-Pass.

I have claimed that the older I get the less I balance. This hand, as least as the results go, supports this attitude. But a slam dunk it is not.

[gwnn]

Pretty sure pass from 3rd hand was stupid here. Why would I be afraid they bid 4H here if 3rd hand passed already? Sorry I'm not buying this.

[gszes]

2/1 acbl made me think this is MP vs IMPS and as a consequence I opted for a 2s bid
not willing to bid any more at these colors with this porous a suit. 2s at least warns p
that we are weak but could not be horribly so to bid red vs white. Its only 1 board at MP if
this is wrong but it may be worth a ton of MP if it is right. Those that play 2s as anything but
weak have a much bigger problem with bidding this hand.

If this were IMPS I would choose pass since it seems unlikely we have a game so there
is significant risk for at best a probable small gain and it may well be our best chance
at a plus score is if p is sitting all over the clubs hoping we would reopen with x.

[the hog]

Pass. You cannot bid 2 or 3S as these are totally different hand types in the POS. This leaves 1S as a second choice. I suspect they can make something, so I pass.

[kenberg]

gwnn, on 2013-October-28, 16:17, said:

Pretty sure pass from 3rd hand was stupid here. Why would I be afraid they bid 4H here if 3rd hand passed already? Sorry I'm not buying this.

Oops, I inadvertently upvoted this. Not that I completely disagree, but I hesitate.


If third hand had Qxx/xxxx/Jxx/Qxx it looks like a pass to me. This would give opener a 19 count with 1=4=3=5 shape, which looks like a 1♣ bid. The trouble with this is that we can beat 4♥ in this set-up, as long as we get our club ruff. Actually we can beat it two if we start with a club ace and ruff, back to the spade ace, another ruff, wait for the trump trick.

So it's true, I am having a little trouble constructing hands where 4♥ cannot be beaten but third hand doesn't bid. It seems we have a heart, a club, a spade. It seems we get a ruff unless there is a stiff spade in dummy, and even then we can overruff. But maybe dummy has the ♥ Q. So we play it. but then?

As mentioned, I pass. Maybe right, maybe wrong, but I pass. But I am having trouble seeing how 4♥ can be makeable. Looks as if 4 of anything by anyone requires a miracle of card placement to make.

[gwnn]

First, I said 'pretty sure it was stupid,' of course not seeing the hand I can't be completely sure, but I strongly suspect it was. And even on that unlikely scenario with Qxx xxxx Jxx Qxx opposite the 1435 monster it's hard to see them bidding to 4♥. And if responder always plays this crazy game of catch-up and bid game whenever he passes and opener shows extras, I like my chances against them in the long run.

[Trinidad]

gwnn, on 2013-October-28, 16:17, said:

Pretty sure pass from 3rd hand was stupid here. Why would I be afraid they bid 4H here if 3rd hand passed already? Sorry I'm not buying this.

It may have been a pretty stupid pass from 3rd hand. But you should accept the presents that you are getting. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

If you have this hand in the pass out seat, you can expect that you are handed a present.

Rik