[Rebound]

Well. Seems I'm all alone in my choice. I think I'll keep it to myself until I hear what the experts have to say :-)

[cherdano]

Rebound, on Oct 9 2005, 12:38 AM, said:

Well. Seems I'm all alone in my choice. I think I'll keep it to myself until I hear what the experts have to say :-)

I think there are so many bids that could work on this hand, I can hardly imagine that anyone could call your choice "wrong", whatever it is.

Arend

[Double !]

cherdano, on Oct 8 2005, 05:01 PM, said:

I assumed 4NT would be for the minors, but I thought that partner would never expect a 4-card disparity for this bid, I think 4-6 would be a more common shape in the minors for this bid. 5♣ then 5NT over 5♥ if I get the chance should rather the suit lengths across.

FWIW, my reasoning was similar.

The more I think about it, the more I'm impressed with reisig's 6D bid. The opps turned on the heat via 4H, and he turned it right back on them big time with 6D. (I was going to add "in spades", but he did it "in diamonds",lol)
Well Done!

DHL

[Rebound]

cherdano, on Oct 8 2005, 06:58 PM, said:

Rebound, on Oct 9 2005, 12:38 AM, said:

Well. Seems I'm all alone in my choice. I think I'll keep it to myself until I hear what the experts have to say :-)

I think there are so many bids that could work on this hand, I can hardly imagine that anyone could call your choice "wrong", whatever it is.

Arend

That's nice of you to say, but I would not be surprised to see my choice deemed to be lunacy. :-)

FWIW, I voted pass.

Here's my thinking: RHO has preempted. I have just a couple of aces and a lot of distribution. I think someone at the table has a monster holding good distribution and HCP. If it's my LHO, we may push them to slam if I bid (assuming no club tricks on defense). If it's my partner, I expect a move of some kind over 4♥. That may give me more info to decide how to handle this freak of a hand.

So, have at it lol. Let me hear your thoughts on my reasoning, if it is not too off topic. I'm not saying I'm sold on this call, but it was my original decision.

[inquiry]

This problem, as predictably had a lot of answers. Let’s just jump in with the top choices (5♣ and 4NT which together garnished 7 votes

Sergey 5♣ - any bid may be right with freak hand ) Besides 7-4 isnt 2-suiter. Next bid will depend on partner's reaction on possible 5H by LHO.

mikeh 5♣: if he bids 5♦, I have an easy 5♥: if LHO bids 5♥, I reopen with 5NT

Gerben42 5♣. I'd feel better if partner would have promised 4♦ for his bid.

Fluffy 5♣, Don't like the idea of taps in a ♦ contract, but this could be very wrong if partner has ♠ tricks.

Frances & Jeffrey 4NT, both minors (by the way, if partner bids 5C and I convert to 5D, that should show a mild slam try in diamonds with an immediate 5D bid weaker). This shouldn't be any form of Blackwood: once the auction gets pre-empted this fast, it's far more important to be able to describe your hand than just to ask a wide ranging opener how many aces he has.

ritong 4 nt. tough one. hope we can convince them to go to 7♥, if we have good enough ♦s. my idea is not to try to "play in peace",they never agree, i just hope i can get them one step higher than the other room.

Roland 4NT. No, it's not Blackwood. Shows a club suit with diamond support. Partner could still be 4432 I suppose, but I've got to bid with this hand. It has great potential with the heart void. If LHO bids 5H and partner passes, I will not give up. Then 6C is my next bid.

In addition to the these seven bids that were not aimed directly at forcing to slam were two votes for 5♦

Fred 5♦. If I had to guess at the final contract, I would bid 6D now, but I think there is a good chance I will have another opportunity to bid (I will try 6C next). 5NT here probably should by a "choice of slams", but I don't think my partner is going to choice clubs with 4-2 in the minors.

If it turns out that my 5D ends the auction, we may still get a good result. The 4H overcall suggests bad breaks so good slams will fail more often than they normally would. Furthermore, when we can make a slam, there is a good chance that the opponents have a cheap sacrifice. +620 in 5D does not have to be a bad score.

Anyone who attempts to embark on a constructive auction that gives them a chance to get to 7D is dreaming. My experience strongly suggests emphasizing practicality in high-level competitive auctions. In other words, don't try to be perfect over preempts.

Beto 5♦. It would be great if 4NT shows clubs and some diamond support. After big preempts i only bid the obvious slams. In here i can easily loose 1 trick in each minor or 2 trump tricks.

Then there was the tactical bidders, pushing the hand immediately to slam level. Where Fred bid 5♦ thinking he will end up in 6♦, Justin bids 6♦ thinking he will end up defending against a save. The others had similar ideas.

Jlall 6C. Tactical. In poker they call this a "semi bluff." If 6C is passed out I could easily be cold, but they will often try a save at these colors. This is not the type of hand I'm going to get scientific on, I have no idea who makes what and they probably don't either. I would not bid 5 of a minor as I would likely end up bidding on over 5H anyways.

Ng 5H. We have slam here, I guess. After 5S, I bid 6C, so partner will know that I have Diamonds also. Nobody could be too smart here, so I pick 5H to save some time. If we will have plus score on this board, I'l buy a lottery.

Luis 5NT. If pd has solid diamonds I’m going to play 7d, in freakish hands anything might work so I really don't see the point in polling the panel in a hand where anything might work. Expect votes for 7d, 6d, 5d, some clubs, 5h, etc etc. This is my scoring for this problem:

5d: 100 if you only win 5d
5h: 100 if pd does the right thing after our bid
6d: 100 if you can make 6d and not 7d
5c: 100 if you can make 5c and not 5d
6c: 100 maybe you win 6c and diamonds are breaking horrible
7c: 100 maybe 7c and not 7d
5NT: 100 maybe pd does the right thing after 5NT
7d: 100 maybe you win 7d so why not bid it?

ADDED NOTES:
I didn't like the problems a lot this time, I hate problems that just depend on partnership style and guessing what to do in freak hands is not very challenging either. Guess we should look for problems where there's something to learn from the expert votes.

reisig [i]I submitted this hand..but I'll stick to the bid I made at the table 6D.

I went with panel votes for the scoring. However, I group three of the single votes together as they allow 6♣ or 6♦. While I downgraded the 6♦ vote as it eliminated even the remote possibility to get to 6♣.

5♣     4     100
4NT     3     80
5♦     2     60
5NT     1     50
5♥     1     50
6♣     1     50
6♦     1     40

[Walddk]

inquiry, on Oct 9 2005, 05:26 PM, said:

Luis [i]5NT. If pd has solid diamonds I’m going to play 7d, in freakish hands anything might work so I really don't see the point in polling the panel in a hand where anything might work. Expect votes for 7d, 6d, 5d, some clubs, 5h, etc etc. This is my scoring for this problem:

5d: 100 if you only win 5d
5h: 100 if pd does the right thing after our bid
6d: 100 if you can make 6d and not 7d
5c: 100 if you can make 5c and not 5d
6c: 100 maybe you win 6c and diamonds are breaking horrible
7c: 100 maybe 7c and not 7d
5NT: 100 maybe pd does the right thing after 5NT
7d: 100 maybe you win 7d so why not bid it?

Since 4NT is not listed, I take it that Luis plays this as Blackwood. It surprises me. Partner opens 1 something. When do you have a hand where your only problem is how many aces partner has? I think 4NT is better used for "two places to play". Can only be minors on this auction.

Roland

[cherdano]

inquiry, on Oct 9 2005, 05:26 PM, said:

Sergey 5♣ - any bid may be right with freak hand ) Besides 7-4 isnt 2-suiter. Next bid will depend on partner's reaction on possible 5H by LHO.

Interesting. I counted 8 clubs.
Of course, if the director is also a player with judgement, it may work to call him and convince him I have only 12 cards. Wouldn't be such a bad idea to throw this board out

[Fluffy]

Walddk, on Oct 9 2005, 04:01 PM, said:

Since 4NT is not listed, I take it that Luis plays this as Blackwood. It surprises me. Partner opens 1 something. When do you have a hand where your only problem is how many aces partner has? I think 4NT is better used for "two places to play". Can only be minors on this auction.

Roland

Count me as well for Blackwood , actually with a minor fit, and many chancees of them competing it is more like an invitational to hand, wich there is no way to show at these level, ,you can use 5NT for 2 places to play (the opposite is true, I know)

[Walddk]

Fluffy, on Oct 10 2005, 06:08 AM, said:

Walddk, on Oct 9 2005, 04:01 PM, said:

Since 4NT is not listed, I take it that Luis plays this as Blackwood. It surprises me. Partner opens 1 something. When do you have a hand where your only problem is how many aces partner has? I think 4NT is better used for "two places to play". Can only be minors on this auction.

Roland

Count me as well for Blackwood you can use 5NT for 2 places to play (the opposite is true, I know)

You can indeed, but that makes it somewhat difficult to arrive in 5 of a minor

Roland

[helene_t]

I voted 4NT but does it necesarily show minors? What to to with six hearts and three diamonds? Usually, (4♠)-4NT shows a generic two-suiter.

Another problem I have with 4NT as either minors or slam-invite with diamonds is that we play 2NT in competition as weak than a direct bid in a suit. Why would 4NT be different? I think the same arguments apply to a scrambling 4NT as to scrambling 2NT.

[Walddk]

helene_t, on Oct 10 2005, 08:41 AM, said:

I voted 4NT but does it necesarily show minors? What to to with six hearts and three diamonds? Usually, (4♠)-4NT shows a generic two-suiter.

Another problem I have with 4NT as either minors or slam-invite with diamonds is that we play 2NT in competition as weak than a direct bid in a suit. Why would 4NT be different? I think the same arguments apply to a scrambling 4NT as to scrambling 2NT.

On this auction you don't have hearts, so 4NT can only be for the minors. If you have spades, bid them. The situation is obviously completely different if the overcall had been 4♠.

Roland

[helene_t]

You're right Roland, sorry, it's too early in the morning. I thought the overcall was 4♠.

[Chamaco]

luke warm, on Oct 7 2005, 11:06 PM, said:

006F - i bid 5H, and i still like it.. unfortunately, i appear to be the only one who does heh

Hey Jimmy, you are not alone !
I did not vote in the poll, but I'd bid the same as you :-)

And about the "Nebulous" diamond issue in Standard American: that's true, *a priori*.

But in this specific bidding sequence, after RHO shows a very unbalanced hand, I tend to believe my pard has probably real diamonds and not a weak NT.

[JLOGIC]

fred, on 2005-October-07, 10:44, said:

Agree. I thought this was a great problem for several reasons:

- Several possible actions none of which are especially appealing
- Judgment is involved
- Tactics are involved
- Language is involved (ie interpretting the meanings of bids like 5NT)

This may seem like an impractical problem because the hand and situation are so unlikely, but that doesn't mean the problem isn't interesting. I think this problem is interesting (and therefore worthy of discussion).

There is a certain skill in bridge that I call "doing the right thing" that is not fully appreciated in my view. The people who keep winning at the highest levels are good at all aspects of the game, of course, but their ability to judge accurately (or guess better) on the "big hands" is one of the main things that sets them apart.

That is another reason why I think this is a good problem. People who read the panel's answers will gain some insight into what goes through an expert's mind when a "big hand" comes along.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

Great Fred quote.

BTW my 6C bid is out to lunch, I like 4N now.