[dboxley]

MP's Dlr W All Vul

---

• Do you agree with the 1S bid? We play it as forcing if responder had his 1st bid.
• Do you agree with the 4S bid? The ♦K is certainly worth an ace.
• Should N take another bid? How should the auction proceed?
• If you play that N should rebid 2NT how do you find the ♠ fit?

[the_clown]

1.No I would have bid 2NT to show 18-19 bal.
2.Yes
3.Yes, either RKCB or cuebid 5♦.
4.After 2N, S can bid 3♣ asking for 3♥s or 4♠.

[Fluffy]

18-19 balanced rebid 2NT. Period. You can make exceptions if you hapen to have 4c major support for partner. But other than that don't complicate things.

1. NO
2. Reasonable, close to 3♠ depending on the kin of trash partner opens.
3. Close call, probably yes, but the problem lies on the 1♠ bid.
4. You have all the 3 level for someone to bid spades naturally, there are many ways but for the most part south makes an artificial enquiry with 3♣ or 3♦ and north bids spades naturally denying 3♥ (1♣-1♥-2NT-3m!-3♠)

[Cyberyeti]

This is one of the sorts of hand our system (weak NT 4M open m with 4M4m32) is made for.

We bid 1♦-1♥-1N(15-bad 19)-2♣(inquiry)-3♠(4243 17-19)-4♠

You really need to play some sort of enquiry over 1x-1y-2N if you play more standard methods.

I like the fact that for us 1♦-1♥-1♠ shows 5-4 unless 4144.

[Codo]

1. It is a very old style to rebid 1 ♠ with your example hand. But I was forced to play that way by my partner till last year and we had one loss and one gain from it, so the net difference is small.
But, as you have asked: I think 2 NT is superior and surely the (by far) view of the majority.

2. Minimum 4 ♠ but still

3. Yes, partner can have even more..

4. As other said, rebid 3 ♣ to ask...

[rhm]

1. No, but I would bid 1♠ if I held ♠AKxx ♥KQx ♦AQJx ♣xx
2. At MP I would bid 3♠. You can upgrade the ♦K as much as you like, your spades are terrible.
3. Yes, which shows 4♠ was an overbid and 1♠ a poor choice. I would bid 5♠ asking for club control.
4. NMF. But with the South hand this would not occur to me. 3NT is a great contract I would very much like to be in at MP.
Playing 3NT and making as many tricks as 4-4 maniac do in their major suit fit is as good as bidding a good slam, when others reside in game.

Rainer Herrmann

[gnasher]

1. It's a matter of partnership agreement. Personally I prefer to play that this hand rebids 1♠. I dislike losing the 4-4 spade fit when it's a partscore hand, and I don't think there's much downside to playing 1♠ as either unbalanced or 18-19 balanced.

2. "Probably worth an ace" would be more accurate, but yes ♦K is a good card and I agree it's worth game.

3. The North hand is very quacky, but on the other hand it is a 19-count, so yes he should probably move. I would bid 5♠, suggesting that I need partner to have a good hand in context. South would pass that, because he has an 11-count with poor trumps.

[rhm]

 gnasher, on 2013-January-14, 08:41, said:

1. It's a matter of partnership agreement. Personally I prefer to play that this hand rebids 1♠. I dislike losing the 4-4 spade fit when it's a partscore hand, and I don't think there's much downside to playing 1♠ as either unbalanced or 18-19 balanced.
2. "Probably worth an ace" would be more accurate, but yes ♦K is a good card and I agree it's worth game.

How likely is it that you do not want to be in game given your partner has scraped up a response already. What you likely accomplish is that you make the defense easy by giving them lead information and playing notrump from the weak hand.
I can remember heated discussions, because I said I would normally not bypass a spade suit in preference to rebidding 1NT. As usual the crowd was against me.
But here I can see good reasons to prefer 2NT in general to 1♠
Yes, the ♦K is a working card, but claiming it to be an ace is an overbid in my view. Claiming to have 2 aces in the same suit also makes no sense. The ace gives value to the king (and other lower honors) not the other way round.
That is one important reason an ace is worth more.

Rainer Herrmann

[mgoetze]

 dboxley, on 2013-January-14, 06:07, said:

If you play that N should rebid 2NT how do you find the ♠ fit?

South bids 3♥ (Transfer), North bids 3♠ to confirm the fit.

[gnasher]

 rhm, on 2013-January-14, 09:34, said:

Yes, the ♦K is a working card, but claiming it to be an ace is an overbid in my view. Claiming to have 2 aces in the same suit also makes no sense. The ace gives value to the king (and other lower honors) not the other way round.
That is one important reason an ace is worth more.

Nobody claimed that ♦K was as good as the ace of diamonds - of course it isn't. I think the argument was that ♦K is as good as an ace in one of the side suits.

[dboxley]

 gnasher, on 2013-January-14, 08:41, said:

1. It's a matter of partnership agreement. Personally I prefer to play that this hand rebids 1♠. I dislike losing the 4-4 spade fit when it's a partscore hand, and I don't think there's much downside to playing 1♠ as either unbalanced or 18-19 balanced.

2. "Probably worth an ace" would be more accurate, but yes ♦K is a good card and I agree it's worth game.

3. The North hand is very quacky, but on the other hand it is a 19-count, so yes he should probably move. I would bid 5♠, suggesting that I need partner to have a good hand in context. South would pass that, because he has an 11-count with poor trumps.

5♠ would be a good call if we played it that way but we play it to ask for:

• control in either a suit shown by opps or the only unbid suit
• trump quality if 1. doesn't apply

I thought N should bid 5♦ denying a ♣ control and S should bid 5♥ showing controls in ♥ and ♣. Now N can bid 5♠ as invitational as in 3. above.

[ArtK78]

 dboxley, on 2013-January-14, 06:07, said:

MP's Dlr W All Vul

---

• Do you agree with the 1S bid? We play it as forcing if responder had his 1st bid.
• Do you agree with the 4S bid? The ♦K is certainly worth an ace.
• Should N take another bid? How should the auction proceed?
• If you play that N should rebid 2NT how do you find the ♠ fit?

(1) I would bid 1♠ on this hand. I don't want to lose the spade suit, and I don't believe it is likely that partner will pass 1♠ on any hand in which we belong in game or in which notrump (or some other strain) is better.

This may be one of the worst 19 counts in the history of bridge.

(2) This is a 3 1/2♠ bid. I would probably bid 4♠ but it would not be a crime to bid only 3. Great controls but a terrible trump suit.

(3) North should take another bid. Probably 5♦. RKCB may not get you the information that you need. And if you ask 3 players about the meaning of a raise to 5♠, you may get 4 opinions.

(4) You can find the spade fit using new minor forcing after a 2NT rebid. Opener's first responsibility is to show 3 card heart support. But when you then rebid 3NT, he knows that you had 4-4 in the majors and were looking for a spade fit.

If North does take another call, the partnership will no doubt wind up in slam. This is a poor slam, but not the worst one in the history of bridge. 3-2 spades, ♠Q onside, and you must score one of your rounded suit Q's all while not losing more than one trick. There is a small chance you can still make 12 tricks if you play towards one of your rounded suit Q's and lose the trick to the K. Probability of success is probably in the teens.

[1eyedjack]

 Cyberyeti, on 2013-January-14, 06:26, said:

This is one of the sorts of hand our system (weak NT 4M open m with 4M4m32) is made for.

We bid 1♦-1♥-1N(15-bad 19)-2♣(inquiry)-3♠(4243 17-19)-4♠

You really need to play some sort of enquiry over 1x-1y-2N if you play more standard methods.

I like the fact that for us 1♦-1♥-1♠ shows 5-4 unless 4144.

Personally I think that a 3 point range 1N rebid is quite wide enough. Whatever range you assign to it. What good does it do you to have a 2C enquiry available to you if half the time the response to that enquiry tells you that you should be in 1N?

[Fluffy]

 dboxley, on 2013-January-14, 12:28, said:

5♠ would be a good call if we played it that way but we play it to ask for:

• control in either a suit shown by opps or the only unbid suit
• trump quality if 1. doesn't apply

I thought N should bid 5♦ denying a ♣ control and S should bid 5♥ showing controls in ♥ and ♣. Now N can bid 5♠ as invitational as in 3. above.

1. and 2. are inconsistent with 1♠ rebid, same as 18-19 balanced actually. But if you assume 18-19 is possible, 1. and 2. are not. Once you eliminte the impossible, what is left must be true.

[Cyberyeti]

 1eyedjack, on 2013-January-14, 13:54, said:

Personally I think that a 3 point range 1N rebid is quite wide enough. Whatever range you assign to it. What good does it do you to have a 2C enquiry available to you if half the time the response to that enquiry tells you that you should be in 1N?

This is the price you pay for having 1x-1y-2N available as an unbalanced GF which works really well. Also bad 19 opposite 6 doesn't make game very often so we need 7 to invite, you don't tend to get silly results in 2N very often, and quite often you play 2M in a 4-3 which plays better than 1N frequently enough to not be much of a problem.

[steve2005]

 dboxley, on 2013-January-14, 06:07, said:

• Do you agree with the 1S bid? We play it as forcing if responder had his 1st bid.
• Do you agree with the 4S bid? The ♦K is certainly worth an ace.
• Should N take another bid? How should the auction proceed?
• If you play that N should rebid 2NT how do you find the ♠ fit?

1) this is matchpoints i'll go with 1♠ if partner has 4 small ♠ could just bid 3N over 2N to make and not look for 4-4♠ fit which will produce an extra trick here from ♥ruff
2) 3♠/4♠ does it matter 3♠ cause your ♠ bad 4♠ you have doubleton & maybe your partner opens solidly
3) no partner didnt splinter in♣ so partner needs all but 1 of these cards to make slam
♠Q ♥ AK ♦ K ♣AK if he had that good a hand would have used 4th suit forcing
4)3♣ new minor forcing

[mikeh]

I would always bid 2N. This has several advantages, most of which have been touched upon already. The main ones are that it immediately announces my strength and general hand pattern.

How one gets back to spade, assuming one wants to, is a matter for agreement. There are several methods, of which my favourite is the transfer: responder bids 3♥, which is accepted only if opener holds 4♠ (he bids 3N without, and can cuebid above 3N, and there are interesting options for the cuebid style: I like that he cuebids the highest A in a sequence: 4♣ shows the club A and denies the diamiond, 4♦ shows both minors and denies the heart, and so on, with 4♠ showing all 4 aces.

As for the responding hand, at mps I'd ignore the spade fit. For one thing, if we have spades, there is some chance that the opening lead will pick up the suit for us as leader, maybe hoping we have 6-7 points and his partner more, tries the unbid major (and I have several times seen a lead from say Q10xx in this situation).

For another, our spades are so weak that 4♠ may play very badly. Imagine something like Axxx KJx AQJx Kx. At the same time, we have extra power. In my view, the combination of very weak trump and extra side strength is precisely when one ought to eschew playing the 4-4. Add to that the chances of a favourable lead and the doubt about shape on defence until part way through the hand, and bidding 3N over 2N seems fine.

[JLOGIC]

Interesting, it is far more obvious to me to avoid the spade fit at IMPs. I mean, we got 29-30 HCP and stoppers, we aren't going down in 3N whereas 4S in a 4-4 when we have xxxx could go down sometimes. At MP, spades might play a trick better so I'd be more worried.

[awm]

I like a 1s rebid here; I feel like stopping in 1s is a huge win when partner responded on trash, and avoiding the space-eating 2nt call also helps on some game and slam auctions.

However I think the 4s bid is a big mistake. It hangs opener when he has extras by removing all space to cue. If we want to game force, why not 4th suit force followed by a raise? This leaves plenty of room to negotiate slam (including using non-serious 3nt to limit the hands) and still get out at the four level.

[JLOGIC]

Rebidding 1S is really strange to me.

Limiting your shape and strength immediately has all kinds of benefits. For instance, you don't have to get too high on this hand and guess what to do over a 4S jump if your partner is the one in control knowing you have 18-19 with 4 spades.

Rebidding 1S also leaves you poorly placed to show 19 on an auction like 1D 1H 1S 1N. I guess people are bidding 3N, because a 2N bid can be and typically would be (to me) something like a 4153 16 count, or a 4252 16 count that didn't want to open 1N. Having a range of 16-19 seems too wide to me. Likewise, if partner preferences to 2D, I don't think that 2N shows 18 or 19 balanced, I would often have a 16 or 17 count since I have to bid again with that much. If we are actually bidding 3N over 1N or 2D, that seems counterproductive to me because partner might still have a hand that would pass a 2N rebid (if he doesn't have 3 spades and can't pass 1S).

Speaking of partner rebidding 1N over 1S, doesn't that seem like a disaster positionally? I think people overrate positional value but in a 19 opp 6 or 7 game, I really don't want to have the weak hand playing it. This seems like it would be a common problem and would often cost a trick.

Also I don't know about you guys but on an auction like 1m 1H 2N, my opponents often lead a spade into me. I am very happy about this when I have 4 spades. If I bid 1S, even if I'm lucky enough to end up declaring it, they probably won't do that. On top of that if I rebid 1S with 4 spades then I will have to alert my 2N rebid as typically denying 4 spades, so they will be more likely to lead spades when it's right, or more likely to defend better later in the hand. It's true that 1S rebidders gain when dummy has 4 spades and doesn't have to check back, but I'd still rather have declarers spade holding be unknown for the entire hand.

And how about the idea that partner will not pass 1S with a hand where a balanced 19 count can make game? I just don't buy it. I am passing 1S with 6 counts and 3 spades all day and not thinking twice about it. If I have to stop doing this to cater to the 19 count that is going to bid 3N over 1N then I think that is a loss. If I still do this and just pay off, then I'm going to miss some games.

All of this to cater to playing 3S instead of 2N with a spade fit, or playing 1S instead of 2N with a 4-3 spade fit, or maybe when partner is very weak and a 4-4 spade fit, I don't think it's worth it. Those are gains for bidding 1S but they do not occur that frequently and sometimes 2N makes with 22 or 23 HCP anyways.

This feels like a weird argument to make since I have always argued the other way when it comes to bidding 1S with a weak NT and 4 spades rather than 1N, but in those cases we are far more likely to have a spade partial that makes when 1N doesn't (or a spade game when partner has a light but shapely hand that can't invite over a 1N rebid).