Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Never put down a 7 card suit ...



... in dummy unless it's trump. On this deal, sitting South, I managed to pass three times with 7510 shape, with the predictable bad consequences. The first pass seems alright, with 5 spades: if partner bids spades at any point, I'm going to raise him to 4 in an instant. Also, RHO has already passed, so a 3 club preempt may just hit partner. The second pass is already very questionable (I was enjoying watching the opponents bidding out their misfit, but that shouldn't prevent me from making the obvious looking 2 club call). The final pass is the real culprit. It's clear partner is not going to enjoy this dummy, so time to correct to 3 clubs, the only reasonable contract. I had foggy thoughts about "not getting higher if the hand is a misfit", but here I have the club fit in my own hand already. Plus, passing violates the rule quoted above.

2 comments:

  1. You blogged this mishap before me! I think I had no business bidding 2H the second time. It's obvious when West limits his hand with 1NT that you must have about 8 points and yet you didn't care for my hearts the first time. I can pass (is a double at this point penalty or takeout?) and if west doesn't correct to 2D, you may get a chance to bid 2C in comfort.

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  2. The question about the double is tricky: I would say cooperative with a strong emphasis on take-out, typically 6 hearts and tolerance for clubs.

    I haven't shown anything and you've limited your hand with the overcall, so for a penalty dbl you would need specifically something like

    Ax KQJTxx Axx xx

    That will not come up very often; also, the opponents can probably easily run to diamonds or spades on this auction, so penalty double doesn't seem very useful here.

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