Conventions and choices

[kenberg]

Here is an uncontested auction from a club game:

 P      1
2    3NT
4    P

+710.  Oops.

I'll give you the hands in a moment but I first want to set the question. We were not playing drury. This might have helped.  We were playing flannery, so possibly the 2 bidder has 6 cards (he would be unable to open 2 ). He doesn't, but he could. But I think the most relevant might be that we were not playing fit showing jumps by a passed hand. Gib plays this, my partner and I were not playing it.

The hands:

  T764
  J76
  KQ654
  A

  AKJ93
  A8
  AJ2
  876

Of course we need to drop the Q to take 13 tricks but surely we want to be in 6 .
I held the big hand, which I felt was too strong to open 1NT. Gib agrees with this, btw.  Gib plays one-way drury so , unlike with my partner, 2 was an option. But my my partner was human this time, and drury was not an option. But  Gib also plays fit showing jump shifts by a passed had. After P - 1 - 3 I thin we are on our way. I would bid 3 , followed by partner's 4 . Looking good.

I do have a good hand and it has gotten better during the auction, but I still did not go on. I have a 17 count, partner is a passed hand. I might reasonably hope for 5 tricks and 5 tricks, and added to the A that totals 11. But then? Anyway, I passed the 4 .

I have never played fit showing jumps by a passed hand, but this certainly seems to be an advertisement for it

I have been playing some more hands with Gib and I still think she/he/it plays a decent game. I have encountered a few weird things here and there, but mostly it goes well.

Anyway, maybe I need to think about fit showing jump shifts by a passed hand.

Actually, now that I think about it, I am not so sure that I regard the 2 call of his as 100% forcing. He is a passed hand, if I have opened a third seat 1 on maybe 11 or a good ten points, might I not pass 2 ? I think I might.

I guess fit showing jump shifts by a passed hand are more or less cost free. It's hard to imagine a natural meaning for Pass - 1 - 3 .

[OliverC]

I'm mystified. Why would you not want to play fit-showing jump-shifts by a passed hand if you have them in your bidding arsenal?

OCP (where Opener is limited to 15 hcp), plays fit-showing jump-shifts over 1 and 1 (it plays mini-splinters as well LOL), all showing a hand in the region of 8-9 hcp. Since your Opening 1 or 1 bids can be much stronger than 15 hcp, it suggests that your fit-showing bids can afford to be a little weaker than OCP's, if anything. They certainly don't need to be stronger, so why omit them from your system when Responder is a passed hand?

If you're interested, OCP gets to use both mini-splinters and fit-showing jump-shifts by an ingenious method of swapping the 1 - 2 and 1 - 2NT responses around, so 1 - 2NT is a fit-showing jump-shift in Spades. Now 1 - 2 and 1 - 2NT are both mini-splinters in an unspecified suit, a little like a request to make a short-suit trial bid agreeing Hearts. Opener can decline by bidding 3M or go straight to game, or, if the location of Responder's shortage makes a difference, they can relay and now Responder shows where the shortage is.

Again, if you interested, by sheer coincidence my OCP session tomorrow (Saturday) happens to be on this exact topic. (Splinters, Mini-Splinters, and Fit-Showing Jump-Shifts over a Major suit Opening). Mini-Splinters and Fit-Showing Jump-Shifts are a hugely more beneficial use of bidding space than game-forcing jump-shifts. On the basis of frequency alone, you get that sort of hand far more often, and reaching thin (sub-minimum but making) games on the basis of a really good fit will gain you IMPs hand-over-fist compared to strong jump-shifts, which crop up much less often and which hands can always be bid in other ways. You can bolt them onto literally any bidding system, so if you don't already use either of these methods, or want to know how to combine them so you have the option of using either one at will, please come along to IAC tomorrow night (9pm UTC, 10pm UK, 5pm EDT).

[Curls77]

Isnt responder's hand too strong for fit-showing jump shift? I must admit I plain HATE when passed hand imposes game, but here imho, hand got so much better after 1S opening that looks strong enough for nice full splinter to 4C. That will make opener super happy; he can cuebid or just check RKC, aware of 9card fit and bid the 6S.
But sure thing Drury would help lots as it saves tons of space compared to splinter.

[kenberg]

I have never used the fit showing jump shift, so I speak from ignorance, but I would not think the hand is too strong for 3 . Suppose  opener has a hand that, either because of modest values or because  the 3 call doesn't do much for him. I assume he bids a passable 3 . After that, responder can raise to 4 . Surely responder has no interest in 6 after partner bids a passable 3 so 4 is enough, and gets them to the same 4 contract that a 4 splinter would.

Now on the big hand that I have, we would need to agree on whether 1 - 3 -  3 - 3 is passable.  I can see an argument for playing 3 as inviting 4 and 3 as declining. And I can see an argument for playing the 3 as a cue bid and a game force. So we would have to decide.
If 1 - 3 -  3 - 3 is passable then it would have to go 1 - 3 -  3 - 4 .  At any rate, we would get to 6 as long as we were clear on our agreements.

Splinters with stiff aces can cause problems since partner will assume a stiff spot. Even if there is agreement that it could be a stiff ace it will far more often be a stiff spot.  This leads to the following, if I were playing  with my clone and the big hand was dealer:I would not (yet) be playing 3 as fit showing so that's out.  After the 1 opening, I would bid 2NT not 4 .   I am speaking of my own style here, and others might do otherwise. And of course I am not saying anything about OCP.   After 1 - 2NT - 3 I imagine we get there. With less clarity than after the fit showing jump shift but I think we get there. When the has is dealer, the fit showing jump shift would be great, and I hope I can talk partner into playing it.

Drury might well have saved us here: P  - 1 - 2 (Gibs use one way Drury) -2 (full opener) and now we are back to normal. I imagine 3 is next and away we go.

[kenberg]

I was thinking a little more about this hand. A heart lead would make the hand a bit iffy.
Win the A and play off the AK of trump.  If the Q falls you make 7. If the trump are Qxx opposite x then you have to hope that the person with the Q also has 3+ diamonds. If so, the losing goes away on the fourth whether or not this is ruffed. If the opponent declines to ruff you can just lead a trump and then claim= 4+1+5+1=11 and you get one ruff in dummy for 12. (If he ruffs the 4th it's 5+1+4+1=11 plus a ruff. You have two ruffs available but no use for the second since one of the clubs can go on the last daimonds.

All in all, we probably want to be in 6 but it is by no means a sure thing on a heart lead.  Not really surprising since it is a 27 high card point slam.  We might have been in 6 off one, discussing who overbid! Not as the cards lay though.

Since you can also, barring bad luck,  make this hand if E holds all four spades I think that it is about a 75% slam.