Balanced hand bidding is relatively easy. We can usually describe our hand to partner by opening 1NT or rebidding 1NT. This lets partner know both our points and our hand type with either our first bid (when we open 1NT, the best situation) or with our second bid (when we rebid 1NT). However, if we have a big balanced hand then we need to have tools for describing our hand as well. These usually involve the use of 2NT – as a rebid, an opening bid, or even a rebid after having opened the bidding 2♣. But this does not solve all our bidding problems when we have these large balanced hands. Let’s look at these auctions in detail, see some of the issues, and then look at a useful gadget called Kokish to help us bid better.
When partner makes a bid, and we choose to bid a suit of our own, this is called a freebid. In most normal situations freebids show values (called positive freebids) and are often forcing 1-round. We’ve all heard the saying -- a new suit is forcing by an unpassed hand. Unfortunately, this is not always true, but it is often our agreement. Let’s look at freebids made by a passed hand and see how the fact that we are passed changes these situations.
One of my favorite sayings is “2NT is a convention, not a contract.” In specific situations, Responder can use 2NT as conventional raise of Opener’s suit. Sometimes we need to choose between several different conventional methods for competitive auctions. Here we look at our options for how to best use 2NT.
One of my favorite sayings is “2NT is a convention, not a contract.” In specific situations, Responder can use 2NT as conventional raise of Opener’s suit. Sometimes we need to choose between several different conventional methods for competitive auctions. Here we look at our options for how to best use 2NT.
When responding to partner’s 1-Major opening bid, Responder tries to apply the Law of Total Tricks (LOTT) – getting to the size of the partnership’s fit as quickly as possible. This is particularly true in competitive auctions but is also useful in constructive auctions. Responder must balance showing the size of their fit with showing their values. This LOTT bidding is especially effective when our side has a 9+card fit. In this case, the auction is likely to become competitive if the opponents have some values as well. Predicting this to happen, we would like to be able to compete to the 3-level with a 9+card fit as quickly as possible, eating up the opponents’ bidding space while showing our values. Bergen Raises are a set of conventional bids Responder can use when responding to a 1-Major opening bid with 4+card support (at least a 9+card fit). Let’s see how this system works.
To state it simply, a squeeze occurs when we force an opponent to try to hold more cards than there are tricks left in the hand. This is done by having threat cards in multiple suits and forcing an opponent to unguard one of these suits. There are a large variety of different types of squeezes, but here we focus on how to use our threat cards to apply pressure and execute some basic types of squeezes.
When declaring a hand, we often run a long suit of winners and one or both of our opponents run out of cards in that suit. This forces our opponents to discard from another suit, which gives us an opportunity to learn more about the opponent’s hand – there are many inferences available for us based on which suits they choose to discard, and which suits they avoid. Let’s take a moment to place ourselves in “the opponent’s shoes” and see how understanding their difficulties can help us to better “read” an opponent’s discards. Card Reading skills are an important part of all parts of card play and something that we should all spend time working to improve.
When declaring a hand, especially in a notrump contract, honor cards are a simple way to produce winners. With experience, we come to recognize that a long suit, particularly a long, strong one, can be another valuable source of tricks. Other cards can become winners as well. These other cards can grow up into winners in a variety of ways. They may not become tricks immediately, but as the play progresses, these cards become more relevant and pose a greater danger to the defense. We refer to these cards as threat cards, because they are threatening to turn into winners! The opponents must hold on to their cards in these suits (guard these suits) in order to prevent our threat cards from becoming winners. Let’s see how threat cards work and how we can make use of them to make us a more dangerous declarer.
When we look at a card combination where we are missing an honor, our thoughts usually turn to how we should play this suit for the best result. We generally focus on whether we should play “for the drop” of the missing honor or take a finesse. But in trying to avoid a loser in this suit, there is sometimes another line of play that we have at our disposal – the smother play. The smother play produces extra tricks by “dropping” a card in an unorthodox way.
Expert players look for ways to avoid taking a finesse. A finesse is usually a fallback plan that is taken only when no other line of play works. One way to avoid taking a finesse is to get the opponents to lead a suit for us. Of course, most opponents are not cooperative, and do not help us in this way, but there are times when we can force the opponents to lead a suit and accomplish what we want for us. One of the ways to get them to lead a suit is to put them on lead when they happen to have nothing but that suit remaining - but this does not happen all that often. Another way to accomplish this is to eliminate all the other suits and then put the opponents on lead, so they must lead what we want them to. This is a removal play (or stripping the hand) as it takes away the opponent’s other potential “exit” cards. Let’s see how to make this work.
Finding the best line of play as Declarer is always a challenge. Instead of trying to determine the better of line of play A and line of play B the best play is often to choose a combination of the two. Here we look at how to improve you declarer play by combining your chances.
You (and your partners) can sign up for Robert Todd's This Week in Bridge (TWiB) lesson emails for free at https://www.advinbridge.com/twib-signup This set accompanies TWiB 489.
Having the right mindset is an important part of approaching a declarer play problem. When you are in a good contact start to consider “What could go wrong?!?” and when you are in a bad contract start to make assumptions that good things are going to happen for you!
You (and your partners) can sign up for Robert Todd's This Week in Bridge (TWiB) lesson emails for free at https://www.advinbridge.com/twib-signup This set accompanies TWiB 490.
When we are defending and the Declaring side holds the King and the Jack in a suit then they will often have to guess the layout of the suit in order to take their most tricks. Here we look at the art of giving them the most difficult guesses we can!
You (and your partners) can sign up for Robert Todd's This Week in Bridge (TWiB) lesson emails for free at https://www.advinbridge.com/twib-signup This set accompanies TWiB 491.
Finding a fit makes declaring a hand much easier. When we are playing a hand without a fit it is much more challenging. Here we look at some strategies for playing hands that have less than an 8-card fit.
You (and your partners) can sign up for Robert Todd's This Week in Bridge (TWiB) lesson emails for free at https://www.advinbridge.com/twib-signup This set accompanies TWiB 492.
