[Fluffy]

I am no expert on the LAW, but I am sure that double fit increases the ammount of total tricks. The problem with this hand is the hidden double fit that only north is partially aware off.

[nige1]

WellSpyder, on 2010-November-30, 06:32, said:

Hmmm, every time I get a bad result in a high-level pass, double or bid on situation (which happens pretty often!) it seems that the LAW is a poor indicator for the hand. Perhaps this is not so much bad luck as a problem with the law...

nigel_k, on 2010-November-30, 13:42, said:

Agree with this. Anyone who blames bad luck whenever the law doesn't work is going to be an extremely unlucky bridge player.

l milne, on 2010-November-30, 14:55, said:

yes.

Top experts may regard them as beneath contempt, but we ordinary players find rules-of-thumb (like losing-trick count and total-tricks) to be of practical help: both in judging how high to bid and in allocating blame when things go wrong.

[l milne]

nige1, on 2010-November-30, 20:43, said:

Top experts may regard them as beneath contempt, but we ordinary players find rules-of-thumb (like losing-trick count and total-tricks) to be of practical help: both in judging how high to bid and in allocating blame when things go wrong.

By all means use "the Law" as a rule of thumb. But it should not be used to allocate blame when a bad result occurs. Sure, you might justify someone's bid on those grounds (as that is how you would judge if you couldn't see all the hands) but bridge "common sense" should play a far larger role.

In the hand, the position of both the diamond and club jacks are very important (give them to the right opponent in 4S or 5H respectively and both are one off). Not only that, but South should know not to double. If South doesn't double, North knows 4S is very likely making and might well bid 5H as a "two-way" bid. The logic of these pass/double situations has very little to do with "the Law", I find. In fact, I can't remember the last time I tried to actually estimate total tricks at the table.

[kfay]

People noticed this was BAM, right?

If I pass and this is just a normal sacrifice (VERY LIKELY!) I'm just forfeiting the board by not doubling them.

If I double them and they make it well maybe I lose the board when I was going to push but this just seems way less likely to me. Maybe I was going to lose it anyway! The 'South should pass'ers are huge resulters, imo.

As far as reaching 5♥... probably not going to happen.

BTW not a forcing pass, this is obvious.

Meh I guess I didn't consider that partner might just be preempting 4♥ some of the time... still, I think that doubling is correct.

[gnasher]

kfay, on 2010-November-30, 23:12, said:

People noticed this was BAM, right?

If I pass and this is just a normal sacrifice (VERY LIKELY!) I'm just forfeiting the board by not doubling them.

If I double them and they make it well maybe I lose the board when I was going to push but this just seems way less likely to me. Maybe I was going to lose it anyway! The 'South should pass'ers are huge resulters, imo.

Did you notice that South had shown "14-16 bal (or distributional equivalent)"? In the context of what South has already shown, this hand's defensive strength is fairly typical. If North wants to defend 4♥x opposite a balanced 14-count, he will double it himself (as he might, in fact, do on this hand - he does have an ace, and he thinks there is a game bonus to protect).

I don't think NS's methods were very helpful here, because they don't distinguish between balanced and unbalanced hands. Over 1♠, opener has pass, double, 1NT, 2♠, 2NT and 3♥ available to cover the balanced hands and the heart raises. It ought to be possible to use two of those to distinguish between Q10x Qxxx AKxxx Q and Q10x Qxxx AKxx Kx. If North knew of five diamonds opposite, he'd have more chance of getting this right.

[Phil]

kfay, on 2010-November-30, 23:12, said:

People noticed this was BAM, right?

If I pass and this is just a normal sacrifice (VERY LIKELY!) I'm just forfeiting the board by not doubling them.

If I double them and they make it well maybe I lose the board when I was going to push but this just seems way less likely to me. Maybe I was going to lose it anyway! The 'South should pass'ers are huge resulters, imo.

As far as reaching 5♥... probably not going to happen.

BTW not a forcing pass, this is obvious.

Meh I guess I didn't consider that partner might just be preempting 4♥ some of the time... still, I think that doubling is correct.

KFay, in Denver when four of us louts made the cut in this event, (I think this was one of the 1st times I had played BAM) and has asked others what sensible BAM strategy was, the overwhelming answer was "don't lose the board at your table". Doubling 4♠ is a great example of this. On other layouts, 5♥ is 500 and try explaining to your partners why your x cost 1/2 a board when they were making a completely normal 420.

[Free]

South 100% of the blame. FP hasn't been setup, so South should pass.

[han]

I'd still like to react to your second post in this thread as I don't agree with some of your points.

mtvesuvius, on 2010-November-29, 10:59, said:

I was South and thought that a forcing pass did apply, since I thought a cuebid or something else would be showing slam interest, not just a full values raise.

This makes no sense to me. What you are saying, if I understand it correctly, that you think that pass should be forcing as partner might still have a good hand, and you might still hold the balance of power. But forcing passes should apply only when you know you have the balance of power, not when you might have. It is important that partner can bid game on a lighter, unbalanced hand, and you want to have the option open to pass out 4S when partner has such a hand. By playing forcing passes here you would make partner think twice before bidding 4H without any defense, that's not what you want!

Quote

My partner's thinking/suggestion IMO makes a lot of sense, however it's fairly deep.

[skip]

Not to say that such a strategy couldn't work out, but I think that generally it is poor. You will still be guessing, and of course you might guess right. But there are two important disadvantages to this strategy: (1) you allow the opponents to exchange more information, and (2) you take partner out of the picture. The first will hurt you sometimes. The extra room they have will make them guess right more often, also over 5H. The second will also hurt you sometimes. For example, south might really have had a penalty double of 4S. If you pass first and then bid 5H over 4S, south is not able to show it.

Your partner's thinking also smells of resulting. Surely you have had occasions where you considered preempting and decided not to because your hand was too flawed, only to find the opponents sailing smoothly into a good slam. You might have thought: darn, I should have preempted, they would never have bid it! I hope you see that this is a very poor way to analyse bidding, a hundred things might have happened after passing or preempting and the fact that your opponents bid the slam this time doesn't make your decision worse.

Your partner's suggestion of operating on this hand is similar. It might have occurred to him at the table, but only after knowing that you got a poor score did he really wish that he had operated. But the not-operating wasn't the cause of the poor score, the poor double was the cause.

[l milne]

kfay, on 2010-November-30, 23:12, said:

People noticed this was BAM, right?

If I pass and this is just a normal sacrifice (VERY LIKELY!) I'm just forfeiting the board by not doubling them.

If I double them and they make it well maybe I lose the board when I was going to push but this just seems way less likely to me. Maybe I was going to lose it anyway! The 'South should pass'ers are huge resulters, imo.

It seems there is a fair chance the opponent holding your cards at the other table might have a similar decision to make over 4♠. Do you think doubling will work more often than not on a hand where you have 1 likely trick and 2 or 3 possible tricks?