[barmar]

There was an article in the Bulletin a year or two ago where Larry Cohen and Frank Stewart debated whether SA or 2/1 is better. I don't recall whether it was specifically about beginners, but I think most of the arguments would probably apply.

If two of the most well known bridge teachers can't agree, I doubt we'll reach a concensus here.

What to the Audrey Grant books teach these days? That's probably the best gauge.

[Vampyr]

 barmar, on 2015-September-23, 09:21, said:

There was an article in the Bulletin a year or two ago where Larry Cohen and Frank Stewart debated whether SA or 2/1 is better. I don't recall whether it was specifically about beginners, but I think most of the arguments would probably apply.

If two of the most well known bridge teachers can't agree, I doubt we'll reach a concensus here.

What to the Audrey Grant books teach these days? That's probably the best gauge.

A better gauge would be what the player's peers and potential,partners are playing.

[Trinidad]

 mgoetze, on 2015-September-23, 04:59, said:

Strongly disagree, Blackwood should be WAY down the list.

From a technical point of view, I fully agree with you. Blackwood is a fairly unimportant convention, and beginners will only misuse it. And for slam bidding it is more important to worry about the question whether we can take 12 tricks than to worry about whether the opponents can take 2.

But there is more to this...

If you ever watch a couple of 6 year olds play soccer then you see that there is one flock of kids running after the ball. If you watch FC Barcelona play soccer, you see that the players are nicely spread out over the field and the ball moves from player to player. Clearly the FC Barcelona method is superior.

What I mean to say is that learning to play bridge is not a straight line from beginner to Bermuda Bowl winner (or club bridge player to set a more realistic goal). It is perfectly fine for beginners to count to 33 points and then use Blackwood to bid slams. At some point they will learn about cuebids and then they will learn to appreciate those nice fitting soft honors in partner's side suit.

Bidding a slam every now and then is the icing on the cake and the Blackwood convention is the only tool that beginners can handle. Give it to them and let them run after the ball like the six year old soccer kids. At that stage it will be more fun.

Rik

[Jinksy]

 Vampyr, on 2015-September-23, 09:06, said:

PS it raises the question.

This hasn't become any correcter since you last said it: http://languagelog.l...edu/nll/?p=2290

[Vampyr]

 Jinksy, on 2015-September-23, 12:35, said:

This hasn't become any correcter since you last said it: http://languagelog.l...edu/nll/?p=2290

Ummm... I didn't suggest what "beg the question" means. My comment just meant that it is non synonymous with "raise the question".

Anyway the blob you link to is not the only source. There are dozens like this.

[mgoetze]

 Trinidad, on 2015-September-23, 11:15, said:

What I mean to say is that learning to play bridge is not a straight line from beginner to Bermuda Bowl winner (or club bridge player to set a more realistic goal). It is perfectly fine for beginners to count to 33 points and then use Blackwood to bid slams. At some point they will learn about cuebids and then they will learn to appreciate those nice fitting soft honors in partner's side suit.

Bidding a slam every now and then is the icing on the cake and the Blackwood convention is the only tool that beginners can handle. Give it to them and let them run after the ball like the six year old soccer kids. At that stage it will be more fun.

If you're really counting to 33 points you're extremely unlikely to be missing 2 aces anyway, at that stage I'd prefer the beginners just bid the slam without checking for aces.

[Trinidad]

 mgoetze, on 2015-September-23, 13:21, said:

If you're really counting to 33 points you're extremely unlikely to be missing 2 aces anyway, at that stage I'd prefer the beginners just bid the slam without checking for aces.

Again, you are technically correct. On the other hand, 33 points doesn't mean 33 HCPs.

When I was a beginner, I played an Instant Matchpoint game with a good friend who was even more of a beginner than I. On one board, my partner opened a 15-17 1NT. I held 20 HCPs in a hand with 5-5 in the minors. In my simple book, I could add a point for each five card suit, making this a 22 point hand. I added 22 + 15 = 37 points and concluded that the grand slam should be bid. I also figured that we just might be missing an ace since points are not the same as HCPs. So, I bid G*****, heard that we had all the aces and bid 7NT. My partner made it nicely.

In the booklet that we got afterwards, they wrote about this board: "6NT should make with an overtrick. 7NT is a good contract, but impossible to bid." I thought it was easy enough: open 1NT, check for aces, bid 7. It turned out that the field hadn't opened 1NT. Partner had a 14 HCP hand with a 5=3=2=3 distribution. The five card suit was his 15th point.

So, probably the field had some convoluted auction, to search for a fit, and probably the strength of the hands couldn't be clarified completely. This time two palookas beat the field with a simple 1NT-4♣; 4Y-7NT.

When as a beginner, you get a (lucky) success like that, it makes you enjoy the game and it gets you hooked. Then, a few years later, you can learn all about proper slam bidding.

Rik

[akwoo]

At some point in the development of a player, he or she learns not to take pointless finesses.

However, this is learned after learning about finesses.

You can't really learn about not taking finesses until you've learned about finesses, and then learned about discarding losers and endplays and squeezes.

Same with Blackwood - you can't learn not to use Blackwood until you've actually learned Blackwood. (BTW, I would teach a beginner that 4N is always Blackwood. It's not optimal, but there's no need to complicate things. When they've actually learned something about bidding then they'll see that it doesn't make sense, and then you can teach them otherwise.)

[Jinksy]

 Vampyr, on 2015-September-23, 13:13, said:

Ummm... I didn't suggest what "beg the question" means. My comment just meant that it is non synonymous with "raise the question".

Anyway the blob you link to is not the only source. There are dozens like this.

Yes, but they just assert its meaning. That blog actually traces it back and finds no etymological or logical basis for it meaning 'circular logic' other than bad translation. So why 'correct' what is obviously the standard usage?

[Vampyr]

 Jinksy, on 2015-September-23, 15:23, said:

Yes, but they just assert its meaning. That blog actually traces it back and finds no etymological or logical basis for it meaning 'circular logic' other than bad translation. So why 'correct' what is obviously the standard usage?

It is not standard. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps I am a naive optimist.

[barmar]

The reason to teach Blackwood isn't necessarily that it's important that they use it. The reason is because everyone ELSE uses it, and they'll assume their partner does. Also, the opponents will use it, and in most jurisdictions it's not alertable, so they need to know it to understand the auction.

So unless the beginner is only playing with people learning from the same teacher, who are all limited to the same conventions, they need to know the most common ones: Stayman, Blackwood, Jacoby Transfers, Takeout and Negative Doubles.

[mgoetze]

 barmar, on 2015-September-24, 08:44, said:

The reason to teach Blackwood isn't necessarily that it's important that they use it. The reason is because everyone ELSE uses it, and they'll assume their partner does. Also, the opponents will use it, and in most jurisdictions it's not alertable, so they need to know it to understand the auction.

So unless the beginner is only playing with people learning from the same teacher, who are all limited to the same conventions, they need to know the most common ones: Stayman, Blackwood, Jacoby Transfers, Takeout and Negative Doubles.

Except that NONE of the people I play with play Blackwood, they all play RKCB and quantitative invites (which makes it particularly terrible to teach that 4NT is "always Blackwood").

Anyway, I'm not so worried about beginners using Blackwood - I'm more worried that they'll continue to use it as intermediates, who tend to use it as a license to turn off their brain during the auction.

[Vampyr]

 mgoetze, on 2015-September-24, 09:14, said:

Except that NONE of the people I play with play Blackwood, they all play RKCB

Is RKCB not a variety of B?then? Anyway how do you play a jump to 4NT after a one-level opening? Normal Blackwood?

[mgoetze]

 Vampyr, on 2015-September-24, 10:27, said:

Is RKCB not a variety of B?then? Anyway how do you play a jump to 4NT after a one-level opening? Normal Blackwood?

Who cares what's a variety of what, it's not going to do the beginner any good to think partner has 3 aces when they've actually shown 2 and the queen. I play 1♥-4NT as exclusion keycard with a spade void, why do you ask?

[Vampyr]

 mgoetze, on 2015-September-24, 10:47, said:

Who cares what's a variety of what, it's not going to do the beginner any good to think partner has 3 aces when they've actually shown 2 and the queen.

Well, I guess the OP would know better than us what variety of Blackwood is played by beginners in his area.

[akwoo]

1) RKCB is already too complicated for a beginner. All that business with the queen of trump, and it's not clear what's trump anyway, and 5♦ could mean two different things!

2) It's much easier for an intermediate to revert to simple Blackwood when playing with a beginner than the other way around.

Simple Blackwood is not optimal, but it's all beginners can handle. Would you rather leave them with NO way of figuring out whether they control side suits?

Mgoetze - I don't know where you play bridge, but around here, only the local experts (and I'm not one of them) actually have a brain. Expecting intermediates to use their nonexistent brain at any time is too much. Beginners can't remember whether the side suit trick will cash.

[Trinidad]

Well, I am in favor of teaching the girl kickback... but perhaps not in lesson 1... or year 1.

Rik

[Trinidad]

 barmar, on 2015-September-23, 09:21, said:

What to the Audrey Grant books teach these days? That's probably the best gauge.

I learned to play bridge with Audrey Grant's club through spade series in the 90's. And you all know what a great player I am today! So, I agree with barmar: Go with Audrey!

Rik

[P_Marlowe]

 Trinidad, on 2015-September-24, 12:41, said:

I learned to play bridge with Audrey Grant's club through spade series in the 90's. And you all know what a great player I am today! So, I agree with barmar: Go with Audrey!

Rik

Depending on age, also a good choice
http://www.amazon.co...e/dp/0944705014

[mgoetze]

 akwoo, on 2015-September-24, 12:31, said:

Simple Blackwood is not optimal, but it's all beginners can handle. Would you rather leave them with NO way of figuring out whether they control side suits?

Mgoetze - I don't know where you play bridge, but around here, only the local experts (and I'm not one of them) actually have a brain. Expecting intermediates to use their nonexistent brain at any time is too much. Beginners can't remember whether the side suit trick will cash.

Sure, as I said if you're counting to 33 it's extremely unlikely you're off 2 aces anyway, Blackwood only becomes interesting once you're bidding more distributional slams.

As for people without brains, I know plenty of card games that are more suitable for them than bridge.