Bridge Maniacs

Simple Squeeze With the Count

2012-05-24T13:42:00.000-04:00

Here is another of my favorite deals from the Birmingham regional, also in the Sunday Swiss. I was declarer in 6NT with a spade lead. How would you bring this one home? Dealer: SVul: None North ♠ xx ♥ xxx ♦ Axxx ♣ AJTx South ♠ AQx ♥ AKQ9 ♦ Kx ♣ KQxx The free finesse (which is a wining finesse) gives you the 11th trick. East had preempted in spades so you kind of

To Rabbi or Not to Rabbi

2012-05-21T10:44:00.000-04:00

I guess this would be considered a successful regional for the 2.5 days I attended. Joel, Jimmy, my dad, and I won a bracket 2 KO without breaking a sweat. It’s still amazing how huge a difference there is between the top bracket and everyone else. We are one of the few teams that falls solidly in between the true top flight and the low flight A and that seems to be how most of the teams I play

Slam auctions in Gatlinburg

2012-04-23T13:44:00.000-04:00

Jumps to a small slam such as 1C-1H; 1NT-6NT are not too uncommon but jumps to a grand slam without any ace- or control-asking bids are pretty rare. In the A/X Swiss yesterday, I got to jump to 7H. I was dealt AKJTx, AKJT9xx, A, void. Our auction: 2C-2D; 2H-4H; 7H-P. How do find out about a 3rd round spade control? I decided I couldn’t find out so I just bid grand. Alli had both major suit queens

Singleton Aces

2012-04-11T15:36:00.000-04:00

At least 3 times last night I held a singleton A in a suit partner held a lot of cards with the KQ and very few if any entries. This one deal I still don’t know how to bid. ♠ x♥ T9xxx♦ xx♣ KQJ9x ♠ AKQJT♥ A8x♦ KQ9x♣ A What contract would you want to be in? 4H, 3NT, 4S, 5C, 6C? Is the north hand good enough for a positive 3C after south opens 2C? After the auction starts 2C-2D (art gf); 2S,

4 suit transfers over 1NT

2012-03-31T14:55:00.000-04:00

When I first learned 4way transfers over 1NT, I learned that transferring to a minor and then bidding a new suit (such as 1NT-2S; 3C-3H) shows a 6+ clubs and shortness in hearts. 3H in this auction should not be natural because you would start with stayman to show 6 clubs and 4 hearts. Over a 2S or 2D response to stayman, you could bid 3C, natural and forcing, while implying having a 4 card major

Memphis NABC fun

2012-03-20T15:23:00.003-04:00

I feel like I should update this blog because I have returned from another NABC but I'm really not sure what I want to say. Sean and I had 3 decent sessions (+15, +7, +21) and 1 really bad session in the imp pairs to not make the overalls but finish with a positive score.Sunday was A/X Swiss with Josh and Alex, which started horribly. At the half, we had 37VP on a 60 average. We dominated the

Bridgemates and the demise of caddies

2012-03-12T12:59:00.000-04:00

In the last 5 years, bridgemates (and other similar machines) have taken over in pair games at tournaments. This means less work for the directors as they don’t have to enter every score into the computer. It means fewer caddies because they are no longer needed to go around after every round to collect pick up slips. It also means no more having to decipher when someone wrote, no more having to

Charlotte sectional recap

2012-03-11T18:57:00.001-04:00

I'm on the drive home from Charlotte, where Sean and I played in our warmup tournament for the NABC next week. Although, calling it a warmup is barely accurate because there were no imp pair or midchart games so we weren't even playing our regular system.It was my first time at a Charlotte sectional and was equivalently as nice if not nicer than their regionals. The food was good, playing space

Does it show or ask for a stopper or show a real suit

2012-03-01T14:49:00.001-05:00

I've had several auctions come up lately where there was someconfusion about where a bid was asking for or showing a stopper ornatural. It's easy when the opponents have intervened because biddingtheir suit would ask for a stopper, in an auction such as 1S-2D-(2H);3D-3H. And if the opponents have bid 2 suits, bidding one of theirsuits tends to show a stopper in that suit but not their other suit,

Changing movements

2012-02-25T15:17:00.001-05:00

My technical director skills were put to the test today. Started with a 6.5 table Mitchell, and about 20 minutes into the game one pair (not the pair that was sitting out first) has a medical emergency and has to leave. How do you reorganize the game?One simple solution would be to put a 5th board on each table and play a 5x5 skip Mitchell. The would mean only 25 boards and the board sets would

Santa Clara regional

2012-02-20T23:00:00.000-05:00

Wow. It's been almost 2 weeks since I updated! I haven't really played bridge in that time until the last 3 days in Santa Clara. It was 3 days of pairs with Meg - definitely not a good weekend of bridge for her and not so great for me either. It took 5 sessions before we scratched with a 3rd in the section of the Sunday imp pairs. We followed it up with just barely scratching in the evening to

Bidding after your side has preempted

2012-02-08T16:17:00.001-05:00

Generally, it is good to raise partner’s preempt when you have 3 card support or better, to extend the preempt and make it even more difficult for the opposition to find the right level and right strain. Therefore, when the auction proceeds with two passes after a preempt, it’s a good bet that preemptor’s partner does not have much heart support. Another general rule of preempting is that once

Interesting tournament schedules

2012-01-25T16:15:00.001-05:00

From time to time I like to check out tournament schedules from other parts of the country (and occasionally go to tournaments that aren't NABCs or in the Mid-Atlantic). Sometime last year I believe I wrote about how I admired the fact that a DC area tournament had a Board-a-match for flight A on Sunday of a sectional. Flight B was Swiss, which is reasonable. I still plan on attending that

Gripes about tournament schedules

2012-01-19T14:36:00.001-05:00

Organizing bridge tournament is hard. I get that and it's impossible to make everyone happy, but the schedule of relevant bridge tournaments for me coming up is just awful. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> There never is a tournament in D7 that goes over President's Day weekend – maybe a small sectional somewhere not particularly close to me but that's

2012 in bridge has started out opposite of 2011

2012-01-16T13:40:00.000-05:00

My first tournament of 2011 saw me win over 23 points at the Macon sectional. The first tournament this year yielded only a little more than 6 points, most of which was won in a pair game that I had estimated at 49% (but was actually 65%). Anyway, I got the 6.47 points that I needed for the next masterpoint milestone (2500 and Gold LM) by coming back from a miserable start to squeak into a tie

I Heart Moysians

2012-01-14T03:04:00.001-05:00

Last night was a comedy of errors all-around. It started with a -670 on the first board and didn't get much better the rest of the session. Emory and I each faced some tough defensive and bidding situations and guessed wrong almost every time but it's this declarer play problem that upset me the most. I found myself in 3SX after RHO opened 1H and lho hit 3S. 7xx KQx xx AJ9xx AKT9 x Kxxxx Q8x

BAM BAM

2012-01-05T14:34:00.001-05:00

This was our 9th board in the BAM that we won with a 20.5 out of 24. I'm not sure I agree with any of the bidding but it was a double game swing in our favor. I disobeyed the rule about passing when the opponents have passed a forcing bid but this was quite the exception. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> Dealer: SVul: none North ♠ A543 ♥ 2 ♦

Won 3 events but overall it was a bad tournament

2012-01-03T17:56:00.000-05:00

It's a fact that team games award about double the number of masterpoints as pair games. And among team games, bracketed knockouts award the most points. The exact numbers are that pair games pay about .43 masterpoints per person per session while team games pay .87 per person per session. A couple of weeks ago I did a little analysis of the masterpoints I won and found a huge disparity. I win

2011-12-20T12:49:00.001-05:00

I feel like I should have stuff to write about but I don't really have any interesting deals in my scorecards from the 5 STaC games I played in last week. I saw lots of comical things in the last week but no brilliant things. The 27 MP I won in the STaC puts me over 500 for the year and basically in a tie for the D7 1000-2500 Mini-McKenney. yay. Here's to hoping my first 4 days at the Myrtle

Which Squeeze to play for - never mind, there's only one possibility

2011-12-07T14:33:00.004-05:00

Last night I had an interesting play problem in a slam. In 6NT, there are 11 top tricks. How would you plan on getting the 12th? North♠ AK8x♥ AKx♦ Ax♣ Kxxx South♠ Tx♥ QJx♦ KT8x♣ AQJx South West North East 1♦ Pass 1♠ Pass 1NT Pass 6NT Pass Pass Pass

Seattle NABC

2011-11-28T11:43:00.001-05:00

While many people are just getting into the swing of things at the fall NABC I am on my way back home after 3+ days there. Richard Popper and I started with a good session in the Nail LM Pairs and ended with a great session in the consolation (regional A/X pairs). Unfortunately the two middle sessions were pretty terrible, on both our parts as well as luck. Additionally I scratched with my dad in

Unexpectedly passing partner's mostly forcing bid

2011-11-23T10:37:00.001-05:00

I've had several opportunities in the last few days to pass partner unexpectedly. Last night at the club, my partner twice intervened over a 1NT opening. In the first instance, I held ♠QJxxx ♥A9xx ♦KTxx ♣- and after 1NT-P-P, partner doubled, which for us showed 1 suited with clubs or diamonds and a major. I have a decent hand and partner is almost sure to have clubs so I converted to penalty.

Spoil the Squeeze but give up the same trick in the process

2011-11-15T08:58:00.001-05:00

My hand of the tournament from the recent Roswell sectional this past weekend is this cute hand where I was all set to squeeze RHO in the black suits until Michael White made it easy for me by leading the ♣J. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> Dealer: NVul: NS North ♠ Qxxx ♥ Q ♦ AJx ♣ KTxxx <?xml:namespace prefix = v ns = "urn:

Simple Black Suit Squeeze

2011-10-31T15:10:00.003-04:00

In our Swiss match against the Granovetters in the Charlotte regional flight A Swiss yesterday, I was fortunate to get to declare this deal. Dealer: E Vul: EW North♠ Axxx♥ xxx♦ x♣ Jxxxx South♠ K9♥ Qx♦ AKQxxx♣ KTx East South West North 2♥ 3♦ Pass Pass Pass West, Matthew Granovetter, led the ♥A, then after a couple of minutes continued with the deuce of clubs to Pamela's ace.

Double

2011-10-28T13:34:00.001-04:00

There were a few bidding sequences that are bothering me from last night and one big concept that people don't seem to understand.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> 1♠-2♠-X. This double shows penalty interest in one or both of the opponents' suits. All subsequent doubles are for penalty. Instead of X, 3H would be a invitational+ spade raise, and 3S would