[ArtK78]

Question to the Forum:

There is a difference between 1♦ - 1♠ - 2♥ and 1♦ - 1♥ - 2♠. Many play Lebensohl or Ingberman or some other method to sign off after a reverse with an unsuitable hand. Theoretically, the jump shift is game forcing. Do players have special Lebensohl"ish" methods or other methods after a 2 level jump shift rebid by opener? And if you do, why?

[By the way, I am fascinated by the number of forum members who advocate passing the "game-forcing" jump shift. Some are getting downright indignant about it as the right action]

[awm]

Perhaps one way to think about this is to go back to the reason you responded to partner's opening bid.

If you responded because you don't want to risk missing a game on values by passing then it's inconsistent to now pass partner's strongest action of jump shifting or reversing. In fact, beginners are often taught that the reason to respond to an opening is in order to not miss a game, and thus that they should pass with less than six high card points, and so forth.

However, there are other reasons to respond to an opening. These including improving the partscore, finding a possible light game based upon a super-fit and stealing from the opponents. It is worth noting that the issues here are much more critical with a shapely hand than a balanced one (with a balanced hand the suit partner opened is usually an acceptable partial, you are much less likely to have game without a lot of points, and "stealing" becomes dangerous since you may have no safe spot yourself and going down in 1NTX could be worse than their possible game). For this reason many good players will pass an opening bid with less than five or six points and a balanced hand but will bid on much less with a five-five hand or six-card major (or in Justin's case a five-card major ).

Anyway, if your only reason for responding was one of the last three and partner jump shifts, you may well have succeeded in improving the partial, you know that you don't have a super-fit (partner didn't raise your suit), and stealing from the opponents is no longer a factor since partner has announced half the deck in his own hand. So passing the rebid becomes eminently reasonable.

[peachy]

My partnerships treat this as if it were a reverse (not a gameforcing jump like 1D-1H-3C) and our agreement about reverse auctions apply. I bid 2NT = lower of 2NT or 4th suit to show bad hand. Second choice is Pass, but I really don't like it.

[kenrexford]

ArtK78, on Jun 9 2008, 04:34 PM, said:

Question to the Forum:

There is a difference between 1♦ - 1♠ - 2♥ and 1♦ - 1♥ - 2♠. Many play Lebensohl or Ingberman or some other method to sign off after a reverse with an unsuitable hand. Theoretically, the jump shift is game forcing. Do players have special Lebensohl"ish" methods or other methods after a 2 level jump shift rebid by opener? And if you do, why?

[By the way, I am fascinated by the number of forum members who advocate passing the "game-forcing" jump shift. Some are getting downright indignant about it as the right action]

There is no relevant difference. Thuis, I want to play Leb/Ing in these sequences also.

With the actual hand, I don't understand passing, even if it was possible. I like my hand a lot. I have a stiff, a club card, and three pieces. Partner can play Moysians well. What, we go down in 4♠ occasionally? So? This is not that bad of a hand, in my opinion.

Partner had the ability to make a very heavy 1♠ bid if he wanted. He didn't. I would imagine that he often may well have five spades.

I don't get this "Opener is limited" argument.

Something like ♠AKxxx ♥-- ♦AKxxxx ♣Ax has a mere 18 "points," the low-end of the range of "18-21," (21 being hardly the maximum, anyway), but we surely take at least 10 tricks. Sure, that's a perfecto hand. Well, jumps to 2♠ tend to be strong bids.

[655321]

ArtK78, on Jun 9 2008, 04:34 PM, said:

[By the way, I am fascinated by the number of forum members who advocate passing the "game-forcing" jump shift.  Some are getting downright indignant about it as the right action]

This is your third (!) followup to complain about people passing 2♠.

I don't understand why people post a hand and then followup by criticizing all replies they disagree with. Why did you post the hand in the first place?

[jdonn]

I think people who pass forcing bids do so way too often (for bridge reasons, not 'do you know what forcing means' or 'partner will never trust you again' reasons.) For example if partner is 5-6 he might need almost nothing for game. Or what if we bid 2NT and partner comes through with 3♣? I know it's just a question of odds since obviously passing could lead to a plus where bidding gets us too high, but I think it's (virtually always) too early in the auction to decide our hand is worthless, I think pass is just too unilateral.

[FrancesHinden]

[quote name='kenrexford' date='Jun 10 2008, 03:40 AM'] [quote name='ArtK78' date='Jun 9 2008, 04:34 PM'] Question to the Forum:

There is a difference between 1[di] - 1[sp] - 2[he] and 1[di] - 1[he] - 2[sp]. Many play Lebensohl or Ingberman or some other method to sign off after a reverse with an unsuitable hand. Theoretically, the jump shift is game forcing. Do players have special Lebensohl"ish" methods or other methods after a 2 level jump shift rebid by opener? And if you do, why?

There is no relevant difference. Thuis, I want to play Leb/Ing in these sequences also. [/quote]
Of course there's a difference.

Unless you play 1D - 1H - 2S differently from everyone else, the first auction is not game forcing and the second auction is.

Therefore you should not need some method to sign off after the jump shift, because there is no signing off to be done.

(I was a bit surprised at mikeh's comment on these lines as well)

[hotShot]

awm, on Jun 10 2008, 12:45 AM, said:

Perhaps one way to think about this is to go back to the reason you responded to partner's opening bid.

Well the main reason I respond to a 1m openings when my hand is to weak, is that I'm void, single or double in that suit and partner only promised to have 3+.

Scoring: IMP

1♦ - 1♥
2♠ - ?

---

With the given hand partner could have a 4432 shape with 12-20 HCP, planning a 2NT rebid. Any spot different from 1♦ holding a 3-1 fit would have better play.

After partners 2♠ rebid, we still don't have a fit although the worst case (3)4-3 fit is still better than the ♦ misfit. There is a good chance that partner has no use for my ♣ values (because he's short there) and if his ♦ are solid, he has no use for my shortage/trumps either.

Last round it seemed that bidding could only make things better, this round it seems that bidding can (will) make things worse. If partner is expecting weak answers to 1m openings than he will proceed with caution over 2NT now. If he's expecting solid answers, than I have to uncover my previous action and pass.

[hotShot]

jdonn, on Jun 10 2008, 05:31 AM, said:

I think people who pass forcing bids do so way too often
....

I prefer that to people who don't open their 11 HCP count and can't stop bidding later, because they have show their 11 HCP.

[han]

I would have no problem passing 2S if I had responded 1H on the extreme xxx xxxxx x xxxx. If I decide to respond 1H on that hand (which I would) then I would certainly pass 2S. I have discussed this with Arend and I do not consider this a violation of partnership trust. In any circumstance we try to make the bid that we think has the highest expectancy to win.

The hand in question has just enough strength to squeeze out a 2NT call. At MPs I might pass though.

[han]

awm, on Jun 9 2008, 05:45 PM, said:

Perhaps one way to think about this is to go back to the reason you responded to partner's opening bid.

Yes, but it would be a really bad way to think.

I expect that most of us understand that when you are considering to sell your stock, the price at which you bought the stock should be completely irrelevant. The expectancy for the future is what should be considered, not whether you made a profit or a loss.

The 1H call can lead to a lot of different scenarios, some good and some bad. Whether you pass now should have nothing to do with your state of mind when you bid 1H.

[cherdano]

awm, on Jun 9 2008, 04:45 PM, said:

Perhaps one way to think about this is to go back to the reason you responded to partner's opening bid.

If you responded because you don't want to risk missing a game on values by passing then it's inconsistent to now pass partner's strongest action of jump shifting or reversing. In fact, beginners are often taught that the reason to respond to an opening is in order to not miss a game, and thus that they should pass with less than six high card points, and so forth.

No it is not. When you have a 3415 yarborough and partner opens 1♦, you may well have a game in case you have a heart fit or a club fit. So I don't think it is inconsistent at all to pass when partner turns out to be strong, but very likely you will only have a 4-3 fit (or a 5-3 fit in a minor).

[han]

Yes, I was planning to say that as well but forgot. Obviously 3S and 4H are the calls that would make it most likely that you have game, and 3C as well.

[nige1]

Stephen Tu, on Jun 9 2008, 04:00 PM, said:

Rosenberg's argument was that those who sometimes choose to pass their partner's "forcing" bids often do so acting either subconsciously or consciously based on partner's hitches (whether micro-hitch or more substantial).  So they get better results more often than they "should", absent the UI, e.g. they somehow stay low in the misfit but scrape up another bid when partner jump-shifted with a fit in responder's suit or the like. And if they choose not to pass on a hand and it works out well, it's hard to argue that they should pass to be consistent, that bidding on was suggested by UI, since the bid was forcing! So his claim is that the ethical way to behave is to always respect the force even if you stretched before. Your opinion may vary.

Good point Stephen. As usual, Rosenberg writes sense. In an experienced partnership, it is remarkable how successful a player can be at interpreting unauthorised information from his partner. Even when a director would have to rule that the UI did not appear to suggest the winning action.

On BBO, however, we have no tells, provided we assiduously ignore the original poster's style and punctuation

[kenrexford]

[quote name='FrancesHinden' date='Jun 10 2008, 03:49 AM'] [quote name='kenrexford' date='Jun 10 2008, 03:40 AM'] [quote name='ArtK78' date='Jun 9 2008, 04:34 PM'] Question to the Forum:

There is a difference between 1[di] - 1[sp] - 2[he] and 1[di] - 1[he] - 2[sp]. Many play Lebensohl or Ingberman or some other method to sign off after a reverse with an unsuitable hand. Theoretically, the jump shift is game forcing. Do players have special Lebensohl"ish" methods or other methods after a 2 level jump shift rebid by opener? And if you do, why?

There is no relevant difference. Thuis, I want to play Leb/Ing in these sequences also. [/QUOTE]
Of course there's a difference.

Unless you play 1D - 1H - 2S differently from everyone else, the first auction is not game forcing and the second auction is.

Therefore you should not need some method to sign off after the jump shift, because there is no signing off to be done.

(I was a bit surprised at mikeh's comment on these lines as well) [/quote]
This difference, though, is not "relevant" to me.

Obviously, it is not relevant to those who pass the GF either, BTW. But, for me. the relevant similarity is the need to distinguish junk from stuff.

[ArtK78]

655321, on Jun 9 2008, 10:03 PM, said:

ArtK78, on Jun 9 2008, 04:34 PM, said:

[By the way, I am fascinated by the number of forum members who advocate passing the "game-forcing" jump shift.  Some are getting downright indignant about it as the right action]

This is your third (!) followup to complain about people passing 2♠.

I don't understand why people post a hand and then followup by criticizing all replies they disagree with. Why did you post the hand in the first place?

I don't think it is out of line to comment (not complain) about the passes to 2♠, a bid that is, by agreement, a game forcing call.

This is not the first thread in which many players advocated taking a call on a near blizzard hand and then pass a subsequent forcing call by partner. I find this to be very interesting.

On the other hand, I do think it is out of line to complain about my comment.

[OleBerg]

Jlall, on Jun 9 2008, 10:48 PM, said:

OleBerg, on Jun 9 2008, 02:36 PM, said:

Incidently, this hand is almost like the one from Michael Rosenbergs book. "Bridge, Zia and me", where he argues that passing a forcing bid is unethical.

lol, serious question, is english your native language? I think you don't understand what the word "unethical" means, or what Rosenberg was talking about, or what anyone else has said (since no one has argued that it's unethical, just bad bridge).

My post in this thread:

http://forums.bridge...showtopic=25531

contains a subtle clue to my native language.

I do of course owe you an apology for not being born in an english-speaking country.

I would also like to apology in advance for being born in 1966, thus be definition being old, slow-witted and incapable of understanding relatively simple concepts.

Another drawback to my old age is, that I actually have to read a book, before I can comment on it.