What should I Bid? - Best enquiry for November 2006 

Gordon Hansen made the best submission for the month of November.

 Hand: My partner and I, vulnerable, were dealt the following:

J98  K974  QJ652  6

KQ6  63  A9874  A98

Bidding:	West	North	East	South
				Pass
	Pass	1	Pass	Pass
	Double	2	2	Pass
	Pass	2	Double	3
	Pass	Pass	Pass

Comments:    Playing basic standard with five card majors. We play balancing doubles so I knew what partner was doing. Should I bid first time around? Should partner bid 3 ?

Peter's Reply:

Hi Gordon,

Unless your defensive bidding method is to double an opponent's opening one bid simply to show an opening hand, I wouldn't bid immediately over the 1 opening. This method, adopted by some, I find inferior.

To bid an immediate 2 here is very poor. Overcalling at the two level with an empty five-card suit is looking for trouble; doing it with values in the opponent's suit compounds the risk.

I expect partner did not bid 3 because he/she saw your penalty double of 2 and decided not to get in your way in case you wanted to double 3 too.

Nonetheless, I think partner was a little optimistic and 3 might have been a better choice. 3 will not necessarily make, given that North could easily be 6-5 here and 3 fail on a defensive crossruff.

Why is the double of 2 a penalty double? Because logically you must have quite a good hand to be bidding again here, and, given your initial silence, that implies some length in the opener's suit i.e. you had the strength to double initially, but had too much in their opened suit.

I would have passed rather than doubling 2 as I have no surprises for declarer. North could see their hand while bidding and had heard everyone else's effort to that point, including their partners thrice silence. Something like:

AJ109xx
A
x
KQ10xx

wouldn't surprise, with 5 cold and 2 doubled making unless you find the highly unlikely lead of the A to give partner two club ruffs. 

Regards
Peter Fordham

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