[jillybean]

P P 1♦ P
1♥ P 1♠ P
2♦*

Playing XYZ, 'on' by a passed hand.
Is there any reason to play this as anything other than natural?

[han]

I know some people play xyz on by passed hands but I've never seen the need.

[jillybean]

han, on 2011-September-19, 08:30, said:

I know some people play xyz on by passed hands but I've never seen the need.

Isn't 2♣ showing a hand almost good enough to open useful?

[aguahombre]

I bowed out of XYZ thoughts when referred to this site:

http://www.bridgehan..._Convention.htm

In the introduction and in the examples they state that the "Z" bid itself by opener, even if it is a 1NT rebid, is conventional and alertable. After that brilliance, we concluded "XYZ" was not something we needed to explore; and that we should agree which of our bids and rebids are forcing, natural, semi-natural, etc. without using that part of the alphabet.

We agree that 2D is an attempt to play the hand in 2D unless opener has a bunch of undisclosed power.

[Fluffy]

2♣ invitational or ♦ sing off, the only possible alternative use for 2♦ GF is 2♦ invitational, but both are equally rare for me so not worth the memory wasted.

[han]

jillybean, on 2011-September-19, 09:30, said:

Isn't 2♣ showing a hand almost good enough to open useful?

I don't understand your question.

[jillybean]

han, on 2011-September-19, 18:44, said:

I don't understand your question.

You say you have never seen the need to play xyz by a passed hand. I think having the ability to show an invitational hand
is very useful.

[mikestar13]

[quote name='aguahombre' timestamp='1316450073' post='576865']
I bowed out of XYZ thoughts when referred to this site:

http://www.bridgehan..._Convention.htm

In the introduction and in the examples they state that the "Z" bid itself by opener, even if it is a 1NT rebid, is conventional and alertable. After that brilliance, we concluded "XYZ" was not something we needed to explore; and that we should agree which of our bids and rebids are forcing, natural, semi-natural, etc. without using that part of the alphabet. <snip>

The bridgehands description is totally wrong: opener's "Z" rebid is natural and not alertable: it is responder's rebid of 2♣/2♦ which is conventional and alertable.. In the uncontested sequence 1x-1y-1NT, there are three conventions used to make a low level forcing bid: 1. new minor forcing 2. checkback Stayman (2♣ is the force even if clubs are bid, and 3. two-way checkback in which 2♣ is a game invitation (or diamond signoff) and 2♦ is a game force. XYZ is nothing more or less than extending two-way checkback to cases where opener's rebid is lower than 1NT and/or competition at the 1 level has occurred. A tolerably simple and useful convention, though I agree unless you have a totally weird opening style there is no point for the game forcing component when one is a passed hand, and many pairs do without the invitational component as well.

[han]

jillybean, on 2011-September-19, 19:31, said:

You say you have never seen the need to play xyz by a passed hand. I think having the ability to show an invitational hand
is very useful.

You can just play checkback or new minor forcing?

[jillybean]

Aren't we talking about the same thing by a passed hand, just a different name?

[BunnyGo]

jillybean, on 2011-September-20, 07:34, said:

Aren't we talking about the same thing by a passed hand, just a different name?

No. Note that in the example hand, this is not a new minor, and so is not new minor forcing. It's just to play.

[jillybean]

BunnyGo, on 2011-September-20, 09:23, said:

No. Note that in the example hand, this is not a new minor, and so is not new minor forcing. It's just to play.

Yep, and that is what I was suggesting here By a passed hand 2♣ is artificial, invitational, 2♦ is natural.

[aguahombre]

han, on 2011-September-19, 08:30, said:

I know some people play xyz on by passed hands but I've never seen the need.

jillybean, on 2011-September-20, 09:35, said:

By a passed hand 2♣ is artificial, invitational, 2♦ is natural.

If 3D would also natural and invitational in diamonds, 2C could be useful as an invite with 5 hearts. And it might well be quite useful for that purpose, even without referring to the butt end of the alphabet.

[mike777]

jillybean, on 2011-September-19, 07:58, said:

P P 1♦ P
1♥ P 1♠ P
2♦*

Playing XYZ, 'on' by a passed hand.
Is there any reason to play this as anything other than natural?

fwiw I think playing 2c and 2d as natural would be much more frequent as a passed hand.

I almost never could have an invite hand after passing in first or second seat.(one reason why I dont play drury)

OTOH I could often have 4h and 6c or 4h and 5d here.

[Zelandakh]

In the old days bidding the 4th suit after P - 1D; 1H - 1S would "obviously" be artificial and show a maximum passed hand. Nowdays you have to go through at least 4 different convention names to come up with the same idea and conclusion.

[jillybean]

Zelandakh, on 2011-September-20, 12:25, said:

In the old days bidding the 4th suit after P - 1D; 1H - 1S would "obviously" be artificial and show a maximum passed hand. Nowdays you have to go through at least 4 different convention names to come up with the same idea and conclusion.

Haha very good and I'm sure, very true also.

[Siegmund]

There certainly exist (a few) hands that are not worth a game force in reply to 1D but are after a 1S rebid - hands where opener was 4-4 or 4-5 in the majors with a maximum, and gained some distributional values once the spade fit was discovered. Let's say Qxxx Axxxx KJx x, as a ferinstance.

Probably not enough of them to justify giving up both 2C and 2D by a passed hand.

Frankly I don't like giving up both 2C and 2D by an UNpassed hand: I'd much rather play garden variety NMF/FSF. I think XYZ has way more invitational sequences than are needed, at the expense of game-forcing sequences. Playing the 1-1-1-3s as forcing by UPH as in XYZ, and putting all the invitations into NMF/FSF, suits me fine, and keeping 2 of opener's minor as weak.

[mike777]

Again I think playing 2c and 2d as natural by a passed hand is much more important and frequent.


I note these perfect passed hands are really very close to being opened and even then can often be handled by bidding naturally. bidding 4sf as a convention by a passed hand must be very rare unless you pass alot of opening bids.

[Siegmund]

Game-forces by passed hands are rare. Using FSF(inv), or its equivalent, to fish for 5-3 fits in responder's first suit, or try to induce opener to bid notrump with a stopper in the unbid suit, remains common by a passed hand, though the frequency with which you need to bail out cheaply with 11 opposite 11 goes up (and I do use FSF on 10 as a passed hand much more often than as an unpassed hand.)

FSF-game isn't overly useful, no. (But I prefer FSF-round by an unpassed hand anyway.)

[mike777]

i cant imagine using 4sf as a passed hand let alone more frequent than an unpassed hand.

4sf auctions are ugly.


10 is 10 and pard knows we can have that.

really good tens are opened.


otherwise we can tell pard we have decent 10 and lots of support.

----


As such play xyz by a passed hand:
1) we aint going to have slam hands
2) we 99.99 aint goint to have gf hands
3) we almost never are going to have invite hands unless we pass alot of opening bids.
4) we have alot of less than invite hands