[jillybean]

The easy, or perhaps not, question first.

---

Playing a 15-17 nt, not playing transfer/1♣

What do you open here?

[mikeh]

1C

Why on earth would anyone ever consider upgrading this completely blah 14 count?

[pilowsky]

Because 1NT is a great bid and the majors look quite nice?

On the question of 'upgrading' why not just say 1NT is 14-17?

[mikeh]

pilowsky, on 2024-March-16, 23:01, said:

Because 1NT is a great bid and the majors look quite nice?

On the question of 'upgrading' why not just say 1NT is 14-17?

Bridge is a partnership game and also a game based on honesty to a degree unlike, for example, poker.

If you have agreed to play 15-17, that means that one should not open 1N with a mediocre 14. Upgrading is something all good players engage in, as a recognition that the 4321 point count method doesn’t adequately account for such things as aces being worth more than 4, jacks less than 1, good suit texture, combined honours, and so on. Thus some 14 counts are undoubtedly ‘worth’ 15 or even more. No expert would ever criticize an opponent for opening a great 14 count while stating on the CC a range of 15-17. Having said that, in our system notes and on the WBF CC (far more informative than the ACBL one) we clearly state that we ‘frequently upgrade out of and into notrump ranges’.

But anyone who ‘upgrades’ this into 15 doesn’t know much about hand evaluation….apart from anything else, 4333 is a very unattractive distribution.

If you and your partner routinely open these hands a 15-17 1N, you’re being (imo) actively unethical. You are misleading your opps about your agreed methods.

If you do it on your own hook, knowing that partner will assume you can’t have this hand, then you’re simply being a bad partner…psyching on ‘good’ hands, for no apparent reason, is silly.

As for nice majors….if you have a game or slam in a major, are you seriously suggesting that you can’t get there after 1C???

All good players are disciplined in their bidding. Even the most aggressive are disciplined….in that they stick to their style. We open 3D in first seat, at favourable, on xx x K98xxx xxxx. But we announce ‘very light on our CC and we do it all the time. We open all 11 counts and many 10 counts….but we state light openings on our CC and we do it all the time.

Opening a 15-17 1N here isn’t being aggressive. It’s either lying to your partner or (worse) if he expects it, lying to your opps. Lying to your partner in what will usually be a constructive auction is silly. Lying to your opps is unethical.

[shyams]

I open 1♣.

The 10s, 9s, 8s in the hand may be valuable but my regular partner and I have an understanding to never (or, extremely rarely) deviate. This hand is not worth a deviation.

[pilowsky]

All good points.
We use a 14-17 range and ethical is our middle name.
Yet the 'upgrading' question comes up here all the time.

If 'upgrading' is an option available to 'ethical' partnerships - as you imply -then why not simply say so in the first place.

[mikeh]

In my first post I implied that some 14 counts can be upgraded…but not this ‘blah’ instance

As for stating 14-17…then I’d better open the vast majority of 14 count balanced hands 1N. Because if I open many of them 1m, my opps are entitled to think 8 have no more than 13! Yet my partner would know, and bid and defend, as if I could have 14. That’s unethical.

The normal CC is very poor in terms of disclosure although the new acbl card is much better than the old one.

Fortunately, at the club level most people don’t actually count declarer’s points and don’t really think on defence so they’re not, in practice, misled and players good enough to pay attention are usually good enough to understand the concept of upgrading, even if they don’t use it themselves. Plus, if they ask, we always volunteer that we do somet8mes upgrade.

It’s important to understand that upgrading isn’t a random decision to lie…it’s a decision that the 4321 count significantly understates the playing strength of the hand.upgrading is not ‘guessing’ or just ‘mixing it up’.

There’s no reason, that I can see (as an aggressive upgrade) to upgrade a 4333 hand with a queen and a jack. Is it a nice 14 count? Yes, in that it’s a little better than average but that’s not what upgrading is about.

[jillybean]

No, I was not thinking of upgrading this to a 15-17 1nt opener.

I do routinely open these hands and some (4423) 1D to protect my diamond holding should the auction here go 1m:1S 1nt

As an aside, perhaps this is another reason I want to play transfers over 1C (this is on hold while I am in NZ)
After 1C - transfer, would the opener typically be the one to bid NT?

[jillybean]

pilowsky, on 2024-March-16, 23:39, said:

All good points.
We use a 14-17 range and ethical is our middle name.
Yet the 'upgrading' question comes up here all the time.

If 'upgrading' is an option available to 'ethical' partnerships - as you imply -then why not simply say so in the first place.

What range appears on your CC?

[pilowsky]

jillybean, on 2024-March-17, 00:38, said:

What range appears on your CC?

14-17
Say what you mean and MWYS.

[jillybean]

pilowsky, on 2024-March-17, 00:44, said:

14-17
Say what you mean and MWYS.

I assumed so but with this discussion it wasn't clear!

[paulg]

jillybean, on 2024-March-17, 00:37, said:

As an aside, perhaps this is another reason I want to play transfers over 1C (this is on hold while I am in NZ)
After 1C - transfer, would the opener typically be the one to bid NT?

It depends on your chosen methods.

I just complete the transfer with a non-fitting weak no trump, which allows the 18-19 no trump hand to rebid 1NT. When we want to play in game opposite a weak no trump it normally does not matter who plays the hand and it is likely that responder has the stronger hand. We have one esoteric sequence when responder can choose who plays 3NT.

The other camp complete the transfer to show 3+M and rebid 1NT with the weak no trump.

[DavidKok]

This is going to be a longer comment, as this topic is something that frustrates me a lot and also something that came up this Wednesday with my (new-ish) regular partner. I hope I can prevent my post from sliding into a rant.

My partner is a very strong player, and while we agree on what we want out of our (bidding) agreements in most situations there are a few where we disagree. Three notable ones are bidding for the lead (he loves it, I think it is much worse than most people think), third seat openings (I open close to normally, e.g. all 11's but few 10's, he likes to tactically open 8-counts) and upgrade style into 1NT (I rarely upgrade and won't bid 1NT with offshape hands much, he upgrades a lot and has an offshape hand frequently). Last Wednesday we discussed the 1NT opening tendencies in particular and agreed to shift to 14-16 (my suggestion) rather than 15-17 (his preference), though he did immediately amend that to "good 13 to normal 16". The truth is that I've noticed him upgrade so much the past few weeks that I find my own disclosure insufficient (though I only noticed after the fact, but I'll do better from here on out). Some examples: he considers a five card suit worth an upgrade by a point, especially in a 5422 hand. Alternatively two 10s in a 4432 hand are enough for him as well, and in third and fourth he is even more aggressive for tactical reasons. I hope the "good 13 to normal 16" range will reduce these desires a bit, as now we get to open all 14-counts with 1NT anyway (well, when vulnerable. We play chicken NT, but I've simplified a bit) and 13's simply aren't as strong on balance as 14's, so personally I've had less of a desire to upgrade them.
For the record, I think this style of frequent upgrades and frequent offshape 1NT's costs more than it gains, but my partner and I failed to find a middle ground so I'm trying his approach more as an experiment. However, regardless of style I think failing to disclose it is unethical and illegal.

The example hand is not worth an upgrade into 15-17.

Lastly some harsh comments. I think some players will upgrade into a 15-17 1NT for no other reason than that their (knowledge of their) system over 1m is inadequate. When all you know is Stayman and Jacoby, you might be best off opening 1NT almost always - any alternative comes with a big cost. This is most prevalent in Precision systems where the nebulous 1♦ opening is bursting at the seams and people start overloading their 1NT opening in compensation, but standard bidders do it as well. Personally I would recommend instead learning a better set of continuations after the 1m openings, gaining the benefits of both the 1NT opening and the good system over 1m.
I have personally had particularly bad experiences with some American players announcing "good 14 to bad 17" without something like T-Walsh over 1♣. In my experience this disclosed range includes all 14's and half of all 13's, and I suspect it is related to my point above.

[mikeh]

jillybean, on 2024-March-17, 00:37, said:

No, I was not thinking of upgrading this to a 15-17 1nt opener.

I do routinely open these hands and some (4423) 1D to protect my diamond holding should the auction here go 1m:1S 1nt

As an aside, perhaps this is another reason I want to play transfers over 1C (this is on hold while I am in NZ)
After 1C - transfer, would the opener typically be the one to bid NT?

I think you are doing it backwards

You should, imo, open 1C with 4432, not 1D with 4423.

Over 1C, responder can punt with 1D with his 3334 or 3343 with the ‘wrong’ hand for 1N. Over 1D, he can’t punt with 1M on such hands. So on very common hands, say 13 opposite 7….you get 1N played by the weak hand, often with either no major stopper or just one suit stopped and the lead coming through the strong hand.

It’s worse when opener has a strong hand and raises the 1N response

Plus sometimes, believe it or not, your side belongs in diamonds, especially if the opps interfere…yet responder can’t safely raise diamonds when opener could be 4423….btw, this is one reason why many players open 1C on 4432…to ensure that 1D shows 4+, letting responder compete with support.

[DavidKok]

jillybean, on 2024-March-17, 00:37, said:

As an aside, perhaps this is another reason I want to play transfers over 1C (this is on hold while I am in NZ)
After 1C - transfer, would the opener typically be the one to bid NT?

paulg, on 2024-March-17, 02:16, said:

It depends on your chosen methods.

I just complete the transfer with a non-fitting weak no trump, which allows the 18-19 no trump hand to rebid 1NT. When we want to play in game opposite a weak no trump it normally does not matter who plays the hand and it is likely that responder has the stronger hand. We have one esoteric sequence when responder can choose who plays 3NT.

The other camp complete the transfer to show 3+M and rebid 1NT with the weak no trump.

Personally I think the style that reserves the 1NT rebid for the strong (18-19 or 17-19) NT is quite a lot better. This does mean that the weak notrump completes the transfer and ends up being dummy in notrump often, in 1NT especially. That's one of several reasons why I prefer Dutch Doubleton to T-Walsh.

[mikeh]

DavidKok, on 2024-March-17, 07:05, said:

Personally I think the style that reserves the 1NT rebid for the strong (18-19 or 17-19) NT is quite a lot better. This does mean that the weak notrump completes the transfer and ends up being dummy in notrump often, in 1NT especially. That's one of several reasons why I prefer Dutch Doubleton to T-Walsh.

Many proponents of T-Walsh (including me) complete the transfer with the weak notrump hand (showing 2-3 cards in the major) and rebid 1N with 17-19. T-Walsh is a bit like ‘2/1’,in that it’s not actually a defined system but, rather, a phrase that captures a central element of the method, onto which players graft as many variations as they choose

[jillybean]

mikeh, on 2024-March-17, 06:45, said:

I think you are doing it backwards

You should, imo, open 1C with 4432, not 1D with 4423.

Over 1C, responder can punt with 1D with his 3334 or 3343 with the ‘wrong’ hand for 1N. Over 1D, he can’t punt with 1M on such hands. So on very common hands, say 13 opposite 7….you get 1N played by the weak hand, often with either no major stopper or just one suit stopped and the lead coming through the strong hand.

It’s worse when opener has a strong hand and raises the 1N response

Plus sometimes, believe it or not, your side belongs in diamonds, especially if the opps interfere…yet responder can’t safely raise diamonds when opener could be 4423….btw, this is one reason why many players open 1C on 4432…to ensure that 1D shows 4+, letting responder compete with support.

Yes, thanks. I keep slipping back into this bad habit. masterminding.

[jillybean]

This discussion has me wondering if I would be better playing short club, especially playing transfer/club, leaving 1D to show 4+. I have always played better minor without giving it any thought.

[DavidKok]

I prefer unbalanced diamond, balanced club. Going from 'better minor' to '1♦ is 4+' does not matter in the slightest. You only moved the 4=4=3=2 hand type around, which you shouldn't be catering to anyway. On paper it might seem like a change, but percentage wise you've changed next to nothing. Though if you are playing under ACBL rules you may want to reconsider - this shift is almost irrelevant from a systems perspective, but does change the definition of your 1♣ opening from 'natural' to 'quasi-natural'.

[P_Marlowe]

 jillybean, on 2024-March-18, 12:03, said:

This discussion has me wondering if I would be better playing short club, especially playing transfer/club, leaving 1D to show 4+. I have always played better minor without giving it any thought.

If you want to play Transfer Walsh, opening 1C with 2+ is sensible, you want to increase the frquency of your Xfer Walsh Seq.
In general I dont think it matters, most of the time I play minor suit opening promising 3+.
But I think it is important to stick to agreement, if your agreement is to open 1C with 33 in the minors (regardless of suit quality) do it,
if you vary it depending on mood / sun and moon, well it is a slibery road with regards to full disclosure.