Both vulnerable at matchpoints, you deal and open 1D and partner responds 1H. What is your rebid holding ♠AKQ ♥A43 ♦Q97543 ♣A ?
When a similar hand was posted in an online bridge forum, dozens of posters offered eight different answers. Their bids and comments revealed just how much confusion exists about the meanings of opener’s rebids, even among fairly experienced players.
Here are some of the proposed solutions and the gist of the bidders' explanations:
“3D. I play this as forcing.”
That’s a convenient answer, but it’s not a standard, common or recommended
meaning. Your anonymous partner in a bidding forum will assume you have around
15-17 points and long, strong diamonds – ideally, a suit that can play opposite
a singleton for just one loser. Even if your partnership has agreed to define
this jump as forcing, ♦Q97543 is way too weak.
“3NT. Shows a hand stronger than a 2NT rebid.”
A jump to 2NT would promise a balanced 18-19 points. With a little more, you would
have opened 2NT, so you don’t need 3NT to show points. If you have a 19-point
hand that’s so strong you want to be in game opposite any response, it was
probably worth an upgrade to a 2NT opening.
Opener’s jump to 3NT in this auction is used to describe
trick-taking strength, not points. It’s a hand with a long, solid minor and some
extra values, but not necessarily a full 18 points. It’s usually unbalanced,
often with a singleton in responder's suit. A typical hand is ♠K76
♥8
♦AKQ10742 ♣A9 .
“3H. My extra
points make up for the lack of a fourth heart."
Extra length in our trump suit often persuades us to overstate our high-card
strength. That tradeoff doesn’t work as well in reverse. An extra king doesn’t
really compensate for inadequate trump support, and a jump raise in a major
removes other strains from consideration. If there are better contracts
available than 3H. 4H or 6H, partner won’t be looking for them.
“1S. New suits are
forcing!”
The most vocal participants claimed this was the perfect, space-saving solution
because partner must bid again. The part of this basic bidding rule that they
forgot is that new suits are forcing by responder, not opener.
Opener’s rebid of 1S or 2C (suggested by a few others) could be a
hand with extra values, but both bids deny forcing-to-game strength. They show a
maximum of 17 (maybe a “soft” 18) points. Responder is free to pass with a bare
minimum and a partial fit (three cards).
A few experts joined the discussion and tried to explain that the only forcing new-suit bid here would be a jump-shift or splinter raise. Some of the 1S bidders, however, were undeterred. They insisted that they were taught that all new suits are forcing and “everyone" plays it that way.
So what’s the "correct" answer? All the choices above mislead partner about at least two features of your hand. A jump to 2NT (my choice) or a jump-shift to 2S rates to be less of a distortion because each has just one flaw. Both show the right strength, but the distribution is off by just one card -- a fourth spade for 2S, a second club for 2NT.
The more valuable lesson from this type of discussion is the need to keep an open mind. Listen to others’ recommendations and consider the possibility that your bridge teacher's advice was wrong, misunderstood or outdated. What is widely accepted as “standard" bidding may well have changed – for the better -- since you learned the game, and the most successful players are always ready to adapt.
© 2020 Karen Walker