Monday, August 14, 2006 9:51 PM

Hand Evaluation -The 40 Pt Deck

PITBULLS:

There are only 40 HCP’s in the deck in the game of Bridge. This is a bench mark in assisting Bridge players to make bidding decisions & defensive decisions. 37 HCP’s in NT virtually guarantees a grand slam. 33 HCP is a nice watermark for a small slam in NT & 26 HCP will do nicely for a NT game unless you are Meckwell ( 23-24) .

What is less known is that HCP’s are your friend on defense also. You must be a human odometer & count HCP’s as cards are played. HCP’s are a known clue to plan your defense so “think in HCP’s” if the opponents have bid. Kiz Fung had a hand playing with Tom Gandolfo that drives that point home. Kiz & Tom are nv vrs vul where leeway is routinely given when bidding non vulnerable. My partner open 1♠ vulnerable , so I bid a Jacoby 2NT. Tom “played the vulnerability” bid 3♣. My partner passed so Kiz played the vulnerability also by jamming to 5♣ on ♠QJ ♥xx ♦AJxxx ♣Axxx which I doubled. My partner pulled to 5♠ and that ended the auction.

♠	♥	♦	♣
K	K	K	K
x	x	10	Q
x		9
x		x
		x

Kiz led the club Ace and everybody followed. Tom played a middle card which in their signaling system shows no particular suit preference. The first thing that strikes Kiz is the 14 HCP’s on the board. As she has 12 HCP’s also , she has 26 HCP’s of the deck accounted for. Vulnerable declarer must have virtually all the remaining HCP’s. You give nv partner a lot of leeway so you trust vulnerable opening bids.

Now go back your old friend patterns. The diamonds are 5-5-2-1 so either declarer or partner has a stiff diamond . Does it matter who it is ? If declarer has 2 diamonds , you can give partner a ruff and if declarer has one you are not beating this hand. Kiz lays down the diamond Ace and gets rewarded when Tom ruffs. This is “standard’ expert defense. Anything but a diamond means you were too lazy to count HCP’s or apply patterns. These skills are the two basics of defense. Tom could have played a low club to signal a diamond switch but that might have been a disaster if declarer was trying to find a queen. Tom should just play “neutral” like he did letting his expert partner figure things out on her own. Being a Bridge expert comes at a price. You are expected to think.