Friday, September 16, 2005 6:58 AM

Hand Evaluation - Switch Hitting

 

PITBULLS:

 

            In Baseball , it pays to  be a switch hitter. I have been told that most leading experts at the world class level “switch hit” when it comes to opening leads. They play 3rd and 5th against suits & 4th best against NT. Against NT you rarely lead from 3 card suits & 4th best brings in the quite valuable “rule of eleven” . In NT, you do not “burn” valuable spot cards by leading your second lowest from a 4 card holding Q983 . Not only is the 8 horribly hard to read ,  it may be the setting trick later on in a NT contract ! If you want to convert to 3rd & 5th , I suggest just doing it for suit contracts. Decide later if you want to switch to 3rd & 5th in NT also. I like the rule of 11 for NT & not burning spot cards so I prefer 4th best for NT.

 

            In suit contracts , it is imperative especially in cash out situations to know the difference from 3 to an honour or 4 to an honour. When we have the AK on lead , we “switch hit” depending on whether we want count or attitude. What if partner opened & has the AK of her suit ?  Hands like this one occur time after time playing 4th best leads

 

                                    ♠ AKQJ52

                                    ♥ J73

                                    ♦ 1086

                                    ♣ 7                     

♠98                                                     ♠1073

♥Q862                                                ♥ AK954

            ♦K932                                                 ♦ AQJ4

            ♣ 962                                                  ♣ K

 

                                    ♠ 63

                                    ♥ 10

                                    ♦ 75

                                    ♣ AQJ108543

 

            If partner by leading the heart deuce has 4 of them , we must cash one heart and two diamonds. If partner has 3 of them , we must cash 2 hearts & 1 diamond ( give west 5 diamonds) . Wrong order would be fatal.

 

            Declarer , by false carding  causes “cash out” problems , unless the spots are just right. What if West has 62 of hearts , declarer has Q108  so false cards with the queen ?  Experts have devised a rule to get around this problem. As East can count the hearts between himself & dummy , he only plays the king from his AK if the combined total is 9 or less. If more , he hides the king & wins the Ace instead. This clues East into the heart count. When partner switches to the diamond Ace , he will discourage with the King as he knows the heart will cash. If partner has a singleton heart , she will discourage in diamonds with the king wanting a heart ruff.  Switch hitting again !  Rather clever !

 

            The most obvious form of switch hitting common to Bridge players is making a decision with an AK combination on opening lead. If the context of the bidding indicates “cashing out” will be important , we switch to the King lead. This signals partner to show count rather than attitude. If we just want the normal attitude signal , we lead Ace from AK. In NT , leading bare Aces are becoming more common , so attitude is preferred rather than the old fashioned unblock or count .

 

            Leading Ace from AK brings in the concept of suit preference. Kiz Fung & Susan Culham were defending a heart partial. The lead of the ♠A by Kiz means she needs help from partner to plan the defense. The lead of the ♠K means she does not need help but just count. Kiz leads the ♠A , the board hits with ♠xx ♥AJ109 ♦AKJxx xx  . Susans obligation is to guide the switches , first she discourages in spades with a middle card. With the next spade she can give suit preference. If it is a low spade this shows a club card or else she would have played another middle card. Attitude & suit preference go hand in hand. If Kiz had led the ♠K , all bets are off & she is on her own.

 

            Upside down count & attitude is another example of “switch hitting” . If you play standard signals like BJ Trelford & myself , there are special circumstances where we should switch to upside down signaling. This action will be predicated on whether the dummy contains a finessible honour so you do not want to “burn your high spot cards” . Another example,  is if partner leads top of nothing so you do not want to waste spot cards also. Discarding should be upside down , if you do not play another treatment like Roman discards. In all other situations normal signals are an advantage because of unblocking ( dummy has no high cards )  Some examples .

 

            ♦ A1073                                                                              ♦ A9753

♦Q                         ♦K94                        top of nothing lead of ♦8                         ♦ KQ102   declarer plays Ace

 

            ♦ AJ5

♦Q                      ♦K1093

 

 

            There are many hands when there are no finessible cards in dummy ,  normal signals work better than upside down because they unblock the suit. if partner has led a short suit or top of nothing , normal signals are almost always wrong. If there are finessible cards in the dummy , standard signals are almost always wrong.

 

            Attitude can change depending on whether you can stand the “obvious switch” . If the obvious switch does not look from your side , the line of least resistance may just be to ask partner to continue her suit. If you tell partner not to continue , you are demanding a switch to the “obvious” suit. Smith echos work on the same principle. You either like partners suit or do not care or you demand a switch.

 

If it is a known count situation i.e. you have bid the suit or shown a systemic count via the bidding we “ switch hit” to middle encourages so we can bring suit preference into play. This “switch hitting” also applies if there is a singleton on the board. Ah , the life of the Bridge expert on defense !  Defense is more of a partnership game than one might expect.