Friday,
April 21, 2006 1:43 AM
Hand Evaluation – Tactics ( The Art of Sacrificing )
PITBULLS:
Setting up a sacrifice starts with your
decision right from the onset. Toys are
used for setting up sacrifices quite often. Partner is a passed hand & you
are vul vrs not . They open 1♠ , you are
dealt ♠x ♥AK ♦xxxxx ♣Jxxxx so do you setup a sacrifice with an unusual
2NT ? You know that the odds of them having a vul
game are very good with a passed hand partner. Of course you do not
, because of hand evaluation skills.
Your HCP’s are not located
in your two suits. You have two sure defensive
tricks so partner only needs 1 ½ trick to beat their vul
game. You do not want to encourage partner to bid as you have the wrong hand for that. You are
only helping the opponents
play the hand with a silly 2NT bid
as they outgun you quite badly & the last thing you want is a passed hand
partner bidding at the 5 level . You do not want to help
them play the hand by announcing your distribution. Anyway ,
you bid 2NT & partner sticks his nose in at the 3 level & goes for
-1100 holding 3 trump( ♣’s) &
the ♦KQ !! Hand evaluation is a nice
skill to develop.
There is a nice negative
inference when you setup a sacrifice nv
vrs vul but partner prefers
to defend their vul game. Partner must feel that she
has a decent chance to beat the contract. Susan Culham
held ♠AQ87x ♥Jxxxxx ♦xx
♣void & her vul LHO bid 1♣.
Susan bid 2♣ & her RHO bid 2♦ . I crawled in 2♠ ,
Susans RHO bid 2NT & Susan setup the sacrifice
with a 3♠ bid . They bid 3NT & I passed so around to Susan. Why isn’t
&*^%^&* partner sacrificing ? He must have
values in the minors & expects to beat 3NT. Susan passes & leads a
spade so 3NT is down 3 for +300. This not the time to avoid leading a spade
because you will not be giving then their 9th trick when partner
announces minor suit values by not taking the sacrifice.
The best way to sacrifice is to determine how well the partnerships’ hands fit. If the
hands fit well, your defensive potential diminishes
so let’s go for the deliberate set. Perry Khakar bid
a hand well nv vrs vul
which shows this principle in action. ♠1098x
♥xx ♦K10987
♣Jx . Partner nv opens 2♠ , RHO vulnerable
overcalls 3NT what is your bid ? You can make the immediate sacrifice to 4♠ but the chances of you playing it there on this vulnerability are
virtually non-existent. Why not
make the “show where you live” bid ? This bid is
designed to allow a joint decision
to sacrifice at higher levels.
Partner will evaluate her hand based on her length & HCP’s in diamonds.
Accordingly Perry bid 4♦ , Kiz Fung my partner bid 4♥. Partner’s hand
is ♠QJ10987 ♥xxxx ♦Axx ♣void so she shows a diamond fit by backing in 4♠. This bid must show a diamond fit or you could possibly be making a
very silly single handed bid. The opponents now bid 4NT so you have the green light to take
your sacrifice.
What if partner with the weak 2♠ did not have a diamond fit ? She would pass 4♥ & partner
should pass 4NT as the hands are not conducive to a sacrifice. You tried for a
sacrifice so do not bid your hand twice. ♠KQJxxx
♥Kx ♦x ♣J10xx so 4NT gets beaten up badly with the spade lead. Once Perry “set up” the sacrifice with the 4♦ bid , the other hand is “captain of the ship” for
sacrificing purposes. Hand evaluation with diamonds is the key . What if partner had ♠QJ10xxx ♥QJx ♦x
♣Kxx ? If Perry made a single handed sacrifice of 5♠ , the result is a
brutal 5 down doubled against 660 . -1100 & a very bad single handed
sacrifice gets what it deserved.
You are essentially bidding your hand twice
by sacrificing & over ruling
partner. The sacrifice should be made by the correct
side ,
taking into consideration the 4♦ bid.
The theme of this article is to setup sacrifices – do not just sacrifice. A pre-empt is not allowed
to bid again unless partner gives
you the green light. In these
types of auctions where partner bids a new suit ,
she has either a fit with you or one hell of a suit. The pre-empter can bid again
with a fit. If the pre-empter or overcaller
wants to force the issue , a D.S.I.P. double is used to ask permission
to sacrifice. The pre-empter is allowed to make an action double as a request to sacrifice ( D.S.I.P. ) . This shows a pre-empt
with unexpected defense and is
asking partners permission. Partner evaluates
her hand depending on fit , defensive
tricks and values in their trump suit. Undoubles of slams
work the same way. I am asking permission
to sacrifice so are we beating this slam or not ? Single handed bids resulting in pseudo sacrifices is horrible Bridge. Use every tool
possible to prevent them.
Kiz Fung
had an ideal hand against Mike Passel to setup
a sacrifice. We held the “boss suit” spades which has a bearing on her decision
to sacrifice. Kiz vul
against vul held ♠Axxxxx ♥x ♦Jx
♣K109x , Mike opened 1♥ . I bid 2♠ with the other hand & the client bid 3♥. The worse bid
you can make is 4♥ because partner already knows
the heart distribution from the bidding so that is no help is setting up a
sacrifice ( allows lets them Q bid cheaply at the 4
level) . 4♠ might jam them up a bit but the client has allowed you room to bid 4♣. This bid shows your
possible defense so partner is able to make an informed decision. I held ♠KQJ109x ♥xx
♦x ♣ QJxx. Hearing the
club bid , I have destroyed
her hand defensively so I will not let them play 6♥ or even 7♥ . 6♠X only goes for 500 against their
cold grand. Our partners had a limit raise
misunderstanding so we could have won the board for them as they got to game instead of slam.
A word of caution
though. Partner is allowed to operate
when you pre-empt. You open 3♦ with ♠x ♥xxxx ♦KQJxxxx ♣x , they make a T/O double. Partner
bids 3♥ & RHO bids 4♠ . Partner has
given you a green light to bid but
bid what ? Bid 4NT , giving
partner a choice of sacrifices. Partner will thank you as she holds ♠xxx ♥x ♦Axxx ♣A1098x & 5♦X is cold. A 5♥ bid was not welcome by partner J
A Tormentee nv vrs vul
setup a sacrifice very well
against Dora & I recently. He opened 1♦ & Dora
overcalled 1♠ which his partner doubled . I Q bid 2♦ so now he made
the key bid of 3♣ which
announces his two suiter & since he did not
double 2♦ ( which would show strength) he is showing his intentions to sacrifice. Dora bid 3♠ & I bid 4♠ so since Bridge is a
partnership game , he now allows partner to
make the decision to sacrifice. OOPS we forgot
that part , as our Tormenttee
now bids his hand again by bidding
5♣. This gets doubled & goes a mere 5 down for +1100 & a cold
zero. Partner’s hand was not suitable
for a sacrifice as it was a flat defensive
hand with all her points in hearts. Pity !