[benlessard]

Ive rarely played prec where 1D contained a bal range so ive wonder how often opener is bal ?

If you play neg free bid

1D-(1S)-???

Do you bid 2H on

Axx
QTxxx
Kx
xxx

on the assumption that hes very often balanced ?

[MickyB]

I think partner will have an 11-13 NT about 62% of the time. That assumes 2C shows six, 4414 opens 2D, no 10hcp openings and no off-shape 1NT openings, so I suspect it's higher than that in practice unless you open a lot of unbal 10s but few balanced 10s. I would bid 2H, yes. Even if partner is unbal they don't have to have a stiff heart.

[Free]

I don't have exact numbers, but it's a lot, way more than 50%.

[PrecisionL]

From an old spreadsheet on classic Precision (NT Opening of 13-15) 1♦ = balanced hand 10-12 of 30 %.

Adjusting (roughly) for 14-16 NT, add 1/3 more for 13 hcp hands excluded = 40% for balanced hands that must open 1D.

Hmmm .... this seems low.

Going back to basic math / probabilities, I recalculate and get 71.5 %.

I just talked (calculated) myself out of playing 14-16 NT and letting the opponents overcall 1D with 1 of either Major. :<(

[blackshoe]

Seems like a good argument for mini-NT.

[Free]

blackshoe, on 2013-November-13, 07:31, said:

Seems like a good argument for mini-NT.

Not really, because including a strong NT in your 1♦ opening has severe consequences...

[PrecisionL]

Free, on 2013-November-13, 10:09, said:

Not really, because including a strong NT in your 1♦ opening has severe consequences...

Maybe, maybe not. IMO 16 hcp hands can be upgraded to 1♣ opening or down graded to 15 and opened 1♦ K-S Style. Opening 1NT with a 11-14 hcp range (per K-S) is workable and great for matchpoint pairs.

[the_clown]

If I played neg free bid, I would certainly bid 2♥. Double +2♥ is forcing so I cant see what else we can do

[mycroft]

I have to admit I hate opening 1♣ on boring flat 16s. I'm willing to trade the problems with having to deal with non-standard NT ranges, having to invite on hands that the room is either bidding 1NT-3NT or 1m-1M-1NT-p on, *and* if playing a mini-NT, having to deal with "11-15 if unbalanced, 13-not great 16 if balanced" 1♦, to not have to worry about flat 16 opposite flat 8 (or an ace and a king) trying to avoid the hopeless game.

Maybe I'm weird.

[awm]

I wrote a short program and generated the following counts:

Weak NT: 440752
Three suiter with diams: 57250
(*)Three suiter short diams: 16812
Five-five minors: 22574
(*)Six-plus clubs: 110733
Six-plus diamonds: 102422
(*)5C-4M-short diams: 22553
5C-4M-3D: 23498
5C-4M-22 weak NT: 28472
5C-4D unbal: 24195
5C-4D-22 weak NT: 15030
5D-4x unbal: 67276
5D-4x-22 weak NT: 41934
(*)5D-4x-22 14/15 high: 12947

Assuming that the * hands do not open 1D, we have:

Weak NT: 440,752 (53.5%)
Semi-balanced weak NT: 85,436 (10.4%)
Six-plus diamonds: 102,422 (12.4%)
Other unbalanced: 194,793 (23.7%)

Obviously this depends a bit on which hands open 1D and what you call "balanced" but it seems like the number will be around 64% balanced hand for a fairly standard precision system with these notrump ranges.

[MickyB]

awm, on 2013-November-14, 23:22, said:

I wrote a short program and generated the following counts:

Weak NT: 440752
Three suiter with diams: 57250
(*)Three suiter short diams: 16812
Five-five minors: 22574
(*)Six-plus clubs: 110733
Six-plus diamonds: 102422
(*)5C-4M-short diams: 22553
5C-4M-3D: 23498
5C-4M-22 weak NT: 28472
5C-4D unbal: 24195
5C-4D-22 weak NT: 15030
5D-4x unbal: 67276
5D-4x-22 weak NT: 41934
(*)5D-4x-22 14/15 high: 12947

Why are the 6+club and 6+diamond figures so different? These numbers don't look right to me. My estimate was wrong too, I forgot to remove 5M332 from the 1D opening, which gives me 57-58% - but that was without removing 5D422 14-15, so I'd expect your method to produce a higher figure.

[rhm]

the_clown, on 2013-November-14, 06:33, said:

If I played neg free bid, I would certainly bid 2♥. Double +2♥ is forcing so I cant see what else we can do

I think it is better to double and forget the hearts if partner can not bid them.
With ♠Axx it is quite likely you belong in 1NT from opener's side if he can not bid 2♥
I also think opener should bid 2♥ when he would have raised with a 3 card suit over 1♦ - 1♥
If you make a negative free bid of 2♥ with a five card suit, the suit should be better.

Rainer Herrmann

[MickyB]

rhm, on 2013-November-15, 06:37, said:

I also think opener should bid 2♥ when he would have raised with a 3 card suit over 1♦ - 1♥

1D-(1S)-??

xx
KJx
Axxx
Jxxx

[benlessard]

Im very fond of neg free bids so the idead of bidding a 5 card suit at the 2 level was alien to me especially a shitty 5 card suit. But according to Kit Woolsey its pretty standard to assume that partner is rarely short in H (do like he opened 1Nt) .

Im not really convinced because 4135,4144,4153,3154,3145,2155,2164 seems like a lot of hands here 2H would be awful.

http://bridgewinners...-highest-level/

Its was BAM format.

[rhm]

MickyB, on 2013-November-15, 06:46, said:

1D-(1S)-??

xx
KJx
Axxx
Jxxx

If this is the hand of the 1♦ opener I bid 2♥ in response to a negative double.
If this is responders hand I pass. I know this is a minority view.
I agree with Jdonn's comment on a different hand
" I passed as I usually do on these, but the only thing I really can't stand is double. When partner has 4 hearts you can just never recover."

Rainer Herrmann

[JLOGIC]

rhm, on 2013-November-16, 03:16, said:

If this is the hand of the 1♦ opener I bid 2♥ in response to a negative double.
If this is responders hand I pass. I know this is a minority view.
I agree with Jdonn's comment on a different hand
" I passed as I usually do on these, but the only thing I really can't stand is double. When partner has 4 hearts you can just never recover."

Rainer Herrmann

It's different in precision, you get buried less often when partner has hearts (nothing horrible is going to happen), and you have far more hands that have no bid since you cannot really raise the minor. In standard this hand is no problem obviously since you can just raise partners minor. Passing with all 2353 2335 2344 hand types with 8-10 points is just going to lead to all pass too often when they have a 7 or 8 card fit and almost half the deck (where in standard, all of those hands could at least attempt to raise the minor). That seems like a disaster to me even though your LHO will often save you with a raise, your partner is rarely going to save you if LHO passes since he will rate to have length.

[benlessard]

Can we say that since there is some neg double without 4H, with 5H you should stretch to bid 2H (if NFB) ??