[kenberg]

I like to think I know standard interpretations in basic situations. I will first give you a hand. Never mind (I comment at the end) about the opponent's bidding, I want to concentrate on the lead.

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Partner led the diamond K. playing standard attitude I did the best I though I could by playing the 5.Partner switched. Declarer ran the heart J to my Q so all's well that ends well.

Partner was worried that declarer held AJx in diamonds, certainly possible. Of course with the cards as they are, I could have helped by playing the J at T1 and maybe I should have, but it seems that could go wrong.

Now to my issue: I thought that it has long been standard to lead the Q from KQT9(x), asking partner to drop the J if he holds it. But BBO gives us some default cc''s and I decided to check. The default BBO cc for 2/1 advanced seems to not give a table of opening leads. The BBO cc for SAYC lists the opening lead as the K. The ACBL convention card editor by Lee Edwards has the opening lead as the Q, and although I do not have an ACBL cc from a tournament handy, I am pretty sure that the Q is in bold on it just as in the online editor. My memory tells me that this became standard sometime in the 1980s, but that's just my memory.


So I ask:
Is it your understanding that, when the lead agreement is"standard honor card leads", the lead against NT from KQT9(x) is the Q asking for a drop of the J?
Partner and I are congenial, he and I can come to an agreement here, but I am simply wondering what people think of as "standard honor card leads".

Note: The bidding was P-1S-P-3NT-all pass. EW were not at all a regular partnership. W felt his 3NT bid showed his hand. E did not. Presumably most people would convert 3NT to 4H no matter what they thought 3NT was, but that didn't happen.

[Zelandakh]

The queen lead asking for unblock of the jack (at NT) is part of Journalist (so 1960s). I do not know how much further it goes back though.

[kenberg]

I had not thought to check on Journalist leads but thanks. I have the Rossler-Rubens book on this and indeed they say that the Q asks for an unblock. And they also remark that third hand at times must use judgment. Sometimes opening leader is hoping third hand has length in that suit. True, but usually easily diagnosed. And there are issues when third hand does not have the J. When the lead of the Q could be from either KQT9x or from QJTx, third hand may wonder which it is. Again this is usually manageable. For example with Ax it will usually be right for third hand to rise and return the suit, regardless of which holding the lead was from. I didn't get into that because I wanted to focus on what the phrase "standard honor card leads" entails. But it is interesting and I am happy to see comments on the general issue of honor card leads, standard, Journalist, or otherwise.

[Zelandakh]

Standards vary from country to country. In England I would probably struggle to find 10 people in any non-London club who have heard of the idea of unblocking the jack under the queen lead as standard. In America, where Journalist was more heavily popularised for a generation, I could easily imagine that this is quite different.

[ArtK78]

The lead of the Q from KQT9x is sufficiently standard now that the ACBL convention card lists it as the default choice from that holding.

That may not have been true at the time "You May Be Right" was released (1980).

[Bbradley62]

Q has been in bold on the ACBL convention card since at least the 1980s (when I played most of my bridge).

[mikeh]

I think it is a matter of regional preference even in NA. I played frequently, for a while, with two excellent players who had moved out here, the west coast of Canada, from Montreal and Toronto, respectively. They both lead the K to request count or unblock while I have for all of my remembered experience thought the Q was the 'standard' card.

I still like the Q, but that is probably just a result of habit

[Stephen Tu]

IMO Q is "standard".

But K = count/unblock is edging on becoming new expert preference I think, in which case the Q shows something else (either rusinow, showing K, but not requesting unblock, or an ambiguous lead showing either KQ or QJ combination).

[kenberg]

mikeh, on 2015-January-21, 14:27, said:

I think it is a matter of regional preference even in NA. I played frequently, for a while, with two excellent players who had moved out here, the west coast of Canada, from Montreal and Toronto, respectively. They both lead the K to request count or unblock while I have for all of my remembered experience thought the Q was the 'standard' card.

I still like the Q, but that is probably just a result of habit

From KQTx you do not always want partner tossing the J, do you? On the posted hand, declarer has four diamonds and, as far as I was aware, they could have been A9xx. And of course I want to consider the general situation. Eg 1NT-3NT. Now surely tossing the J is dangerous unless I know partner has KQT9, is it not? Maybe the ones who play the K to get partner to drop the J lead a Rusinow Q from KQTx?

Anyway, this has all been instructive. I really thought "everybody" leads the Q from KQT9(x). Live and learn.

Aha, and Stephen Tu responded to some of this before i even got it posted!

[PhilKing]

In the UK, King for unblock has been the majority expert choice for as long as I can remember, but I think the "unblock the card under" style is gaining ground but we are not yet really used to all the ramifications.

Playing the "unblock the card under, otherwise give attitude" style, what should one lead from KQJ8x and a side ace against 1NT all pass or 1NT-3NT? I think a team mate made the wrong choice, but I wondered if the situation was well known.

[kenberg]

I am not smart enough to lead anything except the K. More often than not, this lack of intelligence serves me well.

[gordontd]

Zelandakh, on 2015-January-21, 09:41, said:

Standards vary from country to country. In England I would probably struggle to find 10 people in any non-London club who have heard of the idea of unblocking the jack under the queen lead as standard.

You might even struggle to find ten such people in a congress. I only know of it because I used to play with a North American partner.

[Zelandakh]

gordontd, on 2015-January-22, 01:25, said:

You might even struggle to find ten such people in a congress. I only know of it because I used to play with a North American partner.

I guess I am an unusual case then. I learned my carding from a Culbertson book and so the ace-unblock/count method was all I knew for a long time. The queen unblock with KQT9 is a natural extension of this. With a traditional leading style this seems to me to be as good as anything; it is the modern idea of leading unsupported aces much more frequently than was the case back then that allows the Rusinow method to come out ahead in expert circles. For normal club players, taking away the option of leading that unsupported ace is probably a good thing - in this way I still think Journalist Leads are great at that level, not least because club (intermediate) declarers tend not to use all of the information they get from defensive carding.

[Mbodell]

kenberg, on 2015-January-21, 16:18, said:

From KQTx you do not always want partner tossing the J, do you? On the posted hand, declarer has four diamonds and, as far as I was aware, they could have been A9xx. And of course I want to consider the general situation. Eg 1NT-3NT. Now surely tossing the J is dangerous unless I know partner has KQT9, is it not?

It isn't dangerous to play the J in these situations because partner's Q lead is supposed to say "I have a good enough suit, drop the J if you have it (count if not)". Generally that takes KQT9 when 4, KQT with no 9 is good enough when 6 cards for sure, often good enough when 5 cards, and never with 4 or less.

[Zelandakh]

When playing strong ace, the standard lead from KQT (without the 9) is the king. This is one of the issues with the method if you like to lead high from AK suits - do you encourage or not with the jack? Again, in the times when this method was developed the standard lead from AKxx(x) was a spot card. These days you see a high card much more often. FWiiW I think it is right to encourage (absent any other information) and partner has to live with it if they were leading from the ace without the queen.

[PhilKing]

kenberg, on 2015-January-21, 17:48, said:

I am not smart enough to lead anything except the K. More often than not, this lack of intelligence serves me well.

If the suit were KQJx I think the answer would be clearer, but the point is you want partner to give attitute for the ace and the ten, and the way to do that is to lead the queen. If you lead the king partner has some nasty issues when he has Tx Txx or even T9x.

[Fluffy]

I play King asks for unblock since forever, however I recently made a modification, when dummy has singleton or void we only unblock with doubleton honnor, on the rest of cases give attitude.