Weekly Hand Analysis - Vic Johnson - October 4, 2021 - Opener's Second Bid

 

Question:

You know you want to be in hearts but the second suit is clubs.  The procedure is to bid your first suit because it has five and the second because it has 4.  Do you bid the clubs or again bid the hearts even though you do not have six hearts?

Vic:

You are getting ahead of yourself here. You should NOT YET be thinking about where you want to play the hand. That is Step Two. 

At this point you should be thinking ONLY about describing your hand to your partner. That is Step One. Until Step One is accomplished, you need to keep a completely open mind with regard to Step Two. 

Your hand is not balanced. It is a two-suited hand with a standard opening point count. That is what you need to focus on telling partner. You should bid hearts first because it is the longer of the two suits. 

West overcalls 2S & partner Passes. If partner had 3 hearts & at least 10 pts, they should have raised your hearts. If partner had at least 10 pts & a suit of their own, they should probably have  bid that. If partner had at least 10 pts & a spade stopper they should probably have bid 2NT. Partner’s Pass tells you they do NOT have what it takes to make any of those bids. 

You have minimal values to bid at the three level. On the other hand, West was showing a weak hand, so their must be points somewhere. A good guess would be that East has them. It is aggressive to be sure, but aggressive is good in bridge & you are not vulnerable. So I support your decision to bid clubs at the lowest available level. By doing that you have now finished describing your hand. There is nothing more to tell. 

That makes partner Captain of the auction.  It is now up to partner to think about Step Two & decide where you want to play the hand. You need to stop bidding unless partner forces you to continue. 

Partner tells you they think you will be better off playing in 3H than 3C. Partner is NOT encouraging you to bid again, they are performing their duty as Captain & setting the contract. Unless partner has misbid their hand, I expect them to be weak with not more than 2 hearts. Be that the case, you will be fortunate to take nine tricks. 

I wonder who has the five unaccounted for spades.