But Thursday night, I had a standing date at the Memphis club with Dee Adams and played. Late in the game I picked up:
♠2 ♥A J 4 ♦Q 10 5 2 ♣Q J 10 9 8.
I was playing the wrong game! The club straight flush is the third-best hand in poker! It's better than four aces!
I passed, left-hand opponent passed and Dee opened 2♥. My RHO doubled and I bid 3♥. This generally shows three trumps while the strength is variable.
My LHO went into the tank for 10 or 15 seconds and finally passed. Dee passed and RHO bid 3♠. It passed out, I led the ♣J (Rusinow) and dummy tabled:
♠Q 9 ♥9 2 ♦K J 9 7 6 4 ♣7 3 2.
"I don't have anything extra," said dummy. I'm not a conspiracy guy and I don't think everyone is cheating, but this sounded a lot like I don't have anything extra beyond what my hesitation said I have.
Here are all four hands.
Declarer won my lead, drew trumps and played the ♦A K. When the queen didn't drop, he claimed four.
Would you double and bid spades or would you overcall 3♠ after the 2♥ bid? What's the difference? Would you consider bidding 4♠ at either turn?
Nine was top and we scored a disappointing five matchpoints. One pair got to play 4♥ and made it, one played 5♥ down 100, one pair went down in 5♠ and one pair went down in 4♠! Huh?
Declarer has 10 top tricks in 4♠, so I'm guessing he won the lead and played the ♦A K. He intended, no doubt, to ruff a diamond and play trumps ending on the table. If spades split 2-2, he would have discards available and make seven. You can see what happened.
Perhaps East was being ethical in only bidding three spades, since he seems to have a natural game call.
ReplyDeleteWe'll be in St Louis next March for the Spring Nationals. Unfortunately the Cardinals only seem to play in the warm weather!
@Paul: See you in St. Louis.
ReplyDeleteI love the way you say I can "see what happened"! Hah! But it's interesting anyway. Thanks for your nice comment today. Actually, the food wasn't very good at Logan's but we had a good time! :-)
ReplyDeleteHey Dave--what an exciting game last night! Now your team plays my team--the Giants! Bob and I are going Monday night--should be great! See you in SF next month.
ReplyDeleteJennifer
Hats off to you, Bob and them Redbirds. That was quite a finish!
ReplyDeleteps
ReplyDeletemaybe it's in the cards again for the CARDS!
I'm kinda surprised you or your partner didn't go 4H since you had promised heart support and you were sitting with 10HCP. Or is a rebid like yours non forcing to your partner? Good Luck to the Cards tonight.
ReplyDeleteHope you're having a wonderful week. If you come to Ocala and visit Sholom Park remember to bring some bread for the koi! :-)
ReplyDeleteIMO double then Spades is stronger then Spades overcall.
ReplyDeleteWould think par on the board is game in Spades and 3 Spades would get a good score.