April 2009 - 40

PLAY BRIDGE

?

Ask Jerry

Jerry Helms

www.jerryhelms.com

Dear Jerry,
My partner and I regularly pres‑
ent our opponents with a gift in this
situation: They open with a pre‑
empt of a major, partner doubles,
and I, holding the other major, bid
aggressively. I feel a double in this
situation requires four cards in the
other major and a solid opening
bid.
Dlr: West  6 3
Vul: N-S  A 10 6
KQ52
A Q 9 5
 J 10 9
A 7 5 4
 K Q J 5 4 3 2 WN E  9 8
9
S J87
J7
 K 10 8 2
KQ82
7
 A 10 6 4 3
643
West
North
3
Dbl
All Pass

East
Pass

South
4

On this deal, West opened 3.
Partner doubled and I felt that 3
was too conservative. 4 was only
down one.
Are we bearing too many gifts?
Scott
Dear Scott,
I agree that your partnership needs
to stop bearing gifts, unless to family
40

and close friends and even then, not
at the table!
The culprit in your example was
your partner. A takeout double with
two-card support for the suit advancer (you) is most likely to choose
is always dangerous and should be
avoided if at all possible.
With the North hand, I think a
slightly conservative pass is probably
best, with an aggressive 3NT overcall
the only other choice. As the cards
lie, nine tricks would come rolling
home in 3NT. Once your partner
doubled, your values certainly merited a constructive reply and a jump
to 4 was reasonable. It appears you
did not panic and played the 4-2 fit
as well as possible.
Notice that if North does not act
in the direct seat, you have the pattern and values for a take out double
in the pass-out position. Whatever
action North now chooses yields a
plus score rather than a minus. 3NT
is cold because of the favorable location of the A, and even 5 makes
because of the fortunate lie of the
spade spots.
A guideline I devised years ago
may help. When an opponent preempts in front of you, before taking
direct seat action, you should consider ESP - Expect Seven Points. ESP
refers to the values you guesstimate
partner to hold and use as the basis
for action or inaction. If the presence
of 7 reasonable points in advancer's
hand will not justify your takeout
double or overcall, then you do not
have enough values to act. Applying
this to your partner's hand, I fail to
see where 7 reasonable points would
save him. As it turned out, your
excellent 9 points would produce
game, but not the one you would
reach after the direct seat double. As
I said earlier, despite values, pass is

likely the best choice. It is important
to realize that pass in a competitive
auction does not always signify a lack
of values, but may simply mean the
values held cannot be expressed by
any reasonable option.
A second acronym for dealing with
preempts would perhaps have helped
partner after his direct seat pass in
choosing a reply to your reopening
double: TNT - Think No Trump.
In any auction where a preempt has
crowded your bidding space, think
long and hard before choosing any
action that could result in bypassing
3NT as a final contract. TNT would
provide a slight justification for a
direct 3NT overcall in your example,
but I still think it's too aggressive. r

Mike's
Bridge
Lesson
By
Mike
Lawrence
Some holdups come in standard
situations, and a bell goes off warning
declarer that something special is up.
Sometimes there is no bell, and if
declarer fails to fall back on the first
rule of dummy play, he will fail. Do
you know that rule?
Continued on pages 42-43
Bridge Bulletin
http://www.jerryhelms.com
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of April 2009
