Top Ten Reasons to Play Bridge - #8: Start Playing Right Away

Bridge can be an intimidating game, and for those with experience learning bridge, starting out may feel a bit like this:

But it's not like that with the EZ Bridge system! And with an awesome teacher like me.  EZ bridge has complete beginners player duplicate bridge in the first 20 minutes on the first day, and the duplicate style keeps it challenging for players who have a little bit of experience.

Bridge can be a complex game, but it doesn't have to be right out of the gate.  Come to the Anchorage Bridge Center on November 9 at 12:30 and you'll be playing bridge before 1:00.

Top Ten Reasons to Play Bridge - #9

Number Nine:

Because you can play at any age, and it brings all ages together. 

ANY age. 

Sure, thinking of bridge summons up images of senior centers, or grandmother's bridge night.  This is because bridge is a game that you can keep playing for years and years. 

But bridge is also a great game for younger ages. 

I first learned to play bridge when I was in high school.  The card game quickly took over huge sections of the lunch room and our administration even eventually partitioned off part of the cafeteria for cards there were so many of us. 

In college the phrase "who's up for bridge?" was the best way to splinter any study group and result in bleary eyes the next morning after playing late into the night. 

Bridge brings all ages together into a common past time.  When I first started playing bridge in Anchorage I was 24 years old.  I made friends with people 60 years my senior, and realized that I never really had friends outside my general age group before.  Bridge is a game that brings us together young and old. 

Basically, if you think you're too young for bridge or too old to finally learn, you're wrong, you're just the right age, and everyone else at the table will appreciate having you there. 

Top Ten Reasons to Play Bridge

# 10:

Bridge players are super awesome.  Need proof? Here is a video of bridge players dancer Gangnam style:

Afraid you aren't cool enough to play bridge with people this awesome?  Don't worry, awesomeness is a guaranteed by product of the bridge lessons offered every Saturday at 12:30 at the Anchorage Bridge Center starting November 9th.

Interesting hand

I encountered this interesting hand at the game last night:

Dlr: W Vul: N/S 95 AJ752 K KT984 83 K83 Q9842 653 J42 T96 AT6 AQJ2 AKQT76 Q4 J753 7

North opened this 11 point hand in second seat hoping his nice shape would make up for any deficiencies, but he became less confident when south drove them to game in spades.

Imagine you are South on this hand.

West leads the four of diamonds, forcing dummy's singleton king and taken by East's ace, East shifts to a trump which you win in your hand with the Ace.

Can you see a plan from here?  First, count your losers.  Unfortunately, this is a rough hand.  Both you and your partner have singletons, but you also hold the kings in those suits, making those high card points less valuable.

On first count you have zero spade losers, 1 heart losers, 3 diamond losers and a club loser.  You need to get those five losers down to three.  How?

Well, you can trump a diamond in dummy.  But then dummy is out of trump (remember one round has been played), so you're still stuck with two more diamond losers in your hand. So let's hold off on that thought.

You need to ditch diamonds on the long hearts, but how? Well, first you might consider a heart finesse.  If the K is in the west then you can finesse for it, but what then? You won't have a heart loser, but you will still have two diamond losers.

The only hope is for hearts to be split 3-3 so South can drop losing diamonds and/or his losing club on North's long hearts. But here is where it gets tricky.

South must play the Q and when West covers with the King, south must duck and let West win the trick. Now South can win the return,  draw the last trump, and run dummy's hearts, making four.

What happens if you cover the King of hearts with dummy's ace? You run out of entries to dummy.  You can win the Jack of hearts and trump a heart, thereby leaving yourself with no heart losers.  But now you can't get to dummy after you draw trump, and the good hearts are stranded.

The defense has opportunities to set the contract, but they aren't easy to see.  If West or East continues diamonds at their first opportunity, forcing dummy to rough, communication is broken. The defense can take a second diamond trick before South can throw his diamonds on North's Hearts.  But most defenders will see the diamond void in dummy and switch to a trump, usually a wise move.

In this hand the the only hope for declarer is to duck a winning finesse, letting the king of hearts win when you could take it with the ace.  At the same time, the winning line for the defense is to play diamonds, forcing dummy to rough with its short trumps. I love it when hands show us how the typical 'rules' we follow when playing bridge don't always work, and that each hand stands unique.

Hearts Schmarts - or: It's Better to be Lucky than Good

(adventures from 11/12/12 game)

Hello fellow bridge players.  This is my first post of what I hope will be a regular feature.  I play regularly in the Monday evening bridge game at the Anchorage Bridge Center.  I've found that there are almost always a few points of interest that turn up during an evening of bridge. 

While my skill level is far from a level which would allow me to properly analyze the most interesting hands, I thought I would start documenting some of my post game thoughts, and hopefully initiate a conversation about the game of bridge. 

General Thoughts on the Night

As always, it was a fun night.  I had missed the prior week's game.  Playing regularly is the best way to solidify bridge skills, and it's challenging to return after a bit of time off, even just a week.  This is especially true with the new bidding system my regular Monday partner, Terry, has suggested we use.  As a result, I'd say my proudest acheivement of the night was succesfully using a Bergen raise.  There's nothing like that tense moment after your opponents have asked your partner to explain one of your alerted bids . . .

To the hands!
Results from the 11/12/12 game can be viewed here and complete hand records found here.

We had the last sit out of this game, and so I left early.  This meant that I didn't engage in my usual post-mortem activity of alternating between pestering some of the club's better player's with questions about various hands, and eavesdropping on their conversations about the hands they found interesting or challenging.

On another Monday this might mean I wouldn't have much to say, as these conversations often provide many potential angles for a potential post here.  Fortunately, I had a special bidding "issue" which caused me to completely ignore any heart fits my partner and I might have, and to force us into notrump games despite an eight card fit in hearts.  So this gives me some hands to look at and discuss (see how I turned my bidding errors into a positive there? I will call that newly discovered bridge power the Blogger's Perogative).

But, before discussing the hands, we shall first consider the distinction between IMP and Matchpoint scoring. 

Almost all duplicate bridge players are aware that there are different systems of scoring.  Rubber, board-a-match, matchpoints and IMPs are the methods of which I am aware (please add others in the comments).  For now, I will only consider matchpoints and IMPs (mostly because these are the only two I really know anything about). 

For most of us the distinction between these scoring methods can be summarized by stating that in IMP scoring 'margin matters,' whereas with matchpoints it does not.  Let's consider a simplified example with two hands of bridge and the hypothetical scores of two pairs of players:

	Score for Pair A	Score for Pair B
Hand 1	110	90
Hand 2	170	420

Both Pair A and Pair B 'won' a hand.  In matchpoints the result is a tie, as each pair has one 'top' and one 'bottom.'  However, in IMP scoring the margin between the scores matters.  Pair A won hand 1 by 20 points, which converts to 1 IMP.  However, Pair B won hand 2 by 250 points, which converts to 6 IMPs.  Therefore, under IMP scoring Pair B is winning by 5 IMPs. 

This distinction results in tactical differences in the play of the play of the game.  The bottom line is that the bonus points for making game or slam are more important in IMP scoring, and overtricks and part-scores are less important.  Recently, I have been intrigued by the merits of IMP over matchpoint scoring due to one strategic feature of IMP games: the safety play.  The safety play is the name for a strategy where declarer must play "safe" to guard against a bad break or lay of the cards.  Often this safe play sacrifices a chance at an overtrick.  A common scenario would be a contract which makes an overtrick if the opponents cards in your 8 card fit split 3-2, but which requires careful play if the suit splits 4-1 or 5-0.  If the declarer fails to make the safety play he or she will go down, but if the safety play proves to be unecessary then declarer has given up the potential overtrick. 

The safety play is a common feature of the bridge column in the newspaper, or 'puzzle' hands found in bridge magazines.  These features generally assume IMP scoring, as it is the scoring system used for team games, and therefore for the highest level of bridge competition around the world.  The notion of the safety play takes on an entirely different feel at matchpoints, where the difference between 450 and 420 can have a significant impact on a pair's final score.  As a result, sacrificing a chance for an overtrick is generally not the best strategy under matchpoint scoring.

Of course match point scoring has advantages over IMPs.  Most obviously it is the fact that every hand has equal importance, and a part-score in a diamond contract commands just as much attention as making that no-trump slam.  In IMP scoring a single play on a hand with slam potential can overwhelm the play of several hands which may contain more challenging and nuanced play.

This is all a very long and rambling introduction to the hands I wanted to talk about.  You see, another side effect (and arguable downside) of matchpoint scoring is that 3NT making 4 for 430 points can be significantly better than 4 of a major making four for 420.  Even where a pair has a major suit fit, there will be times when being in no trump will result in a better board.  It may be tempting to attempt to find ways to find these 3NT contracts.  Maybe some experts try to find these contracts intentionally, but for those of us who are far from the expert category can rely on my favorite of all bridge assets: luck.

So on to the hands of the night I'm highlighting here.


My partner and I reached two 3NT contracts when we had a 5-3 fit in hearts.  Both of the contracts were the result of my bidding errors.  One was a mid board, but the other resulted in the covetted 3NT making four, for a shared top, where virtually all other pairs were in 4H making four.  I'll also note that as a result we didn't play in 4H once during this game.  I'm thinking of making my seemingly pathological aversion to 4H's a new lucky tradition (don't tell my partners).  Let's take a look at the hands:

BOARD 18

Dlr: E Vul: N/S 732 T43 KT93 652 QJ865 652 8 AK98 AT KQ987 AJ4 QT7 K94 AJ Q7652 J43

I was sitting West.  With a five card major and a solid four card minor I got bidding tunnel vision on this hand.  After Terry opened 1H as East, I completely failed to register our heart fit.  I bid 1S, and then 2C after his 1NT response.  He very reasonably jumped to 3NT and I passed, failing to correct to the much better 4H contract.  With a singleton diamond in my hand the heart contract is significantly better.  However, lady luck shined and we escaped with a mid board.

Next time was even luckier . . .

BOARD 11

Dlr: S Vul: Nil 54 K963 A92 K863 AJ982 A85 J6 AJ7 K QJT72 KQ5 QT92 QT763 4 T8743 54

Another missed fit and an even luckier result.  As West I opened one spade and Terry responded 2H as east.  This bid promises 5 hearts.  With only four hearts east can bid a minor, and allow me, the opener, to bid a four card heart suit if I have one.  This way you can find a potential 5-3 fit immediately, without risking missing a 4-4 fit.  Of course this all makes sense now, at the time I never registered our 5-3 heart fit and responded with 3 clubs.  When Terry showed his diamond stoppers by bidding 3NT, I left him there. 

EW are cold for 4 tricks in either hearts or no trump, even with the K of hearts off side and the 4-1 heart split.  Note that E-W appear to have eleven tricks (two spades, four hearts, two diamonds, three clubs), but have to lose three tricks before they are fully set-up.

So our 3NT making four was a shared top board.

So that's two boards with heart fits where I bumbled our way to 3NT instead of 4H's.  In IMP scoring it would have made a 1 point difference at most, and been quickly forgotten.  But at Matchpoints the result was a mid and a top.  It's almost enough to make one consider looking for these elusive 3NT making 4 contracts.  Enter Board #14, to remind us all never to try to outsmart contract bridge:

Dlr: E Vul: Nil 54 T642 QJ43 QT8 J873 KQ3 A62 765 AQT96 987 T5 AKJ K2 AJ5 K987 9432

We reached a fairly straightforward 4S contract on this hand.  The bidding sequence was 1S by East - Pass - 3D by me as East (Bergen raise! Yay!) - Pass - 4S by East.  But, as I put down the dummy I couldn't help but feel we had missed one of those elusive 3NT making four contracts. 

Take a look at the West hand to see why.  Sure, there is the fourth spade, to make a nine card trump fit, but the hand is completely flat, with 4-3-3-3 shape.  There are no roughing values, and as it turns out, my partner has AKJ in clubs, the suit that looks like the largest concern from my perspective. 

Is there a bidding sequence, or a way I can psych, to get us to 3NT? It seems that such a path would be likely to lead to a top board.  Then I looked again.  4 Spades makes four, but 3NT doesn't even make three, going down one after a diamond lead. 

Matchpoint and IMP scoring are critically different, and they can influence strategic decisions during both bidding and play of the cards.  Even though that's the case (certainly when it comes to overtricks and doubling), as I learned on Monday, it's best not to over think it, and stick to just playing bridge.  Of course, the most important lesson, as always, is that it's better to be lucky than good.