S: KJT2
H: K42
D: AKQ6
C: K7
S: Q95
H: AQ83
D: 73
C: AJ64
The auction would bore you but North showed spades and diamonds with invitational values and South saw there was no fit and that the partnership had fewer than the traditionally required 33 points and so stopped in game. As you can see, though, slam is very good. It requires hearts 3-3 or a club finesse or one of several possible squeezes. Why is it so good? Undoubtedly, that
10 is valuable, but even if you take it away, the slam is still a decent spot.So I endeavoured to find out. My plan was to delve into the details of what makes these hands worth 12 tricks and try to come up with a better evaluation method for 6NT contracts than pure high-card points. However, I didn't need to — points work fine. Over 2,000 tests where the partnership had 32 combined points, slam made a whopping 69% of the time! Since when did this change? We've always been told that you need 33 points to make 6NT and I've never heard anyone say anything to the contrary. Or is this common knowledge that all experts use but which has mysteriously remained a gap in my bridge learning? Post a comment calling me a naïve idiot if you like.
And don't give me any crap about double-dummy results being completely different from real life. I don't buy it. Yes, our solver will pick up any two-way guesses for a Queen or know which squeeze to play for, but in the real world the defence might underlead a Queen at trick one, obviating a guess, or they might have trouble knowing which four-card suit to discard from. And besides, I'm not saying that 69% of slams will make — only that 69% of slams are makeable and I for one would be very happy to bid them on this basis.
It doesn't stop there. With 31 points between the hands, over 2,000 deals, almost exactly 50% of them make 6NT. Who here is surprised by this? This means that you can bid slam more freely knowing that, at worst, it will be makeable 50% of the time.
Of course, if you're bidding these slams with lower point counts you're in more danger of having two cashing aces against you. If only there was some kind of convention which can be used to check for aces after a 1NT opening...
9 comments:
Well, I'd always worked off 32 points not 33, so long as you're not missing two aces or an ace-king in one suit. Of course it's often tricky to tell, but you've got a 5 card suit and know you have 32+ points it's often good to bid it. So it doesn't surprise me that 50% of 31 counts make. Maybe asking for aces and kings at a low level does make sense after all...
On the above had the opponents had a simple 1NT-6NT auction. The 1NT opening was 14-16, and as you can see there are only 13 points in the hand. Maybe declarer upgraded a point because of the 5 card su... oh, er, or maybe because of all those te... oh, none of those either.
North is worth 7.28 tricks (Binky points) and south is worth 4.64, for a total of 11.92 tricks.
33 points for slam is an old-lady Goren value. It keeps you out of slams missing two aces, but also keeps you out of many making slams.
Binky? Binky?!?!?!? WTF is a Binky point? If they work out this well then I honestly want to know! Don't suppose you could post a link to Binky point calculations Thomas? :o)
"Binky" is Brian Callaghan, and they're his invention.
Just to clarify, I'm not talking about hand evaluation. We got this board wrong for two reasons. First, we judged our combined assets as worth 32 points. Secondly, we judged that 32 points wasn't enough for slam. The sim was only looking to solve the second problem.
Sorry, I was referring to my Binky Points, which are a rough way of assigning trick values to hands which are additive (sum of your trick value and my trick value is total tricks.)
See my articles on hand evaluation at:
http://bridge.thomasoandrews.com/valuations/
I've heard that someone else has something called Binky points (is that who Brian Callaghan is?) My work is independent of his work.
Ah, how confusing! Sorry for the incorrect attribution.
Michael, what were your shape constraints for the hands - were you assuming they were balanced? If so, how does the presence of a five-card suit affect things?
They were two balanced hands - always 4333, 4432 or 5332 patterns. There was no constraint as to the degree of fit, though. This probably makes a slight difference but I suspect not a lot.
With neither hand being 5332, the percentage drops to about 62% for 32 points combined. If one or both hands are 5332, the percentage rises to about 75%. So the presence of a 5-card suit makes a substantial difference, but even without one you're still a favourite to make 12 tricks.
Btw, forgot to say - you're a naive idiot :)
But yeah. I remember, a couple of years ago, bidding 2N:4N, pass (or maybe even 2N:3N) with a flat 11-count with five diamonds opposite an inexperienced partner, and a kibitzer commented that 6 should be laydown with that dummy. It duly was. I'm not sure why, but it's not something really mentioned in any bidding materials aimed at those beyond the beginner stage.
Btw, some sort of shape enquiry thing could be useful here - having a mirror distribution with your partner is a huge negative, moving one small card can easily turn a laydown slam into a no-play slam.
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