Is it more important for a responder to bid their suit or raise partner under the following circumstances?

Question

With only us vulnerable at matchpoints, I oponed one heart after dealer passed. The second opponent passed and partner had the following for a response: ♠ AQJ74 ♡ 742 ♢K754 ♣ 7.

I would have expected a one spade bid (one over one) from him but he felt that it was more important to show his heart support.

More to the point, he raised to three hearts (invitational).I raised to game and we went down one, because I believed that he had more strength than he actually had. Specifically, I would have expected either a fourth trump with ten high card points, or at least twelve high card points with only three trumps. And his "three" was pretty nominal. (So, in all fairness, was my five, with A8653; we each had minimum trump strength.)

Was partner right to bid hearts instead of spades? And if hearts, was two hearts or three hearts the better bid?

Answer 1

Despite partner holding only 10 points, I feel that his hand is closer to a game force than to a 2H call. The hand has a good 5-card side suit, ruffing values, and good controls.

The 3H call is not completely wrong when playing Standard American. The SAYC booklet says that a 1S response tends to deny a heart fit, and that 3H shows 10-11 dummy points with three or more hearts. As you have noted, three vs four trumps can make an important difference in how well your two hands mesh, which is why many pairs establish agreements that allow responder to differentiate, but no such agreement exists in basic Standard American.

However, I agree with Joe's answer that 1S is a better call than 3H. If you were to rebid 2D, 2H (promising 6), or 2S, I would bid a game (4H over 2D or 2H, 4C over 2S (splinter showing short clubs; a mild slam try in case partner has no club wastage)); over your 1NT or 2C rebid I would invite with 3H.

Answer 2

The stronger your hand is, the slower you want to go in most cases, with the exception of specific highly descriptive bids. Each higher bid you make eats up space to find the exact right contract - and a partnership with 23+ points needs that time to find out whether they are in a low-point-game, a high-point-not-game, a normal game but in a different suit... all the other possibilities than the standard 'okay we have a heart fit and borderline game points'.

As such, 1h-3h is definitely not what this hand asks for. 10 points is plenty to have a conversation at the lower levels first. 1H-3H is realistically only used to describe invitational hands with clear heart fits - as you say, usually 4 hearts. (Many use Bergen raises anyway for this, but if you're not using them, that's what it should mean.) 10-12 points, 4 hearts, nothing else interesting to talk about.

Whenever you do have something else, you want to show it as soon as possible. If partner also has 3-4 spades, for example, you don't want to miss that - you might still end up in 4H, say, but the double fit is useful to know as it implies additional tricks (but also requires full control of trump to make use of).

Think about what you're going to bid here:

S	N
1H	1S
2C	?

Do you rebid spades? Do you bid 2H? Do you bid 3H? (2D would be fourth suit forcing, probably not in the cards here.)

You need to know what 2H vs 3H raise means here, in particular. 2H might be minimum, 4S/3H fit. 3H might be invitational here and just wanted to mention spades first. I'd make sure you agree on what count of trump 3H bid would show here (I think 4 is still often a good idea here).

Answer 3

You don't say what bidding system you play. If you are playing Acol, then partner's bid definitely shows four card support and 10-12 high card points. In SAYC, at least according to Ned Downey, a jump to three of partner's major is invitational, with 10-12 points and at least three card support. Your partner has only seven losers (i.e. an opening hand), a strong side suit and a club singleton. In my book definitely worth an invitation.

You don't give your hand, nor why you raised to game. If you had the king of spades, then you are looking at 8½ tricks on the cards we know about and were unfortunate with your remaining high cards. Possibly you were missing the aces of clubs and diamonds, to go with your two heart losers; possibly you had wasted values in clubs; in the worst case the diamond ace and queen were sitting over your partner's king and you lose two or three tricks on the opening lead.

If you didn't have the spade king, you certainly had 10-11 points outside the majors; if you don't have first-round control of clubs you certainly have the ace of diamonds. That would make it a 50% game (spade finesse), and you should bid 50% games. Counting losers, you have at most seven for an opening bid, partner has seven, so contracting for 10 tricks would the par recommendation (24 minus your seven losers minus partner's seven gives 10 tricks).

If you don't want partner to raise to three of a major with seven losers and three card support, discuss the hand with them - would you prefer to show the spade suit, do you want to widen the range for the 2H, and how do you cope with the resultant ambiguities in those auctions? It's a partnership, both of you should have input into your bidding system.

Answer 4

Suit quality is of prime importance here and could well be the determining factor.

I would have raised to two hearts with something like the following: ♠ QJ742 ♡ K74 ♢A754 ♣ 7. Here, while I have five spades, they are only so-so, and partner probably has better hearts. (In this case, it is "close" but this i almost the worst case.) And my Axx of hearts is likely to be better than his spades, even if he has as many as three. With such a "bird in hand," I would stick with hearts.

Both of you need to realize that you have minimum heart strength for heart bids. You can't know about your partner's weakness, but you do know about your own. "742" isn't really a three card suit it's more like 2.5. Likewise, Qx can be upgraded to 2.5 because of the honor. In either case, you want to raise cautiously with these holdings.

In this case, you want to bid one spade, and look for a spade fit, or even a "double fit." A "delayed" raise in hearts would then show the "2.5" card holding. That could actually be a good fit if opener has reasonably good hearts, say AKxxx or at least AQxxx, but not so much opposite Axxxx, Kxxxx, or Qxxxx, as was the case here.

Answer 5

What's not been explained well here, is there's no one correct rule to apply. There are many different sets of rules which disagree on whether you ought to bid hearts or bid spades to show the support. (Although having found one major fit in hearts, you aren't bidding spades to find another one). The 'correct' bid depends on several 'variables':

1. The system you are playing: Even 2/1 and SAYC apply different rules (let alone Acol!)
2. Whether you adopt any Conventions (like Bergen, fit-jumps, etc)
3. The length and strength of the suit(s).

(And that's without talking about partnership agreements which depart from underlying rules, interference, and majors vs minors).

Too many permutations to cover, although mostly they just differ by which fits are denied by a 1S bid, and whether the jump-raise in H promises 3 or 4 cards. Ignoring Bergen (and many others!) I believe it's common that:

In SAYC, responder raises with 3 hearts, (2H weak and 3H invitational) so 1S typically denies 3 hearts

In 2/1, responder wants 3 hearts for a minimum raise and 4 hearts for an invitational jump raise; So 3H might be misleading here and 1S followed by a 3H jump-raise is clearer.

EXCEPT! This responder's hand appears to have only 7 losers! so responder could insist on game themself, and stopping at 3H could be under bidding the hand!

Jacoby 2NT and Splinters generally need 4 card support; However I think 1S is generally a good and flexible course of action in most systems, hoping to show support with a 4H delayed-game-raise. But, when opener inevitably replies 2C! responder must either conservatively recognise wasted points in Clubs and Spades and settle for 3H - or see a cross-ruffing opportunity and optimistically plump for 4H. (Would you raise their 3H to 4H regardless with the undisclosed hand?) Checkback could be useful over a 1NT reply (although to investigate how well your hands match rather than looking for spade contract).

Generally in all systems, showing (major) support is always the first priority, however showing strength is an even Higher priority! - Thus, sometimes a delayed raise is the best description of support (it's not about any other suit, its whether the correct Strength and Trump Length are described under the partnership agreement).