[jillybean]

Casual, infrequent partner on BBO
Last hand of the set, time for some fun.

---

Bergen!
Blackwood? Keycard?

Lead H2

[jdiana]

I don't play Bergen so I'm not familiar with the continuations. Is there no other way to keep the bidding going after a mixed raise? 4NT with two quick losers doesn't seem ideal. (The misunderstanding of 4NT doesn't help either. I assume North thought it was regular Blackwood?)

[mw64ahw]

jdiana, on 2024-December-28, 14:56, said:

I don't play Bergen so I'm not familiar with the continuations. Is there no other way to keep the bidding going after a mixed raise? 4NT with two quick losers doesn't seem ideal. (The misunderstanding of 4NT doesn't help either. I assume North thought it was regular Blackwood?)

I'm not sure the balanced hand is good enough for a Bergen 3♣/mixed raise even after revaluation.

[mike777]

Minimum Bergen 3C for me.
Definitely make game trys/ advanced cue bids after that. Jump to RKC is poor.

North hand is huge, unfortunately terrible slam but not hopeless.

[jillybean]

The bidding was both misunderstood and atrocious, but now you've got to bring it home.

how do I insert the lin file from myhands here?

[smerriman]

It seems we need both finesses onside, so ♥A, ♠A, ♠Q, ♥K, ruff a heart, finesse diamond, ruff another heart, cross in diamonds, draw the last trump if 3-1, and then take the club finesse?

[pescetom]

 mike777, on 2024-December-28, 17:03, said:

Minimum Bergen 3C for me.
Definitely make game trys/ advanced cue bids after that. Jump to RKC is poor.

North hand is huge, unfortunately terrible slam but not hopeless.

North hand is not quite huge, but almost too much and far too "balanced" for 1♠ IMHO.
2NT shows it for me, at least last hand of set.
Partners may not expect 2NT with an unbalanced hand?
Better than assuming they know Bergen (whatever it was).

[mike777]

 pescetom, on 2024-December-28, 17:28, said:

North hand is not quite huge, but almost too much and far too "balanced" for 1♠ IMHO.
2NT shows it for me, at least last hand of set.
Partners may not expect 2NT with an unbalanced hand?
Better than assuming they know Bergen (whatever it was).

I certainly would never open 2NT

That South hand is borderline
Have no issues if you downgraded to constructive raise, not a mixed raise.

[mycroft]

Not sure about the lin file, but you can go into your history and get a tinyurl (menu on results, export, handviewer). Myhands, "Movie" is the same handviewer link. IIRC, the long version of that link is in the same format as the BBOCode for the hand diagram (but I've never done it. I have changed names to obfuscate, they're pretty obvious in the link).

I always do the hand diagram manually (but sometimes I cheat and pull the BBOCode text and play with that instead).

[jillybean]

Hope the opponents make a mistake

https://www.bridgeba...DK|pc|DJ|pc|DT|

[mikeh]

Wtf was north thinking when leaping to keycard with zero clue about what to do over any response? F*#k, but I get tired of watching bad players think that 4N is how they show a good hand.

Wtf is wrong with exchanging information with partner? Even if, for bizarre reasons that have nothing to do with bridge, north thinks that slam is likely (as opposed to possible) opposite a 4 card constructive raise, why doesn’t north make just a little use of the enormous bidding space between 3C and 4S! To see whether partner can cooperate.

[jillybean]

mikeh, on 2024-December-28, 20:43, said:

Wtf was north thinking when leaping to keycard with zero clue about what to do over any response? F*#k, but I get tired of watching bad players think that 4N is how they show a good hand.

Wtf is wrong with exchanging information with partner? Even if, for bizarre reasons that have nothing to do with bridge, north thinks that slam is likely (as opposed to possible) opposite a 4 card constructive raise, why doesn’t north make just a little use of the enormous bidding space between 3C and 4S! To see whether partner can cooperate.

This is BBO, we have no agreements, no way forward.

With a regular partner , I'd get a weak bergen raise and wouldn't be in this mess. If continuing, I can bid 3♦ knowing it would be understood, and be confident of what the response will show.

[thepossum]

jillybean, on 2024-December-28, 20:27, said:

Hope the opponents make a mistake

https://www.bridgeba...DK|pc|DJ|pc|DT|

---

I use 400 by 300 for size Hope it works - I think most BBO urls that show the hand will work

EDIT It didn't work - view page source to see what code I wrote lol
I could copy and paste the code as an image but we can't do that
Sorry for being too lazy to waste any more time getting around the HTML parser

EDIT 2 as someone who is Bergen curious I have no problem with the raise. It is a rather ordinary hand though. To those of us who bid normally I would have considered a raise to 2 spades - I dn't think opener should be forced to bid again if they don't want to. I don't think I will even try to make slam lol

[jillybean]

If you are not thinking slam with this hand, it's time to ditch cue bidding & key card.

I considered 2nt but I think I need to convey the strength of the majors here.

[thepossum]

jillybean, on 2024-December-28, 22:56, said:

If you are not thinking slam with this hand, it's time to ditch cue bidding & key card.

I considered 2nt but I think I need to convey the strength of the majors here.

Really, that south hand could barely be worth 1 against a 1 spade opening
Not saying North can't consider slam but I think South should not encourage much
Why not 4 spade preemptive - not even good enough for that - sorry Bergen land - 3 spades?? - isn't that the bid with 9 trumps
Everyone has their own style. I am not forcing partner to bid again

[jillybean]

Ok, I misunderstood and thought you were saying you would not try for slam with North's hand.

I play bergen as 4 card, less than J2nt raise. South's hand is very marginal for a bergen raise, ♦J84 can be disregarded but the black suits are nice.
Jump to 3, 4 card support, weak.
Jump to 4, 5+ card support, weakish, I hope you can make this

[thepossum]

That's fine. Was just joking

I don't live in Bergen world so should not comment at all as you can see

One would hope most options can find game

- even 5

[jdiana]

jillybean, on 2024-December-28, 20:53, said:

This is BBO, we have no agreements, no way forward.

With a regular partner , I'd get a weak bergen raise and wouldn't be in this mess. If continuing, I can bid 3♦ knowing it would be understood, and be confident of what the response will show.

What would this well-understood 3♦ bid show? I would have thought it was a game try of some sort, which wouldn't help to find a club control.

Having slam interest opposite a weak raise must be fairly rare. I don't know how Bergen players deal with that.

[jillybean]

jdiana, on 2024-December-29, 08:24, said:

What would this well-understood 3♦ bid show? I would have thought it was a game try of some sort, which wouldn't help to find a club control.

Having slam interest opposite a weak raise must be fairly rare. I don't know how Bergen players deal with that.

Yes, ostensibly a game try. If I bid game over a sign off, a slam try.

[jdiana]

jillybean, on 2024-December-29, 08:43, said:

Yes, ostensibly a game try. If I bid game over a sign off, a slam try.

That makes sense. Is that a general rule after game tries? I hadn't really thought about it. If opener bids game after responder declines the game try, does that "direct" responder to start cuebidding? Presumably, opener can show slam interest by bidding 4NT or cuebidding herself if responder bids game.

(I guess I hadn't thought of it because it's kind of a fake game try in this situation. It doesn't really describe opener's hand.)