From: altus@leland.Stanford.EDU (Steve Altus)
Subject: Re: Assess the blame
Organization: DSG, Stanford University, CA 94305, USA
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 93 21:51:51 GMT

In article <65965@apadravya.princeton.edu> bpwing@phoenix.princeton.edu (Ben Wing) writes:
>In article <1993Jan25.215252.11442@leland.Stanford.EDU> altus@leland.Stanford.EDU (Steve Altus) writes:
>|
>|Bob:
>|>East isn't "bidding freely". He is showing playing strength in 
>|>support of partner.  I remember a quote about this from S.J. Simon
>|>on a similar situation. One partner said something like
>|>"How am I to bid on only blah blah at the 4 level" and the answer
>|>was:
>|>"You're not damn it! You're supporting me. The only difference is that
>|>you are going to play the hand"
>|>
>|
>|i agree with Bob 100% here... but that's my STYLE, and one of the
>|few things i actually like to discuss with people i'm about to play
>|with for the first time.  i like to play that freebids after a takeout
>|double promise NOTHING, and that takeout doubles carry the following 
>|message:  "partner, i invite you to compete in any suit, please jump
>|right in with anything."  as you might guess, playing this style does
>|not work well with off-shape doubles, and i don't make offshape doubles,
>|unless of course i need to show a hand too strong to overcall, which is
>|for me 20+ balanced or a REALLY good 18 count or so WITH a GOOD 6+ card
>|suit...  
>|
>|playing takeout doubles which guarantee either support or a very strong
>|hand, East's bid is MANDITORY.  (s)he has a potentially very strong hand.
>|
>
>I think the point here is that different people have different styles, and
>things all go together ...  if you play that free bids after a takeout

right, that's the point, but you didn't make that point;  in fact, the point
was necessary to refute the garbage you said in your last post.

>double promise nothing, then you have to play that takeout doubles really
>do promise the unbid suits or a terrifically strong hand; but playing this
>way, you also have to play reasonably sound overcalls.  My style is to play
>quite weak overcalls; with such a style it's hard to also allow overcalls
>on decent 17-count hands.  (now some people might play that overcalls can
>have an extremely wide range, and if someone, e.g. Bob, can convince me
>that such a style is reasonable and gets you good results, then I'll change
>my position.)
>

that's fine ben, but if you ARE going to play off-shape takeout doubles
you need some methods over them;  i'm sure bo-yin has them but i doubt
most people who just randomly say, "oh, i'll double on any old hand" do;
you really need a way to bid on the east hand here, and if you play either
some kind of leb. or transfer responses or something, that's fine.  saying
that Bob is wrong, scared of bad results, or lost in the past b/c of the
methods HE uses is wrong and totally uncalled for.

btw, i've gotten some pretty good results with overcalls which can be on
a "pretty decent 17-count" or on a 6-count with a very good suit or on a
10-count with KQ32...  but that doesn't mean you have to play that way.
if you want to double any time you have 17 "points" go ahead, but if you 
don't back it up with a reasonable system that allows you to compete when
you need to, don't yell at your partner for trying to compete (eg 3 diamonds
on the east hand) and don't enlist the help of a newsgroup to help settle
the dispute and show who is wrong when your system has a huge gap in it.

>So rather than saying "this or that style is WRONG," people should instead
>argue the strengths and weaknesses of different styles in a non-judgmental
>fashion.

look who's talking...

>
>"Can't we all just get along?"

look who's talking again...


--steve altus