[scipio2004]

Green against red. Matchpoints

Playing 2/1 you deal and bid 1D (better minor) and LHO pass.
Partner bids 3D (inverted minors) and RHO bids 4H.

What does X from you mean?

[MrAce]

scipio2004, on 2012-February-09, 19:29, said:

Green against red. Matchpoints

Playing 2/1 you deal and bid 1D (better minor) and LHO pass.
Partner bids 3D (inverted minors) and RHO bids 4H.

What does X from you mean?

X by me means " Pd i will be VERY pissed if you pull this "

[Hanoi5]

MrAce, on 2012-February-09, 19:37, said:

X by me means " Pd i will be VERY pissed if you pull this "

"So pissed I'll post it in bbo forum and make you look bad "

[MrAce]

Hanoi5, on 2012-February-09, 20:37, said:

"So pissed I'll post it in bbo forum and make you look bad "

[sasioc]

For me, double is for blood

[frank0]

As a general rule X is penalty after partner preempt or after partner fully describes his/her hand.

[Antrax]

I played this hand too. I Xed too. It was meant as penalty, and don't worry about the outcome

[Zelandakh]

Welcome to the forums.

The point of a take-out double is to find a fit. If we have a fit then we do not need a take-out double! Therefore this double is penalty by default. Some pairs play a double after a raise to suggest bidding on in specific auctions. That would not apply here even if agreed for other situations.

[Cyberyeti]

MrAce, on 2012-February-09, 19:37, said:

X by me means " Pd i will be VERY pissed if you pull this "

Actually it means you'd better have a really good reason to pull this, which is normally that you forgot to bid 5♦ first time with some extreme shape.

[gwnn]

Zelandakh, on 2012-February-10, 05:39, said:

Welcome to the forums.

The point of a take-out double is to find a fit. If we have a fit then we do not need a take-out double! Therefore this double is penalty by default. Some pairs play a double after a raise to suggest bidding on in specific auctions. That would not apply here even if agreed for other situations.

The basic philosophy behind this argument is clearly sound. When we bid and raised (or implied and raised) a suit, we found a fit and we do not normally want to look for another one. However, there still remains the question what a penalty double should actually show. In some cases it's better to play double as "maximum balanced", for example:

1♠-p-2♠-3♦
p-p-X

would show 8-9 points, 2-4 diamonds (maybe better to play it as 3-4). In this case we are trying to decide between 3♠ and 3♦x (and maybe even 4♠). Note that opener's double could be played either way - penalty or maximum balanced.

Another case where we "found a fit" and double is not absolute penalty:

1♣-4♥-5♣-p
p-x

just shows that the 4♥ bid was maximum, intending to make. We will not really play in any other denomination here, we are just deciding between 5♥ and 5♣x.

And one for the road:

1♣-1♠-2♥-2♠
3♥-4♠-X

just shows you had a game force as responder.

[helene_t]

frank0, on 2012-February-09, 21:22, said:

As a general rule X is penalty after partner preempt or after partner fully describes his/her hand.

Not sure about "fully described his hand". For some, a 1NT opening is a more accurate description than a preempt, but even so you may still play t/o doubles after partner's 1NT opening.

Not after partner's preempt - in that situation, double is always penalty. The reason is this: part of the purpose of preempting is that it puts opps under pressure to bid at an unsafe level. We want to take advantage of this by being able to penalize them.

In other situations, when you want to penalize opps you can pass, awaiting partner's reopening double. Not after partner preempted. Partner, after having preempted, will almost never reopen:

1♦-(pass)-3♦-(3♥)
pass-(pass)-?
Here, the 3♦ bidder will almost always pass. It is quite possible that opener is very happy defending 3♥ undoubled, and that the preempt has done its job, allowing us to defend 3♥ undoubled. Maybe they make 3♥+2. Maybe they struggle in 3♥ while a double would help them escape to 3♠. Responder has shown his hand and opener has decided that defending undoubled is fine. Responder will respect opener's decision.

[scipio2004]

I gave a little time to see what's people reply... I hate to break the sad news to everybody who tried to guess the whole story.

Indeed I opened 1D and X meaning penalty. partner left the double. 4HX+1 made.

An expert said it's common in experts circles to double holding a strong balanced or semi balanced hand (more or less what I had) and
partner should pull the double if he is unbalanced. According to him one should not double with something like
XX AQTX XXXXX AK because one doesn't want the double could be pulled.

I was wandering just how common is that method.
(not on the actual hand in which partner bid was disciplined and systematic)

for those who want the complete hand...
I held Q 9XXX AQXX AKQX and partner held JX X KJXXX XXXXX and stood the double. (partner bid is 6-7 in our method and partner upgraded because 5-5)
declarer held 6 hearts to the AKQJ and 5 spades with void in clubs and two small diamonds.
dummy had 5 spades, doubleton heart, doubleton diamond and JXXX in clubs.

We have 4 in either minor (after giving a spade, a heart and a club) they have 5 in either major. some players actually made 6S or 7S after a club lead.
According to the traveling score it was common to double 4H with my hand.

[Antrax]

I had the same auction in the same tournament holding your hand. I led the ♣A figuring RHO is more likely to jump around with shortness in "our" suit, so they made +3. We weren't the only 890 on the scoresheet. I'd be surprised if anyone would've taken a different action with your hand - not sure how you're supposed to tell the opponents have a double fit on this auction.

[wank]

what this 'expert' told you would be true in many auctions where the opps pre-empt.

not this one though. the difference is partner's already told you what he's got within a fairly narrow band. having already told you what he's got, it's pointless to consult him again, so no need for a TO orientated X.

compare it to 1♣ - (4♥) - X. here opener can have a lot of different hand types (balanced hand, long clubs, side spade suit, etc) for his 1♣ opener. if you have a monster trump stack on this auction then yes you have to pass because doubling invites partner to bid with a shapely hand.

common situations where many people who mostly TOish doubles still play X as penalty include after P pre-empts, after finding a fit in 1 suit, after trying to pass something out but the opps balance, after making a TO X of a different suit, etc

[aguahombre]

The problem was not with the meaning of the double. It was with the double.

[scipio2004]

I am less interested in the actual hand. more interested in he principal. (the auction could just as well be 1H-(P)-3H(bergen)-(4S))
but with respect to comments about the hand.

1. it's pretty obvious they have spade fit. (partner doesn't have a 4 card major and I hold singleton spade so they rate to have at least 9 spades)
The only case where they don't have double fit is if they don't have a fit in hearts - the suit they bid
(could happen if partner has 3 hearts. In this case dummy is probably void and may pull the double...)

2. The X is marginal at best.
I debated before doubling and (wrongly as i turned out...) choose X.
Playing match points I couldn't pass this. so it was between 5D and X.

My intuition was that if they do have heart fit, then partner doesn't have more then 1 heart loser and 1 spade loser and possible 1 diamond loser so 4-5 diamonds is likely.
On the other hand I figured that it's possible that they are playing in the wrong suit.
(maybe a 6-0 or 6-1 and even 5-2 or 5-1 fit is not impossible.)
or that I may score 2-3 clubs, a spade ruff and some diamonds for 500 was not out of the question.

I am not saying I would choose X every time but stating I would bid differently now is being a result merchant.

3. As I said our methods says to pass the X which is what happened on the table.
It will not be the first time our methods yield poor results but we wanted to check that we are on the same page with most of the bridge population.

[barmar]

There's an old saying: If the opponents don't make some doubled contracts, you're not doubling enough.

I don't think you can get hung up about this hand. You had company, so you can tell that your action wasn't insane. More than half your strength was outside your own suit, that suggests defending. You didn't have too much length in your suit. Partner didn't have to be sub-minimum for his bid.

[WGF_Flame]

This is all true and I agree it must be totally penishment, but would you leave this double with something like a 6D5C (assuming that you dont have another bid avaliable for this hand in your system.

[ArtK78]

Partner showed a weak hand and you made a penalty double. You are supposed to be able to beat 4♥.

I would not pull on partner's hand.

[Fluffy]

Antrax, on 2012-February-14, 10:35, said:

I had the same auction in the same tournament holding your hand. I led the ♣A figuring RHO is more likely to jump around with shortness in "our" suit, so they made +3. We weren't the only 890 on the scoresheet. I'd be surprised if anyone would've taken a different action with your hand - not sure how you're supposed to tell the opponents have a double fit on this auction.

On the hand given opponents can´t make more than 6♥+5♠ playing in a heart contract.

Either the auction was not the same (played in spades instead of hearts) or the hand was not the same (spades weren´t 5-5 in the opponent´s hand) or you discarded very very poorly.