Free Weekly Instant Tournament - May 10 - Board 4

Board 4
Both sides vulnerable

♠ A K 9 5 4  ♥ A 8 7  ♦ A Q 10 9  ♣ 6

One club--pass--pass to me. I'm sure some will start with a double. But unless you have a very offensively oriented hand, you should try to end your sequences with double. If you start with one spade then double when the opponents bid more clubs, partner has the option of defending. If you double first, then bid spades, partner doesn't have that option.

I bid one spade. Partner raises to three spades, which the tooltip says shows four spades and seven to nine total points. So it's pre-emptive? That makes no sense. If responder couldn't bid at the one-level, why are we worried about his bidding at the three-level? Pre-emptive raises are unnecessary after a balancing overcall. You should simply raise to whatever level your hand is worth.

But I have no say in the robots' methods, so I have to deal with partner's determination to silence RHO once and for all. Fortunately, I have a good enough hand that partner's depriving me of a game try makes no difference. I have five losers and a clear four-spade bid.

I bid four spades, which ends the auction. LHO leads the king of clubs.

	NORTH Robot ♠ J 10 6 3 ♥ Q J 10 2 ♦ K 8 6 ♣ 10 5
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ A K 9 5 4 ♥ A 8 7 ♦ A Q 10 9 ♣ 6

West	North	East	South
Robot	Robot	Robot	Phillip
1 ♣	Pass	Pass	1 ♠
Pass	3 ♠	Pass	4 ♠
(All pass)

I'm losing at most a club, a heart, and a spade. If spades come home and the heart king is onside, I could make six.

What do I know about the layout? I know that East has at most 5 HCP. Even so, he might have raised to three clubs pre-emptively with five-card support. So there is some inference that West has at least six clubs.

East plays the club three, and West continues with the ace of clubs. East plays the jack, and I ruff. I'll assume the jack is an honest card and West has the club queen.

I cash the ace of spades--deuce--three--seven. In a vacuum, playing for the drop in spades is slightly better than taking a finesse. But it doesn't take much to sway the odds. Is my assumption that West has at least six clubs enough?

It's true this inference isn't 100%, since East won't always bid three clubs with five. But, just for drill, let's say it is 100%. Would that be enough to tip the odds?

A common method for making such decisions is to consider vacant spaces. In general, I'm not a fan of vacant spaces. It's a flawed approach and in some cases can give significantly incorrect answers.¹ But it does have the advantage of being easy to use. And in this particular case its shortcomings won't be an issue, so let's give it a try.

If I lead a diamond to dummy, lead the jack of spades, and East follows, then I will know eight of West's cards: six clubs, one diamond, and one spade. That leaves him with five vacant spaces. I'll assume we would have heard from West again if he had eight clubs, so East must have at least three. That means I know six of East's cards: three clubs, a diamond, and two spades, leaving him with seven vacant spaces. So East is seven to five to hold the spade queen.

But distribution isn't the only consideration here. We also know that East is limited to 5 HCP, and he has already shown up with the club jack. While this doesn't preclude East's holding the spade queen, it does make it less likely.

How do we take this factor into account? There is a variety of ways to do this. But so long as we are using vacant spaces for distribution, let's use it for honors as well. There are two significant honors outstanding: the heart king and the spade queen. East can hold at most one of them; West can hold both. So East has one "vacant honor space," and West has two. That makes it roughly two to one that West holds any specific honor. That's more than enough to offset the distribution inference, so playing for the drop is the percentage play.

I cash the spade king--eight--jack--queen. East has the club jack and the spade queen, so the heart king must be offside. Still, I have nothing to lose by leading the heart queen from dummy, even though I have no intention of finessing. I play the ten of diamonds to the king. East drops the jack.

What's going on? Why is East going out of his way to show me these minor-suit jacks? He didn't have to show me either one. It's almost as if he wants to make sure I cash the heart ace. Could his pass of one club be a psych? If Lowenthal were on my right, I would consider taking the heart finesse. But robots aren't that devious. I lead the queen of hearts--three--ace--king. Making six.

	NORTH Robot ♠ J 10 6 3 ♥ Q J 10 2 ♦ K 8 6 ♣ 10 5
WEST Robot ♠ 8 2 ♥ K ♦ 5 4 3 2 ♣ A K Q 7 4 2		EAST Robot ♠ Q 7 ♥ 9 6 5 4 3 ♦ J 7 ♣ J 9 8 3
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ A K 9 5 4 ♥ A 8 7 ♦ A Q 10 9 ♣ 6

Plus 680 is worth 100%! Really? I'm the only one to drop the heart king?

East's club jack at trick two was a careless play. I never would have dropped the heart king if East had concealed both his jacks. But East made the same play at every table, so I'm not sure why everyone else finessed. Perhaps they didn't notice the club jack? Sometimes it can be hard to pay attention when the hand looks routine.

The "vacant honor spaces" analysis is an interesting approach, isn't it? It's not well known. And rightly so, because it doesn't work. There are some specific cases where it does give the right answer, and this is one of them. But, sadly, it doesn't generalize. Still, like regular vacant spaces, it's easy to use and it gives at least an approximation of the correct odds. Sometimes that's good enough.

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¹See The Vacant Spaces Trap for a discussion of the method's flaws.