Improve Your Bidding Judgment (as Opener)

In this lesson:

Most players were not born with great card sense. They can, of course, make good progress with their card play, but "Great card players are born, not made." On the other hand, every player can be taught to bid a lot more effectively than he presently does.

That is especially true when you have the opportunity to make the first bid. This is a wonderful time to begin describing your hand as well as putting your opponents on the defensive. Too many players fail to make the most of a situation that, as far as I'm concerned, can't occur often enough.

In this lesson, Marty will explain:

• - The surefire way to improve your judgment
• - How to GUARANTEE that you won't have a rebid problem
• - How to get great results with aggressive weak 2-bids
• - How his invaluable Rule of 24 will enable you to make the most effective bid in 3rd seat
• - How to greatly improve your partner's opening leads
• - When you can know your partner's point-count before he bids
• - In 4th seat, when you should "violate" the Rule of 15
• - When is it clearly correct to open 3NT
• - When is it definitely correct to open a weak-2 with a hand worth a 1-bid
• - The right and wrong time to open 4-of-a-major

Here is an example of what Marty will teach:

♠5  ♥86542  ♦AKJ108  ♣J2

Neither side is vulnerable. You are in 3rd seat after 2 passes. What would you do?

Answer

♠5  ♥86542  ♦AKJ108  ♣J2

In 3rd seat, some players would open 1♥. It's okay to open light in 3rd seat, and everyone loves a 5-5 hand. But I believe that opening 1♥ is a short-sighted bid.

Your LHO rates to have the best hand at the table, and is likely to bid. If he is declarer, your partner will be on lead. You are dying to get a diamond lead. But if you open 1♥, partner will lead your major suit. So, if I decided to open at the one level, I'd open 1♦.

However, this bid is also imperfect. If you open 1♦, your partner will not rush to lead your minor suit. Also, 1♦ won't take much bidding space away from your LHO.

How can you resolve both issues? Open 2♦!

Here is the original deal:

After the ♦Q lead, you overtake and continue the suit. South must ruff the 3rd diamond with an honor. West won't overruff, and South will lose 2 spades and be down one.

If you hadn't made it clear that West should lead diamonds, he'd lead the ♥Q. South would discard his ♦4 on a heart winner and make 5.