Don't Save Your Partner

What Never? Well, Hardly Ever

	6 5 3 2
	Q 10 8 6 4 2
	6
	K 7
K Q 8		J 7 4
9 7		A K J
10 5 4		Q 9 7 2
A 10 9 6 4		Q J 2
	A 10 9
	5 3
	A K J 8 3
	8 5 3	Vul: No one

South	West	North	East
			1 NT!
Dbl	Pass	2	Dbl
3	Dbl	All	pass

A curious hand, this one. The worst score for N-S was this one: doubled, down 4 in 3 diamonds. The worst score for E-W was doubled and redoubled in two diamonds, down one. Oh, them Redoubles (q.v.) I've seen 3 no on several occasions bid in each direction and even 4 hearts once. But I believe this is the first time I saw the same denomination anchoring each end of the scale with the worst score for each direction. You might also note that the N-S pair here only got 5 tricks when they named diamonds trump. But the other N-S pair as defenders in a diamond contract got six!

The British magazine Punch once offered this advice to those about to be married: Don't. I could almost say the same thing about saving a partner, though we're always warned in bridge not to make absolute statements. Okay, try saving an incautious partner (especially when you're my opponent) -- every blue moon. You've simply got to be very, very cautious about it. It just doesn't pay very often. You'll almost certainly do better letting your partner tough it out.

Now, the key word here is "save". I am most definitely not suggesting that you necessarily should not take another bid as soon as you sniff out a misfit. Have you bid all your values? Okay, then you'd probably better desist (showing the proper preference if asked). Do you have points, say at least 4, you haven't annouced yet? Then your hand is probably worth another bid. And with an opening bid facing an opening bid, I'd want to get to game. But don't save a partner who simply may not need saving.

Here, South had about three reasons for not saving his partner. First was the most unarguable of all: he had to raise the level of bidding. You know, you've gotta feel you're two tricks better to up the level one. For if you're just one trick better, where's the percentage, since you might even be wrong about that one trick. I can't say you're likelier to invite a double at the 3 level (as I've said elsewhere), since North had already been doubled in 2 hearts. But . . .

Well, the second reason is that he's only got a five-card suit, and you know your partner has at least that many. So where's the advantage in going from hearts, which may indeed be longer than 5 times, to a 5-card diamond suit? And the third reason I'd let my partner play in hearts was almost surely the principal reason South went to diamonds, to wit: because of those high diamonds.

Those diamonds will work very well in a heart contract (almost surely). You've got top winners there and in the spade. Let your partner provide the heart length. You'll provide 3 top cards, in addition to two hearts that will help.

Two hearts looks as if it would be down only one. Down one! Doubled, yes, but not vulnerable! A fleabite. Instead, this "parlous" situation was transmogrified into minus 800! I checked the record on this hand. Several people made 8 tricks in hearts (I didn't check how), one being down two in a four-heart bid, the rest making 2 hearts. More were down one, as I would have expected.

I have discussed elsewhere the types of hands you'd like to see on the side and the types of hands you'd like to see as trump. A six-card suit headed by the K Q J might well be bid opposite a suit where you have a singleton if it's at the same level, which is to say I just might raise the level one on a seven-card suit headed by those three honors. Such a suit might be lost if not trump. But a suit with top honors, quickly cashable honors, should be on the side!

Also, don't save a partner who is not doubled. And here I would make it a flat prohibition. Remember, the key word is "save" here, thinking you're coming to his rescue. If not doubled, you might see the contract passed out, or bid over by LHO or the like. But if you have a positive reason for wanting to bid, if you have values you haven't announced yet, then that is an entirely different matter.