[Al_U_Card]

Scoring: IMP

P-1♥-2♦-p
3♦-DBL-p-???

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What is the DBL showing and what is the best bid to describe this hand's values?

[bridgeboy]

Dbl is takeout...

I'm bidding 4♠ at imps.

[mikeh]

The double is takeout, showing an excellent hand, with support for the black suits and short ♦ (about which you already knew, from your own hand).

What his minimum is would be a question of this player's particular style.

For me, a minimum might be AJxx AQxxx void Axxx

or


AQxx KQJxx x Axx

Both of these examples have 4♠, but he need not have that many. He could well be 3=5=1=4.

In a perfect world, he would tend to have extras (beyond what I would consider minimum with 4=5=1=3) with 3=5=1=4, since the double invites a 3♠ bid.

As it is, you have a huge hand in context. I would have doubled 2♦, myself: this is too good a hand to pass ... altho I admit it is minimum.

Pass is possible, and at mps I might well choose it. I would expect to score +300 on average. But not at imps. I confess that I came close to talking myself into pass, and I would not be at all surprised to learn that, at the table, pass was the winning bid.

However, I long ago came to the realization that few things are more demoralizing to partner and to teammates than announcing -470 or -730 etc.

So here, I prefer to die in a different way: by bidding 4♦, and passing 4♥ (I'd expect 3=6=1=3 or 3=6=0=4) or 4♠... which he will bid with all 4=5=0=4 and 4=5=1=3 hands and maybe some 4=6=0=3 hands. If he has 3=5=1=3, then I expect to have to apologize.

There is a school of thought (to which I usually subscribe) that says that if you have decided, early in the auction, to be conservative, then you should stay conservative later unless something dramatic has happened to make you upgrade a lot. This prevents you hanging partner, and I fear that I may have done exactly that on this board... I'll tell him I mis-sorted and did not see my ♣K

[luis]

4♦ nothing in diamonds and I can play 4♥ or 4♠ depending on pd's hand.

[pclayton]

Yeah 4♦ for me too. Not 4♠, as pard might have some oddball 3=6=0=4.

Those black kings are huge. I don't mind my diamond length either, although I'd rather have 4.

[Al_U_Card]

Pard scraped up a 3S bid so I let it go never expecting to have another chance at seeing a World's Fair.....

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Is 4D after the 3S just looking for a train wreck? I felt guilty after seeing dummy.....