Bridge: Faux Pas: Let Me Count the Ways

By Joe Blatnick

Bridge books, like any other reference books can be tedious reading because they require your undivided attention and concentration. However to eliminate the tediousness this book has been written in a light manner and has been interspersed with Bridge stories, humorous anecdotes and one-liners. For example: All those who play at this club bring joy some when they enter and some when they leave.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 26, 2012
• ISBN: 9781477265109

Joe Blatnick

As mentioned in an earlier book, Joe’s total immersion in the game came late in life. Nevertheless, his contributions to the game have still been numerous. Who knows where an earlier start might have led.

Book preview

Bridge Faux Pas

Let Me Count the Ways

Joe Blatnick

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©2012 Joe Blatnick. All rights reserved.

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No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 12/20/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4772-6509-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4772-6510-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012916308

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Cover and Interior Design and Layout by

Katherine Widziak, www.widziak.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS

BIDDING

EVALUATION

1. Evaluating Unprotected Honours

2. Bidding With Isolated Honours

3. Devalue Singleton Honours

OPENING BIDS

4. Opening A Four Card Major

5. Bidding Five Card Suits In Wrong Order

6. Bidding A Suit Instead Of N.T.

7. Misusing The ‘Rule Of 20’

8. Fourth Seat Openings

PRE-EMPTIVE BIDS

9. Pre-Empting In General

10. Undisciplined Pre-Empts

11. Not Raising Partner’s Pre-Empt

12. Pre-Empting With Stronger Hands

OVERCALLS

13. Evaluating An Overcall

14. Overcalling Partner’s Overcall With Less Than 10 Pts.

OVER N.T.

15. Not Overcalling Their N.T.

STANDARD STUFF

16. Not Arriving Quickly With Weak Hands

17. Not Balancing

18. Choosing A Minor Suit Game Over 3N.T.

19. Not Transferring With Weak Hands

20. Not Using Stayman When 5/4

21. Transferring Instead Of Stayman

22. Stone Age Stayman

RESPONDING TO OPENER

23. Improper Raises

24. Bypassing Majors

25. Two Level Responses

26. Raising A Major Response

27. Passing A Two Level Response

28. Bidding On Instead Of Passing

29. Not Heeding Misfits

30. Not Playing Proper Fits

31. Misuse Of Conventions

32. Bidding Bad Slams

DOUBLING

33. Not Doubling Often Enough

34. Making Them Pay

35. Not Making Low Level Penalty Doubles

36. Passing A Negative Double

DECLARER PLAY

PLANNING

37. Play Now, Pay Later, Plan First, Play Later

38. Hasty Play To Trick One

39. Not Reading The Opening Lead

40. Using The ‘Rule Of Eleven’

41. Squandering High Cards

42. Wasting Intermediate Cards

43. Which Opponent Is The Dangerous One

44. Not Holding Up

45. Applying The "Rule Of Seven’

TIMING

46. Bad Timing

47. Not Developing Tricks Before Taking Tricks

48. Setting Up Defender’s Tricks

49. Not Cashing Winners Before Cross-Ruffing

50. Not Playing A Loser On A Loser

CARD COMBINATIONS

51. Not Handling The Common Combinations Properly

52. Not Maintaining Tenaces

53. Not Leading Towards Honours

54. Not Winning With Short Side Honour

55. Not Leading Towards Double Honours

FINESSES

56. Taking Foolish Finesses

57. Not Repeating A Winning Finesse

58. Not Tempting A Cover

TRUMP MATTERS

59. Getting A Winner Trumped

60. Not Conserving Your Winners

61. Losing Trump Control

62. Drawing Last Trump

ENTRIES

63. Entry Shortage

64. Wasting Entries

COUNTING

65. Falling Victim To The Memory Coup

66. Failing To Count

NO TRUMP PLAY

67. Avoiding N.T. Play

68. Taking The Wrong Fork

69. Not Holding Up With Two Stoppers

DEFENCE

MODE

70. Leading Unsupported Aces

71. Underleading Aces

72. Not Reading The Opening Lead

73. Not Leading Trump

74. Bad Leads Against N.T.

PARTNER’S SUIT

75. Leading Top In Partner’s Suit

76. Underleading An Ace In Partner’s Suit

77. Futile Obedience

78. Not Unblocking

79. Not Using Attitude Signals

80. Not Keeping Options Open

81. Not Overtaking

82. Not Heeding Partner’s Signals

STANDARD STUFF

83. Fourth Highest Leads

84. Adhering To Stone Age Advice

85. Further Adherence To Such Advice

86. Misleading Partner From Third Seat

87. Not Waiting For Second Honour

88. Hesitating

89. Tanking

MORE SERIOUS STANDARD STUFF

90. More Adherence To Stone Age Advice

91. Taking Tricks Too Quickly

92. Breaking New Suits

93. Giving A Ruff And Sluff

DUMMY PROBLEMS

94. Not Keeping Length With Dummy

95. Not Knowing ‘Dummy Surround’

96. Not Killing A Dummy Entry

97. Not Neutralizing Dummy’s Long Suit

98. Setting Up Dummy Tricks

99. Leading Up To Tenaces

100. Discarding From Four Card Suits

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joe was introduced to this marvellous game while attending the Toronto Teachers’ College in the fifties. During the next two decades he played some rubber bridge but found duplicate more challenging in the sixties and became a club director. Having run a successful club north of Toronto for a few years, he was invited to train as a tournament director in 1973. However, after officiating at a Regional, he decided that it held little interest for him. During the late eighties and early nineties he and his wife Tanya, literally disappeared from the bridge scene and only resurfaced in 2002. At that point, Joe really became a student of the game, teaching many classes up to the present with Tanya’s unwavering support, running a very successful club and writing a great deal about this game we all love. This is Joe’s third full length bridge book. The first two, Why You Seldom Win at Bridge and The Seven Deadly Sins of Bridge were well received with glowing reports from readers.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Many thanks to my bridge playing friends and bridge students whose many welcome inquiries were the impetus for this book, the third with 3 more to follow.

And a heart-felt thank you to those who read the manuscript and had many worthwhile suggestions.

But a very special thank you to my wife, my lover and best friend Tanya, without whose tolerance and patience, this book would never have gone beyond the first idea.

This last acknowledgement is a repetition from the first book. However, if anything at all deserves to be repeated, it’s this statement.

Joe

ONE HUNDRED MISTAKES

A number of years ago, the great Dorothy Hayden made a statement which seemed hard to believe. Yet, upon closer inspection, has proven to be quite accurate. She felt that the average bridge player often made as many as 100 errors during a session, but would only be aware of about five of them. In a recent discussion amongst bridge players, the consensus was that many mistakes are truly made but that 100 seemed a mite too high. My curiosity, having been tweaked, I decided to watch for them at tables where I was playing or when I was directing. Following are the first 100 which were observed. I dare say that if the observations were to continue, more would surface. That’s the nature of the game. Bridge is so complex that mistakes will continue to be made, regardless of how much we learn and how much better our play becomes. The mistakes that are highlighted on the following pages are not in any order of priority regarding severity or the order in which they were observed. As the reader will observe some are petty with little or no impact on the hand while others prove to be very severe, affecting results much more severely.

However, they have been divided into bidding, declarer play and defence. An attempt has also been made to present them in a logical sequence of similarity. Progressing from beginning to end, the reader will observe some repetitions, but whenever this does occur it is because of slight differences in each scenario. The purpose of such redundancy is to illustrate how many of the 100 mistakes are related. In the examples of the 100 mistakes which follow, think of the words the mistake of as preceding the title of each.

As an introduction to the 100 mistakes that are made by the average player, here is a hand which shows some of those 95% of mistakes that most players are unaware of committing. It also shows balancing being misused by reopening with a hand which is too weak, even with having borrowed some of partner’s points and being ultra-conservative with very biddable hands.

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The post mortem was short-nothing said. Obviously there was nothing to discuss since every bid was normal.

BIDDING

EVALUATION

This is a part of bidding which doesn’t get the attention which it should. Players tend to confuse length and shortness points when opening and responding. They give the same value to four Kings as