[kuhchung]

I hope you know I was kidding when I said to pass during the tourney Diana, haha

thymepuns was messaging me about how badly you guys got fixed

[MrAce]

PhantomSac, on 2015-January-18, 22:41, said:

How is jxx essentially worthless? A jack is worth more than a small card

It is amazing that I also see this type of comments a lot. I ask myself "did these people never pay attention all these years during the play to what is going on at the table?" What I mean is, the cards that they call worthless can actually be very valuable and they still can not see it.

For example, I had a Jxx in suit where my opponents overcalled. And this J did not produce any trick for me when my pd held xxx in this suit.. Opponents had AKxxx vs Qx. When the guy started A from AKxxx defense was dead. He either had to cash the K and give him ruff from a holding which already had a natural trump trick, or stop leading this suit, in both of which I was cold for making it. There are a lot of times, these worthless cards for you, are actually very valuable for defense. If you did not have it, they would have, and that would amazingly made their communications, leads better.

I have seen so many times my LHO led a suit to solve my problems because he did not want to lead from his AQ holding in another suit where I held stiff K. A so called worthless card. It indeed did not give me any trick, But it made my LHO to try to find an entry to his pd so he can play this suit towards his AQ each time he held a trick. Most players who advances from intermediate to advance, knows and uses the term "right siding the contract" I guess this sounds good to the ear. Which is fine and indeed it is important to try to right side the contract. But all these cards that they easily trash and give zero value or call worthless, gives defenders whole lot more problems than right siding the contract. But their "loser count" or whatever formula that they rely on instead of their logic and experience says these cards are worthless. How can some people ignore this or fail to see it, escapes me by a mile.

No need to mention, I have yet to see a hand evaluation tool, such as KnR or Zar or whatever you may think of, taking out the full value of a card that some people call "worthless". They don't even take out half value of an honor in most cases. Maybe I am just very lucky and only person who is benefitting the most from these so called "worthless" cards.

[diana_eva]

kuhchung, on 2015-January-19, 00:31, said:

I hope you know I was kidding when I said to pass during the tourney Diana, haha

thymepuns was messaging me about how badly you guys got fixed

Oh I know you were joking, and it was funny to see this passed in a BBF Indy. As for getting fixed, this one wasn't even the best fix in that tourney!

Here's my all time fav fix so far (1Cx-1 for 0%):

---

[MrAce]

diana_eva, on 2015-January-19, 00:57, said:

Oh I know you were joking, and it was funny to see this passed in a BBF Indy. As for getting fixed, this one wasn't even the best fix in that tourney!

Here's my all time fav fix so far (1Cx-1 for 0%):

---

Who was East?

[PhantomSac]

It doesn't even have to be as complicated as all that, sometimes your partner just has a holding that makes your jack worth something. Like an honor. I mean in the hand given, we have 2 out of 4 suits where partner having Jxx would be of a lot of value (AT8x opp Jxx is way better than AT8x opp xxx obv, and Jxx opp AQT is a lot better than xxx opp AQT). The 2 suits we didn't have a holding where a jack would be worthwhile....we had the jack of that suit.

A Jxx is not great. It is not as good as Qxx, but it is better than xxx. If I had to estimate, I would say it is worth about 1 point, while a queen is worth 2 and a king is worth 3 and an ace is worth 4. If you don't count Jxx then I guess you don't agree with point count. If you are saying yeah a jack is worth 1 in point count, but a stray jack should be downgraded, I totally agree, it is worth fractionally less than 1. However we must also upgrade holdings like AQT and AT8x which are significantly better than AQx and Axxx, and even those are worth more than the traditional point count indicates since aces and quick tricks are undervalued. So Jxx is not great, but aces and quicktricks and nice spot cards working with them are worth more. Passing 12 counts with some positive features seems silly. I especially don't understnad "I would open 1N if I could but I would not open 1C." If you would open 1N since you systemically open 12-14 balanced with 1N, then why not open 1C which systemically could be 12-14 balanced with clubs >= to diamonds?

[diana_eva]

MrAce, on 2015-January-19, 00:59, said:

Who was East?

He shall remain anonymous Lurker, prob not willing to post and defend himself here, so let's leave it at that.

[MrAce]

diana_eva, on 2015-January-19, 01:01, said:

He shall remain anonymous Lurker, prob not willing to post and defend himself here, so let's leave it at that.

Fair enough.

[NickRW]

I am probably one of the most conservative posters on this board when it comes to opening min balanced hands - but I am opening this one and I don't think it is particularly close either.

[whereagles]

On Jxx:

You don't know if it's worthless or not. It is worth a lot opposite KQTx, but nothing opposite xxx. Statistically it's worth 1 HCP, and that's why you should count it.

Devaluate if you will, but only after you know pard's suits/values lie elsewhere, not before.

[hrothgar]

I was surprised that most folks didn't double with the East hand.

[campboy]

hrothgar, on 2015-January-20, 08:32, said:

I was surprised that most folks didn't double with the East hand.

It sounds like at two tables it went p 1NT p p p, at two it started 1♣ 1NT dbl (nige1's and the table which played 1NTx) and at one it started 1♣ dbl.

What surprises me is that neither South ran from the double.

[mycroft]

Hmm. 1NT-X-XX - seems like an interesting start.

I too am not passing, even if I have to open it 1♣.

[Jinksy]

akwoo, on 2015-January-19, 00:18, said:

1♣ doesn't have preemptive value as an opening bid.

Sure it does, it preempts them out of their weak NT. Not such a big deal at IMPs (where P's also more likely to put you in a dodgy 2-3NT), but it can be 50% of the MPs here.

(fwiw I'd open this hand at either form of scoring, though)