I promised to write up this hand, and so here it is.
Board #6
East dealer
East-West vulnerable
| | North
♠ A J 10 7
♥ A 4 2
♦ A Q 5
♣ A 7 4
| | West
♠ 2
♥ J 7 3
♦ K 4 3 2
♣ K 9 5 3 2
| | East
♠ 9 4
♥ K Q 10 8 6
♦ 7 6
♣ Q J 10 8
| | | South
♠ K Q 8 6 5 3
♥ 9 5
♦ J 10 9 8
♣ 8
| |
|
| | | | |
| South | West | North | East |
| 2♠ | P | 6♠ | P |
| P | P | | |
The bidding shown is that of the only pair that bid the slam. All four declarers won twelve tricks in a spade contract. After the diamond finesse and two club ruffs, the only loser in the North hand is a heart. The real question is whether there might be a more "scientific" method of reaching the same contract.
Most partnerships have only three tools available for responding to weak-two bids: bidding 2NT, bidding another suit at the lowest possible level, and some form of ace/key-card asking.
There are two popular forms of the 2NT approach—Feature and Ogust. Feature asks opener to bid an outside suit in which he/she has an ace or king (other definitions are possible). An opener with no feature rebids the preempting suit at the three-level. An important exception is that opener should ignore the feature if the hand lies in the lower half of the weak-two range, which is usually 5-10. South has no features and has a minimum hand. So, the rebid would be 3♠, and North would have gained nothing.
Ogust is a little more complicated. Opener is asked to evaluate the quality of the bid suit, which usually is aligned with having two of the top three honors. South's hand qualifies. The other half of the answer involves whether the total high-card points rank the hand in the upper half of the range. Six points is in the top half of no one's range. So, the response would be 3♦, which indicates for most (but not all, as I painfully learned in Providence) pairs a good suit in a bad hand. This is good information for North. Since South must have KQ of spades, trumps are solid. However, assuming that the weak-two range is 5-10, South cannot have another king. The best North could hope for is a queen or two jacks. It is hard to visualize how South could cover North's five spot cards in the side suits. I would not have bid the slam if I held North's cards, and South responded 3♦.
What about bidding another suit? This is an extremely dangerous action if the bid is not forcing. With South's cards I would pass any such bid, even 3♦. However, if the bid is forcing, and if North had the brilliance to bid 3♦, South would probably raise to 4♦. The problem is that this approach tells North nothing about the trump suit, and those losers in hearts and clubs have not disappeared. Maybe that response would have been enough for some people. I might bid 5♠ in hope that South would take it as an inquiry about the quality of the trump suit.
There is one other possibility. Some people use the "Rule of 17" to determine whether to jump to game when partner opens with a weak two. Responder is supposed to add the high-card points to the number of trumps. If that number is at least seventeen, bidding game is advised. Well, North has nineteen points and four trumps. That evaluates the hand as six points better than the minimum. A trick is worth three points, right? If you can bid 4♠ with 17, why not bid 6♠ with 23? Huh? Huh?
Well, it worked on this hand. I'll say that for it. Of course, if East had had the ♦K, there would be no way to avoid losing a diamond and a heart. In fact, South must have both the jack and ten of diamonds for the finesse to work. If either is missing, West can cover the first diamond, and the contract goes down as long as the card is not in a singleton or doubleton.
On the other hand, I have noted on several occasions that when a strong hand is opposite a long suit, tricks seem to appear by magic. Both North and South have seven-loser hands. Losing Trick Count predicts that they can only make four, and yet eleven tricks are available against any holding that cannot ruff the first trick. Taking twelve is nearly a 50-50 play.