Unilateral Sacrifice!!!

Unilateral Sacrifice!!!
Greetings Fellow Bridge Lovers! This hand comes from a Sectional Bridge Tournament in San Francisco. I was unresponsibly sleep deprived and yet I was able to find a bid and a play to be extremely proud of: A Unilateral Sacrifice!!! This is when you make a sacrifice bid all on your own with no help from a partner and they rarely turn out to be good bids. But this one was different! I am very proud of this play and I hope you enjoy it!
#bridge #BridginwithKai #competition #strategy #cards #cardgame #cardgames #college #sacrifice #strategygames #logic #logicpuzzles #logicpuzzle

[@victorfinberg8595]

nicely done. the bad news is, only one opponent bid the minor game, and they went down

[@artquey8343]

I would have bid 3H after 3D; when they reach the game in a minor, your pard. should go to 5H himself. In any case, nice thinking, my friend! (Wonder where you learned to "think outside the box" like that!)

[@gin6839]

Wow!!!!😊

[@kiwi1fruit]

great play of the hand !

[@rebageorgiadis3861]

Excellent explanations and play!

[@adsoyad2607]

Really cool hand! I just discovered your channel, you're such a good presenter and teacher. The way you layed down everything was so clear and easy to follow, which is a rarity on bridge youtube. Do you focus on livestreaming or are you planning on putting out more videos on this channel? Also do you have any book/resource recommendations for elimination plays?

[@BridginWithKai]

Glad you enjoyed it! I am planning on posting many more videos to this channel! I will be making Vlog videos on my current trip to Uganda. I am playing for the USA University team in the FISU University MindSport Championships. The preparation day vlog will be coming out today. If you want to see more of me right now I post on the ACBL KZbin Channel: www.youtube.com/@ACBLbridge

[@adsoyad2607]

@@BridginWithKai Awesome! I never knew about the ACBL channel, looking forward to future videos

[@nima8071]

King of spades is the play, endplaying LHO. If you're playing with experts or good flight A players, I like the sac personally. Opps are finding and making a minor suit game. I would stick 3H over 3D personally, especially if you're willing to bid 5H over 5m. On shape, you're a K better than opening, and you can probably assume a mild heart fit. You can also scare off opps from the game, especially if the bidding goes ...-3H-4C-4H-?

[@BridginWithKai]

Good point. However, I am not sure that it would always scare the opponents off of game, In some distributions it may encourage them to go to game even further, especially if one of them has a Heart void.

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@BridginWithKai I wouldn’t be overly concerned with them bidding a game “because of your 3H bid”. Both opponents are limited so over 3H most likely they’ll be in compete to 4D or pass mode rather than looking to bid a game they otherwise wouldn’t bid. LHO already knows his partner doesn’t have much wastage in hearts due to no 2N bid. Sometimes raising partner might let a player with xxx in the suit visualise the shortage opposite, but here it’s not a fit auction so xxx of hearts will still look bad.

[@pimrajasaari9037]

Thanks very much! 😊

[@pimrajasaari9037]

I like you explaining

[@richardfarrer5616]

Though it wouldn't affect the final contract here, how would North interpret 5D from you? It can't be slam interest since you were willing to let them play in 3D. It can't be single suited in hearts since you would just bid them. It's certainly not showing clubs. So 4-6 or 5-6 (or even better) in the majors seems likely. That give North a chance to bid 5S with Qxxxx and a singleton or doubleton heart, say. And, if they bid 6C over you, North knows that a four or five card spade suit is likely to be bad news for defence so might raise to 6H on Jxx, say. Congratulations on the play though. I spotted the KS after you had telegraphed it in the explanation but I doubt I would have found it at the table.

[@BridginWithKai]

Oh! That's a great point. I didn't want to cause a problem with a misunderstanding. I Do think that you are right though.

[@joz4re]

Great how you explain all the moves and the reasoning behind each move and what the potential outcome is. Makes you really think about the hand and what the outcome could possibly be and weather to bid or not.

[@victorfinberg8595]

no, it isn't CERTAIN that R has AD. you could bet your house on it, but not your life

[@BridginWithKai]

Fair LOL

[@JonCookeBridge]

Did you consider 5D instead of 5H, to involve spades?

[@JonCookeBridge]

You imply that LHO holding: QTx x Qxxx AJTxx is less likely than: AQx x xxxx AJTxx I don’t think that’s correct. I think there are more players making a try on that first hand than taking that complete set of actions on the second. If west had neither the sA or Q, I would expect west to discourage clubs and a good East to switch to a spade at trick 3. Most likely the spade honours are split anyway, but that’s fine - you can just use your two trump entries to lead towards your spade honours.

[@BridginWithKai]

I did not consider 5D. I didn't know that it implied Spades, But now I do. To your second comment: Not exactly, I am implying that they are more likely to make a try on Atx x Qxxx AJtxx. My line fails when they are gutsy enough to make a try with your first hand.

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@BridginWithKai It only matters when he has AQx of spades. You can just lead towards your spades twice when he has ATx spade, using hJ and a heart pip as entries. You are right that your line only fails if he has my first hand, but it only gains when he has my second, against the alternative of leading to the J then to the K of spades. It breaks even if the hand is your suggestion. Once in a while LHO has underled the dA and both spades are onside too!

[@TravisCrump-hy4ke]

Really shows why -500 vs -600 is such a bad sacrifice. You gained 2 IMPs if they were making and lost 14 if they went down. They'd need to make 87.5% of the time to break even. Finessing twice in diamonds looks correct or at the very least reasonable. A !ot of layouts where 5m is just hopeless, unusual for partner to have four card support and not raise so two hearts might even cash.

[@sashacooper9326]

3 imp gain

[@ggorshkov]

This is a great example of bad sacrifice. By your own admission opponents get to the thin game. They are probably going to make it less than half of the time. Even with an actual hand that makes double dummy no guarantee that declarer will get it right. He may play N for Kxx or Kx. In first case you must play Q from the hand in second play low to J followed by A. Not to mention he need to get SP right too. And there are many hands where the game is hopeless. For example, exchange Adi and Acl in opps hands. But lets say game is going to make 50% of the time. So when you right you will be gaining +100 (3 imps) and when you are wrong will lose 600 (13 IMPS) not a good odds

[@BridginWithKai]

I can't entirely agree, The bidding rates for the opponents are highly distributional potentially rendering your spades and or hearts irrelevant. Else LHO had no reason to be making a 4C bid. This case is probably the most balanced the hand could be. There are plenty more distributional hand possibilities that could allow a 5m contract to be stone cold. Furthermore, with a more distributional hand the sacrifice is even more potent as our double fit will be stronger allowing us to possibly lose fewer tricks with our own distribution Although I do agree that the play in this particular isn't clear, what I do think is clearer is to play the diamond suit starting with the QD because my hand is more likely to have the doubleton diamond from the bidding, the guess is whether to go back and finesse or try to drop the 10 doubleton.

[@ggorshkov]

@@BridginWithKai It is difficult to asset exactly how often the game will make. But my point is still the same. Even if game will make 70% of the time (and it is very generous estimate) it is still not profitable on the long run since you are risking 13 IMPS to win 3

[@JonCookeBridge]

@@ggorshkov 500 is not what you’d expect the tariff to be before you see dummy. Catching partner with no spade honour on this auction is a bit unlucky. Just catch partner with Qxxx xxx xxx xxx and it’s only 300. You shouldn’t base your imp risk reward estimates on 100% down 3.

[@paulmaier6305]

just bid 4H over 1d