Strong Opening Bid - Yet Again!
In a recent event S held AK, KQJT864, 6, AT8
A number of players opened this 2C or 2D, which seems reasonable to me.
And nobody complained.
Subsequently the legality was queried.
It seems that technically the hand is not strong, whereas AK8, KQJT864, 6 AT would have been!
Can this be right?
Comments
I'm starting to think it might work better if we lost the label strong.
You've got 16 HCP there, so you're fine in any event, Clause b in the Blue book is 16+ (tick) or 13+ in two suits containing 10 cards. It's true enough that the second clause applies to the second hand but not the first, but since we've satisfied the first condition it's fine.
OOoops Can't count! (probably explains some of my bidding!)
As someone who frequently makes the wrong opening bid I do sympathise. If the A of clubs were the queen that's 15 HCP and you've got the situation you describe, I guess that hand looks quite a bit less like a strong hand.
It's a bit of an unintended side effect I think, the 13 HCP in two suits of 10 cards was designed to cover very strong 2 suiters that have big playing strength but less HCP. But applies to 7-3 as well as 6-5 or 5-5. I suppose i would prefer AK8 /QT to AK /QT8