Talk:Inverted minors

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Weak or strong notrump

In the article, it is claimed inverted minors are most useful if one also plays the weak no-trump. I tend to disagree with that. You really don't want to preempt with 5 points if your partner has a minimum 15 HCP; chances are that if you play you go down and that if the opponents play, they go down. So inverted minors are very well suited for strong no trump systems, because partner often has 12-13 points and game is possible for the opponents. Preemptive raises can be very difficult for opponents in this situation. Errabee 18:56, 7 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, as you'd expect, I tend to disagree with that. To take the example you cite, a 5-point preemptive raise facing a strong notrump, my take would be that the outcome depends on how the cards lie, because the strength is pretty evenly divided. If the cards lie well for us, we'll make and if they stick their noses in they'll go down. If they lie well for them, the opposite will occur. The long run expected value is a push. And that's leaving aside the very real possibility that opener has an unbalanced 12 count, when we will show a net gain.

I agree that a weak notrump hand that's opened 1 club, preemptively raised to 3 clubs, is tough for the opponents to handle. But so is a strong notrump hand that's opened 1 club, soundly raised to 2 clubs.

At any rate, it seems to me that there are good arguments on both sides of the medal and perhaps you'd like to soften my claim about "best suited to weak NT systems," and add the arguments that you bring to bear. Xlmvp 04:04, 8 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If you are playing the Weak NT, it is very likely going to be OK to pass with the weaker preemptive raises and only preempt with constructive hands. The example hand given in the article is one that I would preempt over a Takeout Double but pass with no competition. Partner is likely to have a strong enough hand that they won't profit by competing very high. Also, if partner is likely to have a Strong NT, you might want to jump-raise hands where he will have a play for 3NT if he chooses to bid it. The purely preemptive jump-raise is much more likely to pay off opposite a partner who couldn't open a Weak NT.

A problem with the purely preemptive jump-raise is that it creates a _gap_ between the single raise and the jump-raise, a gap that doesn't have to be there. Another way to create a gap is to play the single raise as game-forcing. I don't think having a range of hands that doesn't fit either bid (other than hands where one doesn't want to raise) is advisable. 76.28.103.69 (talk) 15:15, 6 September 2009 (UTC)Will in New Haven76.28.103.69 (talk) 15:15, 6 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]