When you’re at bat in baseball, you get only so many pitches worth swinging at. Same goes for bridge hands. At any given session, only a few fat contracts come your way and the good players get home runs off them.
Usha Khurana and I watched a home run pitch go past us late in the session on Thursday at the Airport Bridge
Spades: A-7; Hearts: A-K-Q-J-7-5
Diamonds: J-9-4; Clubs: 10-7
I open 1 Heart, Usha bids 2 Clubs, I rebid the Hearts and she offers 3 Diamonds. With six sure tricks in Hearts, an Ace stopper in Spades and my partner covering the minor suits, I had no trouble bidding 3 No Trump. When East led a low spade, I knew we should have swung for the fences as soon as Usha laid down the dummy:
Spades: K-3; Hearts: 2
Diamonds: A-K-8-2; Clubs: A-K-9-8-5-3.
Three sets of Ace-Kings to go with my six Heart tricks. Fool proof as long as the fool bids it. Here are the other two hands.
East
Spades: 10-6-5-4-2; Hearts: 10-3
Diamonds: Q-5-3; Clubs: J-6-4
West
Spades: Q-J-9-8; Hearts: 9-8-6-4
Diamonds: 10-7-6; Clubs: Q-2
It wasn’t a bottom board for us, just a little below average. We got 3.5 out a possible 8 match points. Only one North-South bid the slam – at 6 Hearts, yet – and made it. Another bid 6 NT, played from the South, and, unaccountably, went down two. Three pairs who played it at 4 Hearts took all 13 tricks. Two others bid 4 Hearts and took only 12 tricks. One other pair wound up at 3 NT, getting the same result we did.
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