A nice demonstration of how one distribution can be transformed into another, familiar one. I haven't thought of this in 20 years of teaching bridge. Thank you
My reasoning is always the following: I simply imagine the suit splits evenly and the missing honor is with the longer of the two hands. If in that situation I can drop the honor, I play for the drop, else I take the finesse. Two examples: *if I miss 5 cards and the Q, i imagine a 2-3 split with the Q lying with the 3-card. AK wouldn't drop it, so I finesse *If I miss 6 and the J, i imagine a 3-3 split (J is in any 3-card hand). AKQ would drop the J, so I play for the drop. It also remains valid after a few rounds have been played, such as in the heart suit of your examples. Funny thing is this reasoning also intuitively resonates with the probability in the obvious cases. When missing 4 and the J, you'd imagine it splits 2-2 and drop it with AK already (your Q is 'extra'). The drop is much better here.
(edited) Missing 6 cards 4-2 is 49% and 3-3 is 36%. Missing an even number of cards, the least uneven distribution is the most probable (P(3/1) > P(2/2), P(4/2) > P(3/3), P(5/3) > P(4/4) ...). Simply because there are 2 ways to place 4 cards: 3/1 or 1/3. So your assumption is not correct when missing an even number of cards, but the rule still applies. I think I read in a Kantar book the 6-8-10 rule describing what to do missing a J/Q/K.
@@ulrichbongartz2372 Pete explains in the video what the odds are and confirms that playing for the drop is (slightly) better in that situation. Did you watch the video? Your odds are slightly off and you are likely forgetting the J can drop from the shorter side.
My favorite combination to get right at the table was something like AK72 opposite J853 in dummy. I led the J trying to sneak it past the Q. RHO covered but I pinned a singleton 9 on my left. Back over to dummy to lead the 8 which got covered by the 10. RHO was then tucked in at trick 11 to lead from the 64 into my 75. Four tricks from the suit. Partner was very tired so I had to carry him. Don't think I got a card wrong that day.
Just had 4 clubs in hand to 6 clubs in dummy missing a king. RHO opened 2D weak and already showed AQJ in diamonds, so I thought this is easy finesse. Single King of clubs takes the trick and I have to go down on 3NT - I hate when that happens. Everytime I see you making similar kind of, percentage decision and then being unmoved with the negative outcome just impressed the hell out of me. You just know that in the long run, this is the correct choice of play - I get furious too easily. All in all, excellent video and it will really make it easy to remember what to do in all of those missing king/queen/jack situations - cheers, mate!
I heard the actual theoretical math of 9 never has the optimal play to drop one round of the suit, then play for the finesse. This might be based off the added possibility of the 4-0 split however (implying you need 3 entries and the jack & ten) What happens is you beat the 3-1 split and the 4-0 split for the price of losing to the 2-2 split, with only one possible remaining variation of each (at the time of witnessing the LHO's card)
The probabilities expressed are based on the initial hand with 13 cards in it; correct? So, each card played gives more information and changes the probabilities for the next trick. The first trick removes 4 of 52, the next trick removes 4 of 48 and so on. Information is getting clearer and clearer with each trick played and the probabilities are changing correspondingly.
I don't understand how these are equivalent - th-cam.com/video/RfR0qewzdZc/w-d-xo.htmlfeature=shared&t=505 - and how exaclty you could transpose those suit combinations - th-cam.com/video/RfR0qewzdZc/w-d-xo.htmlfeature=shared&t=524. Could anyone enlarge on that? If you started with 8 cards missing the Jack, you would play for the drop, but when you are missing the Ace and the Jack you suggest to finesse. So, if you started with 8 cards missing the Ace and the Jack, you can't avoid losing to the Ace, however you can try to finesse the King. But when it looses to the Ace, now, what you are saying is that: 1. you should think that it is equivalent to the situation where you started with 6 cards missing the Jack, and that is why you finesse or 2. you should think that it is equivalent to the 8 cards missing the Queen, because it actualy does not matter, that one round has been played, as you are in the situation, that after first round you are missing 2nd highest card, so it is as you were missing the Queen at the very beginning?
Suppose we are in the dummy hand, but we have no more entries to it. Our dummy has xxxx and we have KQTxx. Do we finesse the ten or just lead to the Q and play the K on the next round of the suit? My guess is that we play the Q and they the K on the next opportunity regardless of who wins the fist trick. Now what if dummy has xxx opposite our KQTxx? Once again, we have no further entries to the dummy. Now what is the best play?
Let's imagine you have led to the king and the opponent's take the ace. If you had another entry what would you have liked to have done on the 2nd entry. In the first case we have nine cards so this is equivalent to 9 never so we would want to take the queen next anyway. In the second case this is the same as 8 ever so we would want to finesse. Because we don't have the entries we need to do that on the first round. Case 1 play to the king, case 2 play to the ten.
Try this. It doesn't matter whether we're talking about the K, the Q, or the J, and it doesn't matter how many cards you have in your combined hands - this method works every time. The question is: Do you finesse? (1) How many cards did the OPPONENTS start with in the suit? (2) If that number is ODD, finesse, because ODD and YES have the same number of letters. If that number is EVEN, then don't finesse. Play for the drop. So, for instance, you have seven cards in your two hands and want to know if you should finesse vs. the opps' Jack. Since you have seven cards, the opps have six. Six is EVEN, so NO, play for the drop.
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A nice demonstration of how one distribution can be transformed into another, familiar one. I haven't thought of this in 20 years of teaching bridge. Thank you
My reasoning is always the following: I simply imagine the suit splits evenly and the missing honor is with the longer of the two hands.
If in that situation I can drop the honor, I play for the drop, else I take the finesse.
Two examples:
*if I miss 5 cards and the Q, i imagine a 2-3 split with the Q lying with the 3-card. AK wouldn't drop it, so I finesse
*If I miss 6 and the J, i imagine a 3-3 split (J is in any 3-card hand). AKQ would drop the J, so I play for the drop.
It also remains valid after a few rounds have been played, such as in the heart suit of your examples.
Funny thing is this reasoning also intuitively resonates with the probability in the obvious cases. When missing 4 and the J, you'd imagine it splits 2-2 and drop it with AK already (your Q is 'extra'). The drop is much better here.
I thought Peter’s tutorial was excellent and this addendum as well. Thank you so much.
(edited) Missing 6 cards 4-2 is 49% and 3-3 is 36%. Missing an even number of cards, the least uneven distribution is the most probable (P(3/1) > P(2/2), P(4/2) > P(3/3), P(5/3) > P(4/4) ...). Simply because there are 2 ways to place 4 cards: 3/1 or 1/3.
So your assumption is not correct when missing an even number of cards, but the rule still applies.
I think I read in a Kantar book the 6-8-10 rule describing what to do missing a J/Q/K.
@@ulrichbongartz2372 Pete explains in the video what the odds are and confirms that playing for the drop is (slightly) better in that situation. Did you watch the video? Your odds are slightly off and you are likely forgetting the J can drop from the shorter side.
@@YCLP You are right and my comment was wrong! I just mentioned the approx. probab. I wanted to comment, on the even or uneven split of cards.
@@ulrichbongartz2372 I guess that it is a bit counterintuitive that playing for the drop is best, while the 3-3 split is actually not the most likely.
Thanks for this great analytical approach. Love following your channel
My favorite combination to get right at the table was something like AK72 opposite J853 in dummy. I led the J trying to sneak it past the Q. RHO covered but I pinned a singleton 9 on my left. Back over to dummy to lead the 8 which got covered by the 10. RHO was then tucked in at trick 11 to lead from the 64 into my 75. Four tricks from the suit. Partner was very tired so I had to carry him. Don't think I got a card wrong that day.
Wow. So simple and so helpful
Good info .. thank you
I like this video. More like it would be great.
Awesome info Pete. More like this if you have it. Playing for bad breaks etc.
Hahaha, that was literally the next video I was planning on making.
Just had 4 clubs in hand to 6 clubs in dummy missing a king. RHO opened 2D weak and already showed AQJ in diamonds, so I thought this is easy finesse. Single King of clubs takes the trick and I have to go down on 3NT - I hate when that happens. Everytime I see you making similar kind of, percentage decision and then being unmoved with the negative outcome just impressed the hell out of me. You just know that in the long run, this is the correct choice of play - I get furious too easily.
All in all, excellent video and it will really make it easy to remember what to do in all of those missing king/queen/jack situations - cheers, mate!
12:12 😅😅it’s been y hy hy I😅😅yup that’s 😅
I heard the actual theoretical math of 9 never has the optimal play to drop one round of the suit, then play for the finesse. This might be based off the added possibility of the 4-0 split however (implying you need 3 entries and the jack & ten)
What happens is you beat the 3-1 split and the 4-0 split for the price of losing to the 2-2 split, with only one possible remaining variation of each (at the time of witnessing the LHO's card)
The probabilities expressed are based on the initial hand with 13 cards in it; correct? So, each card played gives more information and changes the probabilities for the next trick. The first trick removes 4 of 52, the next trick removes 4 of 48 and so on. Information is getting clearer and clearer with each trick played and the probabilities are changing correspondingly.
Yes
I don't understand how these are equivalent - th-cam.com/video/RfR0qewzdZc/w-d-xo.htmlfeature=shared&t=505 - and how exaclty you could transpose those suit combinations - th-cam.com/video/RfR0qewzdZc/w-d-xo.htmlfeature=shared&t=524. Could anyone enlarge on that?
If you started with 8 cards missing the Jack, you would play for the drop, but when you are missing the Ace and the Jack you suggest to finesse.
So, if you started with 8 cards missing the Ace and the Jack, you can't avoid losing to the Ace, however you can try to finesse the King. But when it looses to the Ace, now, what you are saying is that:
1. you should think that it is equivalent to the situation where you started with 6 cards missing the Jack, and that is why you finesse or
2. you should think that it is equivalent to the 8 cards missing the Queen, because it actualy does not matter, that one round has been played, as you are in the situation, that after first round you are missing 2nd highest card, so it is as you were missing the Queen at the very beginning?
Suppose we are in the dummy hand, but we have no more entries to it. Our dummy has
xxxx and we have KQTxx. Do we finesse the ten or just lead to the Q and play the K on the next round of the suit? My guess is that we play the Q and they the K on the next opportunity regardless of who wins the fist trick.
Now what if dummy has xxx opposite our KQTxx? Once again, we have no further entries to the dummy. Now what is the best play?
Let's imagine you have led to the king and the opponent's take the ace. If you had another entry what would you have liked to have done on the 2nd entry. In the first case we have nine cards so this is equivalent to 9 never so we would want to take the queen next anyway. In the second case this is the same as 8 ever so we would want to finesse. Because we don't have the entries we need to do that on the first round. Case 1 play to the king, case 2 play to the ten.
Try this. It doesn't matter whether we're talking about the K, the Q, or the J, and it doesn't matter how many cards you have in your combined hands - this method works every time. The question is: Do you finesse? (1) How many cards did the OPPONENTS start with in the suit? (2) If that number is ODD, finesse, because ODD and YES have the same number of letters. If that number is EVEN, then don't finesse. Play for the drop. So, for instance, you have seven cards in your two hands and want to know if you should finesse vs. the opps' Jack. Since you have seven cards, the opps have six. Six is EVEN, so NO, play for the drop.
2NT never 🤠🤣
Very complicated 🥴😭