Introduction
Bridge might have been intended to be played by the elites – royalty, nobles, doctors, lawyers and Indian chiefs. Those who could master Ely Culbertson’s honor tricks values in order to determine the trick taking potential of a hand which is bidding strength. He was the first internationally acknowledged master of the game. You are very lucky, if your wish to learn to play bridge, that you don’t have to know about honor tricks. But just in case you are curious, this is the table Mr. Culbertson devised:
Ace = 1 honor trick
AK in the same suit = 2 honor tricks
K by it self in a suit = ½ honor trick
KQ in the same suit = 1 honor trick
QJ in the same suit = ½ honor trick
AQ in the same suit = 1 ½ honor tricks
Q by itself = ¼ honor trick
J by itself = a plus value
2 plus values = ¼ honor trick
All bridge players evaluated the strength of their lands according to the honor trick table above during the Culbertson era and then, Charles H. Goren published his bridge system based on what he called, point court, thus: A= 4pts, K= 3pts, Q= 2pts and J= 1pt. So, a deck of cards having 4 aces, 4 kings, 4 queens, and 4 jacks, total 40 high card points. Now anybody who can count high card points can assess the value of a bridge hand, on offence and defence, accurately.
There are a hundred card games, all of them enjoyable to play but, if you learn to play bridge, you will lose your appetite for the other games and you’ll never stop learning.
Bridge is a partnership game. You will play with many different partners – some whose bids you can take to the bank; some not so reliable and, a few who are mad. Still, one of the first rules of bridge players is: Have confidence in your partner. If he/she lets you down, chalk it up to experience.
It is called Auction Bridge as well as Contract Bridge. It is called Auction bridge because the players compete in a bidding auction to decide which partnership will win the contract to be played with their preferred suit as trumps, or whether he/she prefers it to be played without a trump suit. The name Contact Bridge is of course very obvious.
What will amaze you about bridge is the extraordinary combination of cards you’ll see in a deal. The odds against them happening is astounding. I will tell you about a hand that was dealt in a game I played in recently. The bridge language will be Greek to you but don’t worry, you’ll learn it very quickly.
I am sitting south, all bridge players think of themselves as South in relation to the other players at the table. My partner ‘P’ is North, my left hand opponent ‘J’ is West and my right hand opponent ‘M’ is East. ‘M’ opened the bidding with 2 spades. Two of a suit is the strongest opening bid is bridge. It means that he can take 9 tricks out of 13 if spades are trumps without any help from his partner. I bid 2 no-trumps which means that I have at least five cards in each of the minor suits (clubs and diamonds) and I would like to compete in the auction. ‘J’ bid 4 no-trumps asking his partner to say how many aces he has. ‘P’ bid 5 clubs meaning he had more clubs than diamonds (actually he had five clubs). ‘M’ said 5 spades meaning he had 3 aces. I pass meaning I had no further interest in the auction. And then ‘J’ bid 7 hearts which meant that with hearts as trumps, he would take all thirteen tricks. My partner knew that the opponents held all the aces. ‘J’s’ partner said he had 3 aces and ‘J’ had to have the ace of hearts to bid Grand Slam. ‘P’ had five spades and he said to himself, ‘M’ had six spades to open two, so there was a good chance that I was void in spades and could “ruff” a spade lead. He decided to double for penalties. Bad mistake ‘J’ had no spades, so he redoubled for bonus points. ‘P’ led a spade, ‘M’ played his ace, I followed suit and ‘J’ discarded his single club. ‘J’ had a single club, a single diamond and eleven hearts headed by A, K, Q, J, &10. Actually, ‘J’ became declarer and played both his hand (closed) and his partner ‘M’s’ hand which was laid face up on the table. M’s hand became ‘The Dummy’ and ‘M’ became a spectator, who was obliged to keep his mouth shut about the playing of the hand. ‘J’ played the ace of spades and the ace of diamonds from dummy, then dummy’s singleton heart and claimed thirteen tricks. His score on the doubled, redoubled seven hearts contract was two thousand, eight hundred, and ninety points. He would have been down one trick had ‘P’ led a club to my ace because ‘M’ only had two aces, the ace of spades and the ace of diamonds. Next week I will discuss the basics of Auction/Contract Bridge.