Contract Bridge

A Gigantic Catastrophe

Today’s hand deals with a matter that should be discussed by any regular partnership, namely, how to proceed after an opponent opens the bidding with four of a major and you have the values to compete but don’t know which suit to bid. Some partnerships play that a double in this situation is for penalties, while others treat the double as takeout. Some even play that a double of four hearts is for takeout (leaving space for partner to bid four spades), while a double of four spades is for penalties.

When the double would be for penalties, four notrump is used as a takeout, asking partner to bid his best suit. Naturally, the four-notrump bidder should have substantial high-card values for this bid, since he is forcing his partner to respond on the five-level.

Once upon a time, many years ago, the legendary Harry Fishbein was playing in a high-stakes rubber-bridge game opposite a similarly illustrious partner and held the South hand. His four-notrump bid was well below par; he should have had at least three or four more high-card points.

His famous partner had never heard of four notrump being used as a takeout bid in this situation, and so failed to bid five spades over West’s double of four notrump. Fishbein’s redouble was intended to emphasize that he still wanted his partner to choose a suit. But again North failed to bid five spades (which was ice-cold). So Fishbein played the hand at four notrump redoubled, and lost seven hearts and three clubs to go down seven — 4,000 points!

The next day, North was overheard telling a friend about the gigantic catastrophe. “Imagine that Fishbein,” he said. “I didn’t even open my mouth, and he goes down 4,000!”