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By "hand shape" we are referring to how the cards are distributed within a single player's hand with respect to suits. 1. Terms describing the length of a suit in a single hand. a. VOID neans having no cards in the suit. b. SINGLETON is a one card suit. c. DOUBLETON is two card suit. d. TRIPLETON is a three card suit. e. RADICAL in length is a 7+ card suit. Aka, SELF-SUFFICIENT. A single suited hand that is extremely long (7+ cards) a "RADICAL" suit. 2. Speaking of hand shapes, I have found there are only 6 types: a. FLAT HAND is BALANCED and is one of the following. 4-3-3-3 4-4-3-2 b. FLAT-FIVE is semi-balanced/unbalanced. 5-3-3-2 c. 3-SUITED is UNBALANCED and is one of the following: 4-4-4-1 5-4-4-0 d. "COMPANION SUITED" means that one suit is 5 or more cards in length where the 2nd suit it is exactly 4 cards in length. If you think of your longest suit as having a "4-card companion suit " to boot. The companion suited hand might be likened to a two-suiter in that it exhibits similarity in suit relationship. e. 2-SUITED HANDS are "PEER SUITED". These hands will have two prevalent suits, both of which are at least 5 cards long , leaving less than 3 cards in each of the other two suits. The word "peer" means roughly equal. Therefore, a "peer suited" hand has two long suits that nearly equal in length. f. 1 SUITED HANDS: These will be 6+ cards in length. A 5-card suit would require either a flat 5-card shape or at least another 4-card suit, both of which have already been described. Single Suited where there are at least 6 card in one suit with no other 4+ card suit & it is not a flat-5. There are more specific descriptions of 1 suited hands: LOP-SIDED 6 card suit RADICAL or SELF-SUFFICIENT 7+ 3. 2-SUITED HAND SUIT RELATIONSHIPS. a. The basic characteristics of 2-suited hands can be described by combinations of the following suiit relationships: 1) Two suits of EQUAL LENGTH. When the two suits are equal in length, there is no need for further relational description other than the possibility of two suit lengths being "RADICAL", ie, 6-6.. 2) "RADICAL" when applied to a 2-suiter will have combined length of 11 or more, leaving 2 or less cards in the other suits. 3) "SHELTERED" means the highest ranking suit is longer than the lower ranking suit. If you consider the case where the higher ranking suit is the longer, then it is not to difficult to envision it as providing a roof over the lower ranking shorter suit. One might say that the higher ranking longer suit is "SHELTERING" or "OVER-SHADOWING" the lower ranking shorter suit. 4) "INVERTED" means the highest ranking suit is shorter than the lower ranking suit. b. "PEER SUITED" means that both suits each have 5 or more cards. 1) A PEER SUITED HAND needs no further description unless it is "RADICAL". 2) A "SHELTERED PEER" by definition must be "RADICAL", because the upper ranking suit must be 6+ cards in length with the lower ranking being shorter but at least 5-cards. So there is no need to explicitly qualify it as being "radical". 3) An "INVERTED PEER" is by definition "RADICAL" , because the lower ranking suit must be 6+ cards in length with the higher ranking being shorter but at least 5-cards. So there is no need to explicitly qualify it as being "radical". c. "COMPANION SUITED". 1) A COMPANION SUITED HAND needs more elaborate description than a peer suited hand. 2) The COMPANION SUITED HAND must be described as SHELTERED or INVERTED. If it is SHELTERED, then the lower ranking suit is the 4-card suit. If it's INVERTED, then the higher ranking suit is the 4-card suit. 3) If the COMPANION SUITED hand has a 7+ card suit, then it needs to be qualified as being RADICAL. Therefore, it wi;l be a RADICAL SHELTERED COMPANION SUITED HAND or a RADICAL INVERTED COMPANION SUITED HAND. For opening purposes we tend to regard the NON-INVERTED (ie, SHELTERED or EQUAL) hand shapes as being "NORMAL" shape, because it presents the least difficulty to opener in his subsequent bidding. Therefore, a sheltered (or equal) state is considered to be the de-facto condition. The "INVERTED" hand shapes are considered to be more complicated for the opener, because they give rise to "'REVERSE BIDS". Oddly enough, just the opposite is true for responder as we shall see later. |