Overbidding

No, I'm not here to inveigh against overbidding. Not exactly, anyway. We all do it from time to time. We have to take a few chances over the opponents pre-empt if the hand just feels right, and on top of that, there are the frequent occasions where we'll either overbid or underbid our values and I guess almost anybody will opt for the former sometimes.
Not, it's not overbidding per se I'm inveighing against here, but the pernicious and foolhardy penchant for overbidding on top of an overbid! Now, what's the sense of that? You've already promised your partner more than you can deliver, and if he didn't pick up the ball and run with it thinking you have that strength, why invite him a second time when you still don't have that strength?
A couple of hands recently on OKbridge reminded me of this practice. Here's one:

J 9 2
K Q 9 2
A Q 9 3
Q 10
10 8 3 A Q
A J 5 3 10 7 4
J 8 7 6 4
7 6 5 A K J 9 8 4
K 7 6 5 4
8 6
K 10 5 2
3 2

Let's see, the bidding was opened by North with a diamond, 2 clubs by East, 2 spades by South. North now bid 3 clubs, evidently an asking bid for three no, but South wisely took his partner to diamonds. Only now North took his partner to spades, three of them. Which so encouraged his partner with the fit that he bid four!
Hold on a minute, now. Two spades on 6 hcp's? Less than you need to go to the two level in a lower-ranking suit? Well, that's gotta be an overbid by any system. It's amazing how people who are very disciplined when the opponents don't enter the bidding become profligate and foolhardy when they do. Two spades? However, remarkably enough, for 6 hcp's opposite a minumum opener, that -- temporarily -- wasn't dangerous even when his partner raised the bid to three. They were indeed headed for a positive score, not so much because of point count as because of the favorable lie of the spades, when South said, "Oh, that's not enough. After all, we have a fit don't we?" And so bid four, turning a fine positive score into a negative.
Incidentally, one declarer made only 8 tricks in spades. How could he only make 8 tricks? I wondered. He loses 2 clubs, diamonds are solid, one heart and one spade. Oh, how hindsight blocks the imagination! I went to the hand and found that that declarer, after losing the first round of spades to the ace, now led the jack! That of course was to smother the 10 and thus lose only two tricks if East originally held A Q 4. One could argue that if that was East's holding, he should certainly duck the low spade from dummy, but our opponents don't always make the best play now, do they?
In any event, the tenuousness of the 3 spade contract, or from South's point of view, the flagrant overbid with only 6 hcp's should certainly have inhibited a drive to game. I have said elsewhere on this page that 8-card fits can't work miracles.

Here was another one, picked up at about the same time:
Q 7 6
K 2
K J 9 2
Q 8 6 5
K A J 4
Q J 8 6 4 A 10 7 5
10 7 6 A 8 4
K 9 4 3 10 7 2
10 9 8 5 3 2 West North East South
9 3 Pass Pass 1 C 2 S
Q 5 3 3 H 3 S 4 H Pass
A J Pass 4 SDblAll pass

Vulnerable, no less, this hand made a weak jump overcall of an opening bid on his right of two spades! I must confess that I remembered South as the two-time overbidder. After hearing the three spade bid, as I remembered, this worthy couldn't help but be emboldened by the fit into bidding 4 spades, down 1100. I had that part right. But now finding my printout, I find it was North who made the push to four spades for two too many undertricks and a glaring minus 1100. I can't rightly say North's 3 spade bid was an overbid. It's true, it could have been hit for minus 800, but that would have been South's fault for that horrendous vulnerable two-level bid on a 10-high suit. And anyway, the opponents might not rise to the occasion. But with a motley collection of unsequenced honors and no really pleasant surprises for partner after a three spade bid, this hand should certainly have been content with four hearts, which must be played well to make.
Oh, here is another I recall. I opened a club, a heart by my partner, two no by me, three no by my partner. Now, I've never been one to count my partner's points when dummy comes down. I'm looking first to make the hand and then for overtricks if possible, and nothing seemed to jell here. I kept wondering, why can't I make this, what can I do, why isn't there a clear line to nine winners? Playing on the computer, I always love 3 no contracts and never had any trouble with them.
Down one. It was only later that I realized my partner had only 5 hcp's, the A J of hearts. Now this is a much subtler case. Bidding a heart over what might be a short club is hardly an overbid, and indeed, had the makings of directing us to a much better spot than one club, which was two no. So maybe some would call it not an overbid. Okay, but if not an overbid, one heart certainly states all the values there are in the hand. There's nothing in reserve beyond what's promised, not for winning tricks. And so there should not have been further bidding on a non-forcing bid. I was working on 24 hcp's and had no chance.