Sample lesson 1: Evaluation of Honors

Before the start of the game, each player must count their cards before looking at them.

We call one player’s cards a "Hand".

Your first task in each game is to sort the cards by suits and ranks.

I recommend alternating dark and light colors.

Before we learn how to evaluate the hand, we must understand the game:

• Bridge is a game of tricks, and each player contributes one card to each trick.
• Players play cards one after another in a clockwise direction.
• The highest card wins the trick

• There are 13 tricks in each game.
• The key to good hand evaluation is understanding how each card contributes to winning tricks.
• Aces are the highest cards in the game, and they guarantee the trick unless they are trumped.
• Aces win 4 out of 13 tricks.
• Kings are the second-highest cards and win a trick unless they are taken by the opponent’s ace or trumped.
• We expect that on average, 3 kings win a trick.

• Aces and Kings win the majority of tricks.
• We must therefore give them the highest value.
• Because of their significance, we call Aces and Kings “Primary Honors”.
• The remaining 6 tricks are won by all other cards.
• The majority of tricks are determined by who holds the aces and kings, but the remaining 6 depend on the type of contract and the players' strategy.

• Half of the remaining tricks are most often won by smaller honors – Queens and Jacks.
• We call them “Secondary Honors".
• They have a higher chance of winning a trick if they are connected to an Ace or a King.
• But on average, Queens win 2 tricks and Jacks 1 trick.

Based on this fact, we can presume that honors win 10 tricks on average. Sometimes you win 4 Kings and only 1 Queen; sometimes more Jacks than Queens, but the total is most often 10.

The remaining 3 tricks belong to all other cards, most often trumps, middle cards (10s and 9s), or small cards that become highest due to various card-play techniques.

We call these cards “Distributional Tricks,” and I will talk about them in the following lesson.