How to Play a Hand of Spades: 2nd Low-3rd High

"We've already identified how the proper bidding lands you in the optimum contract. I use the word "contract", because the contract, similar to the terminology in Bridge identifies the combined bid of your partner, your partner's hand and your hand. So, being in the ideal contract or being in the ideal bid, pretty much maps the path. For example: if the combined bid on the table, opponents are just chronic under bidders and there's an eight bid on the table, or a nine bid on the table, or a ten bid on the table, you're really not going to try to grab every trick you can. Why do you want to take three or four bags? It doesn't make any sense! You only have a ten bag limit, in the course of a game, to lose a hundred points. So, the bidding is absolutely essential, it is the blueprint, it is the architecture that designs, tells you pretty much the way you're going to play the hand. For example: say that your side is in a contract of seven, you bid four, he's bid three and the opponents have bid two points a piece. Your mission is to make seven tricks. You would ideally like to make seven and only seven. But, if you can set the opponents and take a few extras, then you look at the value of the game that you get, versus the bags that you might accumulate. It's very important to accurately play hands. For example: if you have the lead and you have a suit like this, you can certainly lead the king and you can tell your partner, if the ace isn't taken, I have the ace. He knows that, he may want to get back into your hand. Like we said before, the opening leads or the leads pretty much tell your partner exactly what to play. Now, when you're playing a game of spades, the other thing that I'm going to mention is the way that they tricks are taken. The computer when you're playing online, automatically tells you how many tricks you take, okay, it's easy. However, when you're playing in a live game."