So here are the 2 hands I mentioned yesterday.

Both times opener was white in 3rd seat.  Our style is to open a lot of 4 card majors in 3rd with light hands (Jeff's suits tend to be anything, mine tend to be at least lead-tolerant.)

1st hand all white:

Q6532 / QJ54 / 43 / J9

AKJ84 / 93 / A76 / AQT

Uncontested auction:

P - 1S - 3S - P (3 Spades is 'weak', had a way to show limit raise, constructive raise, or less than constructive raise)

Game isn't all that great, if they lead a Diamond (or in certain cases if they switch to a Diamond after a Heart lead) it's on the Club hook, but it's better than 50% so you want to be there.

2nd hand white vs red:

J974 / JT64 / 87 / J97

853 / AK983 / 42 / K62

P - P - 2H - 3D - 4H

4 Hearts is down 5 against perfect defense and down at least 4 against non-atrocious defense. 

On the first hand, I had the 18 count.  I'd give myself 65% of the blame for that one.  With Jeff's hand I would have probably showed a constructive raise and if partner doubled the opps later in the auction, of course I'd pull.  But Jeff's decision is certainly reasonable.  What I don't like about it is that he knows that I almost surely have a good hand (the opps have only 4 spades between them and haven't taken a call) and that he might well be forcing me to guess.  He also has QJxx of Hearts, so unless he's worried that the opps will compete to 5 of a minor with a passed hand opposite a passed hand, there's no need to preempt this auction.  But while I think 3 Spades is a bad bid, my pass is the worst bid of the auction.  Jeff knows I will often have 4 Spades for this sequence, so he's not hanging me out to dry with 4 Spades and a 4-4-3-2 3 count.  Either he has a singleton or a fifth spade (but surely not both,) almost 100%.  The same inference he had is available to me.  If the opps are short in Spades and not bidding, Jeff can probably be counted on for a useful card.  And 5 Spades (or 4 Spades + a singleton) and a useful card is all my hand needs to make game reasonable.

The Club was offside, but they didn't lead a Diamond.  +170 was 3 IMPs and change away.  We were the only pair not in game.

On the second hand I had the 10 count.  I'd give Jeff 75% of the blame.  I could have opened 1 Heart, but why not make it harder for the opps to come in?  3rd seat white on red is the traditional 'Don't hang me, partner' spot and Jeff, with his balanced trio of Johnnys and 4 Spades does not a 4 Heart bid have. 

-1100 was lose 12 IMPs and change, but our opps didn't defend that well

-800 was lose 10 IMPs and change, but our opps forgot to double

-200 was win most of an IMP

It's hard to hone your competitive bidding skills against Larry and Mo.