To play a suit with minimal loss, or to capture a particular card (eg ‘To play a small spade to hand picking up the queen’).
![](https://bernardmageebridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-210.png)
South might ‘pick up’ West’s queen by cashing the ace and then ‘pick up’ East’s ten by finessing, thereby ‘picking up’ the whole suit without loss.