The “Positive” Negative Double

June 28th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  1 Comment 

After North opened 1NT with the singleton Q of hearts on the first board of the set (apparently had a diamond mixed in with his hearts) the third board brought into play an interesting “positive” use of the negative double – the hand in question was

Dealer:N Vul:E-W	North ♠ 10 ♥ AK76 ♦ A72 ♣ QJ742
West ♠ J9 ♥ J84 ♦ KJ853 ♣ 863		East ♠ KQ632 ♥ Q93 ♦ 10964 ♣ 5
	South ♠ A8754 ♥ 1052 ♦ Q ♣ AK109

The bidding proceeds

There was a  long BIT before the DBL,  an even longer BIT before the 4NT call, and the DBL was explained to West by North as “negative”.

What was South thinking before the 4NT call? Perhaps something like “Well, partner has shown an opening bid, and I have 13 HCP, so maybe we should investigate slam here – we might even have a 7card club fit”. What must North think over 6C? Maybe “Probably best to ignore the (advertised?) eight card heart fit – surely 6C will score better than 6H”.

It goes without saying that 6C is the only slam that makes, and that it was bid by only one pair in the field. Time to switch to “Positive-Negative” doubles methinks.

Problem Solving

June 10th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  7 Comments 

In quantum mechanics, Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle tells us that we can never see “things” as they are, for the very act of our looking at them changes them. Is there a similar principle involved in solving bridge problems? Does the fact that we know that there is a problem change the nature of the problem? For instance, if we ask what is the way to play 10xxx opposite AK8xx to obtain the maximum number of tricks (assuming no other information is available) then the answer is to lead the 10, play the ace, and then play the K. But if we insert this holding as part of a hand in a “problem”, and the success of the contract depends on obtaining the maximum number of tricks in that suit, should we change the way we play the suit simply because it is known that there is a problem? Does knowing there’s a problem tell us that the normal way of playing the suit will not work? I  thought about this while looking at the problem posed by Eddie Kantar, p. 55, in theMay 2010 Bridge Bulletin. The auction has been

 and you hold 

North
♠	Q762
♥	KQJ
♦	QJ5
♣	QJ2
South
♠	KJ10853
♥	A2
♦	84
♣	A105

  West leads the H4. Plan your play.

There are three apparent losers off the top, a spade and two diamonds,and the club suit to tackle. Given this, don’t we know for sure that the club finesse will fail? If it worked, there wouldn’t be any problem! Thus any solution involving the club finesse is wrong, and we look for ways to set up red cards for discards. Was Heisenberg a bridge player?

Vox Populi:continued

May 25th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  No Comments 

There is an excellent letter to the editor entitled “Adjustments” in the middle column of page 7 of the May, 2010, ACBL Bridge Bulletin – small(er) Regionals should take careful note.

Vox Populi

May 19th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  2 Comments 

It would appear from responses to previous threads that the way to “save” duplicate bridge is to get it back into the hands of the majority of players – perhaps those having less than 5000 masterpoints. As Canadians, we face two problems in doing this: (i) there is no Canadian Contract Bridge League to govern the rules and regulations of the game (ii) the members of the ACBL Board of Directors are elected by the members of the various Unit Boards – not by the ACBL membership at large. The first point subjects us to the American paranoia regarding litigation, and the second to an ACBL Board of Directors with virtually no grass roots accountability.

The 1%ers

May 13th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  13 Comments 

The question has arisen whether duplicate bridge is organized in favour of the 1% of players having 5000+ masterpoints. Many people can remember when social bridge was actually popular – when regular folks, like their parents, just sat down and played – no lessons taken, no books read-no frantic discussion as partners rotated as to what ones new partner played. People just…..played. Funny how popular games tend to be those with a few easily understood rules. And out of that great mass of social players (particularly university!) came many of today’s top players. But now there are very  few social players, and an ACBL membership rapidly approaching a median age of 70. Perhaps it’s because bridge is no longer seen as a “game” but rather as a science –  or so it might seem to a newcomer walking into a bridge tournament and seeing the hundreds of books/software for sale detailing the myriad of systems and conventions that apparently have to be learned before one can “play” the “game”. As Churchill might have said “Some “play”, some “game!””. Then the alerts, the pre-alerts, the announcements, and a 24 part series of articles on how to fill out a convention card. Who benefits from all this? The answer may be found in following Deep Throat’s advice in “All The President’s Men” – “Follow the money”. Had Deep Throat been a bridge player, perhaps he would have said “Follow the masterpoints”. Reminds me in many ways of the situation in education where people pushed new curricula requiring new text books, and the authours of the new text books were invariably those who had pushed the new curricula. Tough to make new money out of old material. Is it the 96% of ACBL members under 2500 MP who called for all the changes that have taken place?  Is it the 84% under 1000 MP who asked for the alert procedure? Does he who pays the piper get to call the tune?

Zero Tolerance

May 5th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  3 Comments 

Would like to hear people’s experiences with how Zero Tolerance is being perceived at clubs and tournaments.

As to the former, do you think that leaving (almost all) discipline and ZT enforcement at the club level to club management has been a good thing?

For the latter, do you think that ZT is being seen as being enforced at tournaments? Do players and directors seem to understand how it works?

Whither A/X:continued

April 29th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  6 Comments 

The concern I keep hearing from people is that while the lower strats are fairly  reasonably bounded, as in D=0-300, C=300-750, B=750-2000 , the highest strat is unfairly bounded, as in A=2000+. The range 2000-infinity is simply too large, and skews the event result markedly in favour of the very small number of players in the field with very large masterpoint holdings. The 8500 players in the 2000-5000 masterpoint range are seen as the cannon-fodder needed to make up the field for the 2000 players in the 5000+ masterpoint range. On a smaller scale, Unit 166 has some 3400 members in total, with 36 players in the 5000+ MP range. But a significant portion of those 36  5000+ players don’t play in tournaments anymore. and others won’t be attending any given tournament because of other plans. This results in the perception then that the limits of the upper strat are very much in favour of a very small number of top players. To digress somewhat, is this perception simply a part of a larger perception that duplicate bridge in general is organized in favour of the 1% of players with 5000+ MPs?  

Whither A/X?

April 26th, 2010  ~  paul cronin  ~  5 Comments 

Has the time come for A and X to divorce? Maybe A=5000+ and X=2500-4999?  There are about 2000 players in ACBL-land at 5000+, and 5,000+ in the 2500-4999 range, and there is definitely  some  difference between having 8000MP and having 3000MP. Thoughts???