[MrAce]

1- What is everyone's observation and predictions for the finals so far ?

2- How about the quality ? Better than previous BB , worse or similar ?


3-What are your thoughts about Buttler ranking, do they really reflect the performance of pairs after a certain amount of boards ? Or does it mean anything to you at all ?


Here my answers

1- Poland and Bulgaria surprised me with their performance. Italians are playing like Italians. USA1 kinda playing stiff and Fleisher-Kamil pair seems like performed pretty good so far. Thier KO opponent Israel is a tuff nut to crack .. USA2 is doing better than everyone else expected, including themselves (upto interviews ) but thats not a surprise to me, i think they are one of the best 3 teams there. Thier match with sweden was an action match, and i expect this to be the case in KO match too. Netherlands is of course a very good team and playing at home, hard to ignore their performance and Iceland came to finals with a lot of ups and downs. Italy - Netherland - USA2 -USA1 are my predictions.

2- I think it would be better if USA and Canada didnt send teams seperately and North America send 3 teams. This would probably allow Nickel or Diamond team to be in BB now too. Nothing against Mikeh or Canada team, just my personal opinion. Also it would be of course totally different story if the team Monaco (Fantunes - Hellness) was in the picture.

3- I have mixed feelings about Buttler ranking. Of course they reflect certain amount of performance after so many boards. However there is another story to this, some pairs especially the stronger pairs of teams prefer to play vs the stronger pair of the teams they play against and stay out if they can vs a weaker team. I am pretty sure this also affects the scores, but to a which degree is beyond me.

[mike777]

point 2


You dont say why your method is better.


My take is it is far better for bridge to have seperate teams for Usa and Canada.


The highest goal is not I repeat not to have the 3 best teams in North America play in the BErmuda Bowl.


But that is an important goal.


As I have mentioned often over the years the higher goal is for Canada and the Usa to allow everyone to compete.

Give HIgher seeds and byes for recent performance.


I think it is more important to allow a third team to come out of North America that is NON Usa.

It is more important to open up bridge than permit all three teams out of NOrth america come from usa.

[jmcw]

1. Enjoying the coverage from WKbridge. Most noteworthy to me is USA2 looking more like the #1 team on the continent (the future is here). New Zealand a big surprise.
2. Top teams are playing great, MrAce your booting out the Canadians sucks. While your at it just get the top 6 or 7 from the US to represent the Americas.
3. Waste of time, I have no interest.

[JLOGIC]

MrAce, on 2011-October-22, 22:57, said:

USA2 is doing better than everyone else expected, including themselves (upto interviews )

I would hardly call finishing the RR qualifying and having a tough QF match "better than we expected." When my poker friends asked me what odds I have to win the event, I told them 10 %. Assuming I thought we were 80% to make it to the knockouts, 65% to win our QF, 50% to win our SF, and 40 % to win the finals, that is about 10.4 % to win the event.

Looking at it now, it would mean we are 65 % to beat sweden (who was the third best team according to the betting lines), pick em against USA 1 who has been very successful in the last few years (and 2nd best team according to lines), and 40 % against italy who is italy (best team in the world). All of these would be considered very optimistic to most people to say the least, as might 80 % to Q from the RR.

Saying that you're 10:1 to win the bermuda bowl when you've never done anything at the open level in world play and one of your partnerships is not even a regular partnership is saying a lot! Anyways, nothing unexpected has happened yet in my eyes.

That said, I have a lot of confidence in us in long knockout matches, we beat the reigning BB champs and reigning rosenblum champs in 120 board matches, but I am realistic and not gonna say we are 80 % or something to beat 3 of the best teams in the world!

[jmcw]

JLOGIC, on 2011-October-22, 23:33, said:

...........
Saying that you're 10:1 to win the bermuda bowl when you've never done anything at the open level in world play and one of your partnerships is not even a regular partnership is saying a lot! Anyways, nothing unexpected has happened yet in my eyes.

That said, I have a lot of confidence in us in long knockout matches, we beat the reigning BB champs and reigning rosenblum champs in 120 board matches, but I am realistic and not gonna say we are 80 % or something to beat 3 of the best teams in the world!

Well, if I can get 10:1 I'll take it, put me down for $100. GL

[JLOGIC]

If we were 80 % to make it out of the RR, and I thought we were 10:1 before the RR...

Whatever we're 50/50, we'll win or we won't

[JLOGIC]

+1 to the idea about no canada being a bad idea. USA could probably field 20 teams better than some of the smaller countries who are in this event, but that doesn't mean it would be "better" if they were allowed to do so. The rosenblum is open to anybody.

[jmcw]

JLOGIC, on 2011-October-22, 23:45, said:

If we were 80 % to make it out of the RR, and I thought we were 10:1 before the RR...

Whatever we're 50/50, we'll win or we won't

So if I bet $10 at 80% = $12.50
$12.50 @ 65% thats $19.23
$19.23 @ 50% = $38.46
$38.46 @ 40% = $96.15 roughly

Not 10:1 where did the math go wrong?

[JLOGIC]

Rounding + I said those numbers would actually be 10.4% I think in my first post here. I did not actually do numbers, I just told my friends roughly 10:1 to give them an estimate. I wasn't betting with them or anything.

My point was simply that I think it's hard to say we are doing better than we expected, this is about what we expected. I'm happy for knockouts to start.

[Phil]

1. Agree with Timo about Bulgaria and Poland's performances. I kept picking Poland in my pools, and they kept disappointing LOL. Except for Italy and NL, Europe seems to be performing below par.

I didn't realize Israel had the talent they have been showing so far and have been surprising. I wouldn't bet the house against them versus USA1.

Up until the last day, the Kiwis were also playing with a lot of heart too. They along with Japan and China also proved that there is more to Asian / Pacific Rim bridge than Australia that year-in, year-out never seems to perform up to expectations. I will also remember the performance of Singapore against a lot of top teams too - very gutsy!


2. Disagree with having three teams from the US be eligible. In our zone, there are at least ten teams from the US that could have performed better than Canada did. This is not a sleight against my friend MikeH, who is by far the best player on Canada, but rather a testament to how deep the US is. My point is "where do you draw the line"?

While we're on the subject, I just cannot figure out USA1. On paper, they are the 2nd best team in the event, and I keep waiting for them to have a breakout set but it doesn't seem to happen.


3. Butlers are the type of thing you analyze after an event, not during.

[JLOGIC]

Phil, on 2011-October-23, 00:44, said:

While we're on the subject, I just cannot figure out USA1. On paper, they are the 2nd best team in the event, and I keep waiting for them to have a breakout set but it doesn't seem to happen.

Weren't they fifth? Whats the problem, they made it in. Winning the RR is about killing the bad teams. Winning the event from the KO phase on is about beating the good teams. I think the Nickell team was not very good at the RR either.

ETA: It just seems like people are overreacting to the RR. If you are the 2nd best team and finish 5th in a RR with 8 qualifying, that is not all that surprising or out of the norm, esp when your best pair is levin/weinstein who are not active bidders and play more of a hamman/soloway style which is not effective at beating bad teams badly, but is effective at winning matches against good teams. They don't double a lot, they don't open with 11, they don't play a weak NT range, they don't overcall light, etc etc. They are obv one of the top pairs in the entire world but lets say they and versace-lauria or meckwell are about equal, obv the latter pairs are going to do better in a mixed field rr.

[paulg]

Poland and Bulgaria disappoint me too. The few times I've played these guys I've struggled to score an imp and they should have been closer to qualifying. I had Bulgaria rather than China in the final eight.

I did a lot of work with butler scores when I was a Scottish selector, as the public here demand pseudo-objective rather than subjective selection. By work I mean that I took the butlers and then analysed each hand. Some years the butlers were an excellent representation of performance, other years they were unbelievably misleading.

So my opinion is that butlers are essentially meaningless on their own.

[jallerton]

MrAce, on 2011-October-22, 22:57, said:

2- I think it would be better if USA and Canada didnt send teams seperately and North America send 3 teams. This would probably allow Nickel or Diamond team to be in BB now too. Nothing against Mikeh or Canada team, just my personal opinion. Also it would be of course totally different story if the team Monaco (Fantunes - Hellness) was in the picture.

The Bermuda Bowl is contested by teams representing their own countries. USA and Canada are separate countries so it makes no sense to allow them to have combined teams,

Nor does it seem fair to tell Canada that they are not allowed to send a team to make room for USA 3. If we applied the same rule to Ice Hockey, we could say that because Canada has a higher world ranking than USA, the next Ice Hockey World Championships should include two Canadian teams but none from the USA.

[Yu18772]

1. No particular surprises, may be Poland was worse than I thought. Since I am a big fan of the Israeli team- Italy, Netherlands, USA2 and Israel


2. To the best of my knowledge North America is not one country.....and I am pretty sure that most of Canada would agree. So if Europe / Asia / Middle East / Africa are sending teams from each country, why should North America be different? Would you like a Bermuda Bowl with USA 1,2,3,4,5 and Italy 1,2,3,4,5

3. Yes and no - its not a perfect system

[Fluffy]

I'm comentating more than I used to, and I have one thing clear: Having expert players as vu-graph operators makes a big difference. They realice what is going on at the table, and they are able to trasmit it to the audience.

[Gerben42]

To your comments:

Quote

1- Poland and Bulgaria surprised me with their performance. Italians are playing like Italians. USA1 kinda playing stiff and Fleisher-Kamil pair seems like performed pretty good so far. Thier KO opponent Israel is a tuff nut to crack .. USA2 is doing better than everyone else expected, including themselves (upto interviews ) but thats not a surprise to me, i think they are one of the best 3 teams there. Thier match with sweden was an action match, and i expect this to be the case in KO match too. Netherlands is of course a very good team and playing at home, hard to ignore their performance and Iceland came to finals with a lot of ups and downs. Italy - Netherland - USA2 -USA1 are my predictions.

Not many surprises in the RR. After the first segment of the QF it seems that Iceland will need a miracle, they are having trouble with the Dutch style, esp. Tarzan system it seems. Italy - China: Not sure if China without Fu - Zhao can make a dent into this, so my guess is Italy with high %.

Israel - USA1: Israel is performing very well, so I think this is a coin flip. USA2 - Sweden I think the Americans are slight favorites. Not sure who Italy picked for the Semis, but there is a good chance that one US team will be out. For me the three contenders are USA2 Italy Netherlands (sorry USA1).

Quote

2- I think it would be better if USA and Canada didnt send teams seperately and North America send 3 teams. This would probably allow Nickel or Diamond team to be in BB now too. Nothing against Mikeh or Canada team, just my personal opinion. Also it would be of course totally different story if the team Monaco (Fantunes - Hellness) was in the picture.

You're missing the point of a country competition. The USA has already got a special position to get two shots at the cup. I'm not missing Fantunes as there should be exactly ONE Italian team playing. USA 3, Italy 2 and Netherlands 2 would all be contenders to get to the last 8 too, you know. It's the same as in other sports, in basketball we're not giving the USA a second team either. In soccer, no second Brazilian team, sorry. And so on.

Quote

3-What are your thoughts about Buttler ranking, do they really reflect the performance of pairs after a certain amount of boards ? Or does it mean anything to you at all ?

After so many boards, you might be able to see if one pair is significantly better / worse than the rest of the team. Otherwise, whoever wins it is moot. The winning team will have all three pairs in the upper part of the butler, that's for sure though.

[MrAce]

I want to make something clear. I never said Canada should not send a team. What i meant was Canada and USA should not make their trials for BB teams seperately. And most of you stated that BB is about countries. I disagree and imo it is about the zones or we would see every country there.

Think about this way, Italy, a bridge giant, has to fight his way EACH and EVERY time vs France - Britain - Bulgaria - Norway - Netherlands - Iceland - Sweden - Poland - Germany- Russia (Israel too if i am not wrong) and add Monaco now for future (Fantunes- Hellness) for getting a ticket to BB. And none of those teams are picnic walk. And all those countries that i listed has to fight with each other to get a BB ticket. Dont forget some of these teams ALSO goes thru a qualification in their own countries to get a ticket to EC. With your logic every country in Europe should have the right to send a team to BB.

Perhaps i really wanted Diamond and Nickel team (Monaco as well) there too i guess. Was nothing against Canada. For some reason i dont even see USA and Canada as different countries.

[MrAce]

Gerben42, on 2011-October-23, 05:38, said:

You're missing the point of a country competition. The USA has already got a special position to get two shots at the cup. I'm not missing Fantunes as there should be exactly ONE Italian team playing. USA 3, Italy 2 and Netherlands 2 would all be contenders to get to the last 8 too, you know. It's the same as in other sports, in basketball we're not giving the USA a second team either. In soccer, no second Brazilian team, sorry. And so on.



After so many boards, you might be able to see if one pair is significantly better / worse than the rest of the team. Otherwise, whoever wins it is moot. The winning team will have all three pairs in the upper part of the butler, that's for sure though.

It is not the same as other sports, in other sports in order to go to a worldchamp they go thru a zonal qualification unless they are the host country. Anyway, it is not really important, i personally prefer to see better teams more than different etnic groups or flags or races or whatever in Bermuda Bowl. Rossenblum can not be anywhere close to BB since the professional expectations and money plays a big role imo.

Regarding the buttler ranking, u are wrong about the winning team's all pairs being in upper part. In fact Duboin and Sementa barely finished + 0.23 if i am not wrong they were like 23rd or 22nd. This alone maybe a good argument about the accuracy of buttler ranking. Don't you think ? Or who knows maybe they performed not as good as they usually do. Alfredo and Lorenzo's 1.25 average in 224 boards is sick !

[Gerben42]

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Perhaps i really wanted Diamond and Nickel team (Monaco as well) there too i guess. Was nothing against Canada. For some reason i dont even see USA and Canada as different countries.

Well, I don't. I would like the Bermuda Bowl to stay a pure contest between national teams. There are already two top American teams who have earned there place by results and not by name (so what if Mike Kamil is not as famous as Eric Rodwell, he qualified). Sorry, and I won't be cheering for the Monaco construct. It's fine for the Transnationals, Rosenblum or any other things. Unless they will be really living in Monaco (yuck if you ask me if the alternative is beautiful Norway), no thanks. Are they going to play the "small federations cup" also? Sigh...

[Hanoi5]

MrAce, on 2011-October-23, 08:23, said:

It is not the same as other sports, in other sports in order to go to a worldchamp they go thru a zonal qualification unless they are the host country.

Zone 3 South America has some 10 countries and only 2 are allowed into the BB. And they're not chosen in a pegeant.

There are more countries (but less people) in Zone 5 and they have only one spot.