[Cyberyeti]

This is a situation that could happen in front of the director or the appeals committee, I wonder how you would handle it tactfully. Teams, 7 board match.

You have the opportunity with:

---

opposite a known ♦AKQx or better and ♠A but unknown club holding to bid a grand in a teams competition. Partner gives some UI which implies he didn't realise exactly what he'd shown.

You settle for 6 and make 7 when your partner's club holding turns out to be Qx. Opps were in game.

What if partner's club holding turned out to be xxx and the Qxx was offside ? Opps now call for a ruling saying that you should have bid 7 and used the UI to stop.

Your real reasons for not bidding 7:

Opps have already demonstrated by going for a love all 500 that should have been 800 on a partscore board, failing to bid a decent 4♥ and going off in a cold 4♠ that you don't need to bid the grand, and will probably pick up just for bidding the small. You are also confident (wrongly) that you're already winning this match at least 16-4 (this is board 5/7, you were actually only winning 13-7 before this).

How do you say this without offending anybody ?

[manudude03]

I would just say we've had a couple of good boards so far and don't feel the need to take unnecessary risks. Besides, if you have a club loser, you could be off in 6, if they lead a spade.

[Cyberyeti]

manudude03, on 2013-March-11, 06:39, said:

I would just say we've had a couple of good boards so far and don't feel the need to take unnecessary risks. Besides, if you have a club loser, you could be off in 6, if they lead a spade.

This is true, but if partner is 4342 and Qxxx is onside, you have enough discards to make 6 but not 7 if you bang down AK first. Partner also could still have A♥ or K♠ on the exclusion auction we used.

[wyman]

"Systemically, I can't determine whether or not partner has a 3rd rd club control, and I'll otherwise need to pick up the Q to make the grand. Also, looking at our first four boards, I thought that we were up already at least 10 imps, and felt comfortable in the event that we missed a difficult-to-bid 7m."

This assumes that you can't ask partner about 3rd rd club control, of course.

[billw55]

The answer is that you felt the state of the match dictated safety. This is totally true.

I am tempted to say that ops who are tough enough to make a UI claim trying to force us to bid grand, are also tough enough to hear the unsweetened explanation. But that is obviously unnecessary. Not to mention that if it were so true, we ought to be up more than 6 IMPs.

[barmar]

Does it matter what you say? Should the "state of the match" argument actually sway the TD or AC?

I can understand that your SOTM judgement may incline you against bidding the grand. But does that remove it from the LAs entirely? As long as it's an LA, we have to consider whether the UI demonstrably suggests against it. This is another case where UI trumps normal judgement -- "I was always going to" doesn't matter.

[wyman]

barmar, on 2013-March-11, 09:50, said:

Does it matter what you say? Should the "state of the match" argument actually sway the TD or AC?

I can understand that your SOTM judgement may incline you against bidding the grand. But does that remove it from the LAs entirely? As long as it's an LA, we have to consider whether the UI demonstrably suggests against it. This is another case where UI trumps normal judgement -- "I was always going to" doesn't matter.

SOTM should be available to the people that you poll, though, to determine what the LAs are, and if the director didn't provide that info when polling, it would be reasonable to make such a case to the AC.

[Cyberyeti]

barmar, on 2013-March-11, 09:50, said:

Does it matter what you say? Should the "state of the match" argument actually sway the TD or AC?

I can understand that your SOTM judgement may incline you against bidding the grand. But does that remove it from the LAs entirely? As long as it's an LA, we have to consider whether the UI demonstrably suggests against it. This is another case where UI trumps normal judgement -- "I was always going to" doesn't matter.

This was what was going to worry me, I think I might have to say something like "I don't bid <100% grands against non name opps when I think I'm already winning the match and there's a decent chance they won't bid the small".

[paulg]

Cyberyeti, on 2013-March-11, 10:14, said:

This was what was going to worry me, I think I might have to say something like "I don't bid <100% grands against non name opps when I think I'm already winning the match and there's a decent chance they won't bid the small".

Were your counterparts at the other table thinking the same?

[ArtK78]

The UI issue cannot ALWAYS trump bridge logic.

It is clear, no matter what you know about partner's diamonds and spades, that making all 13 tricks on this hand is not 100%. Aside from bringing in the club suit, there could be an opening ruff. So, if you argue that the grand cannot be 100% on the bidding and you don't want to risk a large loss in a match that is, in all probablility, already won barring a major disaster on this hand, I believe that you will prevail.

[Trinidad]

I think this is a cultural thing.

In The Netherlands, it is perfectly okay say: "It is clear that we are winning this match, unless I throw out a lot of IMPs on this board. I estimate that we are up by about 12 IMPs."

It is clear to me that in Japan you can't say that and that you shouldn't in England.

But the (British) English language has a variety of euphamisms to protect people's feelings. I am sure that a native speaker should be able to say that he had the impression that the opponents were rather misfortunate on the previous boards, instead of saying that they bid and played badly. If the TD and AC are as British as the player, they should understand.

Rik

[CamHenry]

Trinidad, on 2013-March-11, 10:57, said:

[...] the (British) English language has a variety of euphamisms to protect people's feelings. I am sure that a native speaker should be able to say that he had the impression that the opponents were rather misfortunate on the previous boards, instead of saying that they bid and played badly. If the TD and AC are as British as the player, they should understand.

One such phrasing would be "I felt we had already achieved a number of good boards, and were likely to be leading by 10 IMPs". This doesn't speculate about the reasons for that projected lead, merely that it exists.

If anyone got offended at that, I suggest they go and take up something non-confrontational, like watching paint dry...

[ArtK78]

CamHenry, on 2013-March-11, 11:09, said:

One such phrasing would be "I felt we had already achieved a number of good boards, and were likely to be leading by 10 IMPs". This doesn't speculate about the reasons for that projected lead, merely that it exists.

If anyone got offended at that, I suggest they go and take up something non-confrontational, like watching paint dry...

Obviously, you have never participated in Competitive Paint Drying.

[Cyberyeti]

paulg, on 2013-March-11, 10:22, said:

Were your counterparts at the other table thinking the same?

In the context of local events, we would be closer to sharks than minnows. (we won the green point event with 118/140, although this was round 1)

Our opponents managed 3N+4 so slam wasn't in the picture.

[mycroft]

Well, 7♦ has been known to go down on a club-lead-from-5, too. Frequently after a lead-directing double.

Case in point: KQ9xxxx AKQxx -- A. In 4♥, partner tables x xx KQTxxx JTxx, with a club overcall. Missed 6? No, -1, -2 if you're not careful.

[JLOGIC]

If I could not do a poll I would rule against you. Bidding what likely amounts to about an 80 % grand slam must be a logical alternative.

We can debate the 80 % number, but if your partner has 5 diamonds and 1 or 2 clubs you are in amazing shape. If your partner has 3 clubs he is 50/50 to hold the queen, and when he doesn't you are still going to make it 55 % of the time or so (depending on how often they get a club ruff). That is just a priori, given that your opponents never bid (assuming it started as it did in your other thread) it makes it less likely they have a lot of shape, 4-0 diamonds or clubs are getting really unlikely, even 2-2 diamodns is becoming more likely which is useful if partner is 4-2 in the minors obviously (in which case you are in great shape on 2-2 diamonds and on 3-1 diamonds you will probably need a club hook) Oh, and when he has 2 clubs hes still 1/3rd to have the club Q. And again failure of opps to bid makes this more likely than normal.

Even if partner has the dreaded 4441 it is probably still above 50 % (play gets interesting).

If we accept the 80 % number, then it is probably just bad to not be bidding grand. Even if they are in game half the time, and slam half the time, it is better to be in grand imp expectancywise. Yes imps and VPs are not linear, but the scale is pretty close to total imps until you are crushing them. You would have to know they are in game a lot and that you are up a lot for this to be reasonable, that is what a big view it is. And that is your perogative if you do not have UI that suggests you do not bid a grand, but to me bidding a grand is clearly an LA. This is not like a knockout where you are up a lot and can freeze the puck, its a swiss, and every VP counts. If your counterparts are in game 30 % of the time, and you go down in grand 20 % of the time, that sucks and you might have risked 6 VPs to gain 1 or even 0, but that is only 6 % to occur. The rest of the time, either you will make grand and gain 11 or 3 by bidding it. The 11 will probably count for a lot and the 3 will usually be 1.

That being said, I realize that it is not just you who thinks like this and is far too risk averse on grands and does not try to gain VPs or overtricks or anything when you already are winning a match (what were you up like 7 with 2 boardsto go? lol, in bridge and short matches it is hard to estimate). However, you also had UI that maybe your partner didn't have his bid, and that may have impacted your thinking and made you see all the reasons to not bid grand. The best way to figure out if bidding slam is an LA for you is probably to conduct a poll and give the state of the match.

[JLOGIC]

Also there is no reason to offend the opponents, just say you were having a good set (so VP odds are against you taking a big risk), and you felt like there was a good chance they would be in game at the other table so risking a grand down when you have a club loser would be silly.

Neither of those is offensive. Maybe if they can read between the lines on the latter you can say because it was such a low HCP hand or something and you had a good system to find slam even.

[Cyberyeti]

JLOGIC, on 2013-March-12, 00:41, said:

If we accept the 80 % number, then it is probably just bad to not be bidding grand. Even if they are in game half the time, and slam half the time, it is better to be in grand imp expectancywise. Yes imps and VPs are not linear, but the scale is pretty close to total imps until you are crushing them. You would have to know they are in game a lot and that you are up a lot for this to be reasonable, that is what a big view it is. And that is your perogative if you do not have UI that suggests you do not bid a grand, but to me bidding a grand is clearly an LA. This is not like a knockout where you are up a lot and can freeze the puck, its a swiss, and every VP counts. If your counterparts are in game 30 % of the time, and you go down in grand 20 % of the time, that sucks and you might have risked 6 VPs to gain 1 or even 0, but that is only 6 % to occur. The rest of the time, either you will make grand and gain 11 or 3 by bidding it. The 11 will probably count for a lot and the 3 will usually be 1.

That being said, I realize that it is not just you who thinks like this and is far too risk averse on grands and does not try to gain VPs or overtricks or anything when you already are winning a match (what were you up like 7 with 2 boardsto go? lol, in bridge and short matches it is hard to estimate). However, you also had UI that maybe your partner didn't have his bid, and that may have impacted your thinking and made you see all the reasons to not bid grand. The best way to figure out if bidding slam is an LA for you is probably to conduct a poll and give the state of the match.

We were in fact up 5 but I thought we were up 15-20 (team mates overbid one partscore board to a NV game so -1 when I tried too hard to beat 3 became -6 and undercompeted another so +8 became +3, we'd also bid a not completely auto game where a lot of people didn't bid it, and others saved over it for -200, but that was flat) and might well pick up another 10 for just bidding the small.

Normally we are not shy of bidding grands and had this been board 1, I'd have bid it instantly, but it was the combination of match situation and opponents that screamed NO to me. This confidence proved well justified when we picked up 9 on this board, 12 on the next when they put 4Hx on the floor and another 7 on the final board when I went 1 off in 3N but opps went -4 when breaks were really unkind for the 20-0 I was expecting from the earlier boards.

[barmar]

ArtK78, on 2013-March-11, 10:34, said:

The UI issue cannot ALWAYS trump bridge logic.

I never said it does, I said this is a case where it does.

[barmar]

wyman, on 2013-March-11, 09:56, said:

SOTM should be available to the people that you poll, though, to determine what the LAs are, and if the director didn't provide that info when polling, it would be reasonable to make such a case to the AC.

Do you give them the player's opinion of SOTM, or give them all the previous hands and results and let them decide what they think SOTM is?

There's also the point that the player's statement about SOTM is self-serving. We shouldn't ignore it, but we need to be aware that it may be part of a rationalization of their action.