[lamford]

---

Matchpoints. Table result 2S+2.

SB, West above, is under the impression that the other players and TD are bending the rules against him, as this hand from Tuesday at a North London club showed. RR, North, had agreed to play Charlie the Chimp's wriggle over 1NT doubled, but did not fully understand it. He was unsure how to show both minors as North; he thought it was one of pass or redouble, and went for the former, assuming his partner now had to redouble. ChCh felt that a disaster was looming, and decided to pass, but RR North immediately asked "Did you mean to pass?". ChCh was on the ball, and replied "Dearie me, no, I think that there was a pass out of position in my bidding box. I thought I had taken out the redouble card."

SB was apopleptic. "From any player I would doubt that claim, but from someone like you with the ethics of Bernard Madoff I have severe doubts," he alleged. "ChCh, you make Fantunes seem like the Pope and St. Francis of Assissi." "Director, please".

The TD was, however, forced by the WBFLC minute to allow ChCh's claim that his pass was unintentional, even though he had discovered it as a result of a question from RR, and South replaced it with redouble. North bid 2C showing the lower of two suits, or two touching suits, RR could never remember which, but NS had escaped and East-West's +170 was almost zero.

Do you agree with the TD ruling, and would you rule differently if West had not been SB?

[sfi]

 lamford, on 2017-July-29, 02:29, said:

SB was apopleptic. "From any player I would doubt that claim, but from someone like you with the ethics of Bernard Madoff I have severe doubts," he alleged. "ChCh, you make Fantunes seem like the Pope and St. Francis of Assissi." "Director, please".

Well, that's going straight to the Conduct & Ethics committee. Any ruling on the actual hand will be fairly academic after that IMO.

[Vampyr]

 sfi, on 2017-July-29, 02:38, said:

Well, that's going straight to the Conduct & Ethics committee. Any ruling on the actual hand will be fairly academic after that IMO.

Is there any point to responses like this?

[sfi]

 Vampyr, on 2017-July-29, 04:50, said:

Is there any point to responses like this?

At least as much as the contrived scenario in the original post. As a director, West's comment is going to be the most important issue to deal with at the table - hence my response.

[pran]

 sfi, on 2017-July-29, 05:27, said:

At least as much as the contrived scenario in the original post. As a director, West's comment is going to be the most important issue to deal with at the table - hence my response.

Agreed completely.

I consider Law 74 to be the most important and superior to any other law in the book.

[blackshoe]

 sfi, on 2017-July-29, 02:38, said:

Well, that's going straight to the Conduct & Ethics committee. Any ruling on the actual hand will be fairly academic after that IMO.

I think this is a legitimate comment.

I also think that the table ruling is far from academic. Certainly a committee might impose sanctions on SB that will have far more impact on him than the table ruling on one board. That doesn't matter. Directors need to rule, and be seen to rule, correctly at the table, regardless whatever else might be going on. Is a committee appropriate for this case? Given it's the SB, my thought is "probably". This would hardly be his first offense of this nature. Presumably he's already had a warning for this behavior, and probably one or more DPs. So a committee referral is probably appropriate. If this were a first offense though, no.

[Vampyr]

 sfi, on 2017-July-29, 05:27, said:

At least as much as the contrived scenario in the original post. As a director, West's comment is going to be the most important issue to deal with at the table - hence my response.

I think it is safe to assume that Lamford is not interested in any suggestions regarding penalising the SB. Who cares about made-up comments by a made-up person?

[lamford]

 Vampyr, on 2017-July-29, 04:50, said:

Is there any point to responses like this?

sfi and others are ducking out of dealing with the ruling by turning their attention to SB's remark. If I were Chair of the Committee, I would rule that SB's remark was completely justified as ChCh has far far more incidents of sharp practice than SB ever has.

[gnasher]

 lamford, on 2017-July-29, 13:08, said:

sfi and others are ducking out of dealing with the ruling by turning their attention to SB's remark. If I were Chair of the Committee, I would rule that SB's remark was completely justified as ChCh has far far more incidents of sharp practice than SB ever has.

If you want people to focus on the primary ruling, why do you bother to include the extraneous comments at all?

[gnasher]

Anyway, the ruling seems easy. North's question was an irregularity which damaged EW, and he could have known that it would do so. I adjust the score back to what it would have been without the irregularity, which is some combination of NS -500 and NS -1100.

[sanst]

Yes, the TD was right in allowing S to change his call, provided he truly believed that it was unintended. As a matter of fact, I'm not so sure about that, but it won't make a difference.
RR's question was a serious breach of Law 73A1, so we award an AS based on 1NTx. EW can pick up 10 tricks (small spade to the king, return the jack of hearts and three more heart tricks ending in E, who then plays spades, finally the diamond ace is the tenth trick), -1100 for NS, plus a PP for the breach of 73A1. BTW, SB is actually not shouting his usual abuse but just making some rather funny remarks.

[weejonnie]

 sanst, on 2017-July-29, 16:22, said:

Yes, the TD was right in allowing S to change his call, provided he truly believed that it was unintended. As a matter of fact, I'm not so sure about that, but it won't make a difference.
RR's question was a serious breach of Law 73A1, so we award an AS based on 1NTx. EW can pick up 10 tricks (small spade to the king, return the jack of hearts and three more heart tricks ending in E, who then plays spades, finally the diamond ace is the tenth trick), -1100 for NS, plus a PP for the breach of 73A1. BTW, SB is actually not shouting his usual abuse but just making some rather funny remarks.

I wish I could agree with you - but if ChCh says he would have noticed the error anyway then only part of the time would the final contract have been 1NTX - so we must weight the scores and give something to 2♠ + 2. (And we can't be too severe on him otherwise he would accuse us of accusing him of cheating - and you know how costly the ACBL found that out to be).

Gordon Rainsford commenting on a similar case:

"I know that at the time of that case I tried to get some information on that, and one of the members of the WBFLC expressed the view that the footnote explicitly permitted such questions, so L73 no longer applied to them. The other one from whom I got an opinion thought that it would be possible to award an L73 penalty in these cases but that he would only consider doing so when the player had asked the question and discovered that the call was not unintended."

Against outright dishonesty the bridge lawmakers contend in vain.

[gnasher]

 weejonnie, on 2017-July-29, 16:30, said:

"one of the members of the WBFLC expressed the view that the footnote explicitly permitted such questions, so L73 no longer applied to them"

He was wrong. The WBFLC and its members can explain the meaning of the Laws, but they can't change the meaning except by publishing new Laws. 73A1 reads "Communication between partners during the auction and play shall be effected only by means of calls and plays, except as specifically authorized by these laws." There is nothing elsewhere in the Laws that specifically authorises this type of communication, so it's illegal.

[lamford]

 gnasher, on 2017-July-29, 13:22, said:

If you want people to focus on the primary ruling, why do you bother to include the extraneous comments at all?

In order to annoy some people; perhaps to entertain some. And it seems to work. Actually it does amuse me that so many people seem to get their hackles raised by the actions of a mythical person who is a combination of various obnoxious people in the bridge world.

[lamford]

 weejonnie, on 2017-July-29, 16:30, said:

Gordon Rainsford commenting on a similar case:

"I know that at the time of that case I tried to get some information on that, and one of the members of the WBFLC expressed the view that the footnote explicitly permitted such questions <snip>"

That WBFLC member was just wrong as jallerton and gnasher have explained. I was director (the case has been changed and embellished) and ruled that he was allowed to change the call but I then adjusted (at the end of play), to 50% of -500 and 50% of -1100, for the question. I guessed that East would win the spade lead and switch to the jack of hearts half the time.

And FWIW I completely agree with SB's comments. South cheated.

[blackshoe]

 lamford, on 2017-July-30, 03:34, said:

That WBFLC member was just wrong as jallerton and gnasher have explained. I was director (the case has been changed and embellished) and ruled that he was allowed to change the call but I then adjusted (at the end of play), to 50% of -500 and 50% of -1100, for the question. I guessed that East would win the spade lead and switch to the jack of hearts half the time.

And FWIW I completely agree with SB's comments. South cheated.

On what law(s) did you base the adjustment?

It seems to me that cheating is deliberately breaking the rules. Is Charley the Chimp prone to do that kind of thing? I don't know him that well.

[lamford]

 blackshoe, on 2017-July-30, 09:29, said:

On what law(s) did you base the adjustment?

It seems to me that cheating is deliberately breaking the rules. Is Charley the Chimp prone to do that kind of thing? I don't know him that well.

I adjusted much in the same way as gnasher. I allowed the change of call, as I had no "evidence" that ChCh was lying. But then I adjusted to what I thought would have happened without North's question, "Did you mean to pass", which was a breach of 73A. I assumed that ChCh would not have realised his error without the question and the contract would have been 1NTx as West would have passed.

[RMB1]

 lamford, on 2017-July-31, 07:34, said:

I assumed that ChCh would not have realised his error without the question and ...

Are we still talking about the original case?
The OP says he decided to pass, so there was no error for him to realise.
The original Pass was not unintended but ChCh appears to have lied in suggesting it was.

[blackshoe]

 lamford, on 2017-July-31, 07:34, said:

I adjusted much in the same way as gnasher. I allowed the change of call, as I had no "evidence" that ChCh was lying. But then I adjusted to what I thought would have happened without North's question, "Did you mean to pass", which was a breach of 73A. I assumed that ChCh would not have realised his error without the question and the contract would have been 1NTx as West would have passed.

Law 73A does not specify a rectification for its breach.

[Vampyr]

 blackshoe, on 2017-July-31, 20:59, said:

Law 73A does not specify a rectification for its breach.

Then it is at the discretion of the director.