hotShot, on Oct 12 2006, 09:56 AM, said:
Mistakes and errors are the only things that matter in duplicate bridge. You win because of the imperfection of your opps bidding, play and defence. You loose because of your sides mistakes and idiotic actions. If no side makes mistakes both sides (should) get the average score.
Expert+ players have a very low rate of unforced errors and can keep their "forced error level" low too. This is why they reach the top spots.
The only way to improve is reducing the number of errors you make.
As bridge is a complex team effort it's sometimes hard to pinpoint who has to take the blame. Partners bidding, signals or play may lead us the wrong way.
Of cause if you blame your partner for every bad score and take credit for every good score, there is nothing left for you to improve.
I agree with some of this. However, one of the attributes that an expert player usually develops is the ability to be difficult to play against.
I have both witnessed (as dummy) and read (meckwell v kaplan/kay) of declarer, in 3N, needing to knock out stoppers and having a side suit of xxx opposite Qx, winning the opening lead in dummy and leading immediately to the Qx... the opps never work out, until too late, that this was the setting suit... in the case in which I was dummy, the Q held
Were these unforced errors? No, yet the defenders lost big swings: due to creative play by declarer. As an aside, I think that the ability to make this play is going to be one of the last problems programmers will have to solve to create a WC-level programme.
In addition, is it an error not to spot a truly exotic play? I have long treasured Adventures in Card Play, but I doubt that I will ever recognize some of the plays described in that book. I suspect that they are exceeedingly rare, yet I have played a very large number of hands. Would it be an error to miss these? Or, if I were to lose a swing because my opp at the other table found an immaterial squeeze that I missed, would that be a swing earned by brilliance rather than lost by my mistake?
Also, it is not true that 'if no side makes mistakes, both sides get average.
If I play weak notrump and you play strong, then there is an excellent chance that we will play the same contract from opposite sides, and now the outcome may well depend on the layout of the opponents' cards: maybe I declare with Kx in a suit and RHO with a clear lead of QJ109 into his partner's Axxx: but you declare it the other way around. No error yet a huge swing.
I agree that the MAIN way to improve is to reduce errors, but learning how to be a difficult opponent is also useful. I remember reading a book about 30 years ago: one of a series put out by Reese/Trezel about inducing errors....