[jtfanclub]

I'm all in favor of this.

I am sick and tired of people giving deliberately wrong information in hopes of screwing us up, and feeling it's OK to do this since we aren't playing SAYC. Sometimes, the directors are fair...1NT X Alerted as the majors, passed out, and the Xer had a 20 count 2-2-5-4 while responder had a 6 count and a 5 card major. I'd say about half the time any 2 bid over a weak or mini NT hand shows "any distributional hand", but you should see some of the explanations we get. Then we get all sorts of crap about how we didn't play bridge after it, etc. etc. I have literally asked opponents if they knew what they were playing over the 1NT bid, asked that they make sure that they make sure that they knew what they were playing over the 1NT bid before we started, and yet, sure enough, another amazing fielded psyche and another ruling against us.

And it gets worse. Over a 1NT bid, let's say that a 3 club bid shows diamonds, but partner's been known to forget. Well, much of the time when he does forget, his partner will have diamond length. So of course his hand is allowed to 'wake him up'. Too bad for us.

At high level events, if you can't remember what you're playing for the first freakin' round of bidding, you shouldn't be allowed to play it. Period.

[Free]

jtfanclub, on Sep 4 2007, 07:02 AM, said:

I'm all in favor of this.

I am sick and tired of people giving deliberately wrong information in hopes of screwing us up, and feeling it's OK to do this since we aren't playing SAYC.

~snip~

At high level events, if you can't remember what you're playing for the first freakin' round of bidding, you shouldn't be allowed to play it. Period.

I agree that you should know your system at high level events. However, everybody sometimes forgets something! So not allowing people to play such methods is pretty radical.

Deliberately giving wrong information is an infraction! Making mistakes is not. This is why there are rules and penalties for misinformation, not for making a wrong bid (as it should be). If there's no information on the CC about the bid, you consider it a wrong explanation and act accordingly. If the information given is the same as the info on the CC, it's a misbid. The opponents can read, so they should know what's going on...

I think a better way of punishing people would be to make sure they can't have more than 40% (or lose an immediate 3 imps - or more - in case they have a good board) if they make a misbid. This way, misbids get punished but the opponents don't get rewarded all the time.

[hrothgar]

I threw an email out to the Bridge Laws mailing list asking whether any of the principles might want to comment on this thread. The email discussion is titled "Misbids, infractions, and Wolff's Oh my..."

The complete thread can be accessed at

http://www.amsterdamned.org/pipermail/blml...ber/034242.html

Herman and Hans already threw up responses.

[jtfanclub]

Free, on Sep 4 2007, 02:48 AM, said:

I agree that you should know your system at high level events. However, everybody sometimes forgets something! So not allowing people to play such methods is pretty radical.

Deliberately giving wrong information is an infraction! Making mistakes is not. This is why there are rules and penalties for misinformation, not for making a wrong bid (as it should be).

You're right. For one thing, there has to be damage, and it has to be damage BEYOND what damaged would have occurred from a psych.

For example, I open 1NT, next player bids 2 Hearts, alerted as 'the majors'. But in fact, the overcaller's partner knows that the overcaller is used to playing the bid as Hearts + a minor. The overcaller's partner therefore never corrects 2 hearts to spades, even with a weak hand, unless he can also handle both minors. If he has, say, a 5-1-5-2 hand, he just passes. Overcaller knows that his partner knows this, and he won't correct without both minors. Therefore the overcaller bids 2 hearts with any two-suited hand with hearts, and is completely safe.

I have had extremely blatant cases of this happen. Just obvious to all concerned after the play has finished. Misbid, not mistaken explanation. Play on!

So, for me, there are a lot of requirements for a correction to occur, if the new rules were implemented.

1. The bid has to be enough of a gross distortion that it would be a psyche if done deliberately.

2. The partner of the misbidder must have more information than the opponents: either that the misbidder is likely to misbid, or what the misbidder is likely to have if he did misbid.

3. Damage must have occurred.

It would be nice if there was a #4- that the partner of the misbidder used the information to his advantage, not taking a LA that he would make if he was certain of his partner's bid. But in cases similar to the one I mentioned, I would argue that it's simply too difficult to determine if the information was used or not.

All this really boils down to is that an expected misbid is a form of 'predicted psych', same as if he deliberately made a psych out of a Ghestem or Landry or whatever.

[barmar]

ralph23, on Sep 3 2007, 04:02 PM, said:

Trinidad, on Sep 3 2007, 01:21 PM, said:

The weak link in the reasoning of the Dutch AC is the statement:  "If a pair forgets a convention then they cannot claim that they have an agreement.". They automatically assume that this statement is correct, without backing it up with any evidence. To me, it is obvious that this reasoning is nonsense.

They apparently don't know what an "agreement" is, or how the word is used in everyday language. Think of the wonderful consequences of their view for the legal system!

A borrows money from B, and doesn't repay. A signed a paper, that noted the borrower's (i.e. his) obligation to repay, but A gets drunk and forgets about it. Wiped from his consciousness. He really did forget. He doesn't remember signing anything.

Poof ! There is no agreement -- no contractual claim of B -- because A forgot about it !

People can have an agreement, even if one party forgets about it. They can have an agreement, although one of them is mistaken about what the agreement is. There is still an agreement, even though they may disagree about what their agreement is (i.e. what the terms are) .... one of them may just be mis-remembering.

In fact, it's possible that both of them mis-remember exactly what the agreement is. This actually happens all the time in lawsuits.

This really isn't a hard concept, but apparently for some, it is.

The difference is that a contract is merely a relationship between A and B. But in bridge we have a third party, the opponents.

What the PK seems to be saying is that even though A and B have officially made an agreement, they're not acting as if the agreement is in effect. The purpose of disclosing agreements is so that the opponents have a chance to understand your auction. If you don't actually bid according to your agreements, the purpose of the full disclosure laws is not met.

[ralph23]

barmar, on Sep 5 2007, 12:55 PM, said:

If you don't actually bid according to your agreements, the purpose of the full disclosure laws is not met.

Of course it's met. (If you NEVER bid according to an "Agreement" or you only do so rarely, then you don't really HAVE an agreement, do you? But an occasional sputter doesn't nullify an agreement.)

The purpose of the full disclosure laws is, simply, that the opponents will know what your partnership agreements are.

That is the full and complete purpose of them. Period.

It is not a purpose of the full disclosure laws, that partners must always bid according to their agreements. Sometimes, they goof; or sometimes, they psych. These "sometimes" incidents are not fouls.

And, as you say, the FD purpose is (the same thing in different words) so that they, the opponents, will understand the agreed-upon meaning of your auction and its bids. They are NOT entitled to know anyone's hand; only what the bids mean.

If your auction fails to conform to your partnership agreements, but the opponents are properly informed about what those agreements are, then several things could have happened:

1. Someone psyched. I.e. he intentionally misbid as a tactical matter. This is a permitted bridge strategy, with a few caveats (i.e. (i) no psyching of artificial 2♣ opening, (ii) if you psych in X situation all the time, or a lot of the time, then that has become a de facto agreement that must be disclosed etc etc.... we're all familiar with these).

2. Someone misbid. There is no penalty for a misbid. Of course, the director/powers-that-be must DECIDE whether it was a (i) misbid or (ii) wrong explanation, and presume that it is (ii) unless it's clearly a (i). But that is an evidentiary and procedural rule, which properly casts the risk of non-persuasion (the "burden of proof") upon the erring pair.

If it's truly and clearly a misbid, then there is simply no penalty.

The opponents have no right to make you bid in accordance with your agreements. (Of course, if you never bid in accordance with your "agreement" then you don't really have an agreement, do you? But an occasional slip-up does not mean the agreement doesn't exist.) They are not "damaged" in a legal sense if you fail to bid in accordance with them, so long as they were informed properly about what the agreements are.

And, yes, there is another "party" to a legal contract as well: Society. Social rules ("laws") determine which agreements between private parties are legally enforceable and are thus truly "contracts." Thus, agreements to commit a crime (X agrees to murder Y, and Z agrees to pay X $10,000 in consideration) are not enforceable. Agreements unduly restricting competition may not be enforceable, even if neither the agreement nor the conduct is criminal. Sally's agreement to go on a date with Joe next Friday is probably not legally enforceable; it may just be too trivial (but compare her agreement to marry him).

Lawyers don't of course call "Society" a "party" to these contracts, but without the social rules/enforcement mechanism, you don't have a "law of contracts" but only "gentlemen's agreements."

nb -- If you never bid according to your "agreement" or you often don't, then there is a question of whether you really HAVE that agreement. That may be an evidentiary question, or even one about the meaning of the word "agreement" ... an agreement that no one observes and almost always violates is hardly worthy of the term. But this is a different question !!

This post has been edited by ralph23: 2007-September-05, 12:15

[TimG]

ralph23, on Sep 5 2007, 12:54 PM, said:

barmar, on Sep 5 2007, 12:55 PM, said:

If you don't actually bid according to your agreements, the purpose of the full disclosure laws is not met.

Of course it's met. (If you NEVER bid according to an "Agreement" or you only do so rarely, then you don't really HAVE an agreement, do you? But an occasional sputter doesn't nullify an agreement.)

I think barmar meant that "you" to be plural. That is, if a partnership does not bid according to their stated agreements, full disclosure has not been met.

If my partnership agrees to play transfer preempts, I forget and open 3H with hearts, and my partner also forgets and passes 3H (without a bunch of hearts of his own), then we've done something (lots of somethings) wrong. Even if the net effect is that the opponents think we have had a standard auction and that understanding meets our hands, we have not properly disclosed.

(Yes, I'm aware that the fact that both of us forgot would be strong evidence that an agreement does not exist, but assume the agreement is well documented and we simply had highly unlikely coincidental forgets.)

[ralph23]

TimG, on Sep 5 2007, 02:53 PM, said:

If my partnership agrees to play transfer preempts, I forget and open 3H with hearts, and my partner also forgets and passes 3H (without a bunch of hearts of his own), then we've done something (lots of somethings) wrong.  Even if the net effect is that the opponents think we have had a standard auction and that understanding meets our hands, we have not properly disclosed.

I don't see anything legally problematic about this auction. You misbid and opened 3♥ when you actually had ♥. That was a misbid.

Your partner failed to alert your artificial opening. That was a foul. An unintentional one, certainly; he would never intentionally pass your artificial bid. But his failure to alert your opening bid is a foul nonetheless.

Your partner then misbid (or mis-called). He should not have passed 3♥ unless he held about a zillion ♥. But he did pass. That was a mistake, an error, a bidding mishap. It was not a foul.

You failed to alert his pass as showing a bunch of ♥. (Maybe that's not alertable.... I don't know. What else could his passing an artificial 3♥ bid mean, except, "WOW you hit my long suit!" But let's assume it was alertable.)

Are the opponents entitled to redress for your failures to disclose? Not sure. But there certainly was at least one, and maybe two, fouls in the auction. They have a right to bring those fouls up, and let an independent party decide if redress is in order.

BUT I do know this: that the auction you describe is entirely different than one in which North simply misbids, and South then CORRECTLY alerts and explains the meaning of the North's bid.

That is not a foul. North simply made an error. He is under an obligation not to use the UI he obtained from South's alert, which has awakened him, of course; and if he fails to adhere to this new obligation, that may be a foul. But no foul has occurred simply because of his initial misbid.

And the same in your case. Your opening 3♥ was not a foul. Partner's failure to alert it as an artificial bid was a foul. If harm was caused, there should be redress.

But unless there is a foul to start with, there is simply nothing to redress.

And a mere misbid is simply not a foul.

Mere failure to bid by and according to partnership agreements, on sporadic occasions, is not, without more, wrongful.

Failure to disclose or explain the agreements upon inquiry, or failure to alert them when alerting is required, is wrongful.

Any governing authority which believes that an agreement between X and Y is either nullified or doesn't exist (temporarily or permanently), simply because on one occasion X forgets about it, then later says "Oh crap, I forgot!", just doesn't know how the word "agreement" works in ordinary language, or chooses to ignore it..... That's just Humpty-Dumptyism at its worst.

[Trinidad]

TimG, on Sep 5 2007, 01:53 PM, said:

ralph23, on Sep 5 2007, 12:54 PM, said:

barmar, on Sep 5 2007, 12:55 PM, said:

If you don't actually bid according to your agreements, the purpose of the full disclosure laws is not met.

Of course it's met. (If you NEVER bid according to an "Agreement" or you only do so rarely, then you don't really HAVE an agreement, do you? But an occasional sputter doesn't nullify an agreement.)

I think barmar meant that "you" to be plural. That is, if a partnership does not bid according to their stated agreements, full disclosure has not been met.

If my partnership agrees to play transfer preempts, I forget and open 3H with hearts, and my partner also forgets and passes 3H (without a bunch of hearts of his own), then we've done something (lots of somethings) wrong. Even if the net effect is that the opponents think we have had a standard auction and that understanding meets our hands, we have not properly disclosed.

(Yes, I'm aware that the fact that both of us forgot would be strong evidence that an agreement does not exist, but assume the agreement is well documented and we simply had highly unlikely coincidental forgets.)

I recall one occasion where both my partner and I made the same error. We had just changed from a SAYC like system to 2/1 GF (alertable at the time) and the auction started:

Pass-1♠; 2♣

I opened 1♠ and alerted 2♣. Before the opening lead we were asked and I explained 2♣ as GF. And indeed my partner did have a hand that was worth a game force because of the nice club suit as well as the support for my spades.

After the opening lead, RHO came in and said that our convention card said that we played (Reverse) Drury. We both had forgotten a convention that we had played for ages. Obviously, this could be taken as evidence that we didn't have the agreement that we were playing Drury. If a director would have ruled so and adjusted the score, neither me nor my partner would have objected or protested. We would have taken our loss on the board. (In this case, the misinformation didn't damage the opponents. So nothing happened, other than that four players were laughing.)

(To my best knowledge) this has been the only occasion in 13 years where my partner and I both forgot our system. If it would happen again, I would consider it so rare an event that I would happily take the adjusted score for "misinformation on the convention card", even if the information on the CC actually was correct.

Rik

[ralph23]

Trinidad, on Sep 5 2007, 03:24 PM, said:

[I recall one occasion where both my partner and I made the same error. We had just changed from a SAYC like system to 2/1 GF (alertable at the time) and the auction started:

Pass-1♠; 2♣

I opened 1♠ and alerted 2♣. Before the opening lead we were asked and I explained 2♣ as GF. And indeed my partner did have a hand that was worth a game force because of the nice club suit as well as the support for my spades.

After the opening lead, RHO came in and said that our convention card said that we played (Reverse) Drury. We both had forgotten a convention that we had played for ages. Obviously, this could be taken as evidence that we didn't have the agreement that we were playing Drury. If a director would have ruled so and adjusted the score, neither me nor my partner would have objected or protested. We would have taken our loss on the board. (In this case, the misinformation didn't damage the opponents. So nothing happened, other than that four players were laughing.)

(To my best knowledge) this has been the only occasion in 13 years where my partner and I both forgot our system. If it would happen again, I would consider it so rare an event that I would happily take the adjusted score for "misinformation on the convention card", even if the information on the CC actually was correct.

Rik

That's funny. As you note, there are several sources for determining

(1) whether NS have an agreement regarding X; or
(2) if they do, what the terms of the agreement are.

These sources include the CC, NS's testimony, their actual bids and alerts at the table, the testimony of their peers and NS's behavior in other hands.

Sometimes, the sources conflict. But just because (2) is uncertain or subject to dispute, this doesn't mean that there is no agreement.

[jtfanclub]

ralph23, on Sep 5 2007, 12:54 PM, said:

It is not a purpose of the full disclosure laws, that partners must always bid according to their agreements. Sometimes, they goof; or sometimes, they psych. These "sometimes" incidents are not fouls.

Yet. That may change.

I say if a person opens 1NT with 15-17 labeled on their sheet, but occassionally psyches, and that psych always has 6 spades and 8-10 hcp, I'm entitled to know that information.

And I further say that any time that you can legally do something by saying "Oh! I didn't psyche, I misbid" is just asking for more trouble than it's worth.

Here's looking forward to 2017.

[ralph23]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 04:14 PM, said:

I say if a person opens 1NT with 15-17 labeled on their sheet, but occassionally psyches, and that psych always has 6 spades and 8-10 hcp, I'm entitled to know that information.

Of course you are. That's a near textbook description of a disguised tacit agreement (well, assuming that he plays with the same partner(s), so that the partner(s) tend(s) to get the drift of his bidding after a while and figure out that indeed "1nt" has multiple meanings. The opps are entitled to this information.

If, on the other hand, he never does it with any partner more than once, and the ex-partners don't discuss him with each other so as to convey information to his soon-to-be-future-partners, then there's no disguised agreement, tacit or otherwise, but just a weird guy, which isn't a foul).

[jtfanclub]

ralph23, on Sep 5 2007, 03:27 PM, said:

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 04:14 PM, said:

I say if a person opens 1NT with 15-17 labeled on their sheet, but occassionally psyches, and that psych always has 6 spades and 8-10 hcp, I'm entitled to know that information.

Of course you are. That's a near textbook description of a disguised tacit agreement (well, assuming that he plays with the same partner(s), so that the partner(s) tend(s) to get the drift of his bidding after a while and figure out that indeed "1nt" has multiple meanings. The opps are entitled to this information.

Righto. Let's assume same partners here.

Now let's say that these partners used to play DONT, but have now switched to Capp. 2 hearts used to mean hearts and spades, and now means hearts and a minor. So whenever the player overcalls 1NT with 2 hearts, it usually shows the majors, but sometimes he psyches, er, misbids it with hearts and a minor.

How is this not a tacit agreement? Because he calls it a misbid instead of a psych?

[ralph23]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 04:14 PM, said:

And I further say that any time that you can legally do something by saying "Oh! I didn't psyche, I misbid" is just asking for more trouble than it's worth.

Psyches and misbids are both legal, so I'm not sure what the reference is to, or what sanction this hypothetical person is trying to escape from...

....of course, some psyches are fouls (most aren't)..... maybe if you accidentally opened 2♣ when you claimed you meant to open a weak-2♦ and got your hand on the wrong card in the bid box? But you were sneakily psyching 2♣??

This seems very far-fetched.

If players want to cheat, there are much much better methods than these.

[ralph23]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 04:34 PM, said:

Now let's say that these partners used to play DONT, but have now switched to Capp. 2 hearts used to mean hearts and spades, and now means hearts and a minor. So whenever the player overcalls 1NT with 2 hearts, it usually shows the majors, but sometimes he psyches, er, misbids it with hearts and a minor.

How is this not a tacit agreement? Because he calls it a misbid instead of a psych?

It may be a tacit agreement, which should be disclosed. (I think you meant they used to play Capp and now they play DONT, but I got your drift.)

Alert! Yes? "We play DONT now, but sometimes we still play Capp, due to our aging brains which don't always absorb everything right away.... God only knows which one is in effect this time. I just do my best...."

Or it may be a misbid. Depends on how often it's happened. And on what's on the CC. And on how often they get it right. And on what they discuss between themselves and with others. The evidence is varied.

Misbids aren't fouls.

Or it may be indeed a psych. An odd time for one. But those aren't fouls either.

It's the director's job to put the infelicity into the right category. He uses presumptions and burdens-of-proof, as noted above in earlier posts, for both procedural clarity/ease and for substantive justice. The law's full of these things ... shifting around burdens-of-proof for all sorts of reasons.

But saying misbid is a disfavored interpretation (True), and saying misbids are fouls (False), -- these are different things indeed.

My impression is you must play with a bunch of cheaters or aspiring cheaters. I guess I just don't have that same experience.

[jtfanclub]

Yeah, sorry. Anyhow, if a possible misbid is alerted, then it isn't a misbid.

Alert! Yes? "Shows the majors, but we used to play it as hearts and a minor, and partner has forgotten twice in the past week."

Now it doesn't even qualify as a misbid- it's a perfectly legal dual meaning bid, and I'm happy, whether he used the old meaning or the new one.

Quote

Misbids aren't fouls.

Misbids commonly end up being tacit agreements. I'm not talking about mechanical failures, but repeatedly 'forgetting' your system.

Quote

My impression is you must play with a bunch of cheaters or aspiring cheaters. I guess I just don't have that same experience.

These are people who don't understand that you can't slam a bid down on the table when you really mean it, or take a few extra seconds before you double to show uncertainty. A lot of them seem to feel that anything unusual in a pairs game is cheating, and do all sorts of unscrupulous things. It's nothing formal, but coffeehousers can usually figure out when their partner is psyching, and while I honestly don't care (after all, I can usually figure it out too), it burns me when they know what their partner really has and I don't.

[ralph23]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 05:07 PM, said:

Anyhow, if a possible misbid is alerted, then it isn't a misbid.

Sure it is. If Sam and I have agreed to play strong 2 opening bids, and I (of course) forget and open 2♠ having a six-bagger in ♠ with ♠AKJxxx and nothing else, then I've misbid.

Sam might even alert it, and he will if asked say "Our agreement is that this bid is both very strong and natural." He has properly recited our agreement; I've just screwed up.

We'll get in a terrible contract of course, and I still misbid.... his alerting it and properly explaining our agreement does not change that fact. I have misbid. Whoops.

This post has been edited by ralph23: 2007-September-05, 15:32

[ralph23]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 05:07 PM, said:

Quote

Misbids aren't fouls.

Misbids commonly end up being tacit agreements. I'm not talking about mechanical failures, but repeatedly 'forgetting' your system.

It's true, of course, that a series of misbids may lead to a tacit agreement.

When it does so lead, as in your DONT/Capp example, then at that point the bid is no longer a misbid, but it has become one in conformity with the (somewhat screwed up wacky dual) agreement.

When it's in conformity with the SSUWD agreement, by definition, it is not a misbid. That's what the "mis" means, in effect.

The tacit agreement may indeed be all SNAFU, and may even be an illegal convention or illegal agreement under ACBL rules, but that's neither here nor there for purposes of determining if the bid's a "mis" bid.

[ralph23]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 05:07 PM, said:

These are people who don't understand that you can't slam a bid down on the table when you really mean it, or take a few extra seconds before you double to show uncertainty. A lot of them seem to feel that anything unusual in a pairs game is cheating, and do all sorts of unscrupulous things. It's nothing formal, but coffeehousers can usually figure out when their partner is psyching, and while I honestly don't care (after all, I can usually figure it out too), it burns me when they know what their partner really has and I don't.

A. If they're doing these things consciously and intentionally, they're cheating.

For those in Category A: If they don't know the rules and proprieties of bridge, they're probably beginners and should be instructed that it's not like poker. If they do know, they should be ejected without further ado.

B. If unconsciously, they should be warned about it.

We call the Director on this where I come from. But again, we don't have a lot of violations; most people don't come to play in order to cheat.

[SoTired]

I don't think we are discussing the extra-ordinary situation, like the player who confused Capp & DONT several times in one week or some of the other obvious cheating/unethical situations mentioned.

I think that we are trying to determine the validity of an appeals committee that routinely considers a misbid to automatically abrogate an agreement thus turning an explanation into a mis-explanation and subject to penalty.