[jdeegan]

I am unsure as to what BBO rating I should use - advanced or expert. Could you give me some help, please?

Some relevant facts:

1. Have played duplicate for over 40 years with a 20 year hiatus - 1975 to 95.

2. Have about 1450 masterpoints - 1000 before 1975

3. Play occasional Regional tourneys and have been to three Nationals since 1995. No pro partners, not even Gerard. Placed first, second or third in regional pairs and open swiss events (flight A/X and/or unrestricted) five times since 1995 - about 10% of my outings.

4. Placed 17th in the 2006 Silver Ribbon Pairs - my only outing in a national rated event ever - my pard was a good player, but had only 500 masterpoints.

5. Play quite a bit on BBO (100 to 300 hands per month), nearly always indies for IMPs. Usually plus IMPs for the month, maybe 0.25 per hand on average.

6. I count hands when needed. Find most squeezes, endplays, etc. Able to solve one, sometimes both of Kantar's play problems in the ACBL monthly bulletin. Try to keep up by reading Bridge World, et. al.

Your vote and comments invited.

[gwnn]

just mark yourself anything you like, no one will care, there will be many many players, both advanced and experts, both much weaker and much stronger than you

[han]

Agree with Csaba, but I would suggest either advanced or expert depending on what you feel comfortable with.

[neilkaz]

If I may chime in here and noting that not everyone will agree with some of this and if I mention myself, please respect my self judgement.

Here's how I judge myself ..

Declarer play... I've studied lots, and can do what you can do with counting, squeezes, endplays etc and have studied and practice deceptive declarer play to confuse the opps at times (I hope). I consider myself equal to the average expert on BBO when it comes to declarer play. Your skill sounds similar to mine.

Bidding... Again an area I have spent lots of time on and I feel very adept playing anything SAYCish or 2/1 GF noting I am an American 2/1er. I think I am on par with the average expert on BBO when it comes to bidding the common systems used in our countries and by our typical PD's. I feel that my hand evaluation is very good and that I can make good (not world class level) decisions at high levels of bidding in IMPs (all I play on BBO)

Defense... Still not my strong suit and I feel that I am only somewhat better than the average advanced player on BBO and not equal to the average expert when it comes to IMP (all I play) defence. Maybe my defense is adv+ but it is not what I'd call expert.

So I play with adv and exp lots and lots (15+hrs/week). If I am playing with 3 other experts, I usually don't think that I am the worst player at the table, but would almost never think that I am the best. So...

I ask myself the question...and I am asking the same of you. "Am I as good as the average expert I encounter on BBO ?" I think that I am close, but not quite there yet, and also still want to gain more familiarity against less than usual bidding methods.

So...I call myself advanced. I would check advanced+ if that were available and feel comfortable.

When will I call myself expert ? Hopefully when my defence improves and the rest of my game makes a small gain and I feel without doubt that I am at least as skilled as the average expert on BBO (again noting that maybe 1/4 to 1/3 are quite overrated).

So.... I think I've said (overdone ) my self appraisal and given you and others my guideline for self rating.

I didn't vote yet as you haven't mentioned your bidding skills nor defensive skills and note that we defend twice as often as we declare. From what I've read, I think that you are adv+.

The purpose of self rating is so that your opps and PD have accurate expectations of your abilities and what to expect when you sit with them. I win lots of imps playing with advanced players, and hold my own with experts but just think I need a bit more skill and experience to call myself one.

I think you'll also find that most of the regulars here on this forum would prefer to err on the side of caution when it comes to self rating. Most of the ones of you who call themselves experts are at least as skilled as 3/4 of the many experts I've encountered on BBO and I aspire to be that skilled.

Hold the flames please .. .. neilkaz ..

[jtfanclub]

jdeegan, on Dec 17 2007, 09:20 PM, said:

3. Play occasional Regional tourneys and have been to three Nationals since 1995. No pro partners, not even Gerard. Placed first, second or third in regional pairs and open swiss events (flight A/X and/or unrestricted) five times since 1995 - about 10% of my outings.

4. Placed 17th in the 2006 Silver Ribbon Pairs - my only outing in a national rated event ever - my pard was a good player, but had only 500 masterpoints.

I'd say Advanced

I think it was jdonn who said that an expert playing with an equal partner should almost always come in the money in a regional. I agree with that sentiment, even if I'm misattributing it. I mean, I've won a Swiss and a couple of the choice pair games at regionals, and if I qualify as Advanced it's by my fingernails.

If it's the Vegas or Gatlinburg regionals, that's different, but your ordinary small town regional (like the Minneapolis one) there are no World Class players and only a half a dozen Experts. If you aren't arguably the best person there, I don't think you're an Expert.

Just my opinion, of course.

[inquiry]

In the interest of given an evaluation, let me say that your accomplishments seem to fit with what the BBO would classify as "advanced".

According to the BBO Rules of this site, and
Advanced player is "someone who has been consistently successful in clubs and minor tournaments," while an
Expert is "someone who has enjoyed success in major national tournaments"

Your self-description falls into the advanced by that standard I think.

You suggested that you average "maybe" 0.25 imps per board. Actually, I took the liberty of running Bridgebrowser stats on you and I can attest that since March 6, 2007 through Sept 30 2007 you played in BBO tournaments (and possibly team games, as I didn't sort them out) 2,253 hands. These came out as:

1778 imp hands with an average of 0.28 imps/board (slightly higher than your 0.25)
475 MP hands, at an average of 51.02%

Considering that most of these were clearly played in individuals (most hands played with scotth at 34 hands, second most with dddave at 31) it is hard to draw too much of a conclusion from these imp and MP%, but a true expert would have done better I think over so many hands (given the randomness of individuals, it is difficult to say with certainty). Still, 0.28 against the field suggest you are clearly better than the "average" BBO player (or at least the average bbo player who choose to play in individuals).

Out of these 2253 hands, you bid 4 grand (7c, 7h, 7s, 7n each once), and made all 4, and you bid 55 slams, and made 36 of them. To be specific, you declared 28 of the 55 slams, and you made 23 of them (note, one slam, your partner took a save against 5H that was going down after you opened weak 2D).

So, it looks like you should rate yourself as advanced, but on the other hand, I would guess that you are a better player than 70% of the players who rate themselves as bbo experts, so you could rate yourself expert should you wish and no one would think worse of you.

[han]

inquiry, on Dec 17 2007, 11:19 PM, said:

So, it looks like you should rate yourself as advanced, but on the other hand, I would guess that you are a better player than 70% of the players who rate themselves as bbo experts, so you could rate yourself expert should you wish and no one would think worse of you.

I think that this is exactly right (could be 60% or 80% but the idea is right).

[adhoc3]

With a few of your listed items, someone would claim themself World Class:)

Very intersting statistic done by Inquiry. Maybe BBO will introduce an auto evluation system in future? No need to be a must, but could be helpful:)

[helene_t]

I would say that your results in individuals are accurate indicators of your playing strength. In pairs events you could have the advantage of playing with a good, regular partner against lots of pick-up pairs who don't know each others styles. In indys it should even out in the long run. In theory one could boost indy results by selecting tourneys with a weak field (on the basis of time zone, reputation of the director, inclusion criteria) but I doubt that there is much diference in field strength between indys, except maybe for a few private clubs.

[gizzydrop]

Im not sure there is much of a difference between whether it is pairs or an indy. Although you may be with a person you have played with a couple of times, in individuals i find that often partners dont take it seriously at all, and if they are someone who automatically thnks they are better than you because they class themselves as expert and you as advanced, often they will angle the bidding so they get to play the contract, which can lead to a poor result.

Also i find that individuals are taken far less seriously and people are prone to doing more random things than with pairs. In pairs, although you have a person you have probably played with before, so have the opposition, thus the standard of bridge will be most likely sounder and perhaps pairs are a more accurate result, who knows..

[ArtK78]

I would strongly disagree with the last comment about individuals vs. pairs.

Individuals are the ultimate crapshoot. Almost always, you have three opponents. Even the best player will have bad sessions in an individual event when he has no control over the situation. The results will be very random. On average, better players will do better, but the variance will be extremely high.

In a pair event, with a partner of your own choosing who is probably at a similar skill level, you will get results more in keeping with your skill level.

My personal experience with individuals has been mixed, to say the least. Back on e-bridge, there was a World Individual Competition. I remember having a very good set and being in a position to qualify for the semifinals when I was paired with a player who I was very familiar with. I knew she was terrible, and I feared the worst. Sure enough, two zeros later I was out of the event.

Edgar Kaplan had a very funny story about individuals. Many years ago, the ACBL ran a National Championship - the Life Master Individual. Edgar was playing in the event and he was paired with an elderly lady that he knew was not good. On one hand she held about a 15 count and she did more than her share of bidding, eventually getting doubled and set several tricks. She apologized to Edgar, saying something to the effect that she had 15 points. Edgar replied, "My mistake, dear, I thought you had 300!"

[jdeegan]

ArtK78, on Dec 19 2007, 10:05 AM, said:

I would strongly disagree with the last comment about individuals vs. pairs.

Individuals are the ultimate crapshoot.  Almost always, you have three opponents.  Even the best player will have bad sessions in an individual event when he has no control over the situation.  The results will be very random.  On average, better players will do better, but the variance will be extremely high.

In a pair event, with a partner of your own choosing who is probably at a similar skill level, you will get results more in keeping with your skill level.

My personal experience with individuals has been mixed, to say the least.  Back on e-bridge, there was a World Individual Competition.  I remember having a very good set and being in a position to qualify for the semifinals when I was paired with a player who I was very familiar with.  I knew she was terrible, and I feared the worst.  Sure enough, two zeros later I was out of the event.

Edgar Kaplan had a very funny story about individuals.  Many years ago, the ACBL ran a National Championship - the Life Master Individual.  Edgar was playing in the event and he was paired with an elderly lady that he knew was not good.  On one hand she held about a 15 count and she did more than her share of bidding, eventually getting doubled and set several tricks.  She apologized to Edgar, saying something to the effect that she had 15 points.  Edgar replied, "My mistake, dear, I thought you had 300!"

Pretty good summary of the wacky world of indies. As a recent veteran of 1500+ hands in six months, I can add one additional "X" factor. Even opposite a BBO starred player (and that doen't even include that ONE particular guy) all you can really count on is a good dummy player, and a defender who won't do anything really dumb. Bidding has to be rudimentary.

Outcomes of a typical short match have a very wide variance.

I play indies only to keep my game sharp for the occasional live tournament, so the wild and wierd oucomes have become a source of amusement.