[Hanoi5]

When you play in a good bridge game you often find yourself looking at extremely good results. Contracts that go down on impeccable defenses, contracts made through fine gard play and well bid contracts. Of course there'll be a share of misunderstandings and bad plays but these will only represent a small percentage (or not so big anyway). As you move towards bad fields the results tend to be impredictable and terrible. A good pair might find itself in this kind of situation:

Scoring: MP

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After South opened the bidding with one heart his side got to double E/W at the 4 level in spades. 13 tricks are for the taking as you can see and N/S expect to have a great score of 1390, as everyone else should be in 6 spades at least. However, at the end of the night it turns out only one pair out of 12 tables got to the slam so the Striped Tailed Ape Double didn't quite work. Maybe this is a far-fetched example but I guess you get what I mean. What are 'good' players to do, then?

I was approached by such a player who asked if it will be possible to have some duplicated hands (transcripts) with datums to use in the tournaments. My objective here is to find a RL Director who is willing to give hands played at his/her club with the results gotten there so that we can have better comparisons over here.

Thanks in advance.

[TimG]

Hanoi5, on Jan 31 2008, 11:13 AM, said:

Maybe this is a far-fetched example but I guess you get what I mean. What are 'good' players to do, then?

For every time the field fails to protect your result, you'll get 9-10 excellent MP results because the field isn't able to duplicate your result. The "good" player should simply recognize that the game does not hinge upon a single board and that there is a fair amount of luck involved in a short MP event in a weak field -- the "good" players won't win every time.

[Hanoi5]

That's quite true, but... wouldn't it be better to have some serious results that are not sub-normal? I'm tired of hearing people saying 'Look 3NT can be made' just because one pair played it and God-only-knows-why made it. I think it fairer for good players and more pedagogical for bad players to have some good results to compare to.

[FrancesHinden]

You are describing something known as 'instant matchpoints'. The worldwide simultaneous pairs used to be done on this basis, but it is actually not very popular any more.

Richard Pavlicek's web site includes some data files for instant MP games. Look at http://www.rpbridge.net/rpbr.htm#06

[han]

Hanoi5, on Jan 31 2008, 11:13 AM, said:

When you play in a good bridge game you often find yourself looking at extremely good results. Contracts that go down on impeccable defenses, contracts made through fine gard play and well bid contracts. Of course there'll be a share of misunderstandings and bad plays but these will only represent a small percentage (or not so big anyway). As you move towards bad fields the results tend to be impredictable and terrible. A good pair might find itself in this kind of situation:

Scoring: MP

---

After South opened the bidding with one heart his side got to double E/W at the 4 level in spades. 13 tricks are for the taking as you can see and N/S expect to have a great score of 1390, as everyone else should be in 6 spades at least. However, at the end of the night it turns out only one pair out of 12 tables got to the slam so the Striped Tailed Ape Double didn't quite work. Maybe this is a far-fetched example but I guess you get what I mean. What are 'good' players to do, then?

I was approached by such a player who asked if it will be possible to have some duplicated hands (transcripts) with datums to use in the tournaments. My objective here is to find a RL Director who is willing to give hands played at his/her club with the results gotten there so that we can have better comparisons over here.

Thanks in advance.

So you are claiming that NS doubled 4S on purpose and were unlucky that 1390 was a poor score for them? I'm sceptical, could you give us the auction?

[Apollo81]

If the doubling pair is good enough to make a stripe tailed ape double on purpose, then they should also be good enough to know not to do it in a weak field. Same thing goes for some sacrifices that are right in theory.

In a weak field, if it's the opps' hand and they get a plus score, you're probably getting a bad score. You're definitely getting a bad score if they didn't screw up, even if the hand was easy. At the same time, when it's your hand, unclear, or when the defense is difficult you shouldn't have to work as hard to get a good score, which should more than offset the previous factor.

[Hanoi5]

Ok Hannie, you saw through my plot. But the point is more or less the same, wouldn't it be better to have some serious results to compare to?

[Codo]

1. The hand is a real bad example.
2. If you open the bidding, bet that the opps in 80% won´t reach a slam if you don't push them there.
3. Where is the problem? From time to time I write a plain zero in a contract which should be average. Sometimes you defend for 500 against their cold vunerable game, expecting a top and get a zero cause nobody else did bid game. This is part of the game.
4. If somebody blames you for not making 3 NT which had been made at another table, become good enough to analyze the hand and tell her/him why your line was the best line- just not successfull.