[aguahombre]

No, I don't believe that just because the TD makes a ruling regarding an action by your partner automatically makes that action AI to you. Certain sections, such as substituting an unintended bid, state that the withdrawn bid is AI (whether we agree with that or not), but not everything pard does becomes AI when the TD refers to it.

[campboy]

What has partner done? Nothing as far as I can see other than draw attention to a bid out of turn by his LHO. It is not normal to rule that the fact of an opponent's irregularity is UI to you if your partner drew attention to it.

[WellSpyder]

aguahombre, on 2011-November-10, 08:29, said:

Certain sections, such as substituting an unintended bid, state that the withdrawn bid is AI (whether we agree with that or not)

More or less by definition an unintended bid contains no real I, so it can't cause UI problems. I suspect it is defined as AI just to short-cut any discussions about UI.

[aguahombre]

campboy, on 2011-November-10, 09:24, said:

What has partner done? Nothing as far as I can see other than draw attention to a bid out of turn by his LHO. It is not normal to rule that the fact of an opponent's irregularity is UI to you if your partner drew attention to it.

If you think LHO bidding when a green card is on the table in front of the dealer before him is a bid out of turn and an irregularity making them the OS, we are on different planets.

This post has been edited by aguahombre: 2011-November-10, 10:03

[Cascade]

jhenrikj, on 2011-November-10, 05:08, said:

We had this problem during simulations in the EBL TD course in San Remo. The correct answer was that the pass is not a call made. The 1C opening is BOOT, accepted by the overcall so the bidding just continues.

This seems a normal ruling to me.

I am not sure on the existence of any specific regulation regarding returning the bidding cards to the box. I have certainly seen some players leave bidding cards, in particular pass cards, on the table (but to the side) rather than return them to the boxes.

The other players, in particular the dealers LHO, also seem to be in violation of the laws as they have paid insufficient attention to the game and consequently believed a pass was made when it wasn't.

[ggwhiz]

phil_20686, on 2011-November-09, 12:01, said:

One is a little confused

Lets see....
I have a strong notrump.
lho has an opening bid.
partner has a 2 level overcall
rho has a forcing 2♥ bid.

Perhaps drawing attention would give the opps a heads up that we are bidding with a pinochle deck.

Whether you provide UI or not I doubt partner will act on it in a damaging manner if you just bid 3nt.

[iviehoff]

aguahombre, on 2011-November-10, 09:54, said:

If you think LHO bidding when a green card is on the table in front of the dealer before him is a bid out of turn, we are on different planets.

Your planet is less well populated than mine. I think you are thinking that having made a BOOT is a terrible thing, but in this case it isn't, or at least, it isn't any longer.

The green card on the table should be sufficient extenuating circumstances that he is not going to be disadvantaged by his BOOT, though I have come across cases where a director has argued that it is your responsibility to distinguish between a card/bid accidentally lying on the table and a card/bid played/made, ie, don't assume the bid was made unless you saw it made, though I think that is an uncommon attitude. But clearly, dealer didn't make a bid, though you will have to examine the bidding box regulations of the specific local authority to satisfy yourself of this, since this will define what action the player has to carry out to make a bid. But a bidding card left lying around accidentally is not going to be a bid made, unless there is a specific line in the local regulations to that effect, which doesn't apply in England. So dealer's LHO's call must be a BOOT. But dealer's partner has called over the BOOT - that legalises it. So the player is no longer an offender in any way for having made a BOOT. And if (in the unlikely case) he has been disadvantaged by the misinformation of the pass card left on the table, he is going to be compensated for that too.

[gordontd]

Cascade, on 2011-November-10, 10:12, said:

This seems a normal ruling to me.

The problem comes when the call left on the table is not a Pass. I had a case where it was 1NT, which was doubled by LHO. This is fine if the third hand calls, as you could just rewind the whole auction under Law 36A, but otherwise this approach would lead to the fourth player being barred from bidding for the whole auction.

When I've had this situation, I've ruled under Law 21B1a, that the bidding cards left on the table constituted misinformation. That allowed the doubler to change his call without penalty. Max Bavin agreed with me that this was a reasonable approach.

[aguahombre]

Ivehoff: you snipped a little too much when quoting me. If I had stopped there, you are absolutely right.

But, the point I was making was that the BOOT does not, IMO, make dealer's infraction and the fact that he didn't really pass AI. Or, at least it doesn't make it AI because of the BOOT. Dealer is still the one who committed the irregularity.

[Vampyr]

Cascade, on 2011-November-10, 10:12, said:

This seems a normal ruling to me.

I am not sure on the existence of any specific regulation regarding returning the bidding cards to the box. I have certainly seen some players leave bidding cards, in particular pass cards, on the table (but to the side) rather than return them to the boxes.

This sounds strange. I have certainly never seen this.

Quote

The other players, in particular the dealers LHO, also seem to be in violation of the laws as they have paid insufficient attention to the game and consequently believed a pass was made when it wasn't.

Absolutely not. Often dealer's LHO does not realise it is his turn to bid until he has seen the pass card on the table. In fact, sometimes this realisation is delayed -- haven't we all occasionally seen this player sitting vacantly, unaware that there is a pass card on the table to his right?

Paying sufficient attention to the game does not mean watching your opponents' every move to make sure that they actually place their bidding cards on the table. Looking up from sorting your cards and seeing a pass card on the table is enough.

Anyway, we had a thread like this not too long ago; I think that it happened at the Young Chelsea. I don't know what ruling was considered sensible in that thread, but I personally cannot see any logic in any ruling other than that the Pass and the subsequent auction stand. And I think that even those who disagree would have to concede that it is at least the most practical approach.

Edit: This post has crossed lots of other ones, which is the reason it may seem to be a bit behind the discussion.

This post has been edited by Vampyr: 2011-November-10, 10:40

[blackshoe]

iviehoff, on 2011-November-10, 06:04, said:

I don't think the presense of the Director is necessary to make an immediate ruling on this, or preserve the NOS's rights, I think they can complain about it at the end of the hand if they think we have taken advantage of that UI.

I think what you're trying to say here is that giving UI is not an irregularity, and although bidding out of turn (by dealer's LHO in this case) is, the BOOT was accepted by responder, and that is what the TD would rule, so there's no need to ask for a ruling. If so, I might agree. However, what you say is that an immediate ruling can be made without the presence of the director, and that's just wrong.

[campboy]

aguahombre, on 2011-November-10, 09:54, said:

If you think LHO bidding when a green card is on the table in front of the dealer before him is a bid out of turn and an irregularity making them the OS, we are on different planets.

I don't think they are *the* offending side, since failing to put your pass card back is also an infraction. But the bidding-box regulations make it clear that the pass is not, and never has been, part of the auction on this board. Consequently the opening bid was out of turn.

[AlexJonson]

In the old days when people spoke their bids, the echos couldn't still be there during the next hand,

Arguably authorities have been lazy in their bidding box regulations, as the laws and regulations are often inadvertently lazy in the way they are expressed.

[blackshoe]

campboy, on 2011-November-10, 14:20, said:

I don't think they are *the* offending side, since failing to put your pass card back is also an infraction. But the bidding-box regulations make it clear that the pass is not, and never has been, part of the auction on this board. Consequently the opening bid was out of turn.

AlexJonson, on 2011-November-10, 14:56, said:

In the old days when people spoke their bids, the echos couldn't still be there during the next hand,

Arguably authorities have been lazy in their bidding box regulations, as the laws and regulations are often inadvertently lazy in the way they are expressed.

In the EBU, Campboy is correct (OB 7B7). ACBL Bidding Box regulations do not say anything about putting the bidding cards back in the box. Custom here is that people start putting the bidding cards away as soon as they think the auction will include no more bids or doubles.

[Vampyr]

gordontd, on 2011-November-10, 10:23, said:

The problem comes when the call left on the table is not a Pass. I had a case where it was 1NT, which was doubled by LHO. This is fine if the third hand calls, as you could just rewind the whole auction under Law 36A, but otherwise this approach would lead to the fourth player being barred from bidding for the whole auction.

When I've had this situation, I've ruled under Law 21B1a, that the bidding cards left on the table constituted misinformation. That allowed the doubler to change his call without penalty. Max Bavin agreed with me that this was a reasonable approach.

Perhaps an approach that covers all bases is to treat the call as a mechanical error. That is how it seems to me -- the fact that the error constituted leaving a card out in error rather than taking it out in error does not seem like a big distinction to me.

[iviehoff]

Vampyr, on 2011-November-11, 06:18, said:

Perhaps an approach that covers all bases is to treat the call as a mechanical error. That is how it seems to me -- the fact that the error constituted leaving a card out in error rather than taking it out in error does not seem like a big distinction to me.

I agree it would be a good solution to write the regs in that way, but they aren't written like that now.

[Vampyr]

iviehoff, on 2011-November-11, 08:14, said:

I agree it would be a good solution to write the regs in that way, but they aren't written like that now.

They aren't, as far as I know, written at all.

[RMB1]

Vampyr, on 2011-November-11, 09:51, said:

They aren't, as far as I know, written at all.

The regulations do tell us the Pass was not made; but they don't tell us what to do with a call left on the table.

[JanM]

Quote

I am not sure on the existence of any specific regulation regarding returning the bidding cards to the box. I have certainly seen some players leave bidding cards, in particular pass cards, on the table (but to the side) rather than return them to the boxes.

Vampyr, on 2011-November-10, 10:36, said:

This sounds strange. I have certainly never seen this.

Playing with screens, particularly in a quiet room (such as one with only one table), it is actually excellent practice to remove all of the pass cards from the bidding box and place them on the table, so that you are able to place a pass card on the tray silently. Otherwise one of the purposes of screens (not knowing which player has taken time to make a bid) often is destroyed by the fact that removing a pass card from the bidding box makes a noise. Or course, removing a bid often makes a noise, but at least there is some improvement if the pass cards are not in the bidding box.

(sorry, I couldn't figure out how to properly attribute the first quote, but probably it's not too relevant ).

[Cyberyeti]

blackshoe, on 2011-November-10, 16:20, said:

In the EBU, Campboy is correct (OB 7B7). ACBL Bidding Box regulations do not say anything about putting the bidding cards back in the box. Custom here is that people start putting the bidding cards away as soon as they think the auction will include no more bids or doubles.

Normal in the EBU is that they're put away when the partner of the face down opening leader says "No (further) questions".