[ghsmith45]

This will probably be a Doh! moment, but in his book on overcalls Mike Lawrence makes the following statement concerning matchpoint play:
“If you can’t stomach going for your life every now and then, you’ll get a lot of 167’s and 172.5’s but you won’t get many wins”
Where do those figures come from?
Geoff

[mike777]

 ghsmith45, on 2026-January-23, 00:00, said:

This will probably be a Doh! moment, but in his book on overcalls Mike Lawrence makes the following statement concerning matchpoint play:
“If you can’t stomach going for your life every now and then, you’ll get a lot of 167’s and 172.5’s but you won’t get many wins”
Where do those figures come from?
Geoff

Way back when. 156 was average on a 12 top.

26 boards , 12 top

Back when you may shoot for a score near 200 to win the event, 172 won't be enough to win.


These are just numbers every duplicate bridge player knew as easily as breathing..

Remember all scoring was done by hand.

[jillybean]

Showing your age

[ghsmith45]

mike777, on 2026-January-23, 00:15, said:

Way back when. 156 was average on a 12 top.

26 boards , 12 top

Back when you may shoot for a score near 200 to win the event, 172 won't be enough to win.


These are just numbers every duplicate bridge player knew as easily as breathing..

Remember all scoring was done by hand.

Thanks Mike

[mycroft]

Yeah, if there's a downside to "across-the-field scoring" and web/other perfect movements, it's that the matchpoint numbers we all knew (based on 108 and 156 averages) mean nothing now that the average is "random", so the raw score isn't as useful.

Which to me is kind of like saying that getting good winter boots has the downside of no longer being able to sneaker-skate down the sidewalk on the ice. True, but the compensation is so worth it...

[barmar]

And to save people from having to do "higher math", 172 is about 55%. Good enough to scratch, but rarely enough to win.