[lamford]

blackshoe, on 2014-August-02, 11:26, said:

At first reading, I thought for a second that the antecedent of "it" is "the misexplanation". I suspect though that you intended the antecedent to be "the failure of the contract".

You are correct, and I have tried to amend my post!

[FrancesHinden]

lamford, on 2014-August-02, 11:18, said:

In Europe, North is not allowed to lower the screen and give some comment, even if trying to be helpful. I presume that the screen regulations are different in the US, and we have enough eminent US posters who can tell me if that is the case.

However, the misexplanation did not cause the contract to fail. Its failure was unrelated to the infraction and caused by an inability to think clearly about the diamond suit. If North had been dealt KT doubleton in diamonds, I would adjust.

The ACBL (and USBF) screen regs are different in a number of ways from the WBF/EBL ones (on which the English ones are modelled).

[lamford]

FrancesHinden, on 2014-August-02, 15:17, said:

The ACBL (and USBF) screen regs are different in a number of ways from the WBF/EBL ones (on which the English ones are modelled).

Yes, I gathered that from the Helgemo-Helness v Auken-Welland appeal, where I recall that HH could have checked whether the correct explanation was received on the other side of the screen.

This post has been edited by lamford: 2014-August-03, 02:44

[jallerton]

lamford, on 2014-August-02, 11:49, said:

No. But she had no reason to play the diamond suit this way with the mis-explanation. "The objective of score adjustment is to redress damage to a non-offending side and to take away any advantage gained by an offending side through its infraction." The misexplanation did not cause the damage. Her own blunder did. I would adjust if North had ♦ KT doubleton, as I said. Now the misexplanation has potentially caused damage.

This is a common theme in misinformation cases. A player takes a sub-optimal line in the face of the explanation she was given, but the TD believes that she would have taken a successful line had she received a correct explanation. In such cases, the damage was caused by a combination of two factors: (i) the misexplanation and (ii) the sub-optimal play (or call) made by the non-offender in the light of the explanation supplied at the table.

So it could be argued, as you do, that (ii) was the cause of the damage so no redress is due; or it could be argued as other have done, that (i) was the cause of the damage, so a misinformation adjustment is in order.

How should we approach such cases? I think we should listen to the Chief TD!

[aguahombre]

jallerton, on 2014-August-02, 16:30, said:

This is a common theme in misinformation cases. A player takes a sub-optimal line in the face of the explanation she was given, but the TD believes that she would have taken a successful line had she received a correct explanation. In such cases, the damage was caused by a combination of two factors: (i) the misexplanation and (ii) the sub-optimal play (or call) made by the non-offender in the light of the explanation supplied at the table.

So it could be argued, as you do, that (ii) was the cause of the damage so no redress is due; or it could be argued as other have done, that (i) was the cause of the damage, so a misinformation adjustment is in order.

How should we approach such cases? I think we should listen to the Chief TD!

Please explain how (ii) is not related to the infraction? Or am I misreading SEWog?

[lamford]

aguahombre, on 2014-August-02, 16:53, said:

Please explain how (ii) is not related to the infraction? Or am I misreading SEWog?

It depends on what is meant by "related to". It is probably not the right phrase, but it does not mean "consequent to". I think some cause and effect element is needed, but I guess jallerton is right. It is up to the Chief TD to decide. This one seems to be a clear point of law.

[aguahombre]

Connected in some way=related, I believe. Her play of the suit, however badly it sucked was connected in some way to what she thought was the disclosure; so, even if it occurred after the alleged infraction all the TD seems to have to do is decide whether there was in fact an infraction. That part is the tough one. I am not as sure there was an infraction, but the AC thinks so, and they are better placed.

[barmar]

gordontd, on 2014-August-01, 11:00, said:

I wouldn't understand his explanation - I'd have to ask him for more information.

I agree that it's not as clear as my explanation (which is why I don't describe it that way), and you're certainly entitled to ask for clarification, but his description is not wholly incorrect. The Bridge World definition of "transfer" is "a bid that shows length in a different suit". It doesn't necessarily have to be the next suit up; e.g. Namyats openings are transfers.

[wank]

people concentrating too much on declarer's play. declarer wasn't taking a totally pointless line - she very possibly needs exactly 4 diamond tricks. if she strips south of outside cards, she can make 4 diamond tricks by a first round deep finesse then conceding to the king and waiting for a diamond return at the end

as some others have now said, the director should have put more effort into finding the real extent of north/south's agreement or experience to ascertain how accurate north's description was. of course the word 'usually' is rather grey, but if it turned out north effectively means south won't have a 4 card major unless she has 2 of them, i would say that's not 'usually' enough.

[blackshoe]

My dictionary says of "related" "associated with the specified item or process, especially causally". So I would say that "related to the infraction" in this law means "caused, at least in part, by the infraction" and "not related to" means "not at all caused by the infraction".

Some posters seem to think that declarer would have played the diamonds the same way with or without the MI. I'm not so sure the evidence shows that.

[blackshoe]

barmar, on 2014-August-02, 21:32, said:

I agree that it's not as clear as my explanation (which is why I don't describe it that way), and you're certainly entitled to ask for clarification, but his description is not wholly incorrect. The Bridge World definition of "transfer" is "a bid that shows length in a different suit". It doesn't necessarily have to be the next suit up; e.g. Namyats openings are transfers.

In your original description you said that the initial "transfer" is a puppet if the bidder wants to transfer to a minor. Seems to me that, under ACBL regulations, if it's a puppet it requires an alert rather than an announcement.

Question: in this method, is transferer's partner allowed to break the transfer or must he always bid 2M?

[lamford]

wank, on 2014-August-02, 22:00, said:

people concentrating too much on declarer's play. declarer wasn't taking a totally pointless line - she very possibly needs exactly 4 diamond tricks. if she strips south of outside cards, she can make 4 diamond tricks by a first round deep finesse then conceding to the king and waiting for a diamond return at the end

Extremely good point which I had completely missed, and which has caused me to reconsider my view of the ruling (and to hang my head in shame). I, for one, did not concentrate enough on declarer's play rather than too much.

Let us look at "means nothing". That is hopelessly inadequate. It shows that they do not play that pass shows a desire to defend 1♦xx, and might be 3 3 4 3 or 3 3 5 2 with a bad hand. If South were (3 4) in the majors she would normally just bid 1 of the 4-card major, so pass usually does not have a 4-card major (an a priori chance I think of over 80% certainly qualifies as 'usually'). It is South's explanation that is faulty, not North's. The correct explanation on both sides of the screen seems to be "South's pass does not say anything about her willingness to defend 1♦xx, and usually denies a 4-card major, but there will be bad hands with 4 4 in the majors that pass to try to play in the 4-4 rather than the 4-3 fit". So there was misinformation and it did caused declarer to go wrong. 100% of 430 for me. Well done, AC, and Wildavsky has gone up another notch or two in my estimation. I recall he was chair in the infamous Auken-Welland v Helgemo-Helness appeal and I was one of the few supporters on here of that excellent AC ruling (and, no, I not intend to reopen that can of worms).

[barmar]

blackshoe, on 2014-August-02, 22:20, said:

In your original description you said that the initial "transfer" is a puppet if the bidder wants to transfer to a minor. Seems to me that, under ACBL regulations, if it's a puppet it requires an alert rather than an announcement.

Of course we alert it. It's not a normal Jacoby or Texas transfer, which are the only transfers that are announced.

Quote

Question: in this method, is transferer's partner allowed to break the transfer or must he always bid 2M?

Yes. He can skip a step to show a super-accept in the major only, or bid the minor immediately to show a super-accept of both the major and minor. That's why it's a puppet rather than a marionette.

We don't actually use the "puppet" term when describing the bid, we use the language I gave in my earlier post (it explains what the bid means, not how partner responds to it). I just used that here to explain the convention. If opener breaks the transfer, we alert that and explain what it means then.

[blackshoe]

Okay, fair enough.

[gnasher]

wank, on 2014-August-02, 22:00, said:

people concentrating too much on declarer's play. declarer wasn't taking a totally pointless line - she very possibly needs exactly 4 diamond tricks. if she strips south of outside cards, she can make 4 diamond tricks by a first round deep finesse then conceding to the king and waiting for a diamond return at the end

She can do that by playing a diamond to the queen, then a diamond to the nine on the next round. A diamond to the five never gains over a diamond to the queen.

[c_corgi]

gnasher, on 2014-August-03, 11:14, said:

She can do that by playing a diamond to the queen, then a diamond to the nine on the next round. A diamond to the five never gains over a diamond to the queen.

So the SEWoG is catering for a 5-0 diamond break in a seriously erroneous fashion. It is therefore not related to the infraction, which merely induced declarer to play for a 5-0 diamond break and a split score is therefore permitted. "Usually denies a 4 card major" sounds like "a 4 card major may be suppressed if the suit quality is poor" rather than "this initiates a scramble sequence", so ruling it was MI seems very reasonable. It sounds like the AC got this one right and both sides should receive the adverse result.

[lamford]

gnasher, on 2014-August-03, 11:14, said:

She can do that by playing a diamond to the queen, then a diamond to the nine on the next round. A diamond to the five never gains over a diamond to the queen.

Surely it gains over a diamond to the queen when North has a stiff king and South is (4 3) 4 2, and breaks even when South is 3 3 5 2. The play that doesn't look right is a diamond to the nine; I don't think there is any difference between a diamond to the five and a diamond to the seven. But I now agree with PhilKing that she would have made it without the infraction and I would be inclined to give both sides 100% of 430. It is not apparent that she made a misplay at all, and I wrongly upvoted c_corgi's post but cannot cancel that.

There really is no question of SEWoG here, is there, and that aspect of the ruling was hopeless. It is a bit like denying someone redress for failing to make 7NT on the guard squeeze in this thread:

http://www.bridgebas...63197-play-7nt/

Say declarer was wrongly informed about the opening lead, and he played a failing double squeeze instead of the guard squeeze. You would not deny him redress because his line could never gain!

[gnasher]

lamford, on 2014-August-03, 13:18, said:

Surely it gains over a diamond to the queen when North has a stiff king and South is (4 3) 4 2, and breaks even when South is 3 3 5 2.

No, how does it gain? If I'm sure that diamonds are 5-0 or 4-1, then it's right to play a diamond to the queen and then one to the nine. That ensures three tricks against singleton ten, and breaks even against 5-0 and singleton king.

Quote

The play that doesn't look right is a diamond to the nine;

A diamond to the nine is right if we think RHO has the king and we don't know how many he has.

[lamford]

gnasher, on 2014-August-03, 15:29, said:

No, how does it gain? If I'm sure that diamonds are 5-0 or 4-1, then it's right to play a diamond to the queen and then one to the nine. That ensures three tricks against singleton ten, and breaks even against 5-0 and singleton king.

You wrote: "A diamond to the five never gains over a diamond to the queen." It gains when RHO has a singleton king and you misguess not to finesse the nine on the next round. With correct information, you will be told that South's shape is "not known for sure". You don't give an example of when it is clearly wrong to finesse the five, if South has four or five diamonds. I think it may be symmetrical with the five losing to singleton six and the seven losing to singleton eight, but that may depend on the rest of the hand and play. All I need to show is that low to the five is not SEWoG, not that it survives a Lamford simulation. Even if loses equity it is a country mile from SEWoG. (and why are country miles supposed to be longer than city miles?)

[chrism]

lamford, on 2014-August-03, 17:04, said:

... (and why are country miles supposed to be longer than city miles?)

You have obviously never asked a helpful countryman how far it is to the next pub, and been told "over that hill, cross the bridge, and follow the stream for a mile until you get to the village"; three muddy hours later ...