[inquiry]

Ok, we are now at the point of the post. There are several.

The first is that public accusations of cheating are wrong.

The second is that many people report to the TD's and to ABUSE hands they are certain are evidence of cheating. This south claimed to be certain that no one would lead a trump here (maybe this was to deflect his partners from noticing his misplay that cost a certain overtrick?)

The director went to the table and spent his time discovering the "facts" and (I assume) ruled no evidence WEST cheated when she "found" the trump lead. In all the commotion and discussing, the director never even noticed NS;s odd bidding (I eventually discussed this hand with him).

The NS bidding was, well, non-traditional as a few have pointed out. Responder with a good 16 hcp and good suit bids a non-forcing 2H and his partner with a minimum opening leaps to game. South, with extra's galore tamely passes rather than making a slam move on the assumption his partner must ahve a great hand. How did North know to bid game rather than pass. How did South know north was broke for his strong auction? Were NS here cheating? We really have no idea and it would be likewise wrong to accuse them in public (hence no names, no dates, this occured in the past). Did EW accuse them publically of cheating? No. Did East or West turn NS into the director or to abuse for cheating? Apparently not,

But here in a nutshell is massive problem abuse and TD's face. I can tell you that south thought WEST cheated. West had to defend her honor and the table could have become unpleasant. The director focussed on the allegation when he attended the table, and missed entirely everything else about the hand. So there are numerous (very numerous) false accusations of cheating, and potential evidence of possible cheating goes either un-noticed or un-reported. I found the entire episode an example of why many people think cheaters get away with cheating on BBO. Nothing seemed to convince south West made a normal lead, there were kibitzers at the table (as well as EW), but none of them event hinted to the director that it was NS, not EW that perhaps needed a look.

Abuse, TD's, and yellows get reports of cheating all the time. All are investigated, most are like the accusation against EW here, groundless. But when the reporter sees teh "cheater" still online they think abuse did nothing. In fact, abuse investigates,

As I mentioned, no one turned the NS pair in, and if they had there are at least three possibilities for NS. 1) they are beginners and have no idea how to bid, 2) they are experienced players who play some odd bidding system they forgot to alert, 3) they are beginners who decided to cheat (better players who cheat are not this obvious about their cheating).

I think the declarer's play to 4H combined with the certainty that west would never lead a trump if not cheating strongly suggest they are not better players who forgot to alert some exotic system. But it will take digging and investigation to determine if either of the alternatives apply or if there is some fourth explanation.

[Al_U_Card]

Walddk, on Mar 29 2006, 12:48 PM, said:

1. Declarer should accuse himself of not knowing anything about bridge. He rebid 2♥ on a 16 count.
2. When he has learned the basics, he can turn his attention to his partner for raising a weak rebid with a minimum.

Isn't self-accuse a sin? I don't know who the TD was but he may be in need of a refresher course.....but nonetheless this humorous vignette belies the rank undercurrent of intolerance that pervades most human endeavors. Sad that we cannot protect ourselves even in this sanctum.

[barmar]

The cheating accusation does make it sound like these are weak players. Most experienced players have heard the aphorism "when in doubt, lead trumps", and know that it tends to be applied more than appropriate. But rules of thumb like this cause many people to lead trumps whenever there isn't some really clear killing lead, so it's hard to imagine how this could be cheating.

Also, would deliberate cheaters call the TD to the table, risking him noticing their suspicious auction? This reminds me of some of the stupid criminal stories.

[kenberg]

There probably is some cheating on BBO. (Call me a cynic). However, there are also some folks with really weird ideas, at least by my lights.

Yesterday:

Uncontested auction:
P 1S
4S P


Dummy came down with an opening hand and a stiff heart.

We beat it 1.

Afterwards, I just had to ask: Are you guys playing precision? Nope. SAYC. Not that precision would explain the inital pass but maybe the preemptive jump to 4.

Declarer sent me a message that he was a sub. I believe him. I told him I couldn't make much of the bidding but figured it really wasn't my business. Of course this technically isn't correct.



Today:

Uncontested:

1D 1S
1N 2H
4H


Making 6. The 4H bidder had a minimum, but no matter. The 2H bidder had a 16 count or thereabouts, with diamonds and a stiff club.


And so on.

These both were in acbl tournaments.

Of course the auction Ben presents is crazy. I doubt it's a conspiracy, just crazy. The idea of calling for a director and fussing because of a trump lead is reprehensible, and this they should be told. Their bidding? Who knows.

There is something called standard bidding, at least in some circumstances. Many folks who play are unaware of any of the tenets. Personally, I am inclined to let it be.

Mostly, if you check later on the results, these folks don't do well. Think of them as bridge leprechauns, wandering through the meadow handing out tops and occassional bottoms. They are not cheating, or at least not exactly. I have known more than a few players who "just can't understand" why some bid should be alertable since they are sure their way is standard, and no amount of correction from any authority is going to change their minds.

It perhaps would be good if some tournaments told some players to go elsewhere, but really this is not the BBO spirit. I think the acbl planned to have life master pairs (unfortunately this would not be that much of a barrier) but I am not sure that it worked out.


Hesitating with singletons or in other straightforward situations is fairly rampant. Blatant collaboritive cheating, I think, is not.

If I come to believe that a pair is really up to no good, I'll report them. Hasn't happened yet. Might be an idea to watch this pair though. Just pour a scotch first.


K

[Al_U_Card]

Similar thing happened to me in a tourney. The 2H repeat (After 1x-1H-1NT-2H) was raised to 3 by the minimum opener and then responder bid 4 making 6!!! He had a 17 count and when his pard complained he said that his 2H bid was not even invitational but forcing! I think that these beginners recall that a (new) suit at the 2 level is forcing (since it is "new" to opener it cannot be passed...lol) . Not cheating just ignorance but understandable when you consider all of the info that these people have to assimilate.

[Free]

It seems quite obvious to lead a trump here imo. Dummy looks like being short in ♦, and declarer will always finesse the right side anyway if it's necessary, after ruffing some ♦s... Accusing anyone from leading a ♥ is plain ridiculous!

As noted by others, the bidding of NS looks a lot more like cheating. If opener had singleton ♦ I might agree with his leap to 4♥. But with a balanced minimum hand and a partner bidding 6-9, it's crazy! South is bidding even worse than an absolute beginner.
Maybe they start accusing people because they know they cheat on themselves and they sure aren't alone.

The least I can say is that they don't know ANYTHING about bridge and/or cheating.

[kenberg]

This last point of Free's bears repeating. If they are cheating they are doing a lousy job of it. It suggests that they aren't. If they are, it's really embarrassing.

[kenberg]

To turn that around a little, recently in a tourney someone vaguely hinted maybe my partner and I had an open phone line. The ound changed before I had a chance to reply but I was going to suggest they look at my defense on a board from the previous round. It was bad enough as it was, but if I had inside information I would ahve to have been a total idiot.

K

[glen]

inquiry, on Mar 29 2006, 05:56 PM, said:

...West had to defend her honor and the table could have become unpleasant. The director focussed on the allegation when he attended the table, and missed entirely everything else about the hand. So there are numerous (very numerous) false accusations of cheating, and potential evidence of possible cheating goes either un-noticed or un-reported. I found the entire episode an example of why many people think cheaters get away with cheating on BBO. Nothing seemed to convince south West made a normal lead, there were kibitzers at the table (as well as EW), but none of them event hinted to the director that it was NS, not EW that perhaps needed a look. ...

If this was an ACBL tourney with a paid TD, then:

1) West should not have had to "defend her honor" - the TD should have shutdown all open dialogue, imposed a Zero Tolerance penalty on NS for openly suggesting cheating, and forced S to retract his/her statement if NS wished to continue playing.

2) After discussion was shut down, the TD should have quickly determined that there was no evidence of cheating, and then should have openly stated such.

3) The TD should not have "missed entirely everything else about the hand", unless the BBO software does not allow them to see the full hand. Also the TD should have investigated the NS bidding to determine if NS were relatively new to bridge - if so, the TD would educate the pair about not saying somebody was cheating, and might even rescind the ZT penalty - if the pair was not new and not alerting what should have been then some more of the book would be thrown at them.

4) "...kibitzers at the table, but none of them even hinted to the director..." - the kibitzers should stay quiet, unless the TD invites them to contribute.

In tourneys with paid TDs, these situations can be quickly defused by a TD with a firm hand and the necessary knowledge of bridge and procedures.

If the above was followed, then:
W would not have had bad feelings after the tourney
S would understand the proper way to vent

When a TD does not handle the situation, then
W rightly feels hurt and did not enjoy the tourney experience
S feels free to openly accuse others
Silliness continues...

[Stephen Tu]

There's a good old saying something like "never abscribe to malice, what can be attributed to stupidity". Whenever opponents do something very strange that works out great, I just assume they are bad players who got lucky, it is almost always wrong to assume they are cheating. Browsing through their other results will usually confirm this, lots of weird stuff that doesn't work, just your bad luck they got their top against you. It would take many boards of weird stuff working, without instances of weird stuff backfiring, before I would take any cheating accusation seriously.

[bid_em_up]

So, let me see if I have this right.

Holding honors in both black suits that have been bid by North, and North has reasonably shown a hand that is 4-3-1-5 or 4-3-2-4 most likely, opposite what is supposed to be a weakish hand in the South, a competent West decides to lead trump to cut down on possible ruffs in dummy and is accused of cheating?

This, when South has A) misbid his hand, B ) misplayed his hand, and C) violated every rules of ethics when he made his accusation?

Oh, Please.

I sincerely hope that South has been banned from BBO, or at least, severely reprimanded.

jmoo.

[pigpenz]

well looking at that hand i would expect dummy to have a singleton or doubleton diamond, i see nothing wrong with a trump lead.

[keylime]

I'd be torching the accusers at this point - completely unfounded waste of breath. Matter of fact, if this did happen in ACBL the accuser should be sent in from of a C and E hearing and asked specifically how their psuedo-expert, piece of %^&#$ reasoning can justify this outlandish statement of falsehood. ACBL TD'S - START ENFORCING THE DAMN ZT POLICIES FOR ONCE!

When the ACBL decides to bar the players from slandering in essence, fellow customers, will be day the game markedly improves. Drop the hammer on this individual - AND MAKE IT VERY EXPLICIT that this conduct is not permitted.

I am an ACTIVE proponent of trump leads. I table one right here, right now.

If W-E was REALLY cheating, why didn't they lead a CLUB?

[pigpenz]

kenberg, on Mar 29 2006, 03:26 PM, said:

There probably is some cheating on BBO. (Call me a cynic). However, there are also some folks with really weird ideas, at least by my lights.

Yesterday:

Uncontested auction:
P 1S
4S P


Dummy came down with an opening hand and a stiff heart.

We beat it 1.

.

sometimes people are just really bad bidders....like your example had open 2 spades and rebid 3 spades then we bid game, next hand same person bid 4 hearts to openers one hearet making 12 tricks when there was 13 off the top...oh well.