[luis]

Free, on Mar 8 2004, 08:56 PM, said:

luis, on Mar 8 2004, 09:37 PM, said:

It's hard to rule when neither side is playing bridge.
NS have an ice-cold 6c, south makes a completely insane double or 3d and yet another crazy double of 3h then north assuming the double was "optional" makes an irrational pass of 3dx.
EW bids are also very strange and the play in 3hx should have been extremely poor.

~snip~

And I'd take something for my stomach. Argh!

Hi Luis,

I think you misread some things... North passes because he thinks it's a penalty double, while South thinks his dbl is optional. So imo NS is still playing some kind of bridge, but they misunderstood their agreements.

And I can asure you, if my partner considers my Dbl as optional, we'll find 6♣ or 6♠ without much troubles. To bad he was tired after 80 games (marathon of 100 deals)...

I really doubt NS are playing any form of bridge.
Your double is terrible no matter if it is optional, penalty, takeout, support for spades, or whatever.

[Frosty]

Ok - Sorry, I didn't know what F2F was .... LOL .... now you know why I am a novice poster!

Frosty/Jan

[Trpltrbl]

I would never ever X, everrrrrrrr. That being said, I really don't think that adjusting the result is going to make a lot of difference for N/S , a zero is a zero. And for the 3♦ bidder to run away, is bad bridge too. I would personally let the result stand. 2 Bad things even eachother out, don't they hehehe

Mike

It's kinda that nowadays when people don't know what to do, they'll go for the "optional" X. It means something like this, I don't know what to do, pd, maybe you can do something and if not I can blame you for not getting the optional X.

[Shrike]

Folks, it doesn't matter whether you like South's double. Whether you would double or not, or whether any sensible player would double or not, is irrelevant to any TD decision.

Reading carefully, North explained the double as penalty. Double was meant as optional, and the agreement was. . . we are not told. My guess is that a few more questions reveal that N/S do not have a clear meaning about this sequence. (Note: if you read the hidden portion of Fred's post you see that the TD actually made an inquiry into this, but it's not clear how carefully; that it is not written on the convention card does not establish incontrovertibly that there was no such agreement. Still, as we'll see this is not critical.)

Now, there has been misinformation. The correct answer to a FtoF query to North was not "optional," it was "no agreement." The answer given was "penalty." I don't believe that pulling to an anemic four-card suit is any more likely after a penalty double of your very nice lower six-card suit than after a pass by a weak two (-ish) bidder of an undiscussed but almost certainly penalty-oriented double of that suit. (Looking at East's hand, he can tell that the penalty character must be based on honors in a couple of suits, specifically the reds, if South is bidding sensibly -- South cannot be doubling on a diamond stack whatever the call's meaning.) Hence, the MI did not cause any damage that might have occured.

I'm not applying the ACBL's draconian failure-to-play-bridge standard for NOS (draconian in practice -- sometimes I read appeals writeups and wonder whether at the table I would always "play bridge"), because it's irrelevant. That standard is used to deny relief to a NOS when there was an infraction and consequent damage, but later decisions by the NOS also caused damage that is deemed more important. (Outside the ACBL, this is essentially a rule denying NOSs relief if it appears they took a double shot, clearly irrelevant here.) Here, there was never any damage at all, because the action that damaged E/W was not caused by (made more likely by) the MI. Infractions are not subject to adjustment per se -- they are only matters for TD's intervention if they cause damage or if they are eggregious enough to brook penalties (not here).

If we believe that Free had an agreement that the double was optional, then the MI was different, but I judge the result the same -- pulling on the East hand, on this auction, is no more likely after a penalty pass of an optional double than after a penalty double. Regardless which meaning is correct, hearts is more likely to lose control than diamonds, as the penalty double is marked with cards IN HEARTS behind East. (A penalty double based on nothing but a diamond stack is pretty much impossible here, given East's hand.) No damage, so no adjustment.

Those of you you who are intent on splitting the scores, put your knees down.

[McBruce]

Review: East, holding ♠ K72 ♥ Q987 ♦ KQJ987 ♣ void, hears 2♠ from RHO as dealer and overcalls 3♦ at unfavourable. This is doubled and passed back to him and he asks RHO what LHO's double means (not online bridge here). The answer is "penalty." He pulls to 3♥ and goes down one doubled on poor play with 3♦ a lock. The South player has a 3-3-0-7 16 count and we find no evidence of any agreement on this double on the convention card.

Let me get this straight: you think that East, hearing "it's a penalty double" from North, has no right to pull because you think that according to his cards the explanation can't be right?

Sorry, you're wrong. Of course the explanation can be right, on the information East has. Exchange West and South's seven minor suit cards and you have a penalty double (especially at favourable vulnerability) of 3♦:

South (alternate possible hand): ♠ QT8 ♥ AKJ ♦ AT654 ♣ 62

You say "I don't believe that pulling to an anemic four-card suit is any more likely after a penalty double of your very nice lower six-card suit than after a pass by a weak two (-ish) bidder of an undiscussed but almost certainly penalty-oriented double of that suit."

This is a complex sentence, but what it seems to mean is this: you think East might have pulled to 3♥ anyway if the double were properly explained as "undiscussed." You later say that if there was an agreement of "optional" you still believe that South might still have pulled given a correct explanation. Ergo, because the non-offending side MIGHT have done the same thing they did without the damage, no damage? (By 'might' I mean that your claim is that the chance of South pulling did not change based on the explanation.)

As John McEnroe used to say, "you cannot be serious!"

The double was explained wrong, and this makes E-W the non-offenders. You don't get to make wild assumptions like "East might have pulled anyhow if the explanation was accurate" when judging the NON-offenders. They get the benefit of the doubt in all unclear situations. You may be clear in your mind that East was always going to run whatever the answer he got from North. But let me ask you one thing: if he was always going to pull, why did he ask the question in the first place?

I just cannot believe that the probability of East pulling did not go up at all when he heard the explanation "penalty," over any other explanation he might have gotten. I'll keep my knees up, thanks very much.

[Shrike]

If I'd said what you think I said, I would indeed be wrong. I am not saying that East "has no right to pull," nor that he should know that the double is not penalty. He is entitled to believe the explanation -- as far as he ought to be concerned, South has a penalty double. What I said is that that penalty double is almost certainly not based on a diamond stack alone, and he knows it. For South to have a penalty double of diamonds, with his parner showing a weak hand with spades and (apparently) clubs, South also has to have hearts. Thus hearts is a dangerous bid -- but that's not my point either. My point is that hearts is no less dangerous a bid after this penalty double than after an "optional" double that North chooses to pass, or (less clear, I admit) an undiscussed double that North chooses to pass, and that East knows this.

You chose to quote my statement that pulling was no more likely, and then explain it as meaning that East might have pulled anyway (noting afterward that by "might" you mean "as likely" -- how delightfullly disingenuous). Again, if I'd actually said that I certainly would have been wrong. But I didn't say that. I believe, and stated, that the incorrect word "penalty" instead of the correct word, either "optional" or "undiscussed," did not change the likelihood of East's running from the double. No, not at all. And if the likelihood did not change, then the difference (the MI) did not cause any damage that may have resulted from the decision to pull -- East was going to pull anyway.

Why did he ask the question? I don't know. Maybe if he'd heard "takeout" he'd have left it in, even though then he'd know he was facing a diamond stack (on his right). Maybe he really would have sat for an optional double and a penalty pass, even though that looks like an even worse decision. I could be wrong in my assessment, I grant, but that is my judgment (you obviously disagree; and yes, I am judging that running is just as likely even after I give NOS the benefit of the doubt, as you correctly observe that I should). Moreover, this is how the analysis is done: (1) was there MI; (2) did the MI cause opps to do something different from what they would have done; (3) did the opps do worse as a result of their decision. Anyone who was analyzing it that way, doing each step, my knee comment wasn't about you, but too many responses hereon sounded to me like the analysts were jumping from "there was MI" to "what was the damage?" Some TDs in the US may have a tendency to be too hard on the nonoffenders (I've seen rumblings about that lately), but it's pretty easy to be too hard on the offenders, too. You don't adjust just because one side did something wrong and the other side wound up with a bad score.

On these facts, the MI did not cause E/W to do anything. Yes, Mr. McEnroe, I am serious, the ball was out.

(Seriously, try to be East for a moment. Be an East who would run from that diamond suit to that heart suit when he got doubled. As that East, wouldn't you also run if the double were optional and your RHO, who is known to have one minor, sat for it? Wouldn't you run if RHO, who again holds one minor, didn't know what it was and still sat for it? You wouldn't run? No, I know you wouldn't, and I wouldn't either, but that's because we're not being an East who runs from the penalty double -- that East was always running. You said in your first post that the pull "seems crazy" -- don't you think it was that insanity, rather than the question which one of the opponents had the unlikely-but-possible diamond stack, that made him do it? If so, you're on my side.)

The result looks very weird, but that's because South made a strange double (optional, penalty, whatever) and then East a possibly stranger one. If E/W were damaged, it was by one of those two choices, not North's explanation.

Finally, it's been suggested that the correct ruling depends on online versus face to face. That may be the case, I suppose; I only know in-person laws, and this is how I would rule in a tournament. I had been under the impression that online bridge was governed by the same lawbook; if that's wrong, could one of those who believe it changes things please tell me where I can find the Laws of Online Duplicate Bridge? It must have a different Law 40C.

[McBruce]

Sorry, cannot agree with this at all. The fallacy is a common one: it goes like this.

1. The offending side commits an infraction.
2. The non-offending side does something crazy.
3. Because the non-offending side does something crazy after getting the misinformation, the TD decides that this IN ITSELF is evidence that they would have done something crazy anyhow. No damage!

The idea that the non-offending side's crazy action might be a result (direct, indirect, remote, it hardly matters) of the infraction never seems to occur. And I don't understand why, when we are supposed to favour the non-offending side on any doubtful point. But no, that East "was always running."

My feeling is that it is complete folly to expect anyone to do the right thing given the wrong information. If this is matchpoints and 3♦ is a penalty double the likely downside of 3♥ is getting a zero instead of a zero. The upside is what happens when, as I mentioned below, you switch West's and South's minor suits and South really does have a penalty double:

Scoring: MP

---

Pulling turns a bottom into a top (assuming you play it right).

[Shrike]

Interesting that with your example hand, South would probably double whether North/South were playing penalty or optional doubles; thank you for supporting my point. I know it's confusing, but the question is not whether East should run, the question is whether East would (and relatedly but not dispositively, should) think he should run, depending on the explanation of the double. And yes, I know you could, now that you understand the issue, construct another hand that does prove your point, but you have to remember that the bottom line is what East would have done, not how often he would have been right.

You and others may feel that it is folly to try to figure out what would have happened if there had been no misinformation, but that's what the law requires: "If the Director decides that a side has been damaged through its opponents' failure to explain the full meaning of a call or play, he may award an adjusted score." (Law 40C, emphasis added) That word "through" is about causation. You can't cause something to happen if it was going to happen anyway. As the director, you have to make this call, not just cave in to the plea for damages without conducting a proper analysis.

I am not "expecting" East to run anyway, I am determining that I believe, strongly, that that's what would have happened. You disagree. Fine. But what is not fine is that you seem not even to want to address the question. Your zeal for favoring the nonoffenders has you adjusting the damage without establishing causation, and that's not the way it's supposed to be done.