[kenberg]

What I come to out of all of tis is the utter futility of entering into a quarrel where you were not there and you get the facts, or perhaps facts, spilling out a bit at a time.

This thread purports to set the record straight regarding the earlier incident. I suppose that the facts, as stated, are facts but while one might draw one conclusion from the guilty verdict one might then have to rethink, at least a bit, upon learning, later in the thread, that the verdict was overturned. Further down, we learn that the faced ace of spades was the top card. What to make of this? I guess I would want to know how this came about. I cannot recall ever getting a set of boards with a top card faced. Was everyone drunk, not noticing a hand placed back in the board with a top card faced? Did the pro pull the board out of the stack at some point, fool with the cards, and slide the board back into the middle of the stack? These two extreme scenarios lead to vastly different conclusions as to culpability. Probably it is somewhere in between but who knows?

In the unlikely event that someone involved actually gives a damn one way or the other about my opinion, and if they write out the full story with all of the gory details in place so that no supplemental descriptions are needed, then I will give it further consideration. But trying to evaluate an ever changing story is for the birds.

I will say that my default view is to not have a great deal of faith in coincidence as a plausible explanation when a player's subsequent actions lead to the fouling of a board on which he just got a crummy result. Could be true, lots of unlikely things could be. Usually they aren't.

[barryallen]

mikeh, on Aug 13 2010, 04:18 PM, said:

I think that it is so very difficult to prove deliberate misconduct, and the consequences of being branded a cheat are so devestating, that the League (properly in my view, when it hasn't impacted me personally....at which point objectivity tends to evaporate) leans over backwards to acquit.

Not only that, the most useful source of UI would come from the partner, so further extending the finger of rumour and suspicion. Then extending that premise, the ethics of the partner also has to be taking into consideration and the odds are extending outwards unless similar instances are highlighted.

The very fact the bid was so outrageous, almost puts it back into the "genius/idiot" bracket for me. Because if you did hold this UI, there are far more subtle methods you could use to come to the same contract, without setting off every alarm bell in the building!

[fred]

The_Hog, on Aug 15 2010, 06:58 AM, said:

jkdood, on Aug 15 2010, 01:30 PM, said:

We were told in no uncertain terms, with reiterated confirmations that begged to be believed, that 20 of the Top 20 Spingold experts when queried all agreed without exception, that "The 6D was not possible without UI."

Where is the evidence that this statement is true? We were only told this by one person. The comment was undoubtedly self serving as it was made by a member of the opposing team.

This comment is undoubtedly self-serving as it was made by a person who clearly has an axe to grind against the "one person" he is referring to.

Apparently public accusasions of lying are OK even though public accusations of cheating are not.

Not that it should be necessary, but I will give you some more evidence: I have personally witnessed several "top experts" express "6D not possible without UI" when they were told about this hand. I have not witnessed any "top experts" express a contrary view.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[bluecalm]

I think top expert's opinion aren't very valuable when assessing what weak player may come up with. People who play bridge at high level on regular basis just don't see enough stuff your piff paff average Joe may come up with.

In this case though no matter what subset of bridge playing population you choose to your panel I am pretty sure 6♦ won't receive any votes (or wouldn't receive back then, now many bbo forum regulars can't resist... ).

[fred]

bluecalm, on Aug 15 2010, 04:44 PM, said:

I think top expert's opinion aren't very valuable when assessing what weak player may come up with. People who play bridge at high level on regular basis just don't see enough stuff your piff paff average Joe may come up with.

Agree, but the player in question is a lot closer to being a "top expert" than he is to being an "average Joe". He is certainly not a "weak player".

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[jkdood]

I had mixed feelings when it became a sort of "de facto standard" that TDs and perhaps other ruling authorities would begin making more judgement calls "in consult with appropriate top players", to lessen the abundance of appeals and committee deliberations.

Nonetheless, whatever one may think of experts being able to gauge lesser player's actions or motivations, even the highly capable Mr. P - this seems to be our current accepted approach. Do we wish to question that with some healthy counterpoints? Maybe.

But under current policies and procedures in place, it still begs the question why the authorities did not refer to C&E or similar, when this apparently overwhelming school of (UI) thought existed in the consult group.

If it was an attempt to "sweep the incident under the rug" to avoid a bridge world embarrassment, it failed miserably.

[jdonn]

fred, on Aug 15 2010, 11:03 AM, said:

Not that it should be necessary, but I will give you some more evidence: I have personally witnessed several "top experts" express "6D not possible without UI" when they were told about this hand. I have not witnessed any "top experts" express a contrary view.

I know the exact answers given by 3 of the people in this group and they all concur. In fact it's being generous to merely say they thought the bid impossible without UI. The strongest comment came from one who I can assure you every single person on the forum would consider a top expert. He was told about it at halftime of the match and said something to the effect of it being lucky for Justin that he won't have to play the second half, since clearly the match won't be allowed to continue.

[hrothgar]

fred, on Aug 15 2010, 07:03 PM, said:

Not that it should be necessary, but I will give you some more evidence: I have personally witnessed several "top experts" express "6D not possible without UI" when they were told about this hand. I have not witnessed any "top experts" express a contrary view.

Are any of these top experts willing to go on the record, provide their names, and state

1. The 6♦ bid is impossible without UI
2. What type of UI would allow the player in question to bid 6♦

Admittedly, my grasp of social niceties is questionable, to say the least. However, I was always taught that you should either be willing to state what you think openly and directly or shut the $%&@ up.

Whispering campaigns, innuendo, and talking behind people's back... This type of ***** is frowned upon in a 10th school yard. We're talking about a person's livelihood here.

If these experts believe strongly enough that Pitch is a cheat, they should be willing to say so openly. If they aren't willing to do so, I don't see why I should care what they have to say.

[jkdood]

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 03:49 PM, said:

...they should be willing to say so openly.  If they aren't willing to do so, I don't see why I should care what they have to say.

Just wondering...

...if a C&E or Ethical Oversight committee rules someone is guilty of ethical violations, do you feel the details and especially the members' names should be made public in all cases?

...a very slippery slope!

[TimG]

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 03:49 PM, said:

If these experts believe strongly enough that Pitch is a cheat, they should be willing to say so openly.

I think this is wrong. I think it's a terrible idea to encourage spreading of rumors, even if they are backed up by expert opinion. These things should go through official channels.

[hrothgar]

TimG, on Aug 16 2010, 12:29 AM, said:

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 03:49 PM, said:

If these experts believe strongly enough that Pitch is a cheat, they should be willing to say so openly.

I think this is wrong. I think it's a terrible idea to encourage spreading of rumors, even if they are backed up by expert opinion. These things should go through official channels.

What do you think does more to quell rumors:

Condoning players spreading anonymous innuendo?
Requiring that players do so on the record?

[TimG]

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 04:37 PM, said:

TimG, on Aug 16 2010, 12:29 AM, said:

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 03:49 PM, said:

If these experts believe strongly enough that Pitch is a cheat, they should be willing to say so openly.

I think this is wrong. I think it's a terrible idea to encourage spreading of rumors, even if they are backed up by expert opinion. These things should go through official channels.

What do you think does more to quell rumors:

Condoning players spreading anonymous innuendo?
Requiring that players do so on the record?

I did not condone the spreading of anonymous innuendo; I said these things should be done through official channels.

I think the spreading of rumors is a bad idea, one not made better if people put their names behind the rumor.

[whereagles]

Rumors are inevitable if you make bids like 6♦

[xcurt]

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 06:54 AM, said:

jkdood, on Aug 15 2010, 09:30 AM, said:

We were told in no uncertain terms, with reiterated confirmations that begged to be believed, that 20 of the Top 20 Spingold experts when queried all agreed without exception, that "The 6D was not possible without UI."

I saw a report that Pitch's team lost by ~ 140 IMPs.

I'm not sure how many boards are played during this round, but it looks like this team was averaging at least -2 IMPs per board.

Out of curiosity, how many of the top 20 experts drop a mid stage match by this type of margin?

I accept that the "Top 20 experts in the Spingold" are experts regarding bidding, card play, and defense. However, their level of play might be significantly too high to evaluate this sort of incident.

The losers were blown out in the 4th quarter. I don't recall the gap after 48 boards offhand, but it was posted earlier. The deficit was of a size that was certainly within the realm of reason to continue.

[TimG]

xcurt, on Aug 15 2010, 07:38 PM, said:

The losers were blown out in the 4th quarter. I don't recall the gap after 48 boards offhand, but it was posted earlier. The deficit was of a size that was certainly within the realm of reason to continue.

Even though they thought down 40-something with 40-something boards to go was enough of a deficit to shoot 6♦?

[dburn]

I don't think anyone would deliberately bid six diamonds. But I could easily imagine someone intending to bid six clubs, and bidding six diamonds by mistake.

Mind you, I would find it hard to imagine someone who bid six diamonds by mistake not saying afterwards that this was what he had done. Hard but not impossible - if six diamonds made when six clubs would have failed, and if the person in question judged that he might gain a psychological advantage by keeping his own counsel about his reasons for bidding as he did...

I am a very late comer to this thread, but I have heard it all before, and so had the bard who wrote:

Nothing is more ungentlemanly than
Exaggeration causing needless pain.
It's worse than spitting, and it stamps a man -
Quite properly - with other men's disdain.
Weigh human actions carefully. Explain
The worst of them with charity. Mayhap
There were two sides to that affair of Cain,
And Judas was a tolerable chap.

Hilaire Belloc, Ballade of Gentlemanly Feeling and Railway Strikes

[jjbrr]

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 02:49 PM, said:

If these experts believe strongly enough that Pitch is a cheat, they should be willing to say so openly.  If they aren't willing to do so, I don't see why I should care what they have to say.

lol you can't be serious.

several people in this thread have admitted that they heard first-hand the experts' opinions on this matter. sounds like they were pretty open to me! just because you weren't there for the conversations doesn't mean they didn't happen.

maybe "cheat" is too strong a word, but it seems pretty clear from what's been said that they think the bid is pretty remarkable.

[Mbodell]

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 03:54 AM, said:

jkdood, on Aug 15 2010, 09:30 AM, said:

We were told in no uncertain terms, with reiterated confirmations that begged to be believed, that 20 of the Top 20 Spingold experts when queried all agreed without exception, that "The 6D was not possible without UI."

I saw a report that Pitch's team lost by ~ 140 IMPs.

I'm not sure how many boards are played during this round, but it looks like this team was averaging at least -2 IMPs per board.

Out of curiosity, how many of the top 20 experts drop a mid stage match by this type of margin?

I accept that the "Top 20 experts in the Spingold" are experts regarding bidding, card play, and defense. However, their level of play might be significantly too high to evaluate this sort of incident.

This wasn't a mid stage match. This was the first round match between the 45 seed and the 19 seed. The final margin was 234-97 which is an 137 IMP margin.

All the matches in the Spingold are 64 boards (excluding 3-ways or 4-ways, and this year there was only one 3-ways).

This was the third largest margin of victory in the first round, but there were a number of teams that were around 100 IMP winners (and some of those may have withdrawn after 2 or 3 quarters).

One can be on a low seed because ones teammates don't have many master points. I don't know the person or their strength (nor am I good enough to judge people at that level even if I knew them), and heaven knows that master points aren't perfect ratings, but there are only 481 people in the entire ACBL who have 10,000 or more master points. The 6♦ bidder has 18,800+ master points. That's got to be way, way, way, way closer to "top expert" than the terms "bad player" or "average joe".

[Mbodell]

kenberg, on Aug 15 2010, 04:50 AM, said:

Further down, we learn that the faced ace of spades was the top card. What to make of this? I guess I would want to know how this came about. I cannot recall ever getting a set of boards with a top card faced. Was everyone drunk, not noticing a hand placed back in the board with a top card faced? Did the pro pull the board out of the stack at some point, fool with the cards, and slide the board back into the middle of the stack? These two extreme scenarios lead to vastly different conclusions as to culpability. Probably it is somewhere in between but who knows?

Funny, I had this happen today in a sectional swiss. My partner frequently boxes his cards when we finish playing the board last (so that people know to shuffle the board in the next round, since swisses here are nearly always hand shuffled). We had just had a marginal bad result on the 4th board of a 7 board set and we were the first to play the board. My partner thought we were the second to play and put his cards in upside down with the ♦Q exposed (we were E/W). The N player didn't notice as she was collecting the boards (she only puts one board on the table at a time and moves the others off the table). The caddy had already just delivered us the new 3 boards and passed our 3 boards and came by shortly after we finished the 4th board to pass it to the other table, and the caddy didn't notice the boxed card. When it arrived at the other table, however, the other table noticed the boxed card. I'm not sure exactly what happened but they played the board and I'm pretty sure we ended up pushing the board.

[the hog]

jjbrr, on Aug 16 2010, 10:54 AM, said:

hrothgar, on Aug 15 2010, 02:49 PM, said:

If these experts believe strongly enough that Pitch is a cheat, they should be willing to say so openly.  If they aren't willing to do so, I don't see why I should care what they have to say.

lol you can't be serious.

several people in this thread have admitted that they heard first-hand the experts' opinions on this matter. sounds like they were pretty open to me! just because you weren't there for the conversations doesn't mean they didn't happen.

maybe "cheat" is too strong a word, but it seems pretty clear from what's been said that they think the bid is pretty remarkable.

Why can't he be serious? It is one thing to say something behind someone's back and quite another to say it openly.