[blml] Insufficient rebid

[Eric Landau]

At 12:49 PM 10/26/06, Sven wrote:

> > On Behalf Of Eric Landau
>.................
> > What the ACBL has actually said is that a pair is not allowed to have
> > *any agreement whatsoever*, (presumably whether "changed" or not)
> > regarding methods after the acceptance of an insufficient bid.  As I
> > have often noted, this is a logical absurdity, *at best* tantamount to
> > making it illegal to condone an insufficient bid.
>
>In an auction where the agreement on a particular bid depends only 
>upon the
>number of steps from the last previous bid (e.g. Blackwood, some Vienna
>conventions and Strong club precision agreements) what is the ACBL 
>attitude
>when there is an intervening insufficient bid?

I don't know.  I'd be very surprised if the ACBL has actually adressed 
this.

>Take the following situation from advanced precision:
>1C - pass - 1S - pass
>2S - 2C - ?
>
>The convention (as I believe I remember from long time ago) is that 
>one step
>(i.e. 2NT) now means "five or more small spades", two steps (i.e. 3C) 
>"five
>spades headed by a single top honor", three steps "five spades headed 
>by two
>top honors", four steps "six spades headed by a single top honor" and five
>steps "six spades headed by two top honors".
>
>One step over the IB of 2C is obviously Pass, two steps is double, three
>steps is 2D and so on.
>
>A similar situation exists over for instance Blackwood and various
>Blackwood-like conventions.
>
>Does ACBL allow the responder to accept an insufficient bid and answer his
>partner's bid according to the scale as "calculated" from the IB which now
>is the last previous legal bid? Or does ACBL require NOS, if they want to
>continue using their system, to reject the insufficient bid and allow 
>OS to
>replace the IB with a completely destructive (for NOS only!) 
>preemptive bid?

Again, I don't think anyone knows the answer to this.

>The ACBL regulation quoted above (if the quotation is correct) just 
>doesn't
>make sense, at least not to me.

That's what I've been saying all along: the regulation just doesn't 
make sense, whether to me, to Sven, or to anyone else, including its 
purveyors.  Consequently, nobody can figure out how to apply it 
properly or sensibly.


Eric Landau                     ehaa at starpower.net
1107 Dale Drive                 (301) 608-0347
Silver Spring MD 20910-1607