[blml] De Whale

[Herman De Wael]

Eric Landau wrote:
> At 09:15 AM 4/13/07, Herman wrote:
> 
>> But there cannot be ambiguity. Not is some cases. Maybe the Roudi case
>> is too simple, since there are too many hands where the Roudi bidder
>> has natural clubs too. Your splinter example was far better in that
>> sense. The man who bids 4H either has 6 hearts or only one. There is
>> no ambiguity as to his intentions. And the bid cannot mean both at the
>> same time. The responder will either pass or go on to 4S or 6S, and
>> there too is no ambiguity. If both are on the same wavelength, how are
>> you going to believe them when they say "no agreement".
> 
> The same way you are going to not believe them: by understanding that 
> even if they are both flipping coins to decide which way to treat 4H, 
> they will wind up "on the same wavelength" 50% of the time -- which 
> means that always believing them and never believing them are equally 
> fallacious.  In Herman's world, they would have no way to recover from 
> the ambiguity inherent in a genuine lack of agreement -- disaster if 
> they guess differently (50% of the time), unfavorable adjustment from 
> Herman if they guess similarly (the other 50% of the time).  In effect, 
> having no agreement becomes a de facto infraction in itself.  In Tim's 
> world, TDs and ACs look at evidence and listen to what the players have 
> to say, decide whether they in fact had "no agreement" as they claimed, 
> and rule accordingly; that's their job.
> 

Eric,

do you really believe a player is going to put all his eggs in one 
basket by bidding 4H (either on a singleton or a 7-card suit) if he 
believes it's a true 50/50 toss of the coin? No, that is a case that I 
don't believe will come up.

Rather, the bidder has some idea about this going to be understood. I 
want to know what that idea was, and my AC will investigate fully, and 
judge on the evidence. That's their job, as you say.

My point is that you do not need to be badly off 100% of the time.
Even if your percentages are correct (and I very much doubt the 50/50 
part of it) then the pair will have 50% chance of getting it wrong, 
and 50% chance of getting it right - and not have a ruling at all. 
Provided the answerer tells his opponents about his guess.

It's all good and well you guys giving counter-examples. Some of those 
examples are correct, others are less likely to happen in real life. 
But those are only counter-examples. You have not touched upon the 
majority of cases. In which the TD WILL rule against a pair that hides 
behind "no agreement".

I am trying to get people to tell more about their agreements - even 
to the point of explaining guesses. I want them to "bend over 
backwards" in being helpful to their opponents, because that is how I 
believe bridge should be played.

Even if you manage to convince the TD that you really have no 
agreement, is it really worth the hassle of a TD call and ruling? And 
are you really happy about getting a good score because you guessed 
correctly but left your opponents to guess also - and they guessed 
wrongly so you get an overtrick? Why not simply tell a bit more?

-- 
Herman DE WAEL
Antwerpen Belgium
http://www.hdw.be