Albuquerque Bridge Player

Volume 4, Issue 3                                                                                                                                   Sept 2002

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 




President’s Report                                    continued from page 1

Where can you volunteer?  The Unit 374 board has ten members, five of whom are elected to two-year terms each year.  The Unit 374 board is responsible for holding three sectional tournaments and a regional tournament each year.  We also hold friendship games, awards games, summer and winter parties.  We coordinate bridge education and publicity and encourage the members to pay their ACBL dues.  We need people who want to serve on the Unit board and the committees that manage the many activities.  If you are interested in becoming a board member, contact Susie Law (296-7719) who is the head of the nominating committee for the election to be held in November. 

 

The Duke City Bridge Center also needs people to serve on their board.  DCBC is the owner of the building, and it is responsible for maintenance of the building and operation of most of the bridge games held at the Center.  DCBC also need volunteers.  Bob Lohfeld is the president of the DCBC board.  Contact him if you would like to participate (265-3565).  Volunteers furnish food at special events and tournaments. Volunteers provide sympathy and comfort for members in need.   Volunteers contribute articles and information for this newsletter.  Contact Mike Eckart (298-7155).  Keep up the good work and encourage your friends to do the same. 

 

What’s in it for you if you volunteer?  Hard work, easy work satisfaction, frustration, fun and friendship.  One thing for sure, it won’t be boring.  Your reward is in your own participation and engagement, and there will be an occasional thank you mixed in with the complaints.  Be active! Participate! Volunteer!

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Ask AL                                                      Continued from Page 1  

be useful with borderline slam interest.  Partner opens one no trump, and responder holds 14-15 points including a 5-card major.  This expert used Stayman instead of a transfer, arguing that for slam, he wanted to have a 9-card major suit.  Without that, he settled for 3NT.  That hand doesn’t come up often, so I haven’t had much chance to try it out, but I think he is correct, at least when playing matchpoints. 

 

Q.    I am confused about the rules for when a card is played. 

 

A.     That’s not surprising, since they are different depending on who is making the play—defender, declarer, or dummy.  They are clearly spelled out in the laws of bridge, but sometimes it is difficult to determine what is correct. 

 

Defender---“held so that it is possible for his partner to see its face . . .”  It doesn’t matter whether partner was looking and saw the card or not, or whether declarer saw the card.  Defender can show his entire hand to declarer without penalty.  Note that the card does not have to be near the table.

 

Declarer---“must play a card from his hand held face up, touching or nearly touching the table, or maintained in such a position as to indicate that it has been played.”  This is absolute, but there can be disagreement among the players at the table as to where the card was held, making a difficult decision for the Director.

 

Dummy---this one gets tricky, but basically, a card is played when Declarer names or otherwise designates a card in dummy to be played.  Note that it is not a played card just because Dummy picks it up, so defenders should be cautious about playing just because Dummy has picked up a card. 

Continued on page 3

 

 

 

 

Ask AL                                                     Continued from Page 2           


 

Problems arise mostly on two occasions.  Most frequent of these is when Declarer does not specify a card, but simply says “play”, or something similar.  There are several specific rules covering this, but as dummy, you must always play the lowest card in the suit when declarer does not name a specific card. 

 

There is also a specific rule allowing Declarer to change an inadvertent designation (of a card in dummy) if he does so without pause for thought.  (If LHO has already played, that card can also be withdrawn, and an adjustment made if the withdrawn card provided significant information to Declarer.)   It can be very difficult for Director to determine what should happen in this case.  It is the closest thing to a “mechanical error” exception allowed by the played card rules.  An example might be when Dummy holds AQJ and declarer finesses successfully and returns to hand to repeat the finesse.  Declarer calls “queen” and then changes quickly when he sees that LHO has surprised by playing the king.  Clearly, the intention was to win the trick with whatever card necessary, and Declarer should be allowed to change the call.

 

Note that a played card does not fall under rules similar to those for bidding box mechanical errors, which are much more lenient.

 

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Annual Friendship Game

By Bill Isham

 

Annual Friendship Game on September 8th to be Individual!

 

The goal of our Friendship Game is to welcome newer players to the Unit, and to introduce them to other players at all levels of skill.  We do this by beginning with a potluck lunch, followed by a game of bridge in which less experienced players are paired with more experienced players.

 

This will be our fourth Friendship Game.  At the first two, we played a regular pairs game, then last year we tried we tried a Swiss Team game.  The team game was less successful for several reasons, one of which was that it took long to get the players matched and then assigned to teams.

 

This year, we are going to try one more variation: an Individual.

 

 

 

 

 

An Individual is a game in which you play with a different person on each round.  The game will be set up so that less and more experienced players will be partners more times than not, and everyone will be playing the ACBL Yellow Card.  Only the less experienced players will carry a convention card, however, having crossed out anything he or she doesn’t play.  The more experienced player will hold partner’s card during play, and be responsible for using partner’s system during that round.

 

Assuming enough players, there will be four strata, with an individual winner in each.

 

The potluck will begin at noon, with the game at 1:30pm.  In previous years the potlucks have been fabulous: trust me, you won’t want to miss it.

 

See you on September 8th!

 

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Roadrunner Fall Sectional

 

 

November 1-3, 2002

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday

Friday November 1, 2002

 

 

 

 

Stratified Pairs

Single Session

10:00 AM

 

 

Stratified Pairs

Single Session

 3:00 PM

 

 

Bracketed Knock Outs

Round I

 3:00 PM

 

 

Bracketed Knock Outs

Round II

 8:00 PM

 

 

Stratified Pairs

Single Session

 8:00 PM

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saturday

Saturday November 2, 2002

 

 

 

 

Bracketed Knock Outs

Final Round

9:00 AM

 

 

Sectional Rated Pairs

Single Session

9:00 AM

 

 

Strati-Flighted Pairs

1st Session *

1:00 PM

 

 

Strati-Flighted Pairs

2nd Session *

7:00 PM

 

 

* Single session entries available on request.