[kfgauss]

I agree as far as board 8 goes, but it seems we are playing board 7 and declarer has just informed us that she didn't look at her hand during the auction. It's fine that she didn't use her hand, and it's also fine that this information has been communicated, as she's declarer.

I could see there being a law making this sort of situation an exception (ie specifically for bidding with a hand from a different board), but unless there is one, I see nothing wrong with keeping the score on board 7.

Andy

[Trinidad]

Fortunately, the Laws of Contract Bridge tell us what should have happened. Here is Law 17D:

"D. Cards from Wrong Board
If a player who has inadvertently picked up the cards from a wrong board makes a call, that call is cancelled. If offender's LHO has called over the cancelled call, the Director shall assign artificial adjusted scores (see Law 90 for penalty) when offender's substituted call differs in any significant way from his cancelled call . If offender subsequently repeats the cancelled call on the board from which he mistakenly drew his cards, the Director may allow that board to be played normally, but the Director shall assign artificial adjusted scores (see Law 90) when offender's call differs in any way from his original cancelled call."

So, the TD is supposed to let the dealer take the correct cards out of the board and let him make a bid. If it is 1♠ then play continues as it was. In all other cases, the board is cancelled and an adjusted score is given.

Rik

[zasanya]

mr1303, on Apr 29 2006, 05:28 AM, said:

I hope you appealed. Director's ruling is wrong. Both boards should now be deemed unplayable, with your score being assigned as Ave+ (you were no way at fault) and their score as Ave- (for being mostly at fault).

I didn't appeal because I thought the ruling was quite logical and fair.Moreover I am secretary of our district association and I did not want to antagonise the director and thought it more important to comfort the LOL who was most embarassed.Last but not the least we had done rather poorly on earlier boards and wouldn't have secured 1st/2nd place even if we had got all tops on the remaining boards.
BTW the directors ruling for the board was even more innovative.He advised us to treat the 1♠ bid as bid out of turn and the ♥A was to be treated as penalty card/lead out of turn depending on which one of us became the declarer and asked me dealer on board 8 to bid .The bidding went p p p 1♠ p 2♠ p p p.No penalty.

[jchiu]

My favorite psych is the McCabe Adjunct response psych. For those who aren't familiar, the adjunct applies when partner has opened a weak two and RHO has made a takeout double*. Responder may bid any suit directly as a lead-directing raise of the weak two, directly raise the weak two to promise a control in the suit, redouble to suggest defending, or bid 2NT as a relay to 3C after which responder may signoff in another suit, or make a non-control showing raise.

First psych: November 27, 2005, First Final Session of the North American Swiss. This certainly meets the criteria of strong opposition. On the first board, I doubled them in a cold game that made an overtrick on a lead misfire. The second board was relatively uneventful.

Scoring: IMP

---

Pass (Pass) 2♠ (Dbl!) ... where double shows either a traditional takeout double or a strong balanced hand (22+). With a straight face, I quickly bid 3♥, pointed to it as to indicate an alert (we were playing behind screens). Although I felt clearly nervous when LHO asked me to write down the explanation, he apparently did not notice the psych until after the auction. The auction continued

Pass (Pass) 2♠ (Dbl!)
3♥!! (Dbl) 3♠ (3NT)
All Pass

Twelve tricks all day, for a satisfying -690. Our teammates Barry Harper and Mike Levy had absolutely no trouble getting to 6♥ for a 12 IMP gain. Since he was sitting out, our teammate Gerry Marshall walked by their home table as they finished comparing. They told Gerry "Your teammate psyched!". He echoed the statement, and before he could ask Barry about it, I quipped "So? I wanted a heart lead if they put Warren [Foss] on lead".

Second Psych: April 22, 2006, Gatlinburg. In a twenty-four board KO match, my partner and I brought back a reasonably unspectacular card, but with one disaster where I had gone for 500 on a partscore deal. I figured to be down by anywhere between the nine IMPs I surrendered on that hand and twenty-nine, based on the cards that were coming back that week. At halftime, we were down 31 IMPs and I had enough. While I reassured our teammates that we could come back, I was clearly steaming and was determined to swing.

Scoring: IMP

---

2♥ (Dbl)

Sure, I could bid 4♥ like most experts would. But I thought the opponents (their third pair, brought in to sit on the thirty-one IMP lead) were complacent. I therefore bid a quick and confident 3♠, which was duly alerted by Warren. This sequence is not explicitly defined in the version of McCabe that we agreed, but I did mention to him that "any weird jump not a splinter or otherwise conventional is a fit jump". So he called my psych a fit jump, and with three baby spades was content to let me try 3♠ Doubled. The auction continued

2♥ (Dbl) 3♠ (Dbl)
Pass (Pass) 4♥ (4♠)
All Pass

which was a satisfying -680. Our teammates had no trouble finding the spade slam, which brought home +1430 for 13 IMPs. This set the tone for the second half, and our stunned opponents left by saying "we think you may have come back". We won the second half by a margin of 32 IMPs.

After this incident, I asked Warren whether he suspected prior to my LHO's double that he suspected a psych. He did, but for ethical reasons was planning to bid 4♠ had my LHO not doubled. However, the double gave him bridge reasons for exposing my psychic call, so he was not obligated to raise but with no clear-cut lead was still obligated to lead spades against any non-spade contract. He also mentioned that it would be legal to psych this conventional response as long as partner led the suit as requested whenever necessary. At this point, I promised that despite its effectiveness when properly timed, I would never make this psych when playing with Warren again.

Third Psych: April 30, 2006, Sectional Flight A Swiss. I was playing with Richard Popper, who had no suspicion that I psych McCabe occasionally. Here, I made a semipsych 3♣ in response to a second-hand 2♦ opening with

Scoring: IMP

---

which caused RHO to misplace the clubs in a difficult 4♥ contract. He allowed my ♠Q to score a trick, along with Richard's ♣Q, a diamond trick, and my ♣A. Had he not suspected both club honors offsides, he could have executed an endplay on me to make the contract. My teammate Jay Apfelbaum had little trouble doing this to my counterpart, and scored up +620 for 12 IMPs.

[han]

Jason, I guess this means that I should alert your McCabe's from now on as "likes to psyche these". I wish you had not written this .

[jchiu]

Hannie, on May 8 2006, 03:41 PM, said:

Jason, I guess this means that I should alert your McCabe's from now on as "likes to psyche these". I wish you had not written this .

Darn, I really should not have been retiring this psych here, where my partners could be reading about its adventures. But I wanted to leave it with an honorable discharge from my arsenal of bidding techniques. I was inspired to make this bid after I heard (from Toni Bales, in Denver) a story of Zia psyching such a call and his partner Michael Rosenberg getting the lead wrong because of the psych. A not so glorious advertisement for the psych, but I definitely had keeping the opponents out of slam as the main purpose of (1) and (2) above.

[cherdano]

Btw, anyone have more experience with psychic lead directing doubles in slam auctions?

Arend

[jdonn]

As long as we are all telling our stories, my favorite psych is still the smolen psych with a short weak major and a five card major, although I don't do it on the same hands as the person who first taught it to me. My preferred hand is something like xx xxxxx AQx KQx, where I don't mind missing a 5-3 heart fit as long as partner has four spades, and if he is 3-2 in the majors I want to avoid a spade lead. It's a ridiculously safe psych, since the only way it can go wrong is for partner to choose what he thinks is the 4-3 fit, something most people never do.

In the 2005 GNT qualifier semifinals in my district last year, playing with a first and probably last time partner (great psych situation!) I made the smolen psych on Qxxxx x AKJx xxx. 1NT 2♣, 2♦ 3♥, 3♠ 4♠. Oddly enough it worked by having the opposite effect of normal. Instead of avoiding a heart lead against 3NT, it attracted one against 4♠! Opening leader (an excellent player) led the heart ace from Axxxxx, certain that he was about to give his partner a ruff at trick two. Instead my partner's KQx of hearts was set up for two club pitches, making a game that was never going to make otherwise. Suffice to say, I was quite pleased with my shenanigans.

[han]

cherdano, on May 8 2006, 11:45 AM, said:

Btw, anyone have more experience with psychic lead directing doubles in slam auctions?

Arend

I made one yesterday, but I won't tell you about it Arend.

[han]

Very nice idea Josh, I've got to try that some time .

[kfgauss]

Trinidad, on Apr 30 2006, 09:26 AM, said:

Fortunately, the Laws of Contract Bridge tell us what should have happened. Here is Law 17D:

"D. Cards from Wrong Board
If a player who has inadvertently picked up the cards from a wrong board makes a call, that call is cancelled. If offender's LHO has called over the cancelled call, the Director shall assign artificial adjusted scores (see Law 90 for penalty) when offender's substituted call differs in any significant way from his cancelled call . If offender subsequently repeats the cancelled call on the board from which he mistakenly drew his cards, the Director may allow that board to be played normally, but the Director shall assign artificial adjusted scores (see Law 90) when offender's call differs in any way from his original cancelled call."

So, the TD is supposed to let the dealer take the correct cards out of the board and let him make a bid. If it is 1♠ then play continues as it was. In all other cases, the board is cancelled and an adjusted score is given.

Rik

I didn't really think about the implications of this until now, but this gives the player who took out the wrong hand an interesting problem: take an Ave-minus or repeat your previous call even if it wasn't appropriate for your hand (ie psyche). It seems like this could often be correct, and indeed would have been on this board.

Do the opponents get to change their bids if this player chooses to make the same calls? They have added information that their opponent is somewhat likely to be psyching because the bids are being made under duress of an Ave-minus score for changing.

Andy

[mrdct]

The current free money bridge tourneys are a great place to practice psyching as you have three GIB players to piss-off and no kibitzers. The problem is you have little chance of winning the tourney as psyche opportunities are generally cheap sacrifices, and therefore small negatives, so if you are getting such hands it's hard to win a total points events.

[jchiu]

Apparently you haven't experienced how bad these robots could possibly be in fielding psychs. Not only do they fail to field the psych, they also bid some high and crazy contract based on their distribution and your presumed values. I doubt they play McCabe, so my psych would be dangerous bordering on insane playing with such a robot. On the other hand, that Smolen psych ...