Bridge As Opera

Sometimes bridge glides along as smoothly as an adagio movement from a Beethoven string quartet. When the four participants sustain a harmonious tension over a long period of time, it can be lovely, but it can get boring for all but the most refined connoisseurs, like myself. At other times the bidding becomes highly competitive, emotions rise and bridge becomes like an Italian opera with lots of chaos, shouting, and entertaining suicides by the foolish protagonists. That is the part most love: it is exciting. The trick to achieving success in an operatic setting is to get oneself into the proper frame of mind.

Imagine you are a member of the chorus of a famous opera house. The performance this night is Il Trovatore, a barn burner. Suddenly the famous mezzo-soprano and her understudy are taken ill with food poisoning (oysters), and you are thrust into the role of Azucena, the crazed gypsy woman who years previously had mistakenly thrown her own baby into a bonfire and has regretted it ever since. Let’s set the scene. The all-too-familiar Anvil Chorus has pounded its way to conclusion; you envy your erstwhile colleagues as they wend their way off stage for a much deserved cup of tea leaving you crouched beside the stage campfire awaiting your cue. The stage darkens, and the spotlight shines in your eyes but not before you manage to catch a glimpse of the bald-headed conductor as his lifts his baton and gives you an encouraging wink. Quietly you clear your throat. The maestro is hoping for accuracy, but you know that loudness is the key. You take a deep breath and let it fly.

So it is in competitive bidding – sometimes you have to let it fly. You are a veteran, and this is what you have been playing for all these years, a chance to shine. This is not a quartet or a duet. It is not a time for looking around for someone else to share the responsibility. The difference from opera is that you don’t have a conductor there to signal that it’s your call. You have to recognize the moment yourself and take charge.

This is what to look for. First, in the partnership your hand is by far the stronger. Second, your hand is short in the opponents’ suit. If those conditions exist, it is up to you to make the decisions for the partnership. It is well known that one should never suggest a penalty when holding a void in their trump suit.

Generally in a preemptive auction there is not enough information available for anyone to make a reasoned decision. One operates on instinct and general principles. No length of thinking about the circumstances is going to further one’s cause, and, in fact, may prove counter-productive. Last week there was a deal against an aggressive pair on which my partner made a weak jump overcall of 3♥ over 1♠ . Unhesitatingly my RHO raised to 4♠. I held ♠xxx ♥ QTxx ♦Axx ♣xxx, and just as quickly bid 5♥.

The opener said, ‘This goes against my rule, so sorry partner if this doesn’t work,’ and he bid 5♠. It turned out to be a top for us as 5♠ went down 1 on a diamond ruff. Yes, dummy held 6 diamonds which she had not deigned to show, preferring an uninformative ‘pressure’ bid. This is a characteristic of the operatic approach: loudness, not subtlety reigns. If the opponents are going to put on pressure, it behooves one to do the same. If I had hesitated before bidding 5♥ do you think the opener would not have doubled instead of taking the push to a losing contract? Under the circumstances, there was not enough information available to make a reasoned judgment, and I was not likely to gather more. So I went with what I had. It could be right, it probably was wrong, but if I didn’t know, neither did they. As with any stage performance, the trick is to appear credible at all times.

Linda Lee’s Question

In this light consider the problem discussed by Linda Lee in her blog of Feb 17, 2010. Should West double 5♣ ? The answer to me is clear cut.

After the preemptive 3NT opening bid, West must recognize the spotlight is going to be on her: a void, 4 losers, 8 controls. She knows the preemptor has long clubs, but her partner does not, so she has to mark time with a double and await developments. North cooperates by making a takeout bid in the minors, a vital piece of information being transmitted around the table, and South’s pass completes the picture. At this point West should take a deep breath and bid a conservative 6♣ . (Remember Rozzy’s Rule: Never bid a grand slam in competition.)

Yes, you might on a very bad day not make slam, but do the opponents know that? If one were to double and partner bids 5♠, say, can one judge that this is the right spot? The preempting side will be happy enough to let you play there on the grounds you may have missed your slam or grand slam. Even if you achieve par and make only 11 tricks they will be happy enough to have driven you to the 5-level. Why make them happy?

More important than what you think you can make is what the opponents think you can make. Suppose that West bids 6♣ and partner bids 6♠. How confident can the preemptors be now? Why shouldn’t they believe you can make 6♠? Might they not bid 7♣ as a sacrifice against a slam that is going down? So there is a second way to win when one boldly goes for the top. The greater your uncertainty, the greater theirs, so don’t advertise your doubts with a dubious double that really is not as wise as it seems.

I hate interviews of inarticulate jocks coached to give out mind numbing answers to asinine questions. In the Vancouver Winter Olympics snowboarder Maelle Ricker did Canada proud by being the first Canadian woman to win a gold medal on home ice and snow. In her after-run interview she kept repeating, ‘it was lots of fun!’ This was simple, genuine, and informative, as it demonstrated vividly and succintly the winning spirit: to win one must have fun and not be overly concerned about ending ass-up in a snow bank.

The Four Tenors

Over 60 years ago S.J.Simon wisely cautioned that in competition one should strive to achieve the best result possible rather than the best possible result, yet time and again we observe even experts making ridiculous overbids trying for an imaginary maximum. What has happened to the concept that good bridge is never having to say ‘I’m sorry’? To tell the truth they sometimes make their silly contracts such as 6NT missing 2 aces. The top level competition in the 2010 NEC Cup gave several examples of this tendency to take the bait and bid on and on. Here is my favorite operatic hand in which Italians faced Italians.

Dealer: East EW vulnerable		Bocchi
		♠	Q
		♥	AQ754
		♦	9
		♣	KJ9643
Nunes				Fantoni
♠	KJ9642			♠	A10853
♥	J96			♥	—
♦	J54			♦	8762
♣	Q			♣	A1082
		Madala
		♠	7
		♥	K10832
		♦	AKQ73
		♣	75

A critic once claimed that a good writer never uses the exclamation point, but my view is that sometimes one is not enough. Because information, or the lack of it, is often the key, the question one asks in these auctions that get too high is: who knew what? If Agustin Madala, the latest addition to the Lavazza team, had opened a sensible, informative 1♦ there may have been no story to tell, for drama often turns on ignorance and misunderstanding, as Jane Austen and Charles Dickens well knew. The recent introduction of transfers in competition hasn’t appeared to improve the situation. Eventually Madala did show his diamonds at the 5-level, so his partner, Noberto Bocchi, was in a good position to double 5♠ which Claudio Nunes had interjected before the correction to 5♥ , which, by the way, would have been down 1. But it didn’t end there.

Madala must have thought he had more than so far promised, and he became the first of 3 players on this deal to freely bid a slam missing 2 aces. Or was he just guessing? We know the answer, don’t we? Nunes, emulating the style of his countryman, the late Luciano Pavorotti, overdid it immensely when he bid his mediocre suit a 3rd time, as if he feared that his partner may not have been paying proper attention. Bocchi passed having already expressed an opinion that had been ignored. Fluvio Fantoni didn’t have enough to redouble, but he must have smiled when he put down a dummy with a useable void and 2 aces. It was not nearly enough, as 6♠* went down 2 for a loss of 14 IMPs.

At the other table where 2 Poles faced 2 Italians, there were variations on the same themes but with greater discord and cue bids galore. Adam Zmudzinski was strangely silent over Sementa’s 4♥ although one can imagine he could have chosen with reason from 6 alternatives: double, 4♠, 4NT, 5♦ , 5♥, or 5♠. (Make that 7 if 5♣ is a transfer.)

Balicki’s 4NT appears to have been an attempt to gather more information, although he was the first to jump the bidding and take away bidding room. He had jumped but not high enough. Sementa’s first double is dubious. Without the libretto it remains a mystery as to what this was meant to convey. Zmudzinski’s 5♣ might or might not have shown diamonds, but, regardless, Balicki knew enough to stop in 5♥. Sementa’s push to 5♠ was understandable, however, Zmudzinski’s pass held an unexpected meaning for Balicki.

Most of the bridge world likes to have a late pass available to convey the meaning, ‘nothing to add at this time.’ It is sometimes apologetic in nature, a sly abrogation of responsibility. Poles are notorious for adopting an alternative approach. Copernicus was such a Pole, so they are not always wrong. Maybe confusion is natural in a country overrun repeatedly from both East and West. Balicki, yet another famous Polish émigré, remembers the Polish Pass as meaning ‘Bid on! I’ve got a void and several other features I neglected to mention.’ To non-Poles, that doesn’t appear consistent with Zmudzinski’s previous actions, but if that’s what you think, bidding 6♥ becomes automatic.

Antonio Sementa’s final double doesn’t make sense, either, unless Giorgio Duboin is an idiot, but rumor has it that he is not. Let’s be fair. Maybe double says, ’I’m void, so consider bidding on.’ I admit I don’t know what these bids mean, but on the evidence of the auction I am not sure any one at the table knew what their partners were divulging, so why should I know? Uncertainty is the essence of the modern competitive style.

As reported on BBO the appearance of the ♠7 from declarer’s hand provoked operatic shouting and arm waving that must have shocked the ever-polite Japanese audience. However, Japan is a nation that has developed the act of self-destruction from its humble beginnings as a sincere apology for misdeeds to the ultimate means of self expression. They would have appreciated fully the suicidal aspects of the subsequent events. The Zimmerman team, which had built up a huge lead, continued its downward path to self-destruction, losing the final on a 3 IMP swing on the very last board. As Maelle Ricker might comment on behalf of the Lavazza team, ‘It was lots of fun!’