unLawful 5-Level Competition 1998-08-21 ---------------------------- Paul Wendt MIT/DL 18 Aug 98 - Deal 4, rotated Dealer "East", both vulnerable x JT9xx Jxxxx 8x KQxx Axxxx Axx KQxx xx x AQxx Jxx Jxx x AKQxx KT9x P 1D X 3D 4D 5D X passed This was a disaster for defenders. Spades +650 was "cold" in the common speech (which ignores voids), but they settled for +500 in the auction. The field provided no company, no matchpoints. A simple Losing Trick Count (LTC) would save defenders here. The predictor of is 24 minus each partner's LTC. Here, West holds LTC 6, East LTC 7, and they win 11 tricks in their best suit --which they can't miss if they decide to bid. LTC 7 is supposed to be the playing value of a sound opening bid, so West should expect that from East's 4-level cuebid. A simple Law of Total Tricks (Law) would be no help. The predictor of is the sum of their trump lengths. Here, there are 9 spades and 10 diamonds, or 19 simply Lawful tricks. Given 19 tricks, West would defend, expecting +800 (8 tricks for us in diamonds) whenever +650 is available as declarer (11 tricks); in fact, West expects somewhat fewer than 19 trumps, call it 19-, which makes defending even more Lawful. 9 tricks were not "cold" for me as South, but at worst (repeated spade leads) need only a club Qjack onside (75%) and more commonly need only that or 2-1 diamonds and 4-3 hearts (almost certain on the bidding). The simple Law of Total Tricks wrongly predicts the same number of tricks on the actual deal and its variations with worse and worst North-South distribution, East-West unchanged. The worst variation, about three tricks worse than actual, is xx JT9 Jxxxx 8xx Jx xxx AKQxx KT9 The simple Law founders on the fact that and make no difference to their 11 tricks in spades but make the difference between usually 6 and usually 9 tricks for us in diamonds. Variations on a deal are Lawfully supposed to take tricks from one side as they give tricks to the other, but here that is not so. Old-fashioned reasoning (is that the right name for it?) might have saved defenders. West KQxx Axx xx AQxx sitting over my 1D opening and our bouncy -3D-5D continuation might have reasoned that partner's D stiff or void is certain; that 10 opposing "points" are harmless Diamonds; that the C finesse or single most likely H finesse will win; and --with a reasonable(?) trust in opposing bidding-- might have settled for the probable +650. Or maybe that would be unreasonable. ----Paul Paul Wendt, Watertown MA member, SABR internet committee (baseball research) player, MIT/DL bridge club (card game; like to sit East)