Bridge Comments of local players demonstrate much wisdom

Over the years, some interesting comments by local players at the bridge table have revealed a lot about the game.

From Nancy Chandler: “Duplicate bridge is all about how you bid at the three level.” There is a lot of truth in that. At duplicate pairs, every hand counts the same. You can lose as many matchpoints by losing a more common part score bidding battle (or play and defense) than failing to bid and make a slam.

From Warren Garrett: “You can’t play perfect bridge and have a 70 percent game.” At duplicate, 70 percent is huge. What he meant, of course, was that sometimes for the really big games you have to get into some really ambitious, even awful, contracts that fetch top scores, either through a lucky lie of the cards, poor defense or brilliant declarer play.

From Ernie Skolnik: “Make the bid (or play) that wins the post mortem.” Sometimes an important part of bridge is the after the hand or game discussion about what was done, what wasn’t done, what could have been done, what should have been done (and whose fault it was).

However, his point wasn’t being able to later say, “I told you so” but simply the statistical fact that if you make the bid (or play) that will be most defensible, however it works out at the table, in the post mortem, that is also most likely to be the bid or play that works.

Playing with recent Denver nationals tournament co-chairman Roy Weinstein at a tournament in Albuquerque, and with no particular strength to lead from, I made a somewhat pushy lead from three hearts to the queen (an unbid suit) against a four spade contract. Disaster ensued. The lead rode around to declarer’s ace-king-jack.

In fact, the lead cost two tricks because with four small hearts in dummy, declarer got a pitch in a suit where we could have gotten a trick if I had led it.

Needless to say, I wasn’t too pleased. Did partner have something unpleasant to say? Quite the opposite. Said Weinstein, “I will never criticize partner for making an aggressive lead.” That’s how you build partnership confidence.

Finally, playing four of a major against Gerald Oehm, upon getting in I drew trumps and had four diamonds to the 10 and nine in dummy opposite five to the ace-king in hand (the bidding hadn’t shown five diamonds). Normally you just play the ace and king, hoping for an even break and no losers.

I led small off the dummy and right-hand opponent played the queen in tempo (didn’t seem like a false card from queen-jack). I won the ace, and also in tempo (if you think too long, the cat is out of the bag), led a small diamond back toward dummy.

Oehm, on my left, thought a few seconds and, having started with jack third, ducked. The 10 won, and a diamond back to the king picked up the suit.

Remarked Oehm, “What a great play. I can’t believe you did that.”

It was a classy comment. It can be hard to compliment an opponent when you’re getting a poor result. But Oehm, as a mathematics teacher by profession, always appreciated the beauty of the game in the abstract and the inherent fascination of card combinations, whether working in one’s favor or not.

It is important to note that I also paid him a compliment by trying the deceptive play in the first place. Ironically, the better the opponent, the more likely it is to work. A weak player would simply look at the 10 in dummy and think, “I can beat that,” and fly with the jack, not thinking about crashing partner’s possible king.

Only a thoughtful expert will consider the possibilities and perhaps duck.

A few hands and comments that still stand out after all these years and which speak volumes about the best way to approach the game.

SUDOKU ANSWER JUMBLE ANSWER GLANCE CANOPY STUDIO FIRMLY COARSE WHEEZE When the young author sold his first book, he and other authors celebrated his — “WRITE” OF PASSAGE