schulken

It happens all the time. The best example I have seen was playing against an experienced TD who was making a jump raise. When she placed the stop card on the table ahead of her bid, she announced, "Stop. Please wait." She placed her bid on the table, waited several seconds, and then returned the stop card to her bid box. While a bit pedantic, ACBL's Bid Box Regulations place responsibility on the jump bidder to gain LHO's attention and her announcement accomplished its goal. At the risk of sounding pedantic myself, I would point out that my understanding is that the stop card is designed to protect the opponents from a BIT issue, not to alert their partner, although it accomplishes the same thing if everyone is paying attention.

Not seeing the hands, I think S's X was a bit misguided. Did he intend to defend against 2♣X. S clearly had a chance to show support for N's C after N X 3♥. Since 5♣ was cold, raising to 4 would seem reasonable. I'm not impressed with their claim of damage, either.

Within the last week, I (new club director) have been summoned to the table TWICE to rule on potential damage for an potentially improper Drury alert. In the first instance, the auction proceeded (W dealer) P - P - 1H - 1S - 2C (alert as Drury) - P - 3H - 3S - all P. Declarer called when dummy came down holding 2 H and she held 5 H. She believed she had been damaged because she could have defended against 3HX for a better score. I questioned W who stated that E's alert was correct and that she had forgot they were playing Drury after interference - she meant it as a C bid and she held KQxxx. The club manager and I consulted with a very experienced pair playing in the game (10,000+ MPs) about their experience in using Drury after interference. One said he and a different partner use this in their system and have specifically have marked their card accordingly. However, he agreed that the mistaken call was likely given the hands and the level of the players (NLM). It seemed that S was fishing for a better score - she made 4. I ruled that W made a mistaken call (75C) and that N-S were not entitled to an adjusted score. To my thinking, she could have doubled 3H anyway, believing the defenders had a 5-0 trump split and she was sitting behind the player with the longer and (probably) stronger Hs. In the second occurrence, the auction proceeded (again W dealer) P - P - 1H - 1S - 2C (alert - "I believe that's Drury") - 3S - all P, making 5. N-S believed they had been damaged in that they believed W's hand was stronger than it actually was. While E said she "believed" they were playing Drury after interference, W said they were not, but only after then hand was played. N-S failed to consult E-W's card (which said they were playing Drury but nothing else). Again in consultation with the club manager, I ruled there was no damage. N had other bids available to him regardless of his stated perceived strength of the W hand and the corresponding perceived weakness of his partner's overcall - he could have cue bid 3C or simply raised to 2S - and that his 3S bid showed a weaker hand than he held. Two questions - how do you manage (and rule on) conventional responses when they are not clearly laid out on the pair's card? Second - did I get these right?