Why (and should) 2 USA teams in BB?

[drinbrasil]

Hi all, (valid for BB,SB and VC)

 

2 questions:

 

1) If is about number of players, I am thinking, when China number of players in bridge start to grow as big as USA, they will have rights to China1 and China2 as well?

 

2) I dont remember any other sport where one country can have 2 teams to dispute one WORLD title. If you are playing for your country, cannot you deliberary loss one match at some point to put one team who was in bad run awake to win other team who was disputing with our other country team? Or to play better and make other team go down and not qualify with better carry over?All in all, Is fair have then 2 teams from same country to dispute wich country is better?

 

offtopic: when my sister who doesnt play bridge saw photo "we dont vote bush" and she saw 2 usa teams, she asked me "the other usa is the bush team?" LOL

[awm]

In some sense China already does have multiple teams: China, Chinese Taipei, and China Hong Kong. Of course, whether the latter two really count as China teams is questionable, but according to the Chinese government they do...

 

Presumably if the number of bridge players in each zone changes dramatically, WBF will change the number of qualifying teams from the zones. USA having two teams is a combination of the facts that: (1) The North America zone has a lot of players (2) The North America zone has essentially only three countries (USA, Canada, Mexico) (3) The Zonal Authority (ACBL) has decided to allocate two teams to the USA and only one to Canada/Mexico, a decision which might come under some question if the Mexican team were ever truly competitive (they haven't been).

[kenrexford]

Yeah, plus it is apparently well-known that there are two Americas in the United States. LOL

[markleon]

The WBF always makes the two USA teams in each event play each other within the first 2 or 3 matches to help minimize the incentive for "nationalistic" dumping.

[drinbrasil]

As i received one ask at BBO, not clear in my first post, my position is i think is NOT fair 2 teams from same country in one World dispute.

[helene_t]

I may be wrong but I think it's related to the fact that USA has enough world class players to deliver five or six BB level teams if they were allowed. Not the number of bridge players per se.

 

There is a conflict of interest. It is good for the publicity that many different countries, and many different continents, participate. OTOH it is also a good thing if the field is a strong as possible.

 

I suppose two US teams is reasonable compromise.

[hrothgar]

In some ways, it might be better to consider the Bermuda Bowl as a competition between Zones rather than one between individual countries.

 

The WBF determines how many teams each Zone is permitted to set to the Bermuda Bowl. As I understand matters, this decision is some function of the number of bridge players who are active in each Zone.

 

Individual Zones then determine how they will allocate the available slots to the different teams that are contesting the event.

 

Zone 2 (the Zone that the United States belongs to) made the decision that two of the three slots would be allocated to the United States and one would be contested between Canada and Mexico. As I understand matters, this format is strongly preferred by Mexico and Canada.

 

Most of the other Zones only allow one team per country.

[han]

Agree with Helene that it is not just the number of bridge players, also the level. If you look at how often the US has won and how many teams they can field that would have a shot at winning, it is not comparabe with any other country.

 

Suppose the European Union gets a constitution and becomes more and more one country, should they then send fewer teams to the Bermuda Bowl? I'd say that should be irrelevant. It makes perfect sense to me that a huge bridge country like the US gets two teams.

[drinbrasil]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22. At end i see people talking about how many times USA won titles, the country.

Or the country is irrelevant in this torney and important is good bridge?

(note: i agree USA can have many teams in better teams in world, this is never questionable from me).

 

My main question is about the dispute between countries. I saw one reply here saying BB is dispute between zones :blink: i didnt know this...then zone "A" has x titles, zone "B" y titles and so on...? :blink: we should count this way?

[mike777]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22. At end i see people talking about how many times USA won titles, the country.

Or the country is irrelevant in this torney and important is good bridge?

(note: i agree USA can have many teams in better teams in world, this is never questionable from me).

 

My main question is about the dispute between countries. I saw one reply here saying BB is dispute between zones  :blink:  i didnt know this...then zone "A" has x titles, zone "B" y titles and so on...?  :blink:  we should count this way?

IF you are saying the old USSR should get 2 chess teams, I assume they play and win only as a team, then Yes they should get two teams.

 

If you are saying Europe or South America should get more teams than north america in soccer....YES.

[drinbrasil]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22. At end i see people talking about how many times USA won titles, the country.

Or the country is irrelevant in this torney and important is good bridge?

(note: i agree USA can have many teams in better teams in world, this is never questionable from me).

 

My main question is about the dispute between countries. I saw one reply here saying BB is dispute between zones  :blink:  i didnt know this...then zone "A" has x titles, zone "B" y titles and so on...?  :blink:  we should count this way?

IF you are saying the old USSR should get 2 chess teams, I assume they play and win only as a team, then Yes they should get two teams.

 

If you are saying Europe or South America should get more teams than north america in soccer....YES.

No, you didnt understand what i said.

[P_Marlowe]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22.

<snip>

Not sure if it makes sense, but in the software business

one says, software is the way it is, because of historic

reasons.

 

Does it make sense, that there are 4 soccer

teams from Great Britain in the competition?

- England

- Wales

- Scotland

- North Ireland

 

And two from Denmark?

- Denmark

- Faroer Isles (hopefully I spelled them right

and hopefully the Faroer Isles

belong to Denmark)

 

With kind regards

Marlowe

[MickyB]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22.

<snip>

Not sure if it makes sense, but in the software business

one says, software is the way it is, because of historic

reasons.

 

Does it make sense, that there are 4 soccer

teams from Great Britain in the competition?

- England

- Wales

- Scotland

- North Ireland

 

And two from Denmark?

- Denmark

- Faroer Isles (hopefully I spelled them right

and hopefully the Faroer Isles

belong to Denmark)

 

With kind regards

Marlowe

This is equivalent to there being one team from the South of USA and another from the North.

[Echognome]

In athletics, in the olympics you have limits by country. However, in the world championships, the limits are determined by qualification regardless of country. However you want to set up your competition is really up to the organizers. I don't see why one team per country by default is anything special.

[awm]

Whether this is "fair" depends on how you define "fair." Some problems:

 

(1) It's not the case that, assuming equally good teams, all countries have equal chance of winning. For a good European team to get to the Bermuda Bowl, they have to make it through a potentially tough field in the European Championships. For a good Australian team to get to the Bermuda Bowl, well, that's automatic. So some countries have to struggle to even get to the BB whereas other countries get automatic spots. The US getting two teams is another example of the same thing.

 

(2) An obvious "solution" is to simply say "one team per country" and let every country send a team. But this is not good either, because there would be a lot more teams, making the competition lengthy, and at the same time many of the teams added would be pretty bad teams from tiny countries with very few bridge players.

 

(3) Some countries divide naturally into regions, and in many cases these regions have been granted their own teams. Obvious example is China vs. China Hong Kong. It's not clear to me that British divisions (i.e. England vs. Scotland) couldn't also have their own teams in BB if they qualified via the European Championships. Perhaps the US should be encouraged to send teams from different states/regions (i.e. Texas, California, New England)? I don't see why this really makes matters better though, especially since it's relatively easy for Americans to move from state to state and many bridge professionals hardly even have a home address (since they travel from tournament to tournament for a living).

 

(4) From the viewpoint of an individual player in the US, it's actually still harder to make the BB than for individual players from most other nations. This is because the number of "world-class" players in the US is so ridiculously high. Reducing to one US team would make this difference even more extreme. Fairness to individual players seems like it has some validity as well as fairness to countries; after all the individual player gets to put "world champion" or at least "represented country in bermuda bowl" in their resume, gets a star on BBO, probably helps their reputation as a professional player, etc.

[han]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22. At end i see people talking about how many times USA won titles, the country.

Or the country is irrelevant in this torney and important is good bridge?

(note: i agree USA can have many teams in better teams in world, this is never questionable from me).

 

My main question is about the dispute between countries. I saw one reply here saying BB is dispute between zones  :blink:  i didnt know this...then zone "A" has x titles, zone "B" y titles and so on...?  :blink:  we should count this way?

IF you are saying the old USSR should get 2 chess teams, I assume they play and win only as a team, then Yes they should get two teams.

 

If you are saying Europe or South America should get more teams than north america in soccer....YES.

Mike, I not only understand what you are saying, I completely agree! Let's have a party.

 

BTW, I think the Russia does get to send more than one player to the world championships. Ever heard about Kasparov and Karpov drinbrasil?

 

Another great comparison is the olympics. There are many events where there are many Americans competing for the gold medal but fewer of even no Dutch. That doesn't seem wrong to me, the Americans who don't qualify for those events are probably still far better than the Dutch.

[drinbrasil]

Do you think make perfect sense if Brasil send 2 teams to WC soccer or Russia send 2 teams to Olympiads of chess? hehe what i want know is if you think is fair one COUNTRY, dispute WORLD title with 2 teams in 22. At end i see people talking about how many times USA won titles, the country.

Or the country is irrelevant in this torney and important is good bridge?

(note: i agree USA can have many teams in better teams in world, this is never questionable from me).

 

My main question is about the dispute between countries. I saw one reply here saying BB is dispute between zones  :blink:  i didnt know this...then zone "A" has x titles, zone "B" y titles and so on...?  :blink:  we should count this way?

IF you are saying the old USSR should get 2 chess teams, I assume they play and win only as a team, then Yes they should get two teams.

 

If you are saying Europe or South America should get more teams than north america in soccer....YES.

Mike, I not only understand what you are saying, I completely agree! Let's have a party.

 

BTW, I think the Russia does get to send more than one player to the world championships. Ever heard about Kasparov and Karpov drinbrasil?

 

Another great comparison is the olympics. There are many events where there are many Americans competing for the gold medal but fewer of even no Dutch. That doesn't seem wrong to me, the Americans who don't qualify for those events are probably still far better than the Dutch.

I said olimpics in chess because is per country (teams). Chess WC is individual...and i bet i know more chess than you :D

 

Indivual sports dont say wich COUNTRY is the best. Just the best person. Etiope wins 10000m, usa wins 400m and so on, each category has one winner, and you can say there is ONE country better in medals at atletics. Not realistic think about individual torneys. When is 100mx4 you see more than one USA team running? USA is the best in fast guys...should has 3 teams...

 

Only to me when countries involved, i never saw any sport where there are more than one REGULAR team per country, only bridge. Btw in chess if odd number of teams local team can put one more team (when i was player hosts has advantage to put already 2 for start), but in this case also the country has advantage.

 

 

What i think about bridge is that is because that is and noone says nothing because noone cares and seems natural the best country have 2 teams. Is like basketball soon sending 2 usa teams to WC Basket, soccer Brasil sending 2 teams to WC. Will be very good, if one team play bad other can win.

 

But if all community of bridge like this and thinks is fair, ok, i am alone in this view, no problems:-) Just interesting so diferent aproach for WORLD TITLE, diferent from big majority of all sports and have only one person thinking like me :blink:

[mike777]

Speaking only for myself, in bridge, I would prefer a transnational olympiad than a one team per country olympiad.

 

I would hope that a transnational olympiad would embody all of the "traditions" that one could squeeze in given the fact it is transnational.

[pretzalz]

 

Only to me when countries involved, i never saw any sport where there are more than one REGULAR team per country, only bridge.

Beach Volleyball, bobsled, Luge are just a couple sports that have more than one team per country at the olympics.

[Gerardo]

In Chess Olympiads, hosts get a second team, rarely a third.

 

Last time in Russia, Russia2 got bronze IIRC.

 

drin, in our case (Zone 3), the Zonal Authority (the CSB) decides which teams sends to the WC.

 

For that, it organizes round-robin tournaments with one team per country, then KO (semifinals and final). Semifinals longer than final, as the WC berth is played there (2 berths available).

 

ACBL, Zonal 1 authority, decides to give 2 berths to the same country, unique in the world.

[mrdct]

There are at least four countries (as recognised by the UN) in addition to the USA that are allowed to send multiple teams to the Bermuda Bowl. These are:

 

United Kingdom (England, Scotland and Wales);

Denmark (Denmark and Faroe Islands);

China (China, Hong Kong, Macao and one other debatable one); and

France (France, Guadeloupe, Martinique, French Guyana, New Caledonia, French Polynesia and Reunion).

 

In practice I thing that it's only China and France out of these four that have managed to get multiple teams to a BB, VC or SB through their Zonal qualifier (in France's case four separate Zones are involved).

 

Of course the key difference here vis-a-vis the USA situation is that the sub-entities of these countries have some international profile in their own right and some degree of political autonomy.

 

I think there are plenty of countries with sufficient depth to be able to field a 2nd, 3rd or 4th team with realistic chances of making the quarter-finals. One only has to look at how close the national trials were in some of the contending countries to evidence this. But I don't think that is a reasonable justification for one country getting to send more than one team. With places like the Netherlands, France and China being quite likely to overtake the USA in terms of active membership in the near future, I think now is the time to revert to a "one country one team" structure rather than having to entertain claims for multiple teams from other countries in the future.

 

However, I'm happy to preserve the WBF recognition of "psuedo" countries like the ones noted above on a similar basis to how FIFA do it.

 

Another issue raised in this thread is the relative easy path that Australia has to the Berumda Bowl (essential only needing to finish top 2 out of Australia, New Zealand, New Caledonia and French Polynesia). I couldn't agree more and strongly believe that Zone 7 (South Pacific) ought to be disbanded and merged with Zone 6 (Pacific-Asia) with the top 3 or 4 teams from the PABF Championships getting the Bermuda Bowl berths. If you were going to rationalise things further, you could also look at breaking up BFAME (West Asia and Middle East) sending the Middle East teams to the African Zone and the West Asian teams to the Pacific-Asia Zone. There may also be some merit in moving Mexico to the Central America 7 Carribean Zone to at least give them some hope of qualifying; but this would probably leave Canada with too easy a path so I'm not sure how to get around that one, unless you get Canada to have a play-off against the CAC winner; a bit like FIFA organise the football world cup.

 

So the Bermuda Bowl Field could be something like:

 

Zone 1 (Europe): 6 teams

Zone 2 (Nth Am): 1.5 teams (USA to play-off vs Canada and loser of that plays-off against the winner of CAC)

Zone 3 (Sth Am): 2 teams

Zone 4 (CAC): 0.5 teams

Zone 5 (BFAME): disbanded

Zone 6 (PABF): 4 teams (expanded field including Pacific and West Asian teams)

Zone 7 (Pacific): disbanded

Zone 8 (Africa & Mid-East): 2 teams

 

Total: 16 teams.

 

This possibly a bit harsh on the expanded PABF which would go from 7 teams (this year not counting the host country the BB had Japan, Indonesia, Chinese Taipei, India, Pakistan, Australia and New Zealand). But I think a condensed more elite field will be better for the event. Remember the Olympiad is still open all countries and Zonal Championships are still significant and prestigious events, with the PABF Championships likely to be significantly enhanced.

[JanM]

Well, in Shanghai, Zone 1 had 18 teams (6 in each event); Zone 2 had 9 teams (3 in each event). Of the teams from Zone 1, 10 (56%) made the Quarterfinals, 4 (22%) made the Semifinals, 2 (11%) made the finals and one (6%) won. Of the teams from Zone 2, 8 (89%) made the Quarterfinals, 4 (44%) made the Semifinals, 3 (33%) made the Finals and 2 (22%) won. And you think that Zone 2 should have fewer teams in these events?

Granted, Zone 2 didn't do quite so well in the Bermuda Bowl, which is referenced in the title to this thread. But even there, 1 (33%) of the Zone 2 teams made each of the KO stages. Of the Zone 1 BB teams, 4 (66%) made the Quarterfinals, 2 (33%) made the Semifinals and one (17%) made the final. And if you want to limit the discussion to US teams, the percentages are even higher.

[matmat]

i don't really see a problem with the US sending two teams... send one that voted for bush and one that didn't... only way to represent the whole country, isn't it?

[mrdct]

Well, in Shanghai, Zone 1 had 18 teams (6 in each event); Zone 2 had 9 teams (3 in each event). Of the teams from Zone 1, 10 (56%) made the Quarterfinals, 4 (22%) made the Semifinals, 2 (11%) made the finals and one (6%) won. Of the teams from Zone 2, 8 (89%) made the Quarterfinals, 4 (44%) made the Semifinals, 3 (33%) made the Finals and 2 (22%) won. And you think that Zone 2 should have fewer teams in these events?

Granted, Zone 2 didn't do quite so well in the Bermuda Bowl, which is referenced in the title to this thread. But even there, 1 (33%) of the Zone 2 teams made each of the KO stages. Of the Zone 1 BB teams, 4 (66%) made the Quarterfinals, 2 (33%) made the Semifinals and one (17%) made the final. And if you want to limit the discussion to US teams, the percentages are even higher.

For much the same reasons that Brazil doesn't get to send two teams to the FIFA World Cup, USA shouldn't get to field two teams in the Bermuda Bowl. Whilst the USA clearly has superior depth at its elite level, there are several other countries which could field Bermuda Bowl teams of quarter-final reaching quality too.

 

The fact that USA2 didn't make the quarter-finals this year has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on my views on this matter.

 

With exception of sub-political entities such as England, Hong Kong, Guadeloupe, etc. that have traditionally competed in a variety of sports in their own right, I'm a firm believer in one team per country irrespective of the playing strength and depth of bridge talent in those countries.

 

I also think that where possible no country should have an easy ride into the Bermuda Bowl; hence my belief that my own country's qualification path should be more challenging and even if we don't manage to join Asia (which Australia has done for football qualification purposes) one team from Zone 7 is more than enough..

 

As for my suggested Bermuda Bowl field composition and Zone rationalisation, if Mexico were to compete as part of Central America & Carribean, that would only leave USA and Canada in Zone 2 so any more than two teams would obviously not be possible if countries are limited to one team each. The reason I've suggested 1.5 teams is that Canada should not have an automatic Bermuda Bowl berth.

 

Perhaps a better plan for the Americas would be to split it into two zones of roughly equal size and run two separate zonal championships to pick two teams from each and the respective third place teams can have a separate playoff to give five teams for the combined Americas. Some more analysis of bridge populations, resources and talent would need to be done, but if a few (or all) Carribean countries fell into North America, Miami would be pretty logical place to hold a zonal championship or perhaps a resort in the West Indies somwhere.

 

The Bermuda Bowl should have balanced representation of bridge populations from all over the world and every bridge playing country should have a reasonable but challenging qualification path; or at least be able to play in a meaningful qualification event that includes some "giants" of the game so they can see what they are up against.