Yet another adjustment question

[McBruce]

Individual tournament. You are called to the table. North is playing 5♣ doubled after a competitive auction in which E-W bid and raised spades, N-S bid and raised clubs. East, North and South all tell you in private chat that immediately upon seeing the opening lead of a trump from East, West entered "WHY NOT LEAD A SPADE???????" into public chat. Five tricks have been played.

 

FIRST QUESTION: Since this is a BBO tournament, you have no way to give a disciplinary penalty in IMPs to East only that will show up in the scores. But since this is an Alphabet Points tournament, where everyone who finishes at or above zero IMPs earns some points in my rating system, it is possible to tinker with West's final score before calculating the new Alphabet Points standings. (I do the same for abominably slow players and the threat of this is usually enough to keep everyone on time.) How many IMPs is a reasonable disciplinary penalty for this offense?

 

SECOND QUESTION:

[hv=d=w&v=n&n=s8hjt875djtcaqj83&w=sajt9752ha92d8ckt&e=sk643hkq3da972c65&s=sqh64dkq6543c9742]399|300|Scoring: XIMP[/hv]

North goes two down on this defense:

1) club to king and declarer's ace (comment by West made here)

2) queen of clubs, all following

3) diamond to West's ace

4) King of spades, overtaken by West's ace.

5) ace of hearts

6) heart to king

Declarer claims the rest, down two.

 

Any score adjustment necessary, based on East's lead of a spade at trick three (or any other reason)?

 

I'll let the forum stew on this for a while and let you know what I did later.

[luis]

I wouldn't adjust the result, it's impossible to get less than 4 tricks and they could have got a lot more with a better defense.

 

I think west comment is just the result of the logical obfuscation, poor west, doesn't seem like something unethical just unpolite.

 

About the "disciplinary" question I don't think this is worth discussing in this phorum, since you run these tournaments you are free to decide what to do with west. As long as you are consistent with your actions there's no reason to object them. I you need opinion I think that just a light warning is ok.

 

Luis

[mikestar]

With regard to West's remark, unless he is a rank beginner I would be quite severe indeed. If there is no prior history, I would think in terms of "disqualified and placed last."

 

If there is a prior history of similar blatantly illegal behaviour by his player, the question is "how long a suspension?"

 

No score adjustment is appropriate: N-S have 4 inescapable losers on any semi-rational play of the cards.

[hotShot]

Hi!

 

By bidding ♠ west gave the information to lead that color, east could only lead ♥ which makes no difference here.

So no score correction.

Since you cannot give a penalty to West only, by adjusting scores, i would not do that. I would probably exclude West from further tourneys i manage.

 

Have a nice day

hotShot

[keylime]

This is super easy - adjust to the most likely score possible for the three players involved. For the offender, a banning of at least one month with a stern lecture on their responsibilities under the Laws NOT to damage the intergrity of the board and contest.

[luis]

You are being too hard with west, he just couldn't control himself.

I think that crimes commited under "violent emotion" should have a decrese in the penalty :-)

[JRG]

You are being too hard with west, he just couldn't control himself.

I think that crimes commited under "violent emotion" should have a decrese in the penalty :-)

I thoroughly agree with you Luis. I light warning that one shouldn't comment on the opening lead seems more than adequate. If a later switch to a ♠ by east would have made a difference (and had occurred), then an adjusted score because of the Unauthorized Information would have also been appropriate.

[mikestar]

In my reccomendation, I already allow for violent emotion. Such a remark when the play is going on is in fact cheating, as is any intentional transmission of UI. The Laws presume that UI is unintentional.

 

Had I belived West had done it in cold blood knowing it was likely to make a difference in the play, the question is how many years should West be suspended.

 

As always, I am assuming a sufficently experienced player who knows better and chose not to control himself.

[mpefritz]

My take:

 

It is unlikely that any real defense would have screwed this one up for anything but down 2. However, when WEST made the statement, it was clear to EAST where the spade A was.

 

Leading the spade K now allows EAST to see if WEST wants a diamond ruff (maybe declarer forgot/didn't want to draw the last trump) via the spade 2 on the spade K lead. Here, on this hand, it doesn't matter.

 

But if WEST had another club and was now void in diamonds, a diamond lead might help. So a defense does exists that would allow declarer to be down 1(diamond at trick 4).

 

Give WEST a 7 imp penalty (300 point swing) AND a warning if this is the first yap in your tournament. If this is the second yap...

 

fritz

[McBruce]

Here is what I did and my feelings on the matter (open to discussion):

 

1) I told West in private that his score would be reduced by 3 IMPs for the behavioral lapse -- and that further lapses would lead to larger penalties. He apologized for his outburst to me as soon as I sent the message. I told each of the other players in private that I had penalized West in IMPs and all three were smart enough to realize that it didn't matter to them how many.

 

I think it is important to give him the bad news in private -- even (especially) in an offline setting. There is no need to make an example of the player on a first offense, especially in an indy where one must put up with many partners... In an offline setting I would take the player away and let him know the penalty I had decided to assess. Too many Director calls in my area seem to stop play at all tables within earshot, as the guilty parties and the penalties are gossip items for the rest of the evening. We need to stop this from being the norm.

 

I agree with mikestar that in a club setting this would warrant a larger penalty.

 

2) Law 16A pretty clearly prohibits the spade lead from East at trick four in light of West's outburst at trick one. You can argue that the bidding makes the spade lead obvious but if there is a logical alternative (logical meaning one that might work as well or better) it must be chosen over a spade. The alternative is a heart or a diamond lead (clubs are gone). A heart is clearly a logical alternative, since declarer may be void and has entries to dummy to pitch heart losers on established diamonds. Since the Laws say you resolve any questionable points in favour of the non-offenders, I tried to come up with a logical reason for leading a diamond, but I could not.

 

So the question is: what happens if East leads the K♥ instead of the K♠ at trick four? West will likely encourage and overtake a second heart to cash a spade. Or he may overtake, cash a spade, and play a second heart. I think it is a stretch to say that one possibility is West overtaking the first heart and cashing TWO spades, allowing a ruff-sluff for down only one. East supported spades in the auction and it is quite likely he has four. I told the N-S players that I had considered the options and that I had concluded that the result was not affected by UI from the comment.

 

3) Does East deserve a penalty or a warning for leading the spade at trick four? Perhaps, but in this scenario the nature of online bridge differs from table bridge. In a club setting, I would have arrived at trick one and I would have been able to warn East about taking advantage of the UI. Online I did not have that chance--when I was called the deal was nearly over. Plus, in an individual, maybe one can make the case that East should not be penalized for West's misbehaviour: if there was a difference based on the spade lead, you might adjust the scores so that West gets the score resulting from a non-spade lead. But I see that Law 89 says this is not allowed.

 

The key here is communication. You tell the offender what penalty he is to receive and why, without making a show of it. You look at the deal and give serious thought to what might conceivably have happened if East led something else at trick four, as the Laws require--and you tell the players that you have done so, even when there is no adjustment. Too many Directors (most of the ones I mean don't read these forums!) don't want that sort of responsibility. (They should read Law 81). :)