Why bother playing in the Reisinger ?

[debrose]

Thank you, Fred. That is, and always has been, kind of you to say. When I say "for the most part" there was never any chance of my being considered as just a bridge player, you are always one of the exceptions I think of.

[eyhung]

I strongly agree with Justin's post about recategorizing women's event points but I didn't post about it earlier because I felt writing about it would sound like sour grapes from a male player who saw his female friends getting more platinum points for smaller, lesser events. But if there is truly enough buy-in from great players such as debrose, fred, and Justin then maybe we should lobby our BoD representatives to make this change.

 

How about for women's events, rose points? :)

 

Also, titanium is far more common and cheap than platinum. Diamond points would be thematic, but then you'd have to rename diamond life master.

[nigel_k]

Can't this all be solved by not having separate women's events and instead having separate prizes for the top all-woman pairs or teams?

[eyhung]

Incidentally, here are the relative "degrees of difficulty" for the recent NABC pair events as computed by Power Rankings

(http://www.coloradospringsbridge.com/pr.htm):

 

Nail LM Pairs 1st day : 8-9

Nail 2nd day : 10.5-11

 

Women's LM Pairs 1st day : 5.9-7

Women's LM Pairs 2nd day : 7.8-8.2

 

0-5000 Blue Ribbons 1st day : 4-5

0-5000 Blue Ribbons 2nd day : 6-7

 

Blue Ribbon Pairs 1st day : 8.9-10.5

Blue Ribbon Pairs 2nd day : 11.7-12

Blue Ribbon Pairs 3rd day : 12.8-13.5

 

To clarify, if you play in an event with 5 degree of difficulty, you expect to do 5% better than if you played in an event with 10 degree of difficulty.

[Jlall]

Hi Debbie,

 

Nice post. WRT players opting not to be placed on a list in which they are eligible, I think this is legal in the ACBL because I remember someone winning the Richmond trophy (Canadian race) like a million times in a row before opting to not be placed on the list anymore. IMO at the time, I felt like people should not be able to opt out of being on a list. I think the races should be for the fans and for accurate record keeping more than anything, but I respect that that is how the rule is right now, and as such people would be able to opt out from being listed on the women's race.

 

If you wanted to alter my system, perhaps the women's only race would be for points won in womens events only, with points won in open events counting only towards the regular list.

 

I'm not sure, I'm sure you would have great insights into how to devise a better system than the one I outlined and I'm sure I overlooked things etc. You have the perspective of being both a great player in general and a woman, so I'm sure you in particular would understand some of the issues that would have to be addressed.

 

To Debbie and others who said something about the mixed and how it should count, I would be open to pretty much anything wrt that, I honestly didn't think it through very much and it seems murky. The WBFs system does seem messed up based on what Debbie said.

[dbdance10]

I think the basic problem is that very few women play bridge at the level of the most elite men.

 

Rather than accept this situation as somehow inevitable or biologically predetermined, the ACBL should do everything in its power to encourage more young women to enter the game and to make the game itself a more hospitable environment for women players.

 

The existence of the separate women's events is probably part of the problem. In the events for juniors or seniors or limited masterpoints holders, there is a legitimate basis for presuming that the people who fit the category are "disadvantaged" as players. Juniors necessarily have less experience playing the game. As we grow older beyond a certain age, our mental faculties diminish. And players with fewer masterpoints are by definition in our system presumptively less skilled.

 

Women are different. There is no account for women's relative lack of success at bridge that does not implicate systemic inequalities: the myth that girls are just "bad at math" that keeps us out of the quantitative fields, or the one that we "don't like competition" that discourages us from all things competitive in the first place. Attributing inequalities to biology just distracts us from identifying and fixing the social factors that give rise to those inequalities.

 

Some of those factors in bridge are within the power of the bridge community to remedy. Think about the verbal abuse that many women endure at the bridge table from their male partners. Women are disproportionately the victims of name-calling and expressions of disgust when they make mistakes--real or imagined. By tolerating such abuse, the community implicitly sanctions the destructive message it contains. The existence of women's events may also be a factor: professional women players are under pressure to compete in the women's events rather than the open events, regardless of their ability. The gender-restricted events also implies that women are inferior, which may be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

 

Let's not kid ourselves though. Eliminate the women's events, and the most immediate effect will not be "equality" between men and women in bridge. In the short run, women may nearly disappear from the top ranks of the game. Clients will not realize overnight that their previous biases against hiring women experts were wrong-headed. It is unrealistic to think that women, long discriminated against both in the game and in society, are now just awaiting the elimination of the separate-but-not-equal events to take their equal place in bridge.

 

Eliminate the discrimination, sure, but be ready to deal with the underlying causes of the inequality.

[Elianna]

Very well said Dana, thank you.

 

I have previously stated my experience as a (not so young) female junior in other threads, but, in short, being spoken down to, and having "bridge lessons" that consist of when you should have sex with the male juniors so that they'll play better, is not my idea of creating a level playing field for both genders.

[Phil]

Great thread. Thank you Sathya for starting it, and for fine contributions from Justin, Fred, Debbie and Dana.

 

I don't think I'd reinvent the wheel here. I would simply dilute some of the 'lesser' NABC events that run concurrent or are segregated with the premier events to a mix of platinum / gold points.

[glen]

The last Super Bowl paid the winners $83K per player, and losers $42K. However, even with the low monetary reward (average salary $1.4M), nobody said "Why bother playing in the Super Bowl?". Its not about the masterpoints.

[Vilgan]

The last Super Bowl paid the winners $83K per player, and losers $42K. However, even with the low monetary reward (average salary $1.4M), nobody said "Why bother playing in the Super Bowl?". Its not about the masterpoints.

Okay, remove all masterpoints from national events. See what happens. Track winner and 2nd place only, with absolutely no reward to any other position.

 

Spouting nonsense like "its not about the masterpoints" is relevant if the ONLY members of the ACBL are people who have a solid chance at winning a national event. For those who don't fall in this category, platinum points are a good motivator in the interim as they get better. Heck, even if they never win an event.. but they have a thousand platinum kicking around.. that's still a solid accomplishment imo.

[glen]

Okay, remove all masterpoints from national events. See what happens. Track winner and 2nd place only, with absolutely no reward to any other position. ...

remove all masterpoints <> Track winner and 2nd place only

remove all masterpoints <> absolutely no reward to any other position

[peachy]

Agree, not a politically correct opinion probably but I think it is absurd that womens events get platinum points. I think it absolutely tarnishes the few masterpoint races that should be meaningful like player of the decade and player of the year, ie the races that involve platinum points only.

 

[snipped lots]

 

1) Masterpoint races should measure achievement in the field that you play in.

2) Women's events and open events are different fields.

3) Ergo, having the same color of points for women's events and open events is absurd.

 

That is something I feel strongly about, and tbh I really doubt any top woman player would disagree.

All well said. I would also think it is time to discontinue events where participation requires one (or both) to be of certain gender or age, except juniors. I always thought it was a tainted victory for women when the Mens Pairs was changed to Open Pairs many years ago; logically, at the same time, Womens events should have been discontinued, for consistency in treating each gender equally. That also solves problems in the current ACBL masterpoint award structure that JLall was detailing.

 

PS. I am a woman.

[paulg]

Scrabble has many similarities with bridge, although it has a smaller playing community.

 

Scrabble is an open game, with practically no women's events. The majority of tournament players are women, although the higher levels are dominated by men. Women are not subject to abuse or denigration when they make mistakes. They have a fair and equal opportunity to compete at the highest levels.

 

There is no American woman in the top 40 US players. There are two women in the top 30 in the UK, one of whom, my wife Helen, has been consistently in the top five and the only woman to have won national championships.

 

Last month, at the 10th World Championships, Helen became the first woman to get a top 10 finish. There were only two women, the other a 17-year-old Malaysian, who had a realistic chance of winning the title whereas there were probably 12 men (in a field of 108).

 

Aside from a modicum of talent, Helen feels it is down to effort and ability to focus. The top players put in a huge amount of work and, it seems, that more men are willing to do this.

[junyi_zhu]

Having just read all the discussion by awards of master points in on-line games and Robot tournaments, I thought I'd vent my own a bit.

 

When I was riding the Trolley in San Diego from the Petco parking lot toward the end of the tournament, I ran into an acquaintance from the Bay Area who was absolutely thrilled that she had won a lot of Platinum points in Women's BAM. At first I didn't even recognize what the event was. I knew there was a Women's Pairs event that runs concurrently with the Open LM pairs event, but didn't know there was also a Women's BAM concurrent with the Open BAM. I looked her up in the on-line recaps and discovered that each of her team members had won 25 Platinum Points for finishing 13th in the event, with a score of 25 on an average of 27 ! ! (If you had 25 on an average of 26 in the Reisinger it'll probably cost you a dime more to make a phone call from a pay-phone)

 

There are a lot of teams that enter the Reisinger, knowing that the odds are against their making it to the second day, let alone the finals. They figure that if they all play their best and have some luck they might make it to the semi-finals of what's probably the toughest event in NABC. Any team that misses qualifying for the next day by a narrow margin could most likely qualify easily in the North American Swiss and have a shot at making it to the finals probably. You get very little if you merely make it to the second day of Reisinger, probably a fraction of a Platinum point, if at all. I always used to think that Platinum points meant something, but in the light of what I have recently learnt, there're Platinum Points and there're Platinum Points just like any other kind. Sigh.

I actually think it's a discrimination to have women's events in bridge. Bridge is game of intelligence, and I don't think women are intrinsically less intelligent than men. The current situation in women's event is due to the historic reasons, and attending a lot of women's events may prevent hopeful women players from achieving the top level in open events.

[matmat]

Women are not subject to abuse or denigration when they make mistakes. They have a fair and equal opportunity to compete at the highest levels.

Scrabble is not a partnership game and, as such, has a different dynamic. What I've seen in my limited experience of playing bridge live, most of the unpleasantness happens intra-partnership or intra-team.

[barmar]

Fair or not, humans tend to categorize people. No matter what he accomplishes during his tenure, I predict that Obama will forever be remembered most for being the first African-American President. There shouldn't be a stigma attached to this. And the habit of categorization is why Debbie's accomplishments were frequently qualified with reference to her sex. This will persist as long as the top ranks of players are dominated by men.

 

I think it may be time to kill the NABC+ women's events. Not because they're unworthy, but simply because they're not very popular. This year only 14 teams entered the Wagar.

 

Also, I don't think the issue is specific to gender-specific events. Everything that has been said about masterpoint awards for women's events seems also to apply to senior events. Although the demographics of ACBL membership are such that most of the entrants in the open events are eligible for the senior events, I think it's still safe to say that it's a less competitive field because the most difficult opponents choose to play in the concurrent open event.

 

Of course, what this all really boils down to is that masterpoints are a really lousy measure of achievement, even when you restrict them to recent awards in top flight events. ACBL needs to come up with the ranking system that they've supposedly been working on for the past several years.

[TimG]

I think it's still safe to say that it's a less competitive field because the most difficult opponents choose to play in the concurrent open event.

I think this really boils down to "concurrent". It doesn't really matter whether it is Open v Mixed, Open v Women's or Reisinger v NA Swiss.

 

ACBL needs to come up with the ranking system that they've supposedly been working on for the past several years.

Did you notice that the new President has said that a rating system will be amongst his priorities? Tell him you think that's a great idea when you see him in Newton. I know I plan to.

[awm]

As a slightly off-topic point, I wonder why the ACBL seems to favor concurrent starts for so many NABC+ events. This seems to frequently create "second tier" events. It also means that those people knocked out in one NABC+ event frequently have to wait for the next one to start. Some examples that seem particularly bad:

 

(1) The national swiss that starts concurrent to the Reisinger. Why not have a two-day swiss starting on day two of the Reisinger, so it could include those top teams who failed to make the second day on the biggest stage? This would presumably make the swiss field stronger, and would make those teams who lost in the Reisinger happier (in many cases the tournament is effectively over for these teams, since there are no more NABC+ events). It might even raise more entry fees for ACBL.

 

(2) The IMP pairs which now starts concurrent to the Platinum Pairs. Assuming that the Platinum Pairs draws the strongest players (it's supposed to be a premier event, but time will tell) this makes the IMP pairs field one of the weakest NABC+ events. Since the IMP pairs has never been more than two days, why not start it on day two of the Platinum Pairs so the people who fail to qualify can play in the IMP pairs instead? Again, this strengthens the weaker event and might make marginally more money for ACBL (likely the losers of Platinum Pairs are sticking around anyway, but this way they play NABC+ entry fees rather than taking a day or two off or playing regional events).

 

If the women's events in the fall were a day "out of step" with the open events, it wouldn't prevent the female pros from playing in them, nor would it have much impact on all-female pairs who go with the plan of playing in the women's events. However, it would encourage some of the all-female pairs to try to open NABC+ events when they otherwise wouldn't, figuring that if they fail to qualify they can always play the women's event starting the next day.

[mike777]

Since they have been on this schedule for quite awhile they must have their reasons, whatever..

[xcurt]

[cogent points about starting secondary NABC+ events the day after a primary NABC+ event starts]

I do not expect this to happen, because the ACBL is forever tinkering with the masterpoint formulas to try to keep all constituencies happy with their chances to win points, relative to the points on offer to other constituencies. Since a fundamentally fair MP system is impossible, this tinkering will continue ad infinitum. It's not that different from our (US) endless tinkering with the tax code.

 

The biggest problem with the MP system is that MPs won is dominated by how much you play. This immediately renders MPs useless for comparing abilities of anyone who isn't a pro and doesn't play bridge essentially to the exclusion of everything else. For example, Meckstroth won player of the decade with something like 7200 platinum points. Since he presumably intended to play all days of all 30 NABCs, he averaged about 7200/30*10*2 or about 12 PPs per NABC+ session. My average over the parts of two NABCs I played "seriously" this decade is about 3 PPs per NABC+ session. Sure Jeff is (a lot) better than me, but if you simply used PPs as a gauge of this you would seriously overestimate the ability gap.

[awm]

Likely masterpoints are a lost cause. I do believe that it's possible to take some simple steps which would allow masterpoints to better reflect accomplishment (obviously they will not reflect "skill level" as long as they only accumulate, but the point award for a particular event could reflect the difficulty of winning). However, I see no real evidence that ACBL wants to make these kinds of changes.

 

My concern is more with the value of a national championship, which all NABC+ events are considered to be. Certainly not all championship events are created equal, but it seems to me that there should be a minimum standard in terms of the number of players, skill level of players, and existence of concurrent events in order for an event to be considered a national championship. In addition to the aforementioned national swiss that starts the same day as Reisinger, and the IMP pairs that start the same day as Platinum Pairs, one could question the following open events:

 

(1) The Wernher pairs which starts day two of the Spingold/Wagar/Senior Swiss. This might not be so bad if the Spingold was eliminating roughly half the field on day one, but with the number of byes in most recent years the Wernher is the weakest NABC+ event on the schedule (possible exception of the IMP pairs under the new scheduling).

(2) The Fast Pairs and Mixed BAM, which are not only concurrent but run parallel to the middle rounds of the Spingold. Having one NABC+ event with that start date seems okay, but two is overboard.

[mrdct]

I actually think it's a discrimination to have women's events in bridge. Bridge is game of intelligence, and I don't think women are intrinsically less intelligent than men.

There is a lot more to bridge than intelligence. Intelligence certainly helps and without it you probably won't get very far in the sport, but in my experience the more intangible "card sense" is the factor that takes players to that higher echelon.

 

I've got no idea where one gets "card sense" from, but I think it's quite likely that genetics has something to do with it, so if the Y chromosome happens to be involved; hey presto there is a potential rational basis for gender-based segregation of our sport.

[Jlall]

Intelligence certainly helps and without it you probably won't get very far in the sport, but in my experience the more intangible "card sense" is the factor that takes players to that higher echelon.

 

I've got no idea where one gets "card sense" from

Personally, one thing I've seen when looking at smart people who are no good at card games (hearts, poker, euchre, bridge, spades, etc.) the common factor that I've seen is that they didn't play cards when young.

[barmar]

Bridge is also a social and competitive activity. I think it's well established that the sexes differ in both these areas. Women are generally more social, while men are probably more fierce competitors.

[barmar]

As a slightly off-topic point, I wonder why the ACBL seems to favor concurrent starts for so many NABC+ events. This seems to frequently create "second tier" events. It also means that those people knocked out in one NABC+ event frequently have to wait for the next one to start. Some examples that seem particularly bad:

So many events, so little time? Although getting rid of the women's events would help this problem a bit.

(1) The national swiss that starts concurrent to the Reisinger. Why not have a two-day swiss starting on day two of the Reisinger, so it could include those top teams who failed to make the second day on the biggest stage?

Isn't there a two-day swiss at one of the other NABCs? They presumably want to have a 3-day swiss to make this one worth more.