Is it evident?

[lamford]

Some places define "significant number" or "significant proportion" with respect to this law as 25%.

The problem is that imprecise law is bad law. It would have been better for the WBFLC to have put percentages, say 20% and 10%, in 16B1b.

 

Imagine if the Laws of Cricket specified that the wickets were a "significant number of yards apart", or that a defender in football had to stand "several yards away" when a free kick is taken.

[bluejak]

Look, Paul, it is jolly easy to criticise by comparing apples with oranges. The Laws of football and cricket include lots of Laws that involve umpire/referee judgement, and lots that do not. Same with bridge.

 

How measurably precise is a Law that disallows "deliberate" handball or "interfering with the fielding side"? Of course it would be easier for referees and umpires if there was a Law that if it touches a player's hand it is an infraction or if a fielder runs into a batsman the batsman is in the wrong. But there is not.

[lamford]

Look, Paul, it is jolly easy to criticise by comparing apples with oranges. The Laws of football and cricket include lots of Laws that involve umpire/referee judgement, and lots that do not. Same with bridge.

 

How measurably precise is a Law that disallows "deliberate" handball or "interfering with the fielding side"? Of course it would be easier for referees and umpires if there was a Law that if it touches a player's hand it is an infraction or if a fielder runs into a batsman the batsman is in the wrong. But there is not.

A good analogy. But with, say, deliberate handball, it has to be left to the judgement of the referee, so that unavoidable handball is not punished. Same with interference - accidental collisions are not punished. But the UI Laws lend themselves to greater precision, especially as many experts on here always recommend a poll in marginal situations. So don't we need to be given percentages? In practice RAs interpret the UI Laws and issue their own guidelines. So the need for percentages is perceived.

[mycroft]

how do you deal with "I might"'s? If you give a percentage like 25%, do we have to poll four people? Eight people? Every time? If the first two think that there is an LA, do we have to poll another six to see if we picked the crazies? If it's 10%, does that mean if the first 9 think there's no alternative, we have to find a tenth, just in case?

 

I would like less fuzzy terminology - especially because when this definition of LA first came in in the ACBL (years before being put into the law book), people were saying "'Zero' is 'some number'" to get back to "If it hesitates, shoot it." But we can't make it specific enough to be non-judgemental; the best we can do is give guidelines, and examples of "this happened. This is the results of the poll. This was (not) ruled an LA." Regulation and Case Law, in other words.

 

And back in the (bad) old days when "no LA" = "70% action" in the EBU, I do remember people claiming "well, I thought it was about a 65%, so... in other words, completely ignoring "carefully avoiding using the UI" in favour of "carefully attempting to use the UI in cases where they thought the percentages would let them get away with it." So I kind of like having a judgement in there.

 

[Edited - added last para]

[bluejak]

These last two posts seem to make presumptions that maybe most people believe in, but they are wrong. The view of the authorities, certainly in the WBFLC and the EBU, is that percentages a poor idea, and the Laws would be better applied without them. I expect if the WBFLC thought percentages were a good idea they would have given them, either in the Laws or in additional statements.

 

The reason that the EBU gives some idea of percentages is that it realises it is difficult, especially for less experienced and less well trained TDs, to apply these Laws without percentages. But that does not mean they approve.

 

Also this idea of polling is overdone. If you take a poll, ask people what they would call, count up the answers, and match this against percentages, then you are not applying the Law well. The idea of any consultation, whether with good players, medium players, other TDs or the catering staff, whether by polling or general discussion, is to help the TD make his own judgement decision.

 

So when you poll you do not just count the answers: you listen to the answers, and add further questions like "Why do you bid that?" or "How sure are you?".

 

If you took a problem under an earlier Law book to Max Bavin, and asked him whether such-and-such was an LA, he would not decide whether it was a 70% action [England/Wales] or 75% [Australia/Europe] or whatever. Nor would he these days decide whether it is 80%. What he would do is to consider the wording of the Law and make a judgement.

 

"I might"'s are helpful: they give an impression of likelihood - and that is something that helps the final judgement.

[mfa1010]

Good post, bluejak.

[nige1]

An impasse. WBF policy is to rely more on director judgement. IMO, however, most players would prefer consistent rulings that they could understand.

[Trinidad]

When I conduct a poll I usually ask: "What actions (plural!) would you seriously consider?", followed by "why?" and then "and which one would you choose?" and "how clear is that?".

 

That gives you a decent idea of what the LA's are.

 

You either see that people actually choose A and B, because players have different views. You may also get everybody to choose A where everybody seriously considers both A and B and adds that it really is a coin flip ("but I rather overbid than underbid"). In those cases, you know that A and B are both LA's.

 

At other times I simply ask: "What are your logical alternatives?". But you can only do this with players who understand the concept of logical alternative.

 

I never ask: "What would you do?" because it forces people to make a choice first. If you then question whether there are alternatives there will be a bias towards "NO", since people will naturally defend the choices that they have made. Therefore, it is important to postpone the actual choice as long as possible.

 

Rik

[bluejak]

An impasse. WBF policy is to rely more on director judgement. IMO, however, most players would prefer consistent rulings that they could understand.

No. I know you keep saying this on the dripping tap principle, but the evidence, such as I have seen, is that you are entirely wrong. Players do not equate one judgement ruling with another and have no feel for consistency or inconsistency in such rulings. They think them wrong or right, of course, but not inconsistent.

 

Consistency in non-judgement rulings is desirable, probably desired, and so on: but you are talking about judgement rulings.

 

Players understand rulings that are explained properly. That is certainly true, and all good TDs explain their rulings carefully.

[NickRW]

Back to the original question. Especially not playing a 2 suited defence, 5♦ seems pretty routine to me.

 

Nick