Declarer shows hand to one opponent

[jallerton]

Declarer's LHO is on lead and starts thinking.

 

Declarer shows his hand to his LHO only.

 

Scenario 1. Declarer makes no comment.

 

Scenario 2. When declarer is showing his hand to his LHO he asks "Does this help?"

 

Scenario 3. When declarer is showing his hand to his LHO he says "I am not claiming"

 

 

In which of scenarios 1, 2 and 3, do declarer's actions constitute a claim?

[lalldonn]

None of them. He is trying to speed up the play without having to state all the permutations necessary for a claim. The defenders should be appreciative that declarer is saving them unnecessary thought.

[paulg]

This sounds a dangerous question but I'll have a go at interpreting L68A.

 

Scenario 3 (or the second number two) is not a claim because declarer demonstrably does not intend to claim.

 

Scenario 1 is a claim. Declarer has shown his cards.

 

Scenario 2 is not simple. My dictionary says curtail means 'to reduce' or 'to cut short'. My sense, unsupported by anything, is that the lawmakers intended this to mean the 'cut short' meaning rather than just reduce the time taken to (actually) play the rest of the hand. As lalldonn says, declarer is trying to reduce the time of playing the rest of the hand, so I believe he is not claiming.

 

As a player I would not call the director in any of these scenarios. But if called as a director, then I'd feel obliged to rule scenario 1 as a claim but not the others.

[Trinidad]

My $0.02:

 

Law 68A says:

 

Any statement to the effect that a contestant will win a specific number of tricks is a claim of those tricks. A contestant also claims when he suggests that play be curtailed, or when he shows his cards (unless he demonstrably did not intend to claim - for example, if declarer faces his cards after an opening lead out of turn Law 54, not this Law, will apply).

 

To me the declarer's intent is 100% clear in all three scenarios: He intends to show LHO his hand, not with the intent to claim, but with the intent to help LHO whose choice of play -in declarer's view- is irrelevant. (But RHO's choice of play or declarer's choice of play may still be relevant.)

 

Declarer must have had a reason when he showed his hand to LHO only. If he wanted to claim, he would have shown his hand to both opponents. To me that clearly demonstrates that declarer didn't intend to claim.

 

I fully agree with lalldonn that LHO should simply be grateful that declarer helps him.

 

Rik

[Fluffy]

Not sure what the law says in englsih but for me the intent of the law is clearly that declarer faces them up to claim, or at least in a way that is visible for both opponents.

[sasioc]

I can't imagine calling a director because someone did this at my table - declarer is trying to do defender a favour. I do not think that this constitutes a claim because I believe it is clear that declarer's intent is to save his opponent from thinking unnecessarily. If someone did this to me it would not occur to me that anyone might consider this to be a claim but I'll be more careful in future!

 

As an aside, I have frequently seen people show their hand to their screenmate for this purpose in such a way that it is not clear to the opponent on the other side of the screen that their partner has seen declarer's hand. Clearly in this situation declarer could not say anything to the effect of "I am not claiming" without alerting the other opponent. I have seen this done, for example, as a way of saying "if you are not ruffing whatever your partner returns we're done", where declarer would like to give one opponent the choice to concede or to play on without explicitly telling his partner that there is a ruff to find if this opponent chooses the latter. Where would a scenario like that fit into all of this? This feels even more relevant because events that use screens also tend to be stricter with time penalties so saving time at the table can be very helpful (especially if you are as slow as me :) ).

[aguahombre]

IMO, Josh has it right; it happens on occasion. Scenario number 3 might be a necessary clarification if the opponents are really dumb. The act is often followed by a defensive concession, but that doesn't make it a claim.

[gnasher]

My dictionary says curtail means 'to reduce' or 'to cut short'. My sense, unsupported by anything, is that the lawmakers intended this to mean the 'cut short' meaning rather than just reduce the time taken to (actually) play the rest of the hand.

I don't think there are two distinct meanings of "curtail". When it is used to mean "reduce", it still implies that you are cutting something short rather than condensing it. That's clear from the original meaning of the word, which was "to cut off an animal's tail".

 

I agree with Fluffy that "shows his cards" probably means "shows his cards to everyone".

 

Hence I don't think that any of these constitutes a claim.

 

In practice I don't particularly welcome this behaviour. Usually what happens is that I spend 30 seconds trying to work out what declarer's hand might be that he can't claim, then declarer shows me his hand, and then I see that he could, in fact, have claimed. Or I already knew what his had was and I was trying to work out what to do about it, and declarer's intervention is just a distraction. And the other defender has had the distraction without the benefits.

 

I do, however, understand why people do it. If you make a conditional claim you are sometimes interrupted before you can finish it; or the opponents don't listen and think you're claiming the rest when you're not; or they don't understand words like "if", or a slip of the tongue is seized upon and treated as gospel.

[gordontd]

I think if you ask the player why he did what he did, in all cases the answer is likely to indicate that he was trying to save time - ie to curtail play. Note that "unless he demonstrably did not intend to claim" only applies to him showing his cards, not to him suggesting that play be curtailed.

[gnasher]

I think if you ask the player why he did what he did, in all cases the answer is likely to indicate that he was trying to save time - ie to curtail play.

"To save time" does not mean the same as "to curtail play". There are two ways that this may save time:

- It may bring the hand to an end immediately. That is curtailment.

- It may help the opponent to defend more quickly. That is not curtailment.

[Zelandakh]

Would everyone be ok with this if Declarer needed to find a key card in the end position and could play either opponent for that card?

[barmar]

If declarer wanted to claim, he would just claim, he wouldn't show his hand to just one opponent.

 

I've done this, and I think it's almost always in a situation where I can't make a sure claim yet. Rather, the opponent's difficulty in finding a play strongly suggests that the cards are in a certain place, and that his play is immaterial. When I show him my cards he can make a play (he'll usually be able to see the futility as well) and THEN I can claim.

[lalldonn]

In practice I don't particularly welcome this behaviour. Usually what happens is that I spend 30 seconds trying to work out what declarer's hand might be that he can't claim, then declarer shows me his hand, and then I see that he could, in fact, have claimed. Or I already knew what his had was and I was trying to work out what to do about it, and declarer's intervention is just a distraction. And the other defender has had the distraction without the benefits.

I'm surprised this is your reaction. Even the reasons you give for not welcoming this kind of behavior don't seem very good to me, i.e. why do you care if he could have claimed when he does this instead since they save time equally? Or it seems like maybe your problem is they wasted time thinking about this when they could have claimed, but maybe they were deciding how to word the claim and finally concluded it would be too complicated or cumbersome but that you would see the position when shown the hand. I do this myself quite frequently and my experience is they look at the hand for 8-10 seconds, which is faster than I could have made a claim understood with all the permutations, and then concede. I also considered it a way to protect myself against accidentally misspeaking or leaving part of the claim out, since my brain and mouth do not always seem to be as connected as they should be.

 

As an aside, I have never once had an opponent call the director and say he considered my actions a claim, or anything like that.

[Zelandakh]

my experience is they look at the hand for 8-10 seconds and then concede.

The problem is this. When they do not do this then you may get some additional information that allows you to pick up an obscure situation that would otherwise not have been possible.

[lalldonn]

Nah, I would just assume they don't see it.

[iviehoff]

Would everyone be ok with this if Declarer needed to find a key card in the end position and could play either opponent for that card?

So far everyone thinks "this is just declarer being kind to the defender". And often it will be; but it ain't necessarily so, as Z says. Declarer can do this to obtain a reaction from a player, which helps him solve a little problem he has in the play. If there is no issue of this, then the defender can say "thanks". But if there is an issue of this, then we need to know how to deal with it.

 

Declarers can't be allowed to have the benefits of claiming without specifying a line of play, if there is something to think about, and this looks like it can be a way of achieving it, if we are so willing to rule it can't possibly be a claim. How are we to protect the defender from this coffee-house? I think we have to say that this is a claim. Unfortunately this means that when declarer was genuinely being helfpul, a secretary bird can peck his eyes out.

[gnasher]

The problem is this. When they do not do this then you may get some additional information that allows you to pick up an obscure situation that would otherwise not have been possible.

And then we adjust the score under Law 23.

[gnasher]

I'm surprised this is your reaction. Even the reasons you give for not welcoming this kind of behavior don't seem very good to me, i.e. why do you care if he could have claimed when he does this instead since they save time equally? Or it seems like maybe your problem is they wasted time thinking about this when they could have claimed, but maybe they were deciding how to word the claim and finally concluded it would be too complicated or cumbersome but that you would see the position when shown the hand. I do this myself quite frequently and my experience is they look at the hand for 8-10 seconds, which is faster than I could have made a claim understood with all the permutations, and then concede. I also considered it a way to protect myself against accidentally misspeaking or leaving part of the claim out, since my brain and mouth do not always seem to be as connected as they should be.

No, mainly my problem is that when people do this to me, usually they have some silly idea that they can't claim except when they're on lead, or they can't claim unless they've got the rest. I'm not suggesting that this is always true; obviously it wouldn't be true if you were declarer.

[aguahombre]

There are two types of player for whom I would not perform this service: the highly contentious, and the ones whom I believe already feel intimidated.

 

Andy: we do it for someone, not to someone.

[Trinidad]

And then we adjust the score under Law 23.

On what grounds? Which law forbids a player from showing his entire hand to one of his opponents?

 

Rik

[Codo]

In between all the billions of hands we all have played so far- did the theoretical possibility Zel talked about ever happened at the table?

[gnasher]

On what grounds? Which law forbids a player from showing his entire hand to one of his opponents?

No laws forbids it. Law 23 relates to irregularities, not just to infractions. An irregularity is "A deviation from correct procedure inclusive of, but not limited to, those which involve an infraction by a player."

 

Having said that, Law 23 also uses the word "offender". Hmm.

[Trinidad]

No laws forbids it. Law 23 relates to irregularities, not just to infractions. An irregularity is "A deviation from correct procedure inclusive of, but not limited to, those which involve an infraction by a player."

 

Having said that, Law 23 also uses the word "offender". Hmm.

So, is it a "deviation from correct procedure" to show your hand to one of the opponents? What is the procedure that one deviates from when one shows his hand to one of the opponents?

 

It may be unusual, and in most cases tactically not smart ;) to show your hand, but I don't see how it deviates from correct procedure.

 

And if it would be, I know some players who would continuously unknowingly deviate from that procedure by failing to keep their hand "to their chest".

 

Rik

[WellSpyder]

I once had a defender say to me in a serious competition when I was declaring "I'll show you my hand if you show me yours". He suspected (rightly!) that I was in a silly contract, partner having passed a 4♦ bid that I intended as forcing, with the result that a) they were never beating the contract and b) the number of tricks made weren't very relevant anyway. Was that a claim?? (It certainly didn't strike me as a very helpful comment, at the time...)

[gnasher]

So, is it a "deviation from correct procedure" to show your hand to one of the opponents?

Yes, it is. The introduction to the laws tells us that "The Laws are designed to define correct procedure", and that the word 'does' in the Laws "establishes correct procedure".

 

What is the procedure that one deviates from when one shows his hand to one of the opponents?

The procedure defined in Laws 44 ("Sequence and procedure of play"), 45, 65, 66, 68 etc. None of these laws says "Declarer shows his hand to a defender in order to speed up play." Therefore this is not part of correct procedure.