ACBL GCC legal preempt?

[blackshoe]

I thought we were looking solely at the question of whether the ACBL official referenced was being honest. And I have not concluded that ACBL Management is in general incompetent.

[aguahombre]

Focus, Ed....Start with post #45.

[hrothgar]

Do we conclude that ACBL mgmt. is incompetent? I believe the "little more evidence" leans in a different direction.

 

FWIW, I agree completely that one shouldn't conclude anything from a single data point, however, we aren't working from a single data point.

 

1. Over the past decade there have been multiple threads describing precisely the same problem

2. A few years back a number of people tried to engage with Memphis to determine whether a Muiderberg 2S opening was legal at the GCC level. We were never able to get a satisfactory answer.

3. The ACBL doesn't have any standard mechanism to communicate this type of information. (There is nothing remotely equivalent to either the Orange Book or the White Book). What we do have a large number of unofficial contradictory opinions distributed through highly unreliable channels.

 

If I had to deal with these types of idiots in my profession life I'd see the lot of them fired...

[aguahombre]

2. A few years back a number of people tried to engage with Memphis to determine whether a Muiderberg 2S opening was legal at the GCC level. We were never able to get a satisfactory answer.

Since the GCC spells it out for us that two-suited 2M openings must have 10+ pts and two known suits --also stating that what is not spelled out as allowed is not allowed-- I would guess people who tried to question Memphis regarding this were trying to get a different answer satisfactory to them.

 

If it weren't clear enough in the GCC, the Mid-chart (item 12 of "allowed") specifically addresses Muiderberg 2M preempts ---implying that Mid Chart, not GCC, allows it.

[hrothgar]

I would guess people who tried to question Memphis regarding this were trying to get a different answer satisfactory to them.

 

And you would be wrong...

 

The purpose of this little experiment was to see how many different official answers we could get from Memphis.

 

We were explicitly testing whether the organization was capable of providing consistent rulings.

Guess what... It's not.

 

FWIW, I agree with you.

I don't think that a Muiderberg 2S opening is legal at the GCC level.

But that's neither here nor there.

 

I believe that Phil was the one who got a ruling from Memphis stating that Muiderberg is legal at the GCC level.

[blackshoe]

Focus, Ed....Start with post #45.

No, you focus - and 45 is where I started.

 

The general topic of #45 is whether the ACBL is incompetent. You said no, in #46, rather (in your opinion) "ACBL Official #1" lied. I said (#47) that I tend generally not to believe someone is lying. Put it another way: I'd tend to believe, where there's a discrepancy between what someone says and reality, that the person is not deliberately lying - there's some other explanation for the discrepancy. The discussion continued in #48 and #49, the subject being whether the official lied - you say yes, I say probably not. And now you tell me to "focus"? Pfui.

[mycroft]

In this particular case - oddball "quasi-GCC" calls and the GCC - the ACBL isn't consistent and doesn't either make official-case rulings or keep track of them. There are three places that could issue official rulings and keep track of them; none of them choose to.

 

There are things that the ACBL does very well, and one of them is keep the median-age and median-experience players happy playing. And the large majority of the ACBL population is close to median-age and/or median-experience.

 

Sometimes, the way they do that is frustrate the non-MA/ME players into playing "normal stuff". It wouldn't surprise me if there are some in the chain who are doing it deliberately; I know there are people in the chain who know that this is happening and don't consider it a problem. Part of it is paternalism: "we know what's best for you"; part of it is irrelevance: "well, we can play this stuff, so if others think it's 'too hard' for the rank-and-file, I'll just go with that because it doesn't affect me"; part of it is "it works, by and large; why change it?"; part of it I am sure is a lack of care of how the relevant committees are made up (specifically, a lack of rank-and-file AND a lack of process-priority people on the relevant committees); part of it is surely bureaucracy and red tape. A large part of it is that this work is largely volunteer (or, for the paid TDs, extraneous to "real job requirements"), and doing it right would either be more time than the volunteers wish to give, or cost money on something "nobody" thinks is a big problem.

 

But an awful lot of it is that, for 99+% of ACBL players, this will never come up - they won't even get close to the boundary. And, if anything, they're kind of happy that nobody they play against is playing close to the boundary either. You and I are not that 99%.

 

Of course, with the age of world-wide bridge, that could be changing; I had to explain to a pair in the 199er game that they can't play "multi-Landy" just because they can play "Landy"; and yes, I know that everyone and their grandmother play it in England (and a significant number of experts play it, because they think it's that good. And one of these days this pair is going to play in a separated Flight A game, and they'll be playing against this, and they won't have the experience the "GCC-is-an-exception" pairs have with it or against it. Oh well.) I'm sure the same is going to apply to "2♣ ART clubs or LR", or the dreaded real Multi, or... I'm also sure that this change won't be noted by the people responsible for making these rules.

[TylerE]

I wonder if there is room for another federation to make things more interesting. How do ABA regs compare to the ACBL? I'd love to see an org sponsor tournaments under far more liberal/progressive regime, with the stated purpose of fostering the highest quality of lay possible, and using e.g. EBU or (even better) Aussie rules. I'd have no problem driving a couple states away to play in something akin to an ACBL sectional in scope, if I could play full-blow FANTUNES or Moscito, and know the directors would be transparent, and trained to a high standard. The opposite of the current ACBL which is feeling more and more like a masterpoint lottery, and/or duplicate party bridge.

[chasetb]

Since the GCC spells it out for us that two-suited 2M openings must have 10+ pts and two known suits --also stating that what is not spelled out as allowed is not allowed-- I would guess people who tried to question Memphis regarding this were trying to get a different answer satisfactory to them.

 

If it weren't clear enough in the GCC, the Mid-chart (item 12 of "allowed") specifically addresses Muiderberg 2M preempts ---implying that Mid Chart, not GCC, allows it.

I wish the GCC and Mid Chart were a little clearer on this, but Item 12 does cover it. And for those people who think even that isn't clear (i.e. it doesn't say 5+ M with 4+ m), then this is the link to the ACBL Defense Database, where MC items that need defenses are located. Muiderberg 2M is found on this link.

[akwoo]

There are things that the ACBL does very well, and one of them is keep the median-age and median-experience players happy playing. And the large majority of the ACBL population is close to median-age and/or median-experience.

 

...

 

But an awful lot of it is that, for 99+% of ACBL players, this will never come up - they won't even get close to the boundary. And, if anything, they're kind of happy that nobody they play against is playing close to the boundary either. You and I are not that 99%.

 

 

I wonder if there is room for another federation to make things more interesting. How do ABA regs compare to the ACBL? I'd love to see an org sponsor tournaments under far more liberal/progressive regime, with the stated purpose of fostering the highest quality of lay possible, and using e.g. EBU or (even better) Aussie rules. I'd have no problem driving a couple states away to play in something akin to an ACBL sectional in scope, if I could play full-blow FANTUNES or Moscito, and know the directors would be transparent, and trained to a high standard. The opposite of the current ACBL which is feeling more and more like a masterpoint lottery, and/or duplicate party bridge.

 

I think mycroft is right on this one. The vast majority of ACBL members want something basically like duplicate party bridge. (Frankly, most (but not all) of the time, I want basically duplicate party bridge myself.) I think maybe three or four major metropolitan areas in the US have enough really serious bridge players for a weird-conventions-expected high-quality tournament as you would describe.

 

And even in those places, they could only have such a game a few times a year, because most of the really serious players are pros, and they would have to take an earnings-free week(end) to play, because there is no way their clients would play in such an event.

[Elianna]

Honestly, I'm not so sure this is purely a youth vs. age thing.

 

I know that data is not the plural of anecdote, but the people playing this (that I encountered) were older than me by 10+ years at least. When we played against them last year, the directors ruled that it was not allowed, and they could not play it (they were also playing artificial responses over it, so it was very clearly not allowed). And I'm rather old for this forum.

 

I will say that I'm not against alternate ideas about conventions, it's more that I'm in favor of rule-following. I had a very unpleasant interaction, where I was blamed for calling the director.

 

I agree with others, though, that most of this would be avoided by better clarity in the rules on the account of ACBL. If we are all expected to follow the rules, it would be nice if the rules were clear, and if people were able to get consistant answers from the game's governing body in our region. I can't imagine that anyone enjoys that some people get one response, and others get another response.

[TylerE]

I don't necessarily disagree with that, but I also don't see the problem with it. It could sorta be a "World Poker Tour" of Bridge. Hold a 2 day event once a month maybe 10 months out of the year, and a week long event once or twice a year.

[mycroft]

I would suggest that several clients wouldn't mind it (Roy Welland, for instance, who certainly played, if not plays, a mid-chart only system on his teams; Ekeblad also comes to mind). I don't think it affects the pros all that much; even playing with their clients, they're in "I'm in a mid-chart bracket all by myself, so I never play GCC". Yes, it would matter for the big pairs events, but they're not usually GCC either - and they just don't play sub-National events where the client has to play 100% of the boards.

 

But they do think it's a problem for hoi polloi - and to give them credit, it probably is. But I don't think the "good enough" players are polloi; I'd probably put the limit at my recorded MP level, which means the "best" 20%. One of the problems of the accumulative nature of MPs is that the 60 points/year for 20 years player, who hasn't learned anything in 10 and frankly doesn't like that anyone else has, is stuck in that "best" 20%.

[TylerE]

I sort of see it as an oppurtunity for those like myself who enjoy the rare oppurtunity to play "real bridge" but realistically aren't ever going to make a national team (or be part of a serious top bracket team). I do agree that many pros wouldn't be interested, but again, this isn't so much about making everyone happy, but serving a niche that the ACBL is doing an extremely poor job of serving currently.

[akwoo]

But they do think it's a problem for hoi polloi - and to give them credit, it probably is. But I don't think the "good enough" players are polloi; I'd probably put the limit at my recorded MP level, which means the "best" 20%. One of the problems of the accumulative nature of MPs is that the 60 points/year for 20 years player, who hasn't learned anything in 10 and frankly doesn't like that anyone else has, is stuck in that "best" 20%.

 

Back when I was in the SF Bay Area, it was common knowledge that the lowest bracket in a seven or eight bracket regional knockout was almost always harder than the two or three brackets above it.

[Vampyr]

But they do think it's a problem for hoi polloi - and to give them credit, it probably is. But I don't think the "good enough" players are polloi; I'd probably put the limit at my recorded MP level, which means the "best" 20%. One of the problems of the accumulative nature of MPs is that the 60 points/year for 20 years player, who hasn't learned anything in 10 and frankly doesn't like that anyone else has, is stuck in that "best" 20%.

 

The solution is so simple -- self flighting. There normally aren't prizes anyway at ACBL events, so there is no particular downside. A person could be forced into a higher category only if they have won a reasonably large event at the lower one.

 

Or Flight A and Flight B could both be unlimited in terms of master point holdings.

[mycroft]

Possibly. But what about:

 

- having played for your country in international competition? If that's auto-flight A (which it is in the ACBL, as it stands, as a point of fact), what if it was 1960? What if it was for a country with 10 members in their NBO?

- "won a reasonably large event" - again, what if it was 1960? The "other big MP problem" are the 80+year-olds who have to play in Flight A because at 35, they were world-class or close to it; at 70, they were still insanely dangerous; but now have been known to pass 2♣-2♦ GF; 2♥, or don't have the stamina to play in "Crazy-A" (and aren't, at their current level, "clearly too good" for B)?

 

Also (and this is the big issue) there are "big fish in small ponds" players; the ones that play in separate 0-1000 when they have 995 MPs, but would be competitive (but not winning) in flight A, or the ones that bring in ringers (bright players with few MPs, but they will soon) to KO games to get into Bracket 6 (and butcher it) instead of 4 (which is where they would be if they got a team of their peers, but then they might not win). If one can self-flight, we'd never get rid of these pests, and the real flight B'ers would leave instead (those that don't decide to play in A because of "well, if I'm not going to have a chance, I might as well get beaten by the best", of course).