Author Topic: Crazy?  (Read 14143 times)

kenberg

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #15 on: June 12, 2017, 12:37:54 PM »
Herding cats can be difficult, and I can be one of the cats. But I really only need three other cats. When/if we get more cats, we can see how to make that work.

I'll give you a hand from yesterday's cat fight.
http://tinyurl.com/ybuwydsc

Maybe I should have bid 4S. I have no quarrel with Anne's pass. Zia, at the other table, did bid 4S. Zia went down in 4S. Zia could have made 4S, but he has to play the cards without seeing the EW hands, and he went down. But of course the hands were played at another table, and there they also went to 4S but EW went on to 5DX. Off 2.

This gives a lot to think about. Ideally, I go on to 4S and I make 4S. That would be nice. Under the reasonable assumption that I do not play the hand better than Zia, it would be nice to have them go on to 5D over my 4S.

I plan to put up a couple of the hands I played, and mis-played, in the sleight of hand forum.

I played with Anne (whiterabbt) first against robots but then Lark 16 and Hi Its Me (Roni and Stacy) joined in. I owe an apology to David Grab and others for botchinig up the seating. Lark sat and was a waiting for Hi, and David sat. He graciously gave his seat to Stacy. My error for not reserving seats. I was concentrating on the loading of deals and such. Anyway, I think everyone enjoyed having the results imped against Zia et al.

My plan is to do this again, and if it catches on we can see if some sort of organization would be good. Sometimes cats just need to be left to be cats.

About experts: I do take advice. Sometimes I do. Sometimes I don't. I (almost) always listen to advice.

A simple example: DaveG has to be one of the most generous minded guys in bridge. And of course he knows a lot. Listening to his lessons, I learned that if he has a minimum hand with a 4=4=3=2 shape he opens his two card club suit. I open my three card diamond suit. I don't plan to change my style. Now there is a modern trend to open this 1C, but this is then coupled with transfer Walsh responses. OK, if I wanted to get into all of that, maybe I open it 1C. But if I am playing straight stuff over 1C openings, I prefer 1D on the 4=4=3=2 hands. I have thought some about this, and I have experimented a little with 1C on two. I could supply arguments for my preference of 1D: On an auction 1D-1M-1NT partner knows I have 4+ diamonds, and if the auction goes 1D-1M-2M he doesn't care. But there are arguments in the other direction I know. We could poll experts.  Or we could just let it be that I prefer 1D. 

Similar problem: Holding 3=2=4=4 and minimum count, open 1D or 1C?  I prefer 1D. A partner prefers 1C. Frank Steward used to write about the advantages of opening 1C, but I haven't seen him do so lately. Steve Robinson says open one of them. I like that. But I almost always, open 1D. One issue: If the auction begins 1m -(1S)-X(neg)-P I have to find a call. If my two card heart suit and three card spade suit are such that I am comfortable with 1NT as a rebid then opening 1C will be ok. But if I am not going to be comfortable with that as a rebid, I prefer 1D. Yes partner might think/hope that I have five diamonds when I bid 2C over his double, but he should keep in mind that my choices were limited.  Probably we will land on our collective feet.

The mistakes in life that I most that regret are those where I followed the advice of someone else even when I thought  a better choice was available. So I listen but then choose as I think best. In bridge or life, it is all the same.

Anyway, I will put up a couple of hands from yesterday. One in particular bugs me. I should have gotten it right.











« Last Edit: June 12, 2017, 12:51:26 PM by kenberg »
Ken

onoway

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #16 on: June 12, 2017, 02:38:47 PM »
Thanks Ken :)  If you establish some degree of routine when you are in the club I'm sure some cats will plan to join the table. Let me know if I can help in any way.

onoway

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #17 on: December 02, 2017, 09:22:22 PM »
any further thoughts on this  Ken?  I think that if we had a specific sort of time/date this would be very much worth taking a shot at.  Let me know if you are interested and need any help setting up hands and so forth, I'll do my best to (learn how to) take that on.

ggriffin0

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #18 on: April 10, 2018, 10:39:17 PM »
If we really want to make this fly. My recommendation would be to create a “Ken’s corner” either in the teachers section or as a stand alone. If in a stand alone, Ken could post under categorized themes, not necessarily in order, but as to whatever hand he is presenting at the time; corresponding under his own designations. A routine post per week by a certain time could be helpful. This way everyone would know what and where to expect a post and cue in to which topics might be interesting based on our own preferences. Just a thought and I do appreciate Ken’s posts and efforts here :).

kenberg

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #19 on: April 11, 2018, 01:28:06 PM »
What I would most like to see is "Discussion corner". But wait, we have that! It's called the IAC Cafe. But if you look at the posts, you might think it is called '"Ken's corner".

Oliver's creation of the Forums was at least in part a response to a suggestion I had made. In  many ways the Forum has been a success but in the way that I imagined, people sharing interesting hands and discussing them, it has not worked out so well. Elsewhere Dick Hy mentions that he has read some of Kantar's books. A very good idea. If someone is up for getting teacher/student guidance, going to Edwin Kantar is a far better idea than going to Ken Berg. Not just Kantar, there are many truly excellent authors. So what I had in mind was not that I would teach and others would listen. I was hoping for discussion.

I'll illustrate by pulling up some of what I wrote in "Are humans obsolete?"

The hands were

4
AQJ63
QT92
Q94

opposite

9632
K752
A
AK72

My bot partner N opened 1 !H, I bid 2NT, N showed his stiff spade and we got to 6 !H, making. So why post it? The title brought up the possible obsolescence of humans. I had amused myself by sitting 4 bots at the table to see what they would do. Their auction went 1 !H - 4 !D - 4 !H - Pass.  So this time the human did better than the bot. I got a kick out of that. Maybe someone else would find it interesting. Maybe someone else would try sitting 4 bots at a table and having them replay a hand that s/he had played before.

I did explain how I played the hand. I played it [the software switched me with the bot after the auction so I rather than the bot was declarer] ok but as soon as I finished the hand I realized that I could have played it better. The lesson here, my opinion, is not in the exact way that this particular hand should be played but rather that there is often more than one way to play a hand and it can be worthwhile to go over a hand later and calmly see if you could have done it better.

I have accepted that hand discussion, as opposed to hand instruction, simply is not going to happen. I have chatted with a few on this, and it is not something that they want to do.

People differ in their interests, their experience, their native ability. When I was 13 I took algebra in high school (yes, I know, the kids are now in AP Calculus when they are 7 or something like that, but this was in Minnesota in 1952). There was a kid, Lug Larson, who was competent but I was better and I helped him. Later we both took a class in metal shop. I was competent but he was better. He helped me.  We both enjoyed the interactions all around. I like discussion. I just like it. I also think a strong case can be made that discussion is a good way of learning, but mostly I just like it.
« Last Edit: April 11, 2018, 02:36:44 PM by kenberg »
Ken

Curls77

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #20 on: April 11, 2018, 06:10:49 PM »
What I would most like to see is "Discussion corner". But wait, we have that! It's called the IAC Cafe. But if you look at the posts, you might think it is called '"Ken's corner".

HAHAHA Ken !!  :D
But do not be discouraged, many of read what u say, just have nothing smart to add on  ::)

kenberg

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Re: Crazy?
« Reply #21 on: April 11, 2018, 06:51:06 PM »
What I would most like to see is "Discussion corner". But wait, we have that! It's called the IAC Cafe. But if you look at the posts, you might think it is called '"Ken's corner".

HAHAHA Ken !!  :D
But do not be discouraged, many of read what u say, just have nothing smart to add on  ::)

We need to work on you about this. There is a lot of room between "Expert" and "Have nothing smart to add on".  I have stories to illustrate this. I learned to play tennis when I was 13 or so and could sometimes win, sometimes not. I agreed to play aganst a guy I had never met before. This consisted of me serving the ball to him, watching his return go past me at lighting speed, but well within bounds, and then me fetching the ball to repeat the experience.  So when someone asks if I am good at something, I always recall the Roberta Flack song Compared to What?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XG_RvYTfDk8 in case this was before your time.
Ken