Marketing Bridge
John Blubaugh
professional marketing specialist and ideas come to mind that could
apply to bridge all of the time. It seems to me that the ACBL's
biggest failure (and they have many) is in promoting and marketing the
game even though that is listed as one of their directives. They lost
complete generations of young players when electronic games came into
vogue. Some of those are coming back via computer bridge.
Here are some of my ideas for what they are worth:
1. Reduce membership fees by half. This is a little like reducing
taxes. There are always some people and groups of people (youth?) who
balk at spending money.
2. Reduce card fees at NABC tournaments by half. (see #1)
3. Reduce the ACBL's portion of fees for regionals and sectionals by
half.
4. Reduce fees charged to sanctioned clubs and computer games by half.
5. Hire a set of full time bridge teachers that work in an area for
six straight weeks (or 8 weeks) and then they move on to another area
to teach bridge. This would be a great job for the semi-retired who
now live in an RV of some kind. I live fulltime in an RV but I also
work full time. I see this done by other people in other fields who
spend all of their time traveling.
6. Do press releases in newspapers around the country when anyone
becomes a life master or attains any new masterpoint rating. This
should also include photography. There are millions of dollars worth
of free publicity just waiting to be had if the effort is put forth.
7. Do the first four things and when the crowds start growing (and
they will) you will have more of a chance to attract sponsors to
defray some of the cost from members.
8. Put recruitment ahead of every other item of concern for the ACBL
and stay at it constantly. This isn't any different from having a
product you want to sell in a department store. They call it fighting
for shelf space but the idea is the same. You can never stop
recruiting no matter how many members you have.
9. Cut costs so that you run the ACBL as a business and try to use the
ABA as an example of how well that business can be run with much less
revenue.
10. Develop a board of directors that mirrors the ABA. There is no
need for more than a half dozen of them and let them pay their own
expenses. Yes, you will only get directors who can afford to work for
free and pay their own way but that is a good thing. Most of the work
the Board of Directors does now could easily be done in house for a
fraction of the cost.
11. Cut staff to a bare minimum. I have watched far to many of them
playing online bridge or solitaire at tournaments. With all of the
computer scoring the work just in not that hard. This won't be popular
with directors (they are aging too) but if we could pay them a little
better we could get some younger and more energetic directors.
12. Really work on developing real volunteers for everything including
working in the ACBL office. That is the way the ABA does it and it
works. Much of the work the directors do at tournament could be done
with good volunteers. If the volunteers know that there is not someone
at the top lining their pockets from the fruit of their labor, more
will volunteer.
I could go on and on here. Bridge, as it is now, is a rich man's/
woman's pursuit. Attending an NABC can cost thousands of dollars for
housing and entry fees. Start putting these tournaments in places and
times of the year when RVers can find camping grounds and some of them
will make them regular events. The current host hotels are nice but it
is reducing the number of players attending by half. All the folks
want is a nice, comfortable and clean place to play. They don't care
about downtown Boston or New York City. If this is done correctly,
some of the smaller convention center cities will come begging with
good deals for us.
I will step down from my soap box now. All of this is quite possible
if the ACBL really decides it wants to fight for membership and quit
spending a fortune on the hierarchy and the top 5% of the membership.
Who cares about the WBF and World Championships? If you care about
them, then you pay for them, they don't mean anything to 95% of the
membership.
Just a thought,
JB
thg
newcomer items ought to be available to anyone. I have long thought
that it inexcusable that the ACBL does not have daily bridge content
on their website.
I don't agree with your across the board fee cuts, but think there are
certain groups that should be targeted. Youth (and/or students)
should have a minimal membership fee and reduced entry fees, I think.
richlp
Items 1 - 4: I'm not sure exactly what the impact would be but I
don't think it would be as favorable as you do. OTOH, significanly
reducing membership and table fees for juniors is an effort well worth
trying. I would offer a differnt suggestion. A rebate of dues and
table fees based upon the number of sessions played. The percentage
rebate would increase based on the total number of tables played.
(I'm not sure if it should be based upon the level of the events
played). The rebate could be ACBL Scrip (does that even still exist)
but preferably cash.
Item 5: Interesting idea that I think should be targeted at High
School and/or college. To maintain the impact it must be followed up
by the local bridge community.
Item 6: Seems like a no-brainer, especially in smaller communities
that still have a "local" paper of some kind. Focus on young people
that are getting into the game. Articles on Poker players who also
have bridge success might prove interesting to younger players.
Item 13: Moving NABC to smaller cities is an(other) interesting idea,
but I doubt it will have much of an impact. Without having done any
analysis, my impression is that smaller host cities tend to attract
smaller table counts, not larger.
THG: Your comment about the Bulletin online is right on the mark.
The newcomer and club information ought to be available to all
regardless of membership status
Will in New Haven
> I no longer play bridge (make whatever jokes you like) but I am a
> professional marketing specialist and ideas come to mind that could
> apply to bridge all of the time. It seems to me that the ACBL's
> biggest failure (and they have many) is in promoting and marketing the
> game even though that is listed as one of their directives. They lost
> complete generations of young players when electronic games came into
> vogue. Some of those are coming back via computer bridge.
>
> Here are some of my ideas for what they are worth:
>
> 1. Reduce membership fees by half. This is a little like reducing
> taxes. There are always some people and groups of people (youth?) who
> balk at spending money.
>
> 2. Reduce card fees at NABC tournaments by half. (see #1)
>
> 3. Reduce the ACBL's portion of fees for regionals and sectionals by
> half.
>
> 4. Reduce fees charged to sanctioned clubs and computer games by half.
1-4 are not going to get much done. The costs of travel and hotels are
beyond the control of the League and are a much larger part of why
this is an expensive hobby.
>
> 5. Hire a set of full time bridge teachers that work in an area for
> six straight weeks (or 8 weeks) and then they move on to another area
> to teach bridge. This would be a great job for the semi-retired who
> now live in an RV of some kind. I live fulltime in an RV but I also
> work full time. I see this done by other people in other fields who
> spend all of their time traveling.
This would be good.
> 6. Do press releases in newspapers around the country when anyone
> becomes a life master or attains any new masterpoint rating. This
> should also include photography. There are millions of dollars worth
> of free publicity just waiting to be had if the effort is put forth.
How do you get them to print the press releases. They are drowning in
self-interested puff and tend to ignore it. Where in the newspaper do
you want it?
> 7. Do the first four things and when the crowds start growing (and
> they will) you will have more of a chance to attract sponsors to
> defray some of the cost from members.
Sponsers? I don't think this is going to happen.
> 8. Put recruitment ahead of every other item of concern for the ACBL
> and stay at it constantly. This isn't any different from having a
> product you want to sell in a department store. They call it fighting
> for shelf space but the idea is the same. You can never stop
> recruiting no matter how many members you have.
This is a good thing to emphasize but...
> 9. Cut costs so that you run the ACBL as a business and try to use the
> ABA as an example of how well that business can be run with much less
> revenue.
This is a very good point.
> 10. Develop a board of directors that mirrors the ABA. There is no
> need for more than a half dozen of them and let them pay their own
> expenses. Yes, you will only get directors who can afford to work for
> free and pay their own way but that is a good thing. Most of the work
> the Board of Directors does now could easily be done in house for a
> fraction of the cost.
Also true.
> 11. Cut staff to a bare minimum. I have watched far to many of them
> playing online bridge or solitaire at tournaments. With all of the
> computer scoring the work just in not that hard. This won't be popular
> with directors (they are aging too) but if we could pay them a little
> better we could get some younger and more energetic directors.
I think we need good directing. But there could possibly be some
cuts.
> 12. Really work on developing real volunteers for everything including
> working in the ACBL office. That is the way the ABA does it and it
> works. Much of the work the directors do at tournament could be done
> with good volunteers. If the volunteers know that there is not someone
> at the top lining their pockets from the fruit of their labor, more
> will volunteer.
Very true.
> I could go on and on here. Bridge, as it is now, is a rich man's/
> woman's pursuit. Attending an NABC can cost thousands of dollars for
> housing and entry fees. Start putting these tournaments in places and
> times of the year when RVers can find camping grounds and some of them
> will make them regular events. The current host hotels are nice but it
> is reducing the number of players attending by half. All the folks
> want is a nice, comfortable and clean place to play. They don't care
> about downtown Boston or New York City. If this is done correctly,
> some of the smaller convention center cities will come begging with
good deals for us.
At one time, and it may still be true, the ACBL was one of the top
users of hotel and convention space in the country. And it still had
almost no "pull."
> I will step down from my soap box now. All of this is quite possible
> if the ACBL really decides it wants to fight for membership and quit
> spending a fortune on the hierarchy and the top 5% of the membership.
> Who cares about the WBF and World Championships? If you care about
> them, then you pay for them, they don't mean anything to 95% of the
> membership.
Many of the members are fans too.
--
Will in New Haven
John Blubaugh
wrote:
> On Feb 3, 3:47 pm, John Blubaugh <jbluba...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > I no longer play bridge (make whatever jokes you like) but I am a
> > professional marketing specialist and ideas come to mind that could
> > apply to bridge all of the time. It seems to me that the ACBL's
> > biggest failure (and they have many) is in promoting and marketing the
> > game even though that is listed as one of their directives. They lost
> > complete generations of young players when electronic games came into
> > vogue. Some of those are coming back via computer bridge.
>
> > Here are some of my ideas for what they are worth:
>
> > 1. Reduce membership fees by half. This is a little like reducing
> > taxes. There are always some people and groups of people (youth?) who
> > balk at spending money.
>
> > 2. Reduce card fees at NABC tournaments by half. (see #1)
>
> > 3. Reduce the ACBL's portion of fees for regionals and sectionals by
> > half.
>
> > 4. Reduce fees charged to sanctioned clubs and computer games by half.
>
> 1-4 are not going to get much done. The costs of travel and hotels are
> beyond the control of the League and are a much larger part of why
> this is an expensive hobby.
>
Every little bit helps. Also, if some of the hierarchy wasn't
pocketing the money, there would be better rates at hotels for ACBL
members. I have gone to tournaments where the price of a room if I
walked in off the street was $45 but if I said I was with the bridge
tournament it was $60.
>
>
> > 5. Hire a set of full time bridge teachers that work in an area for
> > six straight weeks (or 8 weeks) and then they move on to another area
> > to teach bridge. This would be a great job for the semi-retired who
> > now live in an RV of some kind. I live fulltime in an RV but I also
> > work full time. I see this done by other people in other fields who
> > spend all of their time traveling.
>
> This would be good.
>
> > 6. Do press releases in newspapers around the country when anyone
> > becomes a life master or attains any new masterpoint rating. This
> > should also include photography. There are millions of dollars worth
> > of free publicity just waiting to be had if the effort is put forth.
>
> How do you get them to print the press releases. They are drowning in
> self-interested puff and tend to ignore it. Where in the newspaper do
> you want it?
It doesn't matter where or when they run it but they will run it if
they get good copy with good photography. The smaller the town
newspaper it goes to, the more likely it is to be printed.
>
> > 7. Do the first four things and when the crowds start growing (and
> > they will) you will have more of a chance to attract sponsors to
> > defray some of the cost from members.
>
> Sponsers? I don't think this is going to happen.
It sure won't if there isn't someone out there working to get them. If
there are large turnouts, they will be more likely to get sponsors.
They need a professionals sales and marketing person to do this.
Remember, a lot of small sponsors is as good as one big one. Plus the
community should help if it wants are members back spending money in
their city. We do not have the right demographic to get some sponsors
but if the game were to suddenly get younger....... As the bridge
community is it is a very solvent group with a great deal of money to
spend.
>
> > 8. Put recruitment ahead of every other item of concern for the ACBL
> > and stay at it constantly. This isn't any different from having a
> > product you want to sell in a department store. They call it fighting
> > for shelf space but the idea is the same. You can never stop
> > recruiting no matter how many members you have.
>
> This is a good thing to emphasize but...
It is the only thing to emphasize. Everything else is secondary if you
want to build your organization.
>
> > 9. Cut costs so that you run the ACBL as a business and try to use the
> > ABA as an example of how well that business can be run with much less
> > revenue.
>
> This is a very good point.
>
> > 10. Develop a board of directors that mirrors the ABA. There is no
> > need for more than a half dozen of them and let them pay their own
> > expenses. Yes, you will only get directors who can afford to work for
> > free and pay their own way but that is a good thing. Most of the work
> > the Board of Directors does now could easily be done in house for a
> > fraction of the cost.
>
> Also true.
>
> > 11. Cut staff to a bare minimum. I have watched far to many of them
> > playing online bridge or solitaire at tournaments. With all of the
> > computer scoring the work just in not that hard. This won't be popular
> > with directors (they are aging too) but if we could pay them a little
> > better we could get some younger and more energetic directors.
>
> I think we need good directing. But there could possibly be some
> cuts.
Good directing and making cuts do not necessarily pull the
organization in opposite directions. The ACBL has many directors who
are over the hill and are just putting in their time. They will do no
more than absolutely necessary. Retire them and replace them with well
trained younger people.
>
> > 12. Really work on developing real volunteers for everything including
> > working in the ACBL office. That is the way the ABA does it and it
> > works. Much of the work the directors do at tournament could be done
> > with good volunteers. If the volunteers know that there is not someone
> > at the top lining their pockets from the fruit of their labor, more
> > will volunteer.
>
> Very true.
>
> > I could go on and on here. Bridge, as it is now, is a rich man's/
> > woman's pursuit. Attending an NABC can cost thousands of dollars for
> > housing and entry fees. Start putting these tournaments in places and
> > times of the year when RVers can find camping grounds and some of them
> > will make them regular events. The current host hotels are nice but it
> > is reducing the number of players attending by half. All the folks
> > want is a nice, comfortable and clean place to play. They don't care
> > about downtown Boston or New York City. If this is done correctly,
> > some of the smaller convention center cities will come begging with
>
> good deals for us.
>
> At one time, and it may still be true, the ACBL was one of the top
> users of hotel and convention space in the country. And it still had
> almost no "pull."
>
Because it didn't have the right people in place to get it and because
the hierarchy was pocketing the perks as fast as they could get them.
Those perks should be passed on to the membership in some manner.
> > I will step down from my soap box now. All of this is quite possible
> > if the ACBL really decides it wants to fight for membership and quit
> > spending a fortune on the hierarchy and the top 5% of the membership.
> > Who cares about the WBF and World Championships? If you care about
> > them, then you pay for them, they don't mean anything to 95% of the
> > membership.
>
> Many of the members are fans too.
>
No, few are fans of the WBF events. Only a very small number have any
interest and if they knew they paying for it all, they would have even
less. What percentage of the membership do you think has an interest
in WBF events? Before you answer that, you might want to look into
what percentage of the membership have less than 100 points.
JB
Adam Beneschan
> I could go on and on here. Bridge, as it is now, is a rich man's/
> woman's pursuit. Attending an NABC can cost thousands of dollars for
> housing and entry fees. Start putting these tournaments in places and
> times of the year when RVers can find camping grounds and some of them
> will make them regular events.
The way gasoline prices have been (thankfully they're lower now but
who knows what's going to happen), attending an NABC in an RV is a
rich man's/woman's pursuit. How much does your RV get, 700 ft/gallon
(city), 850 (highway), something like that? Your footage may vary.
-- Adam
John Blubaugh
Well, mine gets 12 MPG pulling a Jeep behind it. It is a diesel
pusher. People are moving these rigs going somewhere all of the time.
By the way, bridge is not played in RV parks but poker is. The actual
price of fuel now is cheaper than fuel was 40 years ago based on the
incomes of the time. The RV community is a lot like the bridge
community. It is old and it is wealthy. If you can afford to buy one
of these rigs, you don't worry about the fuel. RV parks would be a
great place to start recruiting new players. Perhaps RV trips could be
planned around bridge like cruises are. There are hundreds of these
kinds of marketing possibilities and do you know how many the ACBL
pursues? ZERO!! And that will always be the case as long as everyone
is silly enough to accept automatic raises in card fees and membership
fees every two years. That is easier than marketing. Oh, sure, it
costs the membership but the ACBL has always made it clear that it
doesn't give a damn about the membership. It takes care of the
hierarchy!!
If the ACBL hired just four first class marketing people to go after
sponsorship money and placed them regionally around the country,
thousands and thousands of dollars would be brought in. I'll give you
an example. There should be a bag for everyone registering at every
tournament and in that bag would be a book full of coupons for
discounts at local restaurants and other attractions. Suppose you got
50 businesses to pay $100 each to be in this book and display their
coupon? Well, you just raised $5000 in sponsorship money for your
tournament. This, is a slightly different form, is what I do for a
living. The hotels do it themselves to some extent and there are some
of these things in every room. The company I work for routinely
collects between $10,000 and $30,000 (sometimes much more) to produce
a concierge book for each hotel and a book to place in each room that
does this same thing. The sales person routinely makes 20% for a week
to sometimes two weeks of work doing this. Yes, it was better when the
economy was better but my company is still doing it.
We do the same thing for RV Parks around the country. We get
restaurants, attractions, RV dealers and RV repair people to take
part. This is given to everyone who checks in and it includes a map of
the park and the surrounding area that marks where each advertisor is
located. It is easy to sell, you just make it clear that the RV park
will not recommend them unless they take part. I have been working
with home builders for the last five years and I put together a
brochure for them that is completely paid for by their sub-contractors
and vendors. The builder gets a fantastic brochure showing off his
homes for free and my company makes between $10,000 and up to $120,000
for each project. Again, I get 20% and my expenses. This was easier 18
months ago too but as long as we are careful to work with only the
best builders who pay everyone on time, we are still producing good
results. I am in Mississippi now on a project that will bring in
between $50,000 and $60,000. I'll work here for two weeks and move on
to another builder or wait for one to be developed.
I hope I have been able to show you how sorry the ACBL is in this
area. If they raised this money the way the league is now run, the
Board members in each district would pocket most of the money.
Restructure and you can make money and save the membership thousands
of dollars. It will only happen if the membership revolts and forces
it to happen.
Sorry, I didn't mean to give a marketing lesson but the sales people
are revenue, not overhead like everyone else who works for the ACBL.
JB
dranon
<bill....@taylorandfrancis.com> wrote:
>> 7. Do the first four things and when the crowds start growing (and
>> they will) you will have more of a chance to attract sponsors to
>> defray some of the cost from members.
>
>Sponsers? I don't think this is going to happen.
Depends sounds like it should be willing.
dranon
<jblu...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>On Feb 3, 7:31 pm, Will in New Haven <bill.re...@taylorandfrancis.com>
>wrote:
>> On Feb 3, 3:47 pm, John Blubaugh <jbluba...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>> > Here are some of my ideas for what they are worth:
>>
>> > 1. Reduce membership fees by half. This is a little like reducing
>> > taxes. There are always some people and groups of people (youth?) who
>> > balk at spending money.
>>
>> > 2. Reduce card fees at NABC tournaments by half. (see #1)
>>
>> > 3. Reduce the ACBL's portion of fees for regionals and sectionals by
>> > half.
>>
>> > 4. Reduce fees charged to sanctioned clubs and computer games by half.
>>
>> 1-4 are not going to get much done. The costs of travel and hotels are
>> beyond the control of the League and are a much larger part of why
>> this is an expensive hobby.
>>
>
>Every little bit helps. Also, if some of the hierarchy wasn't
>pocketing the money, there would be better rates at hotels for ACBL
>members. I have gone to tournaments where the price of a room if I
>walked in off the street was $45 but if I said I was with the bridge
>tournament it was $60.
There is a reason for this. The ACBL (and any large organization) has
to make a deal with the hotel have the hotel provide a block of rooms.
Any premium is put towards other amenities, such as renting the rooms
where bridge is actually played, or providing food for various
functions. You might argue for transparency in pricing. That isn't
how the industry (the hotel industry) functions.
>> > 11. Cut staff to a bare minimum. I have watched far to many of them
>> > playing online bridge or solitaire at tournaments. With all of the
>> > computer scoring the work just in not that hard. This won't be popular
>> > with directors (they are aging too) but if we could pay them a little
>> > better we could get some younger and more energetic directors.
>>
>> I think we need good directing. But there could possibly be some
>> cuts.
>
>Good directing and making cuts do not necessarily pull the
>organization in opposite directions. The ACBL has many directors who
>are over the hill and are just putting in their time. They will do no
>more than absolutely necessary. Retire them and replace them with well
>trained younger people.
Did I just hear you violate the Age Discrimination and Employment Act?
That would be very, very expensive.
dranon
Even the worst of the worst get around 30000 feet/gallon, city, don't
they?
John Blubaugh
of the Board of Directors (an ex-director from Florida is a prime
example) pocket perks like frequent flier miles and even cash
kickbacks. They also take some free rooms and make sure they go to
people who make sure that Director gets re-elected for life. The
people who book hotels for NABC nationals are absolutely horrible
negotiators. If you didn't go to such expensive hotels, you could save
everyone a lot of money but since these people all get free rides,
they don't give a damn about saving any money or developing sponsors
to defray some of their expenses.
> >> > 11. Cut staff to a bare minimum. I have watched far to many of them
> >> > playing online bridge or solitaire at tournaments. With all of the
> >> > computer scoring the work just in not that hard. This won't be popular
> >> > with directors (they are aging too) but if we could pay them a little
> >> > better we could get some younger and more energetic directors.
>
> >> I think we need good directing. But there could possibly be some
> >> cuts.
>
> >Good directing and making cuts do not necessarily pull the
> >organization in opposite directions. The ACBL has many directors who
> >are over the hill and are just putting in their time. They will do no
> >more than absolutely necessary. Retire them and replace them with well
> >trained younger people.
>
> Did I just hear you violate the Age Discrimination and Employment Act?
> That would be very, very expensive.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
No, but you did hear me say that inept directors should be fired or
reassigned to some other duty.
JB
thg
wrote:
> At one time, and it may still be true, the ACBL was one of the top
> users of hotel and convention space in the country. And it still had
> almost no "pull."
Bridge, not the ACBL, was one of the top users of hotel and convention
space. (Second to square dancing as I recall.) In New England, where
a single person negotiate the hotel contracts for all regionals, we
got good deals for a long time. That is, we did not pay for
convention space AND the hotel rates were much lower than what you
would get otherwise. I imagine that if the ACBL had a department that
negotiated hotel contracts for regionals and NABCs, they could do
well. But, having lots of individuals contract for convention space
once or twice a year won't be nearly as effective.
In regards to the smaller cities hosting NABCs. This seems to make
perfect sense to me, too. But, it is simply not reality. Smaller,
cheaper, NABC sites consistently draw a smaller attendance than the
bigger cities. It is true that NYC did not do well for attendance,
but NYC isn;t just expensive, it is ridiculous.
John Blubaugh
Part of the problem is the season. If you go to cold weather small
cities in the winter, you will get poor attendence. In fact, you
usually get poor attendence anytime you go to any cold weather site in
winter.
JB
Henk Uijterwaal
> I no longer play bridge (make whatever jokes you like) but I am a
> professional marketing specialist and ideas come to mind that could
> apply to bridge all of the time. It seems to me that the ACBL's
> biggest failure (and they have many) is in promoting and marketing the
> game even though that is listed as one of their directives. They lost
> complete generations of young players when electronic games came into
> vogue. Some of those are coming back via computer bridge.
I think this is the first question one has to answer. There are lots
of juniors playing all kinds of online games, how do we make it
attractive for them to turn to bridge. I'm not a marketing expert
nor do I have the answer, but I think that without a plan how to
turn juniors to bridge, all other steps you list will do very little.
Henk
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Henk Uijterwaal Email: henk.uijterwaal(at)ripe.net
RIPE Network Coordination Centre http://www.amsterdamned.org/~henk
P.O.Box 10096 Singel 258 Phone: +31.20.5354414
1001 EB Amsterdam 1016 AB Amsterdam Fax: +31.20.5354445
The Netherlands The Netherlands Mobile: +31.6.55861746
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Belgium: an unsolvable problem, discussed in endless meetings, with no
hope for a solution, where everybody still lives happily.
John Blubaugh
> John Blubaugh wrote:
> > I no longer play bridge (make whatever jokes you like) but I am a
> > professional marketing specialist and ideas come to mind that could
> > apply to bridge all of the time. It seems to me that the ACBL's
> > biggest failure (and they have many) is in promoting and marketing the
> > game even though that is listed as one of their directives. They lost
> > complete generations of young players when electronic games came into
> > vogue. Some of those are coming back via computer bridge.
>
> I think this is the first question one has to answer. There are lots
> of juniors playing all kinds of online games, how do we make it
> attractive for them to turn to bridge. I'm not a marketing expert
> nor do I have the answer, but I think that without a plan how to
> turn juniors to bridge, all other steps you list will do very little.
>
> Henk
>
> Henk Uijterwaal Email: henk.uijterwaal(at)ripe.net
> RIPE Network Coordination Centre http://www.amsterdamned.org/~henk
> P.O.Box 10096 Singel 258 Phone: +31.20.5354414
> 1001 EB Amsterdam 1016 AB Amsterdam Fax: +31.20.5354445
> The Netherlands The Netherlands Mobile: +31.6.55861746
>
> Belgium: an unsolvable problem, discussed in endless meetings, with no
> hope for a solution, where everybody still lives happily.
We are bouncing around the real reason that no marketing program will
ever work for the ACBL. They won't hire a professional marketing
director and give him/her a reasonable budget to work with. Whatever
programs are developed will have to be approved by the Board of
Directors. They will take at least a year to mull it all over and then
they will turn it all down because the idea did not come from them.
Then, 12 to 24 months later one of them will propose that they try the
progam that was originally proposed. That makes it their idea now and
it justifies their existence and the continuation of their non-stop
party. The problem is that by now the ACBL will have let the marketing
professional go or that person will have resigned in frustration. The
board will also modify the original proposal so that it will not work
in the attempt to put more money in their pockets or the pockets of
their cronies. When it all fails, they will simply say, "See there, we
tried and no kind of marketing works for us."
As long as the ACBL is structured the way it is and the spending
priorities are as they are, they will never be able to run a
successful recruiting program. So, they will continue to raise the
dues and fees every two years because that is the easy way to raise
revenue.
JB
ted
As far as recruiting youth to play bridge it is hard to see where
following the football model could fail. So you create a high school
bridge league (in the football sense) where schools play each other in
team matches or in double team matches where the sum of the IMPs from
both matches gives the final team score. Then you have a wide enough
league you have a playoff series.
This seemed to work at the grade school level with chess where a team
was comprised of 6 active players plus normally 2 alternates. The team
score was the sum of the results for all six simultaneously played
games with a set of fairly simple tie breakers. I realize that this is
not how the current National chess organization runs their IMO less
effective team matches.
David Babcock
> As long as the ACBL is structured the way it is and the spending
> priorities are as they are, they will never be able to run a
> successful recruiting program.
Your specific criticisms of the substance of ACBL's program to support
members teaching bridge in schools are what, precisely?
David
Will in New Haven
Here's how:
Teacher or other adult: Who wants to learn this game called bridge.
No hands raised. No interest evidenced.
--
Will in New Haven
So you create a high school
dranon
Or:
Administrator to Teacher: If you see a deck of cards, confiscate it
immediately as we will not tolerate card games, such as poker, 'round
heah!
lescor
>
>
> I will step down from my soap box now. All of this is quite possible
> if the ACBL really decides it wants to fight for membership and quit
> spending a fortune on the hierarchy and the top 5% of the membership.
> Who cares about the WBF and World Championships? If you care about
> them, then you pay for them, they don't mean anything to 95% of the
> membership.
>
> Just a thought,
>
> JB
Marketing bridge to the degree of popularity it once deserved is
probably impossible now. The opportunity was lost decades ago when those
controlling the game were seduced by the natural fascination of new
bidding systems and conventions. Understandable that the acceptance of
Stayman, as a useful tool, plus all the other clever bits and pieces,
would open the doors to the flood. But in the main the players still
described what they were looking at.
The introduction of the many one club opening systems, strong passes,
weak twos, multi coloured etc, changed bridge from the greatest game of
cards in the world into a test of system memory.
I understand the system fascination. I appreciate the intellectual
interest there is in discussing system and defence to other methods
and they will continue to attract those who enjoy such things.
But it is the same complications which prevent those who learn the game
from becoming more regularly active.
There is no other pastime where the participants are not singing to the
same hymn sheet. None where so much explanation is called for. A game
which is now impossible for the layman to watch at the highest level.
(unlike all others) without explanation rather than simply expert
opinion, a fact soon discovered by TV companies who attempted to
introduce it.
Add to this the introduction of bidding boxes which, without doubt,
solved a few problems, but it did so by accepting that players cannot be
trusted to speak. A cop out? Possibly, because large stake rubber
bridge games continued to be played vocally and with little need for
rulings. Maybe they still do. They did not require a director with a
knowledge of 'law' as great as a high court judge.
This chasm between those who learn because they enjoy a game of cards
and those who take it further, will never be repaired by marketing, at
least, not to the extent the ruling bodies would like. Bridge at the
serious club level is no longer a "game of cards" is it? So the divide
will remain.
Maybe anyone wanting to market the great game to the masses should go
back to the days when it was more about judgement rather than memory and
agreement. A return to a strictly limited system used by all as played
in rubber bridge, probably the finest of all forms of the game.
Give those there own events with regional heats. The National Rubber
Bridge Championships has a nice ring to it. It could even be telivised,
just like poker.
LC
David Babcock
> Marketing bridge to the degree of popularity it once deserved is
> probably impossible now. The opportunity was lost decades ago when those
> controlling the game were seduced by the natural fascination of new
> bidding systems and conventions
> But it is the same complications which prevent those who learn the game
> from becoming more regularly active.
It is those "controlling the game" (I'm speaking from ACBL-land) who
authorize member clubs to allow or restrict conventions as they choose
in local games, and it is those local clubs, very mindful of how many
people come in the door, who generally do not restrict conventions at
all. This should not be surprising; seriously hard-to-understand
methods are so infrequent at the club level here that occasional
experimentation by those so inclined simply is not a problem in terms
of business.
> The National Rubber Bridge Championships has a nice ring to it. It could even be telivised,
> just like poker.
Indeed, and there are some names in the game now who might have some
drawing power as players, and anyone who plays high-powered methods
certainly *can* play Goren or something of the kind. With that happy
start, let us now consider what forces are preventing such an
enterprise in our highly enterprise-oriented society.
???
David
thg
> The introduction of the many one club opening systems, strong passes,
> weak twos, multi coloured etc, changed bridge from the greatest game of
> cards in the world into a test of system memory.
Vanderbilt introduced a strong club in the 20s. There were long,
highly publicized, rubber matches in the 20s and 30s that were meant,
in part, to be system battles.
Perhaps what you are longing for is Whist rather than bridge.
> There is no other pastime where the participants are not singing to the
> same hymn sheet.
The problem may be that you are looking at bridge as a pastime rather
than a competitive game. That's fine, of course. But, if your bridge
is a pastime, it makes little sense to complain about the conditions
at a duplicate bridge tournament.
Tim
Will in New Haven
I don't know who is right but one hears about an equal number of
"Bridge would be more popular if people didn't use all those
conventions" and "Bridge would be more popular if the powers that be
didn't discourage people from experimenting with systems." I fall into
the "It's a better game if people can work toward bidding systems that
suit them and are effective" and leave what will make bridge more
popular to the marketers. I'm sixty-three and the game isn't going to
disappear while I'm around. If I KNEW some way to help the game become
more popular, I would work for it. As it is, I'll just play.
David Babcock
> I don't know who is right but one hears about an equal number of
> "Bridge would be more popular if people didn't use all those
> conventions" and "Bridge would be more popular if the powers that be
> didn't discourage people from experimenting with systems."
Unfortunately, both of those tend to be hobby-horses that some will
ride on the slightest excuse. We would not be lamenting the condition
of bridge if it had not been so popular years ago, and that popularity
operated in great part when women tended more to stay at home. It is
the loss of that -- a kind of feeder system from the home to the
clubs, often by way of college -- that *had* to impact the game; and
the normal youthful rebellion against whatever interested one's
parents had peaked (in the US anyway), very dramatically sometimes,
just shortly before that. We certainly want to be working to bring
the game back to some part of its lost prominence, but IMHO we can get
lost working on the wrong things if we try to see what has happened as
something much different than just a natural part of changes around
us. Embrace the new technology? Fine. Work in the schools and send
notices to the newspaper for achievements (thanks JB for that one,
I've emailed our club manager)? Fine. But restrict/de-restrict
conventions in the belief that that's where the problem is? Highly
unlikely to matter IMHO.
David
John Blubaugh
There could be ACBL Yellow Card games with only stand convention if
there was demand for them. I doubt that there really is. The problem
is the old folks don't want someone bidding new conventions they don't
understand or desire to learn. It apparently upsets their
digestion.....
JB
thg
There have been attempts at "standard card" events. None of them very
successful, or we would see them more often. It seems to me that the
trouble is often that people want to play their favorite conventions,
but don't want to face other players' favorite conventions.
You may recall that 15-20 years ago, there was a Blue Ribbon
Commission created to come up with ideas to revitalize bridge. One of
their suggestions was a "common card" event where there were a minimum
of conventions in use. My father (a sometimes contributor to this
group) was on that Commission and related to me that there was
disagreement amongst the members regarding whether things like four-
card majors should be allowed in these "common card" events. I think
it was Hamman who objected to a five-card major "common card".
Before you say that the difference between 4-card and 5-card majors is
not what concerns the common player, let me mention that I had a pair
leave my OKbridge table one night. They said they didn't want to play
against our exotic home brewed system. We were playing something not
much different than Goren advocated before his switch to 5-card
majors. It's not really about exotic or complicated, but rather about
the unfamiliar. And, no system is going to be familiar to all or even
be common in all parts of the world.
Tim
Will in New Haven
I remember a club director in Florida many, many years ago having the
following on her "Welcome to the club" sheet she handed out.
"Do not say 'we don't open four-card majors." So I asked her about it
and she said, "You can open three-card minors and it isn't a problem
for me if you never happen to have a hand where you think you should
open 1H or 1S on four but my players don't like to play against fancy
conventions." I wasn't in town very long and I played at her club
twice. Nice people but what a wierd way of thinking.
I can easily imagine something similar today if you played four-card
Majors.
Jürgen R.
There is much in bidding that is simply fad and fashion.
However, the reaction against the unfamiliar is quite understandable:
In this game the assumption is - and the rulebook says so - that a player
has a right to a full explanation of his opponent's bids. For a complex
system that is unfamiliar full disclosure is an impossibility
and some people think this is unfair.
Bridge could be played without the full disclosure rule and
we could thus eliminate an absurdity from the laws, but I doubt
that that would improve matters.
Jürgen R.
The problem is a fundamental one: There are no objective criteria to
determine
which system is best, or even which among alternative conventions is best.
Basic questions that an intelligent beginner will ask cannot be answered,
e.g.
what's so hot about weak NT? How weak? If you search, for example,
the Kaplan-Sheinwold book for a logical argument, or a statistical one,
in favor of weak NT you will not find one, even though it is an important
aspect
of the system.
This missing yardstick has many unfortunate consequences, chief among which
is
the profusion of systems that have no particular virtue besides being
different
from others. But by the same token there are no sensible rules according
to which systems and conventions can be regulated.
It isn't the fact that there are so many different systems around that makes
it
unpleasant for beginners - it is the fact that there is no rational basis
for most of them.
It doesn't seem likely that an advertising campaign is going to overcome
this
problem.
John Blubaugh
>
> - Show quoted text -
I played with a partner who played four card majors in 2000. I believe
we won 15 Flight A pair events that year and four-card majors created
a lot of havoc among lower level players. The major advantage it gave
us was I got to play a lot more 1NT contracts. My partner kept track
of such things and we won 75% to 80% of the masterpoint everytime I
played 1NT. Unfortunately, this didn't work so well when he declared
1NT. I will admit to bidding 1NT many times when with a decent partner
I would have made some other bid. I know someone will jump all over
that statement and declare that I was cheating. That isn't so and it
should have worked against us as much as it did for us. If everyone is
going to tell me that they have never bid NT more often than normal to
keep a weak partner from stroking the dummy, well, I would find that
hard to believe. Then again, they probably don't play in events where
there is that much difference in skill levels between partners. It is
a typical ploy of a professional to get more of the hands played from
his side.
JB
David Babcock
> There could be ACBL Yellow Card games with only stand convention if
> there was demand for them. I doubt that there really is.
There wasn't when they (or something similar) were tried, and I can't
think of any reason for that to have changed.
> The problem
> is the old folks don't want someone bidding new conventions they don't
> understand or desire to learn. It apparently upsets their
> digestion.....
If "the old folks" get indigestion at modern bidding, shouldn't they
have made the restricted-convention games a success? I'm not sure
there's really much evidence that modern bidding really puts anyone
off, not around here anyway, and south Florida is pretty much Old-
Folks-Central for bridge in the US. The only adverse comments I run
into are when a pair plays something *so* bizarre (by ACBL-land
standards) that they might be suspected of trying to win just by
sowing confusion, but nothing comes of those very minor (and
infrequent) occurrences.
David
Will in New Haven
I found one and I remember it after fifty years. The weak notrump
helps you because any other bid partner makes denies a weak notrump.
When partner raises your one-level response to two, he has other than
a balanced minimum. He doesn't have to stretch a raise to three, it
can be very solid. The Strong NT sits in the middle of your opening-
bid range and doesn't do much for limiting your other bidding unless
you happen to rebid in NT. Kaplan and Sheinwold also mentioned the
preemptive impact of the Weak NT. That it often led to YOUR side being
in the wrong partial but paid this back by giving the opponents a
bigger problem. The Strong NT does that also, but it comes up less
often.
--
Will in New Haven
>
> This missing yardstick has many unfortunate consequences, chief among which
> is
> the profusion of systems that have no particular virtue besides being
> different
> from others. But by the same token there are no sensible rules according
> to which systems and conventions can be regulated.
>
> It isn't the fact that there are so many different systems around that makes
> it
> unpleasant for beginners - it is the fact that there is no rational basis
> for most of them.
>
> It doesn't seem likely that an advertising campaign is going to overcome
> this
> problem.- Hide quoted text -
thg
> However, the reaction against the unfamiliar is quite understandable:
> In this game the assumption is - and the rulebook says so - that a player
> has a right to a full explanation of his opponent's bids. For a complex
> system that is unfamiliar full disclosure is an impossibility
> and some people think this is unfair.
Is is undeniable that some users of complex systems do not disclose
properly, just like some players of simple systems do not disclose
properly. But, it is my belief that complex systems are often easier
to disclose than simple, natural systems. Rosenberg (or Zia) said in
his book that there are something like 11 factors he considers when
choosing an opening bid with 44 in the minors and that no one in the
world, not even Zia, could accurately duplicate his choices. In many
more complex systems, such choices are not left to judgment and are
easier to convey to the opponents as a result.
brsri...@gmail.com
wrote:
>
> - Prikaži citirani tekst -- Sakrij citirani tekst -
>
> - Prikaži citirani tekst -
The weak NT is not as constructive as 1H or 1S and opening 1H or 1S on
a four card major is almost as preemtive as opening 1N. I vote for
four card majors and 14-16 NT in a strong 1C opening environment. The
weak NT gains some points here and there but it is too limited in its
scope.
Boris
Will in New Haven
Those were the reasons given in 195something for playing Weak NT. The
comment was that Kaplan and Sheinwald had given no reasons for playing
them. I didn't mean to imply that those reasons would be compelling
for all. In the context of a Forcing Club system those reasons, other
than the preemptive and limiting nature of opening 1NT, don't have
much impact, of course. Still, many of the good Strong Club players I
know play a weak 1NT. Many play it weaker than 12-14.
In your analysis, I found the phrase "more constructive" and "limited
in scope," as you used them, to be mere noise. What is "more
constructive" about a Major opening that could be four cards and shows
maybe ten to fifteen HCP in any kind of distribution, compared to a
Weak NT, which defines shape and strength. How is a 12-14 HCP NT
"limited in scope" when compared to a range two points higher?
Someone may count your vote. I didn't ask for votes and will certainly
ignore yours.
lescor
I do not understand your suggestion that a competitive game cannot be
also considered a pastime. I feel the word embraces those extra chosen
things we do for enjoyment, interest or relaxation, and that includes
sport, which are all, by definition, competitive.
Who's complaining about duplicate bridge? The game in that form will
continue to hold an understandable fascination for many, despite the
rather clinical atmosphere it now creates. As I said, I appreciate, as
much as anyone, the continued discussion about the best way to describe
13 cards, but I am also aware that is what has been accepted in this
pursuit which now divides the game.
The thread was about marketing the game to get more people to play under
the control of the organising body and, to me, the insurmountable
problem it has to overcome.
If I take up a competitive sport as my pastime I play the same game as
Tiger or Federer. Only the skill level differs. If bridge is my choice
it will take some time to learn and appreciate the logic which
lies within the simplest of standard bidding languages. An enjoyable
experience for those who take to it. After some time I will be capable
of playing the game in a manner which makes some sense and I will
improve with experience. The unique partnership language concept makes
the game difficult enough for beginners, but if they continue and try to
play at the club duplicate level they find that it isn't enough. Other
languages operate and it is this new problem of "what the hell am I
supposed to do over a weak two " which creates the loss between those
who learn at a club and those with enough ambition to continue to play
there and start learning again, with the hope that some of the bits and
pieces you decide to add do not suddenly become unacceptable overnight.
Give me a racket and some balls and it is simply my skill which will
decide if it's next stop Wimbledon. We can hardly say that about bridge
where partnership system memory might be even more important than the
skill element of the game, the card play.
I was aware of the history of the early days of the game, but you must
agree that this is hardly relevant to what it has become.
LC
lescor
I think that most of the above posters miss the point. Of course you can
encourage events where minimum conventions are used. But this simply
further widens the gulf between those who play. Who would enjoy
competing in an event for those who "do not really understand". A lower
division for those who do not have the time to discuss new ideas or, the
even greater problem, of how to combat the various methods used by
opponents.
I know from experience why the drop out rate between those who learn and
those who continue at club level is so high. Someone suggested that
there is some doubt about whether sudden introduction to opposing
strange systems was the major cause. Not to me. I have started several
hundred (maybe thousands) into the game, watched them progress, looked
after them in supervised practice sessions at the club, furnished them
with masses of comprehensive notes on each aspect of bidding and play.
Even the keenest are dismayed at the difference they are faced with in a
club duplicate. And that is where we lose them, although most continue
to play socially at home.
Marketing bridge as a game should be easy enough as it is the finest
card game in the world. It was never a problem in my recent years of
teaching where we filled classes without the use of marketing skills
(unless word of mouth can be considered such) and with very little
advertising. The attractions of bridge as a game are not the problem.
It is the strange ideas held by the organisations which control it that
the game, as overseen by them,, is the only way.
"Let's popularise bridge" really means let us get more people into club
duplicates, more paying members for regional and national events. But
the vast majority who learn and try say "no thank you", mainly for the
reasons I have given, and another, which I have not mentioned before,
which is the too often found belligerence and unfriendliness they meet.
Anyone trying to market a product has to look at the qualities of the
product itself. The attractions of bridge as a skilful interesting game
are obvious. Very few will continue to see it in that light when faced
with the reality and demands of club events. Its a different game folks!
LC
Jürgen R.
I didn't mean to start a discussion on the virtues of weak, strong or any
other kind of NT. The point is that there is no way to quantify the relative
advantages of bidding conventions.
brsri...@gmail.com
wrote:
>
> - Prikaži citirani tekst -
Why should my partner open every 12-13 count, and even if he does what
stops him in letting me know that avoiding 4H and bidding 3N instead
is wiser. Not to mention that I need only 3 hearts for raising to 2H
and this will happen much more often than seeing me raising to 2N.
Either way opening a not very competitive flat 12 count, be it even
with as a mini preemt, is not very wise. How do you know your partner
is not holding 3 aces and a working doubleton instead. What do you do
with S xx H xxx D AKQx C Axxx, do you open a 12-14 1N?
Boris
brsri...@gmail.com
>
> - Prikaži citirani tekst -
Or even better, S AKxx H AKxx D xxx C xx, 12-14 1N anyone?
Boris
thg
> I do not understand your suggestion that a competitive
> game cannot be also considered a pastime. I feel the
> word embraces those extra chosen things we do for
> enjoyment, interest or relaxation, and that includes
> sport, which are all, by definition, competitive.
>If I take up a competitive sport as my pastime I play
>the same game as Tiger or Federer.
Maybe, maybe not. If you take up golf, do you always use a caddy,
ever take a mulligan, ever improve your lie in the fairway, always
take a penalty stroke when you ground your club in a bunker, play from
the white tees, red tees or blue tees? There are lots of ways that
your golf game will differ from the game Tiger plays.
> I was aware of the history of the early days of the
> game, but you must agree that this is hardly relevant
> to what it has become.
Not at all. Encountering unusual systems has always been a part of
the game, through some very popular times and now through some less
popular times. I think that makes the reference relevant.
Tim
David Babcock
> I have started several
> hundred (maybe thousands) into the game, watched them progress, looked
> after them in supervised practice sessions at the club, furnished them
> with masses of comprehensive notes on each aspect of bidding and play.
> Even the keenest are dismayed at the difference they are faced with in a
> club duplicate. And that is where we lose them, although most continue
> to play socially at home.
The jolt in going from being successful at kitchen-table bridge to
seeing pair after pair with a better score with the same cards on the
traveler, followed by the day's 35% posted in the wall and perhaps on
the Internet, can be ego-shattering, just as it was for many of us way-
back-when. Focus as well as you can on helping newbies to manage the
shock of suddenly being on the bottom of the heap and see to providing
a civilized environment in terms of basic behavior, and you are doing
the most important things you can do in terms of getting the people
who show up to come back.
Our club has gone in five years from asking people to *please* switch
the arrow in a Howell to discussing whether to get a duplicating
machine for our ever-more-frequent two sections. Our newbies help to
continue the same club culture. It's a nice thing to be a part of.
David
dranon
wrote:
>Give me a racket and some balls and it is simply my skill which will
>decide if it's next stop Wimbledon. We can hardly say that about bridge
>where partnership system memory might be even more important than the
>skill element of the game, the card play.
This seems to me to be an emotional argument that resonates for you,
based on your experience, but is contrary to my understanding, based
on mine. What you describe as system memory IS PART OF THE GAME. For
you to say that people drop out once they encounter a competitive
environment where there is increased demand in that area is the
equivalent of saying that your budding tennis stars drop out once they
play an opponent who can, at will, put a top-spin rotation on a
backhand shot. It is all part of the skill of the game.
I dare say that *IF* you are correct, then the fault lies with those
who taught said students about the game in the first place. If they
were presented with dishonest expectations, they have a right to be
disillusioned at some point.
John Blubaugh
Thank you for this post. I once was in a club where someone said as
scores were being placed on a black board (that will let you know how
long ago that was although this club still posts all of the scores on
a black board as well as printing out a computer sheet) look, that
pair got seven zeroes in a row!!! Well, THAT pair never played again.
New players have to be nurtured, pampered a bit but most of all
prepared to see some bad results as they learn and adjust to the
competitive game. How much better would it have been if that person
had looked up that pair and said, "Don't get discouraged, this happens
to just about everyone who is new to the game." This is one of the big
problems in getting new players to continue playing duplicate after
completing lessons. They need to be told that when they meet certain
pairs, if they can get an average score, that is a tremendous
accomplishment. Bridge owes much of its decline to the attitude and
behavior of its members.
JB
Will in New Haven
I had a friend who passed away a few years ago. Even though she was my
friend I estimate that she drove two or three beginners away from the
game every year that she played. Another veteran player in this area
may have been even worse in this respect. Neither of them seemed to be
motivated by malice. Neither of them could be convinced that they were
doing anything wrong.
One of the huge difficulties of bridge promotion and growth is that it
takes such a long time to become adequate. Other games may take a
lifetime to master but the basics can be learned quickly. There is a
paralell here to young people getting involved in baseball versus
soccer. One can debate the skills required to be excellent at each
game forever. There is no doubt, however, that baseball has a much
greater ability to make a beginner or intermediate player look and
feel like an idiot. When you are at bat or about to catch a batted
ball, the spotlight is on you. And neither task is easy. Bridge has
the same feel when you start out. Or fifty years later, in my case.
boblipton
Earlier this week I was talking with a friend who is just beginning to
play bridge but is frustrated by the classes. So I said "Give me a
call and I'll play with you". She phumphaed around and said I was an
expert which I am sure would have amused the people around here, and
why would I want to play with her? Because she was a friend. But she
wasn't up to my standard. "So we'll lose."
I'm reminded of something that Mollo wrote about himself in the half-
page bio of one of his books: that his favorite thing is to win at
bridge and his second favorite is to lose at it.
Bob
lescor
> On Feb 6, 4:10 am, lescor <lescorb...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
>
>>I do not understand your suggestion that a competitive
>>game cannot be also considered a pastime. I feel the
>>word embraces those extra chosen things we do for
>>enjoyment, interest or relaxation, and that includes
>>sport, which are all, by definition, competitive.
>
>
>>If I take up a competitive sport as my pastime I play
>>the same game as Tiger or Federer.
>
>
> Maybe, maybe not. If you take up golf, do you always use a caddy,
> ever take a mulligan, ever improve your lie in the fairway, always
> take a penalty stroke when you ground your club in a bunker, play from
> the white tees, red tees or blue tees? There are lots of ways that
> your golf game will differ from the game Tiger plays.
Oh come on! This is hair splitting. The fact is that I will play under
the same conditions as my opponent. No components of the game will apply
only to him or differ from mine. Whatever either of us do is able to be
countered by equal or superior skill. The outcome depends on the way we
play. We play on the same sized court or the same length course.
This 'level playing field' principle applies to just about every
pastime, with PLAY being the vital component, apart from bridge.
Its two sections of activity make it the interesting game it is, but
whilst one part remains unchanged, the other has become more and more
complex over the years, and this, without doubt, is the reason that club
participation does not reflect the numbers who actually play the game.
Most tennis clubs and golf clubs have waiting lists, probably because,
even though highly skilled games, they remain basically simple. Not
quite the same as, for the first time, meeting an opponents opening and
slightly preempive bid which you are told will have one of four meanings
is it?
I am not knocking the game as it is now played. Many would have it no
other way and maybe it was inevitable. But I have little doubt that it
would have become far more popular at club level if the bidding control
had been tighter.
But that's the way it is, my main point being that it is about time the
official bodies realised it. Instead of pursuing this unrealistic
conceit that BRIDGE , as a game, is identical with, and relates only to
the stuff they promote - proven unattractive to so many - maybe they
should be trying to attract those they have lost, and not by simply
running 2nd division, limited convention contests for the novices and
ancient.
How to do this is more about fresh thinking than marketing, but until
they do it will remain a case of teach them and lose them, apart from
the continued small trickle of bright youngsters who have not taken up
poker and are happy to discuss their relays into the small hours.
LC
lescor
Interesting points, but not quite correct. My comments are not at all
emotional and I, until recently, enjoy playing duplicate bridge as much
as anyone. I am simply pointing out the main reason why so few from
those who take up the game don't also find it so.
Of course system memory is part of the game, and it is difficult enough
for the beginner to learn even the most basic, uncluttered methods and
they take time to absorb. If you are suggesting that the teachers
should, in the cause of honesty , also add defence to opponents multi or
weak twos and the rest, its a non starter. It also presupposes that they
wanted to learn the game so that they could play duplicate bridge in a
club, a strange idea and one which the games governing bodies seem to
subscribe to.
Under the direction of an enlightened owner, we ran large classes for
all levels throughout the year, plus several weekly, well attended
supervised practice sessions. We taught them rubber bridge because it is
a fine game and the one most of them would continue to play. And the
club ran daily cutting cash game at stakes from the small to the
frightening. It also ran many weekly duplicates of a pretty high
standard.In short, a complete bridge package.
Those who wanted to enter these duplicates were encouraged to do so and
advised not to expect great results but to enjoy the frequent moments of
getting a good score against well known experts. But most often the leap
from all playing similar systems to the complex world of duplicate was
too great. This was a decade or so ago but, as I discovered the last
time I played, the duplicate world is now even less appealing for the
novice and that fact will never be overcome by even the most expert
marketing.
I dispute your suggestion that system memory is a bridge SKILL, at
least, not in the context discussed, possibly because it could be learnt
by someone with a lively memory but who had never touched a card in his
life. A vital part of the game without doubt, but memory of agreed
system is hardly a skill is it?
Your tennis example is not valid. Of course an opponents greater skill
in play will give him an advantage, but we both play with the same ball
as we do in all other pastimes apart from bridge.
I never suggested it was wrong that sophisticated and 'non natural'
systems are allowed. but simply pointing out that they are the reason
for the drop out of most who learn. It is not losing a point to a
swerving spinning serve, a result of skill. It is more like losing one
to an opponent suddenly serving with a smaller harder ball, one we have
never experienced before.
You are dead right, it is part of the game. I never disputed that, but
it is the part which makes duplicate bridge glowingly more difficult to
market to those who have recently taken up the great game.
LC
lescor
Correct in that, with one bid, it descibes the majority of opening bid
hands and, by definition, shows any other opening bid to be of a
different type. With old fashioned Acol (4 card majors) 1 heart either
shows a min of five or a hand stronger than minmum....for what that is
worth.
It gets interesting with a minimum range opening with a poor 5 card
major like A J x ....J 10 x x x .....K J 10... A x where 1NT makes
more appeal than bidding and maybe rebidding that rotten major.
LC
thg
> Oh come on! This is hair splitting. The fact is that I will play under
> the same conditions as my opponent. No components of the game will apply
> only to him or differ from mine. Whatever either of us do is able to be
> countered by equal or superior skill. The outcome depends on the way we
> play. We play on the same sized court or the same length course.
To some extent this depends upon what things you call skill. Yes, I
can go out and play on the same course as Tiger, play from the same
tees and play under the same conditions. But, I cannot use a fade or
a draw (a slice maybe, but not with any control). Using a draw or a
fade with any success takes lots of practice. Just like the skills
required to cope with unfamiliar methods. And, yes, they are skills.
If bidding, competitively or non-competitively, were merely memorizing
lists of conventions or relays answers, think how good the best
computer bidders would be. But, computers do not bid so well.
A better sport analogy might be US football. The offense has a
playbook, some play a wishbone, others a west coast offense, etc.
But, each offensive play has to conform to some general rules (certain
number of men on the line of scrimmage, players set at time of snap,
etc.). The defense has to cope with this variety of offenses. The
defense can prepare ahead of time for certain things, but how they
react on the field is just as important.
I guess where we really disagree is that I think devising system and
coping with the system the opponents devise is a skill. It may not be
a skill that attracts players to the game in the first place, but it
has been a part of the game since its inception.
Tim
David Babcock
> We taught them rubber bridge because it is
> a fine game and the one most of them would continue to play. And the
> club ran daily cutting cash game at stakes from the small to the
> frightening. It also ran many weekly duplicates of a pretty high
> standard.In short, a complete bridge package.
>
> Those who wanted to enter these duplicates were encouraged to do so and
> advised not to expect great results but to enjoy the frequent moments of
> getting a good score against well known experts. But most often the leap
> from all playing similar systems to the complex world of duplicate was
> too great.
Do clubs have the authority to restrict conventions in their duplicate
games in your jurisdiction?
David
dranon
wrote:
>dranon wrote:
>> On Fri, 06 Feb 2009 09:10:38 +0000, lescor <lesco...@btinternet.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Give me a racket and some balls and it is simply my skill which will
>>>decide if it's next stop Wimbledon. We can hardly say that about bridge
>>>where partnership system memory might be even more important than the
>>>skill element of the game, the card play.
>>
>>
>> This seems to me to be an emotional argument that resonates for you,
>> based on your experience, but is contrary to my understanding, based
>> on mine. What you describe as system memory IS PART OF THE GAME. For
>> you to say that people drop out once they encounter a competitive
>> environment where there is increased demand in that area is the
>> equivalent of saying that your budding tennis stars drop out once they
>> play an opponent who can, at will, put a top-spin rotation on a
>> backhand shot. It is all part of the skill of the game.
>>
>> I dare say that *IF* you are correct, then the fault lies with those
>> who taught said students about the game in the first place. If they
>> were presented with dishonest expectations, they have a right to be
>> disillusioned at some point.
>>
>
>Interesting points, but not quite correct. My comments are not at all
>emotional and I, until recently, enjoy playing duplicate bridge as much
>as anyone. I am simply pointing out the main reason why so few from
>those who take up the game don't also find it so.
But I think your understanding of their reasons and reasoning is based
on your personal bias and is not consistent with my experiences.
>Of course system memory is part of the game, and it is difficult enough
> for the beginner to learn even the most basic, uncluttered methods and
>they take time to absorb. If you are suggesting that the teachers
>should, in the cause of honesty , also add defence to opponents multi or
>weak twos and the rest, its a non starter.
Not at all. I am suggesting that the teacher make it clear that there
are certain skills that they need to have a grasp on before they
anticipate mediocrity in an open environment.
> It also presupposes that they
>wanted to learn the game so that they could play duplicate bridge in a
>club, a strange idea and one which the games governing bodies seem to
>subscribe to.
Ah, but that is the purpose of the lessons. Even if a large
percentage never do, there may, someday be an individual coerced to
the game by three such never-doers, who his/herself goes on to do so.
>Under the direction of an enlightened owner, we ran large classes for
>all levels throughout the year, plus several weekly, well attended
>supervised practice sessions. We taught them rubber bridge because it is
>a fine game and the one most of them would continue to play. And the
>club ran daily cutting cash game at stakes from the small to the
>frightening. It also ran many weekly duplicates of a pretty high
>standard.In short, a complete bridge package.
>
>Those who wanted to enter these duplicates were encouraged to do so and
>advised not to expect great results but to enjoy the frequent moments of
>getting a good score against well known experts. But most often the leap
>from all playing similar systems to the complex world of duplicate was
>too great.
Then you "advisory" was lacking.
> This was a decade or so ago but, as I discovered the last
>time I played, the duplicate world is now even less appealing for the
>novice
Why is that?
> and that fact will never be overcome by even the most expert
>marketing.
Disagree.
>I dispute your suggestion that system memory is a bridge SKILL
Houston, we have a problem. This is a fundamental difference that
can't be brushed over.
>, at
>least, not in the context discussed, possibly because it could be learnt
>by someone with a lively memory but who had never touched a card in his
>life. A vital part of the game without doubt, but memory of agreed
>system is hardly a skill is it?
It is indeed. In a nutshell, people's brains have different
capacities. You either manage your capacity or fail. Managing that
is definitely a skill and separates many a bridge player from the next
level.
>Your tennis example is not valid. Of course an opponents greater skill
>in play will give him an advantage, but we both play with the same ball
>as we do in all other pastimes apart from bridge.
I guess it depends on your definition of ball. I see 52 balls and
they look alike at every table I've ever played at.
>I never suggested it was wrong that sophisticated and 'non natural'
>systems are allowed. but simply pointing out that they are the reason
>for the drop out of most who learn.
Again, I fault the teacher.
>It is not losing a point to a
>swerving spinning serve, a result of skill. It is more like losing one
>to an opponent suddenly serving with a smaller harder ball, one we have
>never experienced before.
A fabrication of your own choosing, I'm afraid. I see no difference
between your smaller ball and my top-spinning backhand. The novice
can not handle it and only the crybabies murmur something about a
different ball. It isn't different. It is returned with greater
skill. Learn to defend that skill or lose. Simple.
>You are dead right, it is part of the game. I never disputed that, but
>it is the part which makes duplicate bridge glowingly more difficult to
> market to those who have recently taken up the great game.
Only because their initial tutors failed them miserably.
lescor
> on your personal bias and is not consistent with my experience.
Fine, so all is well and there is no problem, no worrying drop out rate?
But why the hell should you come to that "bias" conclusion? My
knowledge of their reasons are based upon teaching them by the hundreds,
speaking to them and even playing with them as an introduction. In
short, it is based upon what they said. You seem, for some strange
reason, and despite my comments, to suggest a personal bias. Seems that
in your haste to defend the status quo you assume that I dislike
duplicate bridge This is not so.
The topic, remember, was why so many do not find it as attractive as
some of us do.
>>Of course system memory is part of the game, and it is difficult enough
>> for the beginner to learn even the most basic, uncluttered methods and
>>they take time to absorb. If you are suggesting that the teachers
>>should, in the cause of honesty , also add defence to opponents multi or
>>weak twos and the rest, its a non starter.
>
>
> Not at all. I am suggesting that the teacher make it clear that there
> are certain skills that they need to have a grasp on before they
> anticipate mediocrity in an open environment.
This is obviously made clear very early. It is not some guarded secret.
They know that in the game played under a different format they would be
faced with playing against systems which were not 'natural'.
>>It also presupposes that they
>>wanted to learn the game so that they could play duplicate bridge in a
>>club, a strange idea and one which the games governing bodies seem to
>>subscribe to.
>
>
> Ah, but that is the purpose of the lessons. Even if a large
> percentage never do, there may, someday be an individual coerced to
> the game by three such never-doers, who his/herself goes on to do so.
And some do, including me, but not enough it seems. But the purpose of
the lessons is NOT to provide players for duplicate, it is to teach them
the fundamentals of bridge. Where they take this, what form of the game
they play and how often, is for them to decide. Maybe our difference of
opinion have a geographical basis , but I do not understand where this
accepted wisdom that bridge means duplicate (in one form or another) is
correct. Seems the vast majority of those who play the game would not
agree. Fault of the teachers you say......... but if so, maybe the
teachers have got the market right?
>>Under the direction of an enlightened owner, we ran large classes for
>>all levels throughout the year, plus several weekly, well attended
>>supervised practice sessions. We taught them rubber bridge because it is
>>a fine game and the one most of them would continue to play. And the
>>club ran daily cutting cash game at stakes from the small to the
>>frightening. It also ran many weekly duplicates of a pretty high
>>standard.In short, a complete bridge package.
>>
>>Those who wanted to enter these duplicates were encouraged to do so and
>>advised not to expect great results but to enjoy the frequent moments of
>>getting a good score against well known experts. But most often the leap
>
>>from all playing similar systems to the complex world of duplicate was
>
>>too great.
> Then you "advisory" was lacking.
Yes maybe, but that presupposes a wide low standard of teaching. There
might be other reasons for the problem and they could just be the ones I
stated. We have a class of 32 new players, slightly bewildered at the
beginning, but after 8 x 3 hour lessons and armed with pages of
comprehensive notes on each topic, they learn and, most often, fall for
the game, become fascinated by it, and will then sign up for another
course at the intermediate level a few weeks later after attending
weekly practice sessions.
We have them. keen as mustard and enjoying their increasing bridge days.
Many will, at some stage, take the natural step into club duplicate, but
not for long. Why? Poor preparation at clubs where the main objective
is to get them into club duplicates, as you suggest? Unlikely!
this was a decade or so ago but, as I discovered the last
>>time I played, the duplicate world is now even less appealing for the
>>novice
>
>
> Why is that?
The thought occurred to me as I played at a club and where the event
which once attracted 18 plus tables now had 8. Many old faces ( very few
young) and I reflected on how things had changed in such a short time.
How, a few years ago these events, and even one which carried a $200
winners-take-all cash prize, was run in a far more informal, chatty and
friendly fashion.
Maybe the last straw was bidding boxes, unless they see a need for under
table leg barriers in the future of course, But the change was
screamingly obvious, and if that past environment was unattractive to
novices, the present one is even more so.
>>and that fact will never be overcome by even the most expert
>>marketing.
>
>
> Disagree.
>
>
>>I dispute your suggestion that system memory is a bridge SKILL
>
>
> Houston, we have a problem. This is a fundamental difference that
> can't be brushed over.
>>, at
>>least, not in the context discussed, possibly because it could be learnt
>>by someone with a lively memory but who had never touched a card in his
>>life. A vital part of the game without doubt, but memory of agreed
>>system is hardly a skill is it?
>
>
> It is indeed. In a nutshell, people's brains have different
> capacities. You either manage your capacity or fail. Managing that
> is definitely a skill and separates many a bridge player from the next
> level.
But you again miss the point. I am not suggesting that reason or skill
and experience cannot be used in tight bidding situations. It is more
about facing new artificial bids - many of which are meant to be
disruptive - of which there is a long list, some allowed, some allowed
for a while before being banned in some events but not in others.
It takes no great skill to recognise a multi opening bid which might
have one of 3 or 4 meanings. Its use disadvantaged more than novices for
a while, until they had agree a defence when it started to become widely
used. All part of the game of course, but why should the less
experienced player bother? Why learn yet another list of defences to it
and a few more for other such openings? Do you honestly think teaching
is the reason that they find the task not worth the time?
Face the fact that this unlevel playing field is unattractive to most
apart from a few like us. No amount of marketing will change that
fact. The clubs that taught them once had them by the nose but failed to
keep them. You won't get them back with naive idea that you can , by
marketing, get them to see that what they found unappealing really isn't.
There is a way of increasing club activity given time, but it requires
fresh thinking and an acceptance of what the vast majority of those who
play the game would really enjoy. Market what is attractive, not " you
may have found it wanting but please try again as it's all we have got".
LC
>>Your tennis example is not valid. Of course an opponents greater skill
>>in play will give him an advantage, but we both play with the same ball
>>as we do in all other pastimes apart from bridge.
>
>
> I guess it depends on your definition of ball. I see 52 balls and
> they look alike at every table I've ever played at.
>>I never suggested it was wrong that sophisticated and 'non natural'
>>systems are allowed. but simply pointing out that they are the reason
>>for the drop out of most who learn.
>
>
> Again, I fault the teacher.
>>It is not losing a point to a
>>swerving spinning serve, a result of skill. It is more like losing one
>>to an opponent suddenly serving with a smaller harder ball, one we have
>>never experienced before.
>
>
> A fabrication of your own choosing, I'm afraid. I see no difference
> between your smaller ball and my top-spinning backhand. The novice
> can not handle it and only the crybabies murmur something about a
> different ball. It isn't different. It is returned with greater
> skill. Learn to defend that skill or lose. Simple.
>
>
>>You are dead right, it is part of the game. I never disputed that, but
>>it is the part which makes duplicate bridge growingly more difficult to
David Babcock
> On Sat, 07 Feb 2009 09:46:26 +0000, lescor <lescorb...@btinternet.com>
> >I never suggested it was wrong that sophisticated and 'non natural'
> >systems are allowed. but simply pointing out that they are the reason
> >for the drop out of most who learn.
>
> Again, I fault the teacher.
Yes. Students who are freaked when they encounter conventional
methods are freaked because they have been taught to be (however
inadvertently). The fact that we are many decades past the day when
everyone actually bid naturally has a very useful consequence for
teachers: wherever bridge is played, it is routine to be teaching
conventions that are in widespread use there. This makes -- or should
make -- the teaching of ways of dealing with conventions generally,
easier. The student learns Blackwood (for better or worse...) and
also learns to double a Blackwood response for the lead. The student
can then be guided to generalize -- "hey, when they bid some
conventional thing, whatever it is, we can double to show the suit!"
and similarly later when they see that they can cue-bid the other
side's target suit in a transfer auction and convey useful information
that way. Their actions, when they have just started to "get" this,
are often not optimal, of course, but they are mentally in the game,
and that is the important thing.
David
David Babcock
> We have a class of 32 new players, slightly bewildered at the
> beginning, but after 8 x 3 hour lessons and armed with pages of
> comprehensive notes on each topic, they learn and, most often, fall for
> the game, become fascinated by it, and will then sign up for another
> course at the intermediate level a few weeks later after attending
> weekly practice sessions.
and this in spite of having surely been taught some conventional
methods within those "pages of comprehensive notes" -- are you
*really* that confident that the problem is not adequate psychological
preparation for the lost safety of the cocoon where mistakes are
shuffled away and everyone is a bad card-holder?
David
David Babcock
> adequate
should have said "inadequate", sorry
David
John Blubaugh
>
> Face the fact that this unlevel playing field is unattractive to most
> apart from a few like us. No amount of marketing will change that
> fact. The clubs that taught them once had them by the nose but failed to
> keep them. You won't get them back with naive idea that you can , by
> marketing, get them to see that what they found unappealing really isn't.
>
Snipped
I believe your statements on this subject are correct and I believe
you are right that the idea is to train bridge players, not
necessarily duplicate bridge players. If people are learning and
playing bridge at home, there is always the chance that they will
someday turn to duplicate. We have always only had a small percentage
of players who decide that duplicate if for them and I think your
reasoning here about why is sound.
The only thing marketing can do is create many more bridge players and
therefore increase that small percentage that decide to try and play
in a local club and then perhaps move on the the tournament world.
Computer bridge is a good way to get them into duplicate. They can
play there under a made up personality and if they get beaten too
badly, they can just change that persona to another one and keep
playing. Some will get the duplicate bug this way. The ACBL teaching
is missing the boat by not supplying the new students with all the
information they need about computer bridge. But, then again, they
missed the boat on computer bridge entirely because a few individuals
(or perhaps one person) insisted on making it and income producing
machine with the money not going to the ACBL but directly into their
pockets. These people don't care about bridge but only care about
getting what they see as their rightful share of the pie. That is
volunteerism at the top the ACBL way.
JB
David Babcock
> The ACBL teaching
> is missing the boat by not supplying the new students with all the
> information they need about computer bridge.
1. ACBL's document "The School Bridge Lesson Program" suggests
BridgeBase.com as a resource for teachers to recommend to students,
and it describes some of the features.
2. ACBL's document "Guidelines for Teachers" does the same.
3. In ACBL's "Elementary School Bridge Lesson Teacher Manual, Second-
Fourth Grades", the teacher inroduces MiniBridge, and the teacher
instructs the students on how to use BridgeBase.com to play
MiniBridge.
4. In the "Resources for Teachers" portion of its Web site (one click
from the start page), ACBL says of the Fifth Chair Foundation, "This
volunteer organization supports learning through the Internet,
including mentor games on Bridge Base Online and OK Bridge. The site
also includes a number of lessons" and provides a link.
5. The bridgeiscool.com Web site, done by ACBL and aimed at
youngsters, has a number of useful links on its first page.
Anybody who has actually looked into teaching bridge to youngsters
under ACBL auspices knows at least the first two items; anyone who has
looked through the lesson manual for 2nd-4th grades (it's on-line and
downloadable for free) will have encountered the third. Their other
lesson manuals may have something similar, but 2nd-4th graders are the
only ones that I have had occasion to prepare for so far, so that
lesson manual is the only one I can speak about from my own
knowledge.
David
John Blubaugh
> On Feb 8, 9:48 am, John Blubaugh <jbluba...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > The ACBL teaching
> > is missing the boat by not supplying the new students with all the
> > information they need about computer bridge.
>
> 1. ACBL's document "The School Bridge Lesson Program" suggests
> BridgeBase.com as a resource for teachers to recommend to students,
> and it describes some of the features.
Thank you for the information. It is good to see that they have
changed something in the last ten years.
>
> 2. ACBL's document "Guidelines for Teachers" does the same.
>
> 3. In ACBL's "Elementary School Bridge Lesson Teacher Manual, Second-
> Fourth Grades", the teacher inroduces MiniBridge, and the teacher
> instructs the students on how to use BridgeBase.com to play
> MiniBridge.
>
> 4. In the "Resources for Teachers" portion of its Web site (one click
> from the start page), ACBL says of the Fifth Chair Foundation, "This
> volunteer organization supports learning through the Internet,
> including mentor games on Bridge Base Online and OK Bridge. The site
> also includes a number of lessons" and provides a link.
>
> 5. The bridgeiscool.com Web site, done by ACBL and aimed at
> youngsters, has a number of useful links on its first page.
>
> Anybody who has actually looked into teaching bridge to youngsters
> under ACBL auspices knows at least the first two items; anyone who has
> looked through the lesson manual for 2nd-4th grades (it's on-line and
> downloadable for free) will have encountered the third. Their other
> lesson manuals may have something similar, but 2nd-4th graders are the
> only ones that I have had occasion to prepare for so far, so that
> lesson manual is the only one I can speak about from my own
> knowledge.
>
> David
Thanks again.
richlp
> > wrote:
>
> >>dranon wrote:
>
> >>>On Fri, 06 Feb 2009 09:10:38 +0000, lescor <lescorb...@btinternet.com>
>
> read more »- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
The growing complexity of bidding systems has been cited as the
potential cause of bridge's downfall since well before I started
playing over 40 years ago. It wasn't true in the 50's and 60's when
bridge thrived and expanded among younger people.
I don't think it was true in the 70's when growth seemed to stop
abruptly. I have some wierd theories about why the popularity of the
game took such a precipitous dive then, but they aren't relevant to
this discussion.
I'm very curious as to the average age of your students who try
duplicate and reject it beacuse they feel so unprepared for the
bidding complexities they encounter. I agree with you that this is a
major reason so many don't come back. My personal opinion is that
another factor is equally significant. And that is the
competitiveness with which duplicate is played.
My guess is that most of your students are middle aged or older. I
realize it's a generalization, but I feel most of them are approaching
bridge as a past-time. They are not that much interested in the
competitive nature of duplicate. Even in clubs where deportment is
not an issue, where the players are friendly and accepting of
newcomers, there is still an intense feeling of competition that can
be very off-putting.
Add the pressure of competition to the sudden realization that they
are not equipped to compete, and these newcomers will back away to
where it is "just a game." I realize that I don't have the teaching
background you do and have no research to back my gut reaction. But I
have the feeling that if you were to ask your students
"After your experience at the duplicated club, if everybody played the
bidding system you were taught in my class, would you consider playing
there again?"
You would get a considerable number of negative responses.
dranon
wrote:
I didn't mean to imply that. We both want to see a change that
increases the student's longevity. I submit that all things point
back to the teaching methods and that, as has been suggested elsewhere
in this thread, teaching to the expected course is far superior to
"just teaching the game."
Tel them upfront:
This is a class where you will learn how to play the game of bridge,
and you will learn those things which are necessary for you to be
prepared to play in a friendly duplicate bridge club.
I hardly think that ACBL (or any other SO) should bother with a course
that doesn't offer the above as a minimum syllabus.
>But why the hell should you come to that "bias" conclusion? My
>knowledge of their reasons are based upon teaching them by the hundreds,
>speaking to them and even playing with them as an introduction. In
>short, it is based upon what they said. You seem, for some strange
>reason, and despite my comments, to suggest a personal bias. Seems that
>in your haste to defend the status quo you assume that I dislike
>duplicate bridge This is not so.
You invite many a comment about WHAT you are teaching and HOW.
Suffice it to say that if one teaches "to the result", you missed.
Many others have also, so don't feel too bad.
But John is right. It is all about marketing. If the bridge
"lessons" aren't seen as a marketing tool for increasing ACBL
membership, then they are not properly developed. Or, if one wants to
be kinder and gentler, they aren't tapping the vein with maximum
efficiency.
>The topic, remember, was why so many do not find it as attractive as
>some of us do.
I still blame the teacher.
>>>Of course system memory is part of the game, and it is difficult enough
>>> for the beginner to learn even the most basic, uncluttered methods and
>>>they take time to absorb. If you are suggesting that the teachers
>>>should, in the cause of honesty , also add defence to opponents multi or
>>>weak twos and the rest, its a non starter.
>>
>>
>> Not at all. I am suggesting that the teacher make it clear that there
>> are certain skills that they need to have a grasp on before they
>> anticipate mediocrity in an open environment.
>
>This is obviously made clear very early. It is not some guarded secret.
>They know that in the game played under a different format they would be
>faced with playing against systems which were not 'natural'.
Bravo. A problem identified is 1/2 solved. Then teach to them the
skills necessary to not feel overwhelmed.
>>>It also presupposes that they
>>>wanted to learn the game so that they could play duplicate bridge in a
>>>club, a strange idea and one which the games governing bodies seem to
>>>subscribe to.
Not at all. If you want my support, I expect something in return.
Hardly unreasonable.
>> Ah, but that is the purpose of the lessons. Even if a large
>> percentage never do, there may, someday be an individual coerced to
>> the game by three such never-doers, who his/herself goes on to do so.
In retrospect, I wasn't as pointed here as I should have been. The
purpose of the lessons is to increase ACBL membership.
>And some do, including me, but not enough it seems. But the purpose of
>the lessons is NOT to provide players for duplicate, it is to teach them
>the fundamentals of bridge. Where they take this, what form of the game
>they play and how often, is for them to decide. Maybe our difference of
>opinion have a geographical basis , but I do not understand where this
>accepted wisdom that bridge means duplicate (in one form or another) is
>correct. Seems the vast majority of those who play the game would not
>agree. Fault of the teachers you say......... but if so, maybe the
>teachers have got the market right?
They may have "something" right, but it isn't the "market".
>
>> Then you "advisory" was lacking.
s/b "your"
>Yes maybe, but that presupposes a wide low standard of teaching.
Admittedly.
>There
>might be other reasons for the problem and they could just be the ones I
>stated. We have a class of 32 new players, slightly bewildered at the
>beginning, but after 8 x 3 hour lessons and armed with pages of
>comprehensive notes on each topic, they learn and, most often, fall for
>the game, become fascinated by it, and will then sign up for another
>course at the intermediate level a few weeks later after attending
>weekly practice sessions.
>
>We have them. keen as mustard and enjoying their increasing bridge days.
>Many will, at some stage, take the natural step into club duplicate, but
>not for long. Why? Poor preparation at clubs where the main objective
>is to get them into club duplicates, as you suggest? Unlikely!
Agree to disagree.
> this was a decade or so ago but, as I discovered the last
>>>time I played, the duplicate world is now even less appealing for the
>>>novice
>>
>>
>> Why is that?
>
>The thought occurred to me as I played at a club and where the event
>which once attracted 18 plus tables now had 8. Many old faces ( very few
>young) and I reflected on how things had changed in such a short time.
>How, a few years ago these events, and even one which carried a $200
>winners-take-all cash prize, was run in a far more informal, chatty and
>friendly fashion.
I started in 1971 in the Washington DC area and the games were very
large and definitively NOT informal, chatty or friendly. They were
fierce. The Thursday night Unit game was considered to be regional
open pairs' quality. My brains were bashed by the likes of Robinson,
Woolsey, Cappeletti(s) and so forth. Trust me, there were times when
achieving 35% was a victory.
I certainly understand being beaten to a pulp.
What I don't understand is not being prepared by one's teachers for
the experience.
What you describe is general bewilderment. You blame it on a specific
toxin: unfamiliarity. I suggest that is merely a convenient excuse.
Whether it is the first time one encounters a reverse into a 3 card
suit or a forcing pass system, the result is the same: newbies are
overwhelmed when playing against experienced players. Those that you
saw drop out would have still done so if they never ran into a Reverse
Bergen with LOTT undertones (or any such other system name you want to
make up). And they should be prepared for that reality from the get
go.
>Maybe the last straw was bidding boxes, unless they see a need for under
>table leg barriers in the future of course, But the change was
>screamingly obvious, and if that past environment was unattractive to
>novices, the present one is even more so.
>>>and that fact will never be overcome by even the most expert
>>>marketing.
All can be overcome by marketing.
>> Disagree.
>>
>>
>>>I dispute your suggestion that system memory is a bridge SKILL
>>
>>
>> Houston, we have a problem. This is a fundamental difference that
>> can't be brushed over.
>
>>>, at
>>>least, not in the context discussed, possibly because it could be learnt
>>>by someone with a lively memory but who had never touched a card in his
>>>life. A vital part of the game without doubt, but memory of agreed
>>>system is hardly a skill is it?
>>
>>
>> It is indeed. In a nutshell, people's brains have different
>> capacities. You either manage your capacity or fail. Managing that
>> is definitely a skill and separates many a bridge player from the next
>> level.
>
>But you again miss the point. I am not suggesting that reason or skill
>and experience cannot be used in tight bidding situations. It is more
>about facing new artificial bids - many of which are meant to be
>disruptive - of which there is a long list, some allowed, some allowed
>for a while before being banned in some events but not in others.
>
>It takes no great skill to recognise a multi opening bid which might
>have one of 3 or 4 meanings. Its use disadvantaged more than novices for
>a while, until they had agree a defence when it started to become widely
>used. All part of the game of course, but why should the less
>experienced player bother?
To become a less less experienced player.
> Why learn yet another list of defences to it
>and a few more for other such openings? Do you honestly think teaching
>is the reason that they find the task not worth the time?
Absolutely.
>Face the fact that this unlevel playing field is unattractive to most
>apart from a few like us. No amount of marketing will change that
>fact. The clubs that taught them once had them by the nose but failed to
>keep them. You won't get them back with naive idea that you can , by
>marketing, get them to see that what they found unappealing really isn't.
>
>There is a way of increasing club activity given time, but it requires
>fresh thinking and an acceptance of what the vast majority of those who
>play the game would really enjoy. Market what is attractive, not " you
>may have found it wanting but please try again as it's all we have got".
>>>Your tennis example is not valid. Of course an opponents greater skill
>>>in play will give him an advantage, but we both play with the same ball
>>>as we do in all other pastimes apart from bridge.
>>
>>
>> I guess it depends on your definition of ball. I see 52 balls and
>> they look alike at every table I've ever played at.
>
>
>
>
>>>I never suggested it was wrong that sophisticated and 'non natural'
>>>systems are allowed. but simply pointing out that they are the reason
>>>for the drop out of most who learn.
>>
>>
>> Again, I fault the teacher.
>
>>>It is not losing a point to a
>>>swerving spinning serve, a result of skill. It is more like losing one
>>>to an opponent suddenly serving with a smaller harder ball, one we have
>>>never experienced before.
>>
>>
>> A fabrication of your own choosing, I'm afraid. I see no difference
>> between your smaller ball and my top-spinning backhand. The novice
>> can not handle it and only the crybabies murmur something about a
>> different ball. It isn't different. It is returned with greater
>> skill. Learn to defend that skill or lose. Simple.
>>
>>
>>>You are dead right, it is part of the game. I never disputed that, but
>>>it is the part which makes duplicate bridge growingly more difficult to
>>> market to those who have recently taken up the great game.
More difficult? OK, I'll buy into that. 1%, maybe 2% more. It
merely is a matching of expectation with experience.
>> Only because their initial tutors failed them miserably.
Ibid.
David Babcock
> I
> have the feeling that if you were to ask your students
>
> "After your experience at the duplicate club, if everybody played the
> bidding system you were taught in my class, would you consider playing
> there again?"
>
> You would get a considerable number of negative responses
Perhaps that was done, or such an outcome was so widely expected that
no one saw a need to ask. It is clear that the club had the energy
and resources to offer a restricted-conventions duplicate if bidding
complexity were really seen as the issue, but we are told of nothing
along that line.
David
David Babcock
> If the bridge
> "lessons" aren't seen as a marketing tool for increasing ACBL
> membership, then they are not properly developed.
*If*. I suspect that most opinions in this newsgroup on that "if" can
be little more than guesswork. I have posted before, in this and at
least two other threads, asking for comments on ACBL's teaching
materials. I have never received a comment from anyone.
David
lescor
Yes I am. To me there is no doubt. The few conventions the novice is
introduced to, like stayman, ace asking bid or take out doubles, make
absolute sense at a quite early stage. The simple logic within the
national standard systems takes time to absorb, but the need to have
these conventions makes them quite easy to teach.
But it is not the problems of bidding 'our' system which puts novices
off. It is the need to now absorb a host of defences to those of the
opponents. No matter how well prepared they become in the available
time,, or how talented they have become in understanding and bidding
their system or in their card play, they will be faced with the fact
that they will either have to spend months learning various complex
defences or continue to become cannon fodder. The obvious fact is that
bids which are, in part, intended to be disruptive actually work, and
they work best against the less experienced. It does not take very many
situations of finding yourself defending 3 diamonds, when all others
with your hand were making 4 hearts, to lead to disillusion.
Many will say ( and have said ) "so what, this is the way the game is
played" as if I disputed that fact when it would be stupid to question
the obvious. Of course it is, but whilst it may be part of the games
fascination for people like us, it seems to have become an established
fact that we are in the minority, otherwise we would not be discussing
this subject
You make a valid point about the difference in the friendly and "cocoon"
like atmosphere in which they were taught and the sudden shock of
results which reflect their inexperience. It could be a factor, but I
doubt if many teachers send them into the fray with any expectations.
My approach was, "relax and enjoy it. Don't worry about bad results or
even silly results. Most opponents will love you for them, and in what
other pastime could you, after a few months learning, find yourself
playing against masters, internationals and published experts of the game"?
This fact certainly hooked me, but.........
The fact is that teaching is done best in a relaxed and friendly
environment, so the change to the more formal, less relaxed world of
"director" rulings ( which make no provision for inexperience ) bidding
explanations,which are often impossible to absorb in the time, and many
other things - including a competitive unfriendliness from too many -
are just too much for most, and the difference has become greater and
has created an even wider gulf over the years.
It is an interesting question as to whether the ACBL and EBU and others
should have allowed this division in the first tier of the game which
has, to some, now made it top heavy? Has this tolerance for the new and
clever been taken too far? With hindsight, it probably has, certainly
as far as retaining the duplicate participation of newcomers is concerned.
But what is, to me, unquestionable, is the fact that these bodies retain
a unrealistic idea that bridge has only, or mainly, one form and it is
the one they encourage and promote. Unless they realise that, in order
to keep more players, they will have to promote a version of the game
which severely restricts complex and 'unnatural' bidding without, as it
seems to be now, making such competitions seem lesser events for
duffers. Having established this elitist framework we now have, it is
time they encouraged a form which is DIFFERENT BUT EQUAL, a move back to
a level playing field. A game with two forms, not two divisions, each
one given equal status and promotion.
They might also like to take a second look at rubber bridge, a form of
the game where all play the same simple system (ideally no weak twos
even) and the only agreements you need to make with a strange partner
are how do we handle preempitve bids and what no trump do we play?
The fascinations of this form of the game are slowly becoming lost.
Many will now think of it as just a form of scoring without
understanding how much tactics, sacrifice and defending the part score
is involved. How you harness this natural home for those who dislike the
game duplicate has become, and get them back into clubs, is worth
some thought.
Until this is understood they can market forever with poor results. Two
of the first concepts of selling and marketing. Look at the quality of
the product. Does it meet what your potential punters are looking for?
Hardly sensible to continue to flog something most of them don't want is it?
LC
Dave Flower
>
> - Show quoted text -
Perhaps I should repeat a suggestion I made a few months ago:
Introduce a novice status, giving novice players a certain amount of
protection; this would essentially involve requiring their opponents
to play a simple system against them. The novice pair would also, of
course, be similarly restricted. No player would ever be required to
accept such a status.
This raises at least several questions:
Who would qualify for novice status ?
How long do they retain such status ?
What happens when a novice partners an experienced player ?
Dave Flower
lescor
So many good points. When I last taught the average age of most classes
were certainly not in the middle aged group. The lessons attracted a
high number of younger people, some of them teenagers.
You are correct about their reasons for wanting to learn. Many saw it as
the basis for a social evening at home with friends. This was
particularly true of young women ( I am pleased to say) and few of these
would consider playing duplicate.
But our through put was pretty high and many did try before giving up.
Yes, you are again right. The more competitive atmosphere was a bit off
putting it seems, and you are correct that many would soon return to
other forms. Many would continue to come to practice sessions, which
they took very seriously, but without wanting to return to actual
competition.
I am sure I knew of the reasons. They were mainly those you suggest. but
the main one was the realisation of just how much time it would take to
learn all those defences to bids they had never before experienced.
In short, the gap was far too wide. They knew that this would be the
case in skill, but being clobbered by strange bids was something else.
Some might argue that this reasoning of " its just a game" isn't the
healthier one? Not many keen duplicate players would agree though. To
them its about as relevant as the advise given to a friend of mine who
worked at The British Museum. He knocked a nice artifact onto the floor
where it shattered into pieces. "Don't worry" said his more experienced
workmate...."it was pretty old".
LC
Jon Siegel
> table leg barriers in the future of course, But the change was
> screamingly obvious, and if that past environment was unattractive to
> novices, the present one is even more so.
What's the big deal about bidding boxes? It literally takes less than
one minute to learn how to use one properly. If they are offputting
to beginners, it can't be for long. Someone shows you how to use
them, you try them once, and that's it. Much easier than learning or
remembering Bergen raises or puppet Stayman.
Bidding boxes keep noise down, they eliminate improper intonation in
bidding, and they provide a visible record that eliminates the need to
review the bidding. A good innovation, I would say.
lescor
To reply to all your latest comments in one go, as they are all
coloured by the same misconception, don't you see how you fall into the
same trap as the ACBL or the EBU? This is the idea that the game has
only one face and it is the one played in the form the ACBL have allowed
it to take. Teachers are wrong, it seems, if their lessons are not
constructed to prepare the students for club duplicates. Why?
Where does this idea stem from? What logic is their behind it other
than some preconception that all roads should only lead to one place?
That there is only one true and valid destination?
The suggestion that the game of bridge equates only to duplicate as
provided at club level is not only illogical, it is untrue. Consider the
simple fact that far more play the game than play in the clubs. Don't
they also play bridge? Don't they also enjoy bridge? So was this love
of the game the result of poor teaching? It makes as litte sense to
blame teachers for not producing more club duplicate players as it would
for blaming them for not producing more cash rubber bridge players.
If you can justify this suggestion that the game has only one true
facet, which also seems to echo the official line, many of your
suggestions would make sense. Right now they don't and I can see no way
they ever could.
It is this elitist and unrealistic attitude which will prevent the
controlling bodies from ever solving the drop out problem, and the
cop-out suggestion that, although they provide so many new bridge
players each year, this is just the result of poor teaching, is just a
bit too easy and convenient. Try an even more realistic idea for which
there is plenty of evidence, simply that the complex bidding which the
authorities have allowed, which remember is only one part of the game
of bridge, has put it out of reach of too many.
It is a strange and unrealistic approach, but I suppose understandable,
that having allowed themselves to disenfranchise most who play the game
by lack of control over one aspect of duplicate, they, and you it seems,
want to continue along this ever changing road under the illusion that
this is what it has become so this is what was always going to be.
This is not true. If most see duplicate as some strange and unfathomable
monster, it is one that the rulers created. Some of us are fascinated by
it, but most are not.
There was never any need to accept the road club duplicate has gone
down. No reason to allow all that has been allowed. Many would argue
that what is now acceptable adds little or nothing to the simpler, more
'natural' game. Not sure that this is so, but the question remains. Have
those who supervised its development themselves created the falling
membership problem? But would the games rulers consider this a problem.
Would they hell! Far easier is the conceit that we have obviously got
it right and getting all to agree can be done by marketing.
This is truly laughable....and I do mean amusing in its true sense.
Flogging a dead horse by marketing whips.
Far better is for them to understand that the chasm is now established
and to drop this nonsense that duplicate, as mostly played, is not only
"the game" but the only game of merit. Understand that they need to
discourage this elite tag given to the form which the game has taken and
provide more 'natural' events which carry as much or even more kudos.
Events which would attract the best along with the less experienced on a
truly level paying field. There are already some, but not enough with
the required clout and prestige. Two types of bridge of equal stature.
One which allows those with the time to pursue the more complex, and one
which doesn't.
Forget teaching as the answer. The problem I have with that is where
should I introduce the beginner to the defences to the multi? Before or
after ' responding to partners one level major opening bid'?
LC
The idea that teaching novices the way duplicate ( rather than bridge )
is played is as the answer is
lescor
I obviously have no idea how close to the needs of ACBL membership
interests your teaching is, but I am amazed by the suggestion that it
should be. WHY? Maybe this is a geographical thing, but we never taught
anyone with the objective of increasing the EBU's membership and
coffers. We just taught them the great game of bridge. To do otherwise
would be like teaching maths with the sole intention of adding members
to the Institute Of Chartered Accountants.
LC
dranon
wrote:
> To reply to all your latest comments in one go, as they are all
>coloured by the same misconception, don't you see how you fall into the
>same trap as the ACBL or the EBU?
No, they don't take it far enough. Per your own words, the EBU taught
the game without concentration on a feeder system. It needs to be a
coordinated effort.
> This is the idea that the game has
>only one face and it is the one played in the form the ACBL have allowed
>it to take.
In my neck of the woods there are multiple forms, duplicate being one,
but teams and BAM (an entirely different form of the game, IMO) are
also potential destinations.
>Teachers are wrong, it seems, if their lessons are not
>constructed to prepare the students for club duplicates. Why?
>Where does this idea stem from? What logic is their behind it other
>than some preconception that all roads should only lead to one place?
>That there is only one true and valid destination?
I would say "tournaments" rather than "club duplicates", of which club
duplicates is one of a number, rather than the only one, but yes, if
the governing body wishes to maximize its return on investment
(teaching materials generally available, discounts to new members,
etc.) it needs to teach to the targeted result of increasing
tournament participation.
When you take lessons from an accrediated USTA coach, do they not make
it clear just what skill set you need in order to enter the grassroots
events and enjoy minimal success? [I don't actually know, being that
my knowledge is limited to their commercials during television
broadcasts of major tennis tournaments.]
>The suggestion that the game of bridge equates only to duplicate as
>provided at club level is not only illogical, it is untrue. Consider the
>simple fact that far more play the game than play in the clubs. Don't
>they also play bridge? Don't they also enjoy bridge? So was this love
>of the game the result of poor teaching? It makes as litte sense to
>blame teachers for not producing more club duplicate players as it would
>for blaming them for not producing more cash rubber bridge players.
Apparently, without a goal, one isn't achieved. No surprise.
>If you can justify this suggestion that the game has only one true
>facet, which also seems to echo the official line, many of your
>suggestions would make sense. Right now they don't and I can see no way
>they ever could.
I didn't mean to imply that there is only one true facet, only that
the organized teaching effort should have one true goal. A return on
investment of those that sponsor the activity (as stated above,
generating teaching materials, etc.).
The ACBL has a multi-tier system of allowable conventions, ostensibly
to combat what you perceive as a flaw in the game. Multi isn't
allowed at the normal tournament level, is it? Many other destructive
conventions aren't, either. Doesn't this abrogate your arguments?
David Babcock
> I obviously have no idea how close to the needs of ACBL membership
> interests your teaching is, but I am amazed by the suggestion that it
> should be. WHY? Maybe this is a geographical thing, but we never taught
> anyone with the objective of increasing the EBU's membership and
> coffers. We just taught them the great game of bridge. To do otherwise
> would be like teaching maths with the sole intention of adding members
> to the Institute Of Chartered Accountants.
"sole intention", no, but in a happy coincidence of interests between
ACBL and bridge teachers, one's students' taking up ACBL membership is
not a bad metric for a bridge teacher here. ACBL offers terrific
value for money for *any* bridge player (perhaps excepting the highest
level) just with its Bulletin, with its many columns on play and
defense and "It's Your Call" (for a Brit, think "Marks and Comments"
but ratchet down the level quite a bit). If I can't sell students on
ACBL just with that magazine, I should suspect that I've been doing
something wrong. I cannot speak to whether the EBU offers comparable
value to the non-duplicate bridge community there, so this may indeed
be different between our jurisdictions; or it may not.
David
David Babcock
> >Forget teaching as the answer. The problem I have with that is where
> >should I introduce the beginner to the defences to the multi? Before or
> >after ' responding to partners one level major opening bid'?
>
> The ACBL has a multi-tier system of allowable conventions, ostensibly
> to combat what you perceive as a flaw in the game. Multi isn't
> allowed at the normal tournament level, is it?
A tournament newbie who doesn't buy a pro team to play in Swisses or
KOs will not see the Multi; the Mid-Chart sees to that. However,
clubs have blanket authority to allow or disallow what they wish, so
it might be encountered at the club level. This is somewhat academic
in ACBL as compared with EBU, though, because the Multi has much less
of a beach-head here in ACBL-land.
David
thg
> Forget teaching as the answer. The problem I have with that is where
> should I introduce the beginner to the defences to the multi? Before or
> after ' responding to partners one level major opening bid'?
I've played a lot of bridge and only faced "the multi" a few times.
Currently, in the ACBL, it is only allowed in mid-chart events with 6+
board segments/rounds -- i.e. not very often. New duplicate players
wouldn't be forced to face it -- flight B and C events are hardly ever
(if ever) mid-chart events. (Yes, clubs may allow whatever they want,
but generally I think it is the exception rather than the rule when a
club allows more than GCC, and doubt that there are any clubs running
newcomer games that allow anything more than GCC.)
There are places where multi is allowed in more events and where
duplicate bridge is doing much better than it is in the US. I do not
believe you would find a direct relationship between duplicate bridge
attendance or national bridge organization membership and
permissiveness of system regulations.
Tim
lescor
An interesting idea, but protection of this type hardly prepares new
players for the "real" world of duplicate. An easy introduction to the
format, if not the competitiveness, can be done by running limited
convention duplicates for novices, which I am pretty sure many clubs
already do. But if they received special treatment, apart from this
slight stigma of "novice" , it removes the element which attracted me
and others to the game which was to take on the trophy winners, authors
and internationals on their own terms.
And this special status would still leave them unprepared for their
first meeting with a canapé 3 opening or similar(if allowed in that
club, that area or that particular country) or the first ruling against
them over tempo or innocent inadequate explanation.
So, what the hell! They simply have to learn the rules of the game they
decided to play. This is fine and reasonable, until you actually look at
those rules, fattened by the long diet of artificiality and constantly
tweaked or changed.
They need to know them, but it is better for all if they don't actually
see them, unless you want them running for the door. It is worth having
a look at the site and putting yourself in the position of a newcomer
facing this mass of pages of what is and what is not allowed.
No problem for those who frequent these parts, but I can think of
nothing more off putting for the new players than seeing this mine
field. Try reading through them without the thought and question
crossing your mind " what has the game become"? Not easy.
LC
Dave Flower
> club, that area or that particular country) or the first ruling against
> them over tempo or innocent inadequate explanation.
>
> So, what the hell! �They simply have to learn the rules of the game they
> decided to play. This is fine and reasonable, until you actually look at
> those rules, fattened by the long diet of artificiality and constantly
> tweaked or changed.
>
> They need to know them, but it is �better for all if they don't actually
> see them, unless you want them running for the door. It is worth having
> a look at the site and putting yourself in the position of a newcomer
> facing this mass of pages of what is and what is not allowed.
>
> No problem for those who frequent these parts, but I can think of
> nothing more off putting for the new players than seeing this mine
> field. �Try reading through them without the thought and question
> crossing your mind " what has the game become"? �Not easy.
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
Interesting thoughts. A couple of points:
- I think the status would be entirely voluntary
- I don't think that it would make the game any less competitive, I
would be perfectly happy to play stone-age Acol with my regular
partner, but we will certainly be trying just as hard!
- It would reinforce the novices' learning, rather than confuse it
Dave Flower
lescor
Hardly. It corroborates it. To put it in a less kindly way, the need for
control has been forced by the lack of it. The restrictions on certain
bids are a sensible step and, I am sure, very welcomed. But they do beg
the question of why are they needed? I accept that this wanders from
the topic of keeping more players, but it is connected. What has
happened to the game when, in order to keep the players you already have
happy, it requires this sop of restriction. Fine, if as I suggested,
these event carried the same prestige as the others, but they don't do
they? They are lower division events. Until the rulers decide that the
game now needs to be run under two bidding formats of equal status the
problem will not be solved.
It is a fact that, in general, the better players in the game tend to
play the more exotic systems, but this was inevitable. Where else would
they go? This has, unfortunately, led to this elite image and the idea
that the game played in other ways is, by definition, inferior. This can
be changed in time.
You might like to give some thought to the idea that the need to provide
multi-tier events is an admittance of past failure, and It doesn't seem
to have worked, at least, not well enough. This does not surprise me.
Overcoming the problem of the unlevelled playing field by imposing
fields of different levels is not the way.
Give the masses a game which is more 'natural'. Give them the
opportunity to take on their betters without the need for even more
hours of homework than the natural systems demand, which is great enough
in itself if played well.
Take a step back and look at what the game has become rather than this
head in the sand idea that all is well. Divided, growingly more
complex, saturated with an ever changing legality, and elitist for no
good reason.
THEN.....the the final act, revert some of the top regional and national
events to the standard system. What better way of overcoming membership
drop out problems than giving the punters the knowledge that they can
compete with the best on level terms in many of the best events the game
has to offer.
Would the ACBL or EBU do it? Pigs might fly.
LC
lescor
Fine, but why doesn't the obvious question spring to mind? Why the need
for these differing bidding tolerances for different events. It
suggests a need to cater for them. Why? Seems to be quietly accepted
that this is just the way things are, which is just as well for the
rulers. The fact is that the divisions within the game and the need for
different rules for different events have been created by just one
factor, and that is the steady acceptance of too many convventions and
too much artificiality. Seems the criteria has been how clever and
effective these things might be rather than how good for the game as a
whole they are? And seems the need for flights or levels prove that
they got it wrong.
Fine for those of us who enjoy them, but it needs a fresh start to keep
those who don't....and not just by running events for the thickos.
LC
lescor
I tend to agree. They overcome a long standing problem for the directors
and are not too difficult to use. But I was not commenting on their
efficacy but on how much their use now adds to the change in atmosphere
between the way bridge is played in other forms (even for money) and the
clinical nature of duplicate. And it is this that so many beginners find
unattractive, not their use, but the fact that their use makes the game
even more impersonal.
LC
David Babcock
> An interesting idea, but protection of this type hardly prepares new
> players for the "real" world of duplicate. An easy introduction to the
> format, if not the competitiveness, can be done by running limited
> convention duplicates for novices, which I am pretty sure many clubs
> already do. But if they received special treatment, apart from this
> slight stigma of "novice" , it removes the element which attracted me
> and others to the game which was to take on the trophy winners, authors
> and internationals on their own terms.
It does remove that element, but only temporarily, and only for so
long as the new player (who is aware of the situation) wishes it.
Something that amuses me and at the same time frustrates me here (and
I'll bet at least a couple of others in ACBL-land are thinking the
same) is that threads on this kind of issue seem to cycle between
threads like this one and threads in which ACBL is criticized for
getting too much in the way of those who *want* to play and face
modern methods but cannot do so without travel and/or hiring
professionals to get past the master-point issue. This tension is
probably unresolvable within ACBL's existing master-point system,
which is fundamentally different from that in chess, where if you win
as much as you lose against, say, 2200-rated players over a few
weekend tournaments, you will have that rating, or very close to it.
Whether EBU members find any similar tension in their environment, I
would be interested to hear.
David
David Babcock
> There are places where multi is allowed in more events and where
> duplicate bridge is doing much better than it is in the US. I do not
> believe you would find a direct relationship between duplicate bridge
> attendance or national bridge organization membership and
> permissiveness of system regulations.
Agreed, and that point certainly doesn't inconvenience my view, but
I'm not sure how much we can lean on it because there are other
variables. Some places where bridge is doing relatively well are
places where it is relatively new, and where that newness figures in
turn to have a greater attraction for the young and relatively
adventurous when it comes to how to approach the game. Identifying
the critical factors may be difficult.
David
David Babcock
> The restrictions on certain
> bids are a sensible step and, I am sure, very welcomed. But they do beg
> the question of why are they needed?
For the same reason training wheels are needed on bicycles.
David
thg
> too much artificiality. Seems the criteria has been how clever and
> effective these things might be rather than how good for the game as a
> whole they are? And seems the need for flights or levels prove that
> they got it wrong.
By your reasoning, MLB has also got things wrong. My son started out
playing t-ball. In Little League, they complicated things a whole lot
by adding a pitcher to the game (along with an umpire to call balls
and strikes). Think how much simpler it would have been to keep
hitting off a tee.
I played in a softball league for a while. It was slow pitch and
there were no balls and strikes. There were some other rules that
differentiated the game played there from "real" softball. Should we
not have made the game simpler by using these rules, or should we
demand that college softball teams also use our rules?
I can't imagine anyone teaches their kid to hit a ball by throwing him
fastballs from 60'6".
In bridge you start out with a very simple set of bidding agreements
and as you gain experience and play in stronger games, you encounter
(and learn) more complicated bidding agreements. To me, suggesting
that regional and national events should have the same system
regulations as newcomer games is the same as suggesting the rules in
MLB should be the same as in Little League.
Tim
David Babcock
> Give the masses a game which is more 'natural'. Give them the
> opportunity to take on their betters without the need for even more
> hours of homework than the natural systems demand, which is great enough
> in itself if played well.
> THEN.....the the final act, revert some of the top regional and national
> events to the standard system. What better way of overcoming membership
> drop out problems than giving the punters the knowledge that they can
> compete with the best on level terms in many of the best events the game
> has to offer.
Before bracketed KO's took over the Regionals in ACBL-land, the Open
Pairs events were the top events at those tournaments. ACBL decided at
one point (1980s??) to run restricted-convention events in parallel
with the top events, and did what it could to confer prestige by
giving equal master point awards. Some of the top players played in
those events and the punters never had a chance, they did not come
back, and the events disappeared from the calendar. The punters
didn't like losing without conventions any more than they liked losing
with them.
David
Jürgen R.
I haven't read all the posts in this thread, but it appears that
one obvious solution to some of the problems has not been mentioned
at all, namely a meaningful rating system.
There are two important advantages of ratings; first,
they give players an objective measure of performance
and improvement; second, they provide a sensible criterium for the
segregation of tournaments according to strength.
lescor
Good question, but I don't think the way kids are introduced to more
physical games is really relevant. They need special handling, but a 14
year old might win a major chess title after just one lesson when he was
six....("this is the way the pieces are allowed to move").... followed
by years of play in games where he honed his playing skills in matches
played in a identical way to the world championship.
He can follow reports without explanation and with enjoyment, because it
is HIS game from trick one. He never faced playing in events where he
had to ask " is this a two queen one rook event" or one where grade 'A'
players were not allowed to castle?
I appreciate that this is also not the greatest analogy because bridge
DOES have two elements, but was it inevitable that this fact would
create a "different" game, maybe.....but SUCH a different game?
I don't think anyone can argue that it hasn't, and I an not suggesting
that we should suddenly go back 50 years and start again, probably
because I am also fascinated by way players have met the challenge of
using the available bidding space over the years, but maybe we should
question the cost?
My comments are related to the original question of how do we get more
players to stay in the clubs and I have suggested what the main problems
are. And, for the sake of accuracy, I did NOT suggest that national
events should be played under a simple system regulation appropriate to
the beginner. God forbid that they should be discouraged from
discovering the enjoyment of adding clever bits and pieces to a
improving and growingly more sophisticated system. The question is,
where should the line ( in at least some major events) be drawn"?
There is a seductive attraction in playing games where "the expert"
plays the same game we do and only his greater skill makes the
difference, a situation which applies to just about every other game.
The way ours has developed ,this divide has become more artificial,
the gap too wide, the horizon too distant. Because of the skill
difference? Well maybe not. Isn't it a fact that the biggest bridge
duffers can join the ranks of "the experts" in one part of the game
given enough time to read and a decent memory? Yet you suggest that the
beginners will progress to a "stronger" game, which I assume to mean
more expert, the definition of expert being just how much stuff the
players have added to their system. In reality he moves to a different
game, and I feel that this more concept that "more complex = stronger"
is the very one that the rulers have to overcome.
Yes, the experts tend to adopt these methods so it is easy, although a
mistake, to equate the methods with expertise when it may or may not be.
To me, encouraging the concept of different but equal is the answer,
but only if pursued over enough time and with serious intent, and by
taking a step back and admitting that what they offer has not worked,
and that there is no reason it will respond to remarketing.
But I repeat myself.
Thanks for your interesting comments.
LC
lescor
Yes, devisive as they might be in an ideal world, such things might have
a place. But to me it will never solve the problem which you underline
with your suggestion of " the segregation of events according to
strength" when I feel that "strength" as you and the authorities see it,
has become far too much to do with how willing a player is to study and
add the complex, rather than other bridge skills.
To me, such ideas are just tinkering and an acceptance that this bidding
based divide the bosses have allowed is the way things have to be.
That thinking is unlikely to solve the membership problem.
LC
Jürgen R.
It is an odd but widespread opinion that objective ratings
would be 'divisive' while pseudo-ratings like masterpoints
are desirable and an 'important marketing tool'.
> But to me it will never solve the problem which you
> underline with your suggestion of " the segregation of events
> according to strength" when I feel that "strength" as you and the
> authorities see it, has become far too much to do with how willing a
> player is to study and add the complex, rather than other bridge
> skills.
I think you are exaggerating the difficulty as well as the utility
of complex material.
>
> To me, such ideas are just tinkering and an acceptance that this
> bidding based divide the bosses have allowed is the way things have
> to be.
> That thinking is unlikely to solve the membership problem.
No doubt true. The decline in the popularity of bridge, in particular
in the U.S., has sociological reasons that can't be solved
by marketing campaigns and are not specific to bridge, nor
to cards games generally.
>
> LC
thg
> Good question, but I don't think the way kids are introduced to more
> physical games is really relevant. They need special handling, but a 14
> year old might win a major chess title after just one lesson when he was
> six....("this is the way the pieces are allowed to move").... followed
> by years of play in games where he honed his playing skills in matches
> played in a identical way to the world championship.
I have no experience with top level chess, but my understanding is
that there is a LOT of time spent studying various openings and the
positions that result. My guess would be that the average chess
master spends much more time memorizing than the average bridge
master.
Along similar lines, I think Scrabble is a fun game. When I started
playing regularly, one of the first things I did was memorize the 2-
letter word list. My wife thought that this took some of the fun out
of the game. But, it seemed like a small thing to me. If I was going
to take Scrabble seriously, I would need to start memorizing lists of
hooks and bingos. These next steps seemed more like work than play.
Perhaps this is a better parallel to bridge because as the game is
played today, the highest level Scrabble requires memorization and the
memorization can start in small steps -- the 2-letter word list might
be analogous to learning Stayman, Blackwood and takeout doubles.
> There is a seductive attraction in playing games where "the expert"
> plays the same game we do and only his greater skill makes the
> difference, a situation which applies to just about every other game.
> The way ours has developed ,this divide has become more artificial,
> the gap too wide, the horizon too distant. Because of the skill
> difference? Well maybe not. Isn't it a fact that the biggest bridge
> duffers can join the ranks of "the experts" in one part of the game
> given enough time to read and a decent memory? Yet you suggest that the
> beginners will progress to a "stronger" game, which I assume to mean
> more expert, the definition of expert being just how much stuff the
> players have added to their system. In reality he moves to a different
> game, and I feel that this more concept that "more complex = stronger"
> is the very one that the rulers have to overcome.
I don't think the "stronger" games are stronger because of the methods
they allow. I think those methods are allowed because the game is
stronger and the stronger players in these games recognize (or
perceive) a superiority in the methods.
I think you over-estimate the amount of difference that is
attributable to methods. Meckstroth and Rodwell won the Life Master
Pairs when they were both under 21 (or thereabouts) before they had
developed RM Precision and spent 100s and 1000s of hours studying
opponents' methods; Steve Weinstein won a LM Pairs when he was 17 or
18. I know these are rare cases, but the point it that their success
did not require the years and years of experience against (or with)
complex methods. There are a lot of factors that separate the expert
from the non-expert, time spent on methods is only one of them.
I don't think duffers can join the ranks of expert (even the area of
bidding) through study and memorization alone. Bidding, even with a
complex system, requires the use of judgment. A lot of judgment.
Fred Gitelman has suggested that it takes at least 10,000 hours of
play and study for a player with aptitude to progress to the expert
ranks. When he says "study" he doesn't mean learning the latest xyz
convention. He means things like thinking through suit combinations
or reviewing hands to figure out what things will help partner on
defense.
You make reference to the game being played under more liberal method
restrictions as being a different game from that played in more
restricted events by the very fact that there are different method
conditions: "is this a two queen one rook event?". Perhaps there is
some truth to that just as Little League is a different game than
MLB. It seems strange to me, however, that you equate the restricted
bridge game to being the "pure" game, while you think of the
restricted baseball game as necessary "special handling".
The reality of bridge is that the official rules of the game (The Laws
of Bridge) do not restrict methods. They set out provisions for
sponsoring organization to restrict methods, but they do not
themselves restrict methods. They do make clear that methods must be
disclosed to the opponents. You could think of bridge in its "pure"
form to have no systemic restrictions. And, all contests, from the
World Championships right down to the local club, as imposing some
artificial restrictions. In chess, there are two bishops and they
move along a diagonals by rule. In bridge, there is no rule that
requires a bid of 1S to show a particular hand strength or even to be
natural. "Standard" bidding is not part of the rules of the game.
Perhaps this "pure" form of the game is unmarketable. Every bridge
organization that I know of has taken this view and exercised their
rights to regulate methods.
But, I think you are looking at things a little bit backwards. Your
position seems to be that the simple, mostly natural bidding language
that beginners learn is the real bridge and that as system
restrictions become looser an artificiality is being added to the
game. I would argue that real bridge has no system restrictions and
those imposed at every level mean that we are playing some minor
variant of real bridge.
I do recognize that your concern isn't what "real bridge" is, but
rather with getting players into the club and getting them to come
back regularly. And, quite rightly so. I am not opposed to system
restrictions, in fact I would support more severe system restrictions
in many situations.
What I take issue with is your apparent opinion that complex methods
are a bastardization of the game, much like the designated hitter in
the American League. The auction may be a lesser part of the game,
but it is what separates bridge from its predecessors. From the time
of bridge's inception, players have been tinkering with methods,
whether it be Vanderbilt's strong club system (published in the 20s),
or takeout doubles, or Stayman, or canape, or weak two bids, or
relays, this bidding language and its evolution is what distinguishes
bridge. Without it, we'd just be playing Whist, or perhaps a fancy
form of Whist if you allow a small handful of bidding methods.
Tim
John Blubaugh
>
> - Show quoted text -
Jurgen,
The last thing that is needed is a rating system. Rating systems in
whatever form are the biggest evil in the game. We are talking about
NEW players. They won't be concerned about ratings for a few years if
they get interested in them at all. The Life Master system has worked
well for bridge and it will continue to work well. You have to realize
that these players will not give a hoot about Meckstroth and Rodwell
or any other pair. They will be concerned about how they do in their
Tuesday night club game or on BBO. We are looking to increase
membership here and only a fragment of the membership cares about
ratings.
han...@gmail.com
1. The Bridge playing population is diminishing due to several
factors. I'm not sure at what rate but it certainly is worrying,
'cause it could lead to an eventual disappearance of the game
altogether. Therefore something must be done by EVERY person
interested in the game. It doesn't matter if you're ACBL or not, why
don't YOU advertise bridge in a Spades game? Why don't YOU advertise
bridge to your students? Why don't YOU teach bridge to your friends
and relatives?
2. An important marketing strategy that should be use is in fact a
very easy one: Publicity. Publicize bridge as much as you can, using
any means available. Good publicity, bad publicity, it doesn't really
matter whether the news talk about a young life master who just
received his/her title or a team who denies having voted for the
current president in their country. Drop pamphlets at universities/
colleges/highschools, push sport channels/newspapers to cover stories
(or plays) about/of bridge, advertise everywhere you can about classes
and clubs and tournaments, etc. I was just watching this news bit
about how the economic recession is leading the American families to
play more board games; birdge is not a board game but, why couldn't it
be mentioned? Just let people know that bridge exists and that people
play it and have fun or drama with/in it.
3. Find sponsors. Some people should take care of this and even in the
present economic situation find people/institutions willing to donate
money for bridge. What about teaching in companies that would then
compete amongst themselves? Can you imagine in the news "AMD bridge
team beats Intel", or "Donald Trump's bridge team beats Bill Gates'".
And guess how these teams will be trained? By bridge teachers and/or
coaches who'd find a more interesting job than teaching old ladies in
a country club (and leaving that job to someone else, of course).
4. Create a Universal Beginner's Bridge System. Let's gather teachers
and theorists from all over the world and have them devise (or
choose?) a system to be used in all beginners classes everywhere in
the world. May the WBF impose all NBO's this system as the starting
system for all new students. Let each NBO design and adapt it's
present teaching program to teach this system adding some defenses to
whatever is common at club levels. And then, let everyone play
whatever system they choose according to the tournament level but let
all beginners be able to play together, no matter where they're from.
If, though I don't think it's possible, systems seem to begin to
'dissappear', create events where your inventiveness (or memory
capacity for learning a new system) is rewarded, put beginners in the
'next level' by teaching them a new system (2/1 or Polish club to give
examples, depending on the club).
5. Charge more money to those who can pay it, and less to those who
can't. Let's face it, a teenager would rather spend his/her money in
something else than in a bridge tournament or NBO fee. Lower the
charges according to age! Or according to several factors, whichever
they be.
6. Create a figure like the Chess ELO for bridge. Sort of what
OkBridge does. The rating system can keep on being what it is but the
ELO will better help to rate the players appropriately, which the
current rating system doesn't do.
Jürgen R.
>> I haven't read all the posts in this thread, but it appears that
>> one obvious solution to some of the problems has not been mentioned
>> at all, namely a meaningful rating system.
>> There are two important advantages of ratings; first,
>> they give players an objective measure of performance
>> and improvement; second, they provide a sensible criterium for the
>> segregation of tournaments according to strength.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> Jurgen,
>
> The last thing that is needed is a rating system. Rating systems in
> whatever form are the biggest evil in the game.
Is there something about bridge that makes rating
systems undesirable while they work very well elsewhere?
> We are talking about
> NEW players. They won't be concerned about ratings for a few years if
> they get interested in them at all.
Precisely the new players are particularly interested in accurate ratings.
The reason is obvious: It reflects their improvement.
>The Life Master system has worked
> well for bridge and it will continue to work well.
Obviously, you are joking. What happens after everybody has become a life
master?
> You have to realize
> that these players will not give a hoot about Meckstroth and Rodwell
> or any other pair.
Why do you assume that bridge players are different from people who play
chess, go, backgammon etc?
John Blubaugh
>
> - Show quoted text -
Are you aware of what a small percentage of the ACBL are Life Masters?
Ratings are for advancing and developing players, we are talking about
NEW players here and they would have no interest in a rating system.
They want to have fun. Enjoy their time and learn more about bridge. I
don't know the make-up of chess and backgammon players but I do know
something about players starting out at bridge. Seeing their name at
the bottom of a rating list is the last thing they need to see.
Ratings are for players like you who evidently cannot determine on
their own what kind of player they are. The NEW players already know
they are novices with much to learn. They just don't know how much if
they want to become flight A players. Most will never care about that.
People who only play once or twice weekly just want to be comfortable
and do well at their play level.
Your ranting about ratings is a great example of what is wrong with
bridge, not what bridge really needs.
JB
John Blubaugh
>
> - Show quoted text -
About 60% of ACBL members are NOT life masters. 41% have less than
100 masterpoints.
JB
thg
> Are you aware of what a small percentage of the ACBL are Life Masters?
I'd guess between 35% and 40% of ACBL members are Life Masters.
Last time I saw figures broken down by point ranges, the top two
ranges were 0-5 points and 300-500. (300 is what you need to be a
Life Master in ACBL-land.)
The masterpoint system works well for maintaining a certain group of
players who work to become Life Masters and then basically give up the
game. It also works for an even smaller group of players with 1000s
of masterpoints who see masterpoints as a way to measure success. For
lots of players with 1000s of points, masterpoints are a nuisance
because they are placed in higher strats/flights/brackets than they
would like.
I think there should be a dynamic tournament rating system similar to
the one chess has. But, it should not be standard to apply it to club
games or newcomer/Flight C games.
But, I am with Jurgen on wondering why it is that bridge players in
particular need to be insulated from rating systems. When I was in
the Junior High chess club, we kept ratings. What is it about the
psyche of new bridge players, who know they are not yet good players,
that makes it unpleasant for them to see this reflected in the ratings?
patri...@gmail.com
I agree with this last. I played tournament chess fairly seriously in
high school (USCF rating about 1900). Part of the appeal of chess for
me was that it is a wonderful game and I enjoyed it. Part of it was
the ability to win tournaments, and win prize money in so doing. Part
of it was being able to watch my rating steadily rise, and to play
against and beat or draw with players whose ratings were quite high. I
don't understand why we think people are being driven away from bridge
by its much-less-punitive rating system, especially when one of the
wonderful (or ridiculous, depending on your perspective) things about
bridge is that it's quite possible for an intermediate pair to beat an
expert pair, at least for a few boards.
But chess and bridge are quite different. The luck factor in chess is
basically nonexistent (although there is some in a typical tournament--
whether you play White or Black in your tough matches, whether you are
paired up or paired down in the later rounds, etc.). ELO-type ratings
are hugely effective and constantly self-correcting. If you play
someone rated 200 points higher than you, they're clearly better than
you (unless you're young and your rating hasn't caught up to your
strength) and you're likely to lose.
I am not sure how a chess-style rating system would work in bridge.
The luck factor in a typical open pairs game is absolutely off the
charts. Ditto one-day Swiss team events, where there is a ridiculous
amount of luck in the pairings and in the matches themselves (one
lucky game swing can cost you 6 or 7 VPs). In KO team events of
sufficient length, on the other hand, the cream tends to rise to the
top.
I'd be interested to hear a proposal for a rating system that
evaluated every different type of game that the typical tournament
player plays in and really gave a decent estimate of relative
strengths. It's one thing to say "bridge needs a chess-like rating
system" and another to decide just how you'd overcome the difficulties
inherent in constructing such a system. Surely someone with too much
time on his or her hands could try something like this, if he or she
had access to the ACBL's tournament data (at least for the top
players). The results would be exciting, I think.
--Patrick.
lescor
Couldn't agree more about master points and our club was never in that
scheme. Far more attractive for our main weekly duplicate was my
introduction of a weekly cash prize which could only be won if the
winners matched or bettered the target winning percentage. This started
at the seldom makeable and dropped by 1% each week. Ł10 from the
takings was added weekly so that by the time the target was makable the
prize was substantial . Just imagine, " next week the prize pool will
be $ 380 and the target will be 68%". Expect plenty of tables, and at
such little cost.
The problem of suddenly having a very unattractive small cash prize the
week after it had been won, was overcome by having a reserve pool which
received half the cash of the main one weekly and started with a
slightly higher target score, so when the main one was gone. the reserve
kicked in with a decent amount already in the pot. Maybe this is marketing?
>
>> But to me it will never solve the problem which you
>> underline with your suggestion of " the segregation of events
>> according to strength" when I feel that "strength" as you and the
>> authorities see it, has become far too much to do with how willing a
>> player is to study and add the complex, rather than other bridge
>> skills.
> I think you are exaggerating the difficulty as well as the utility
> of complex material.
I cannot be exaggerating when I simply pass on the reasons I have
regularly been given by newcomers after their first few tries. I found
the difference fascinating , as I guess you also did, but the facts
suggest we are probably in a minority.
>> To me, such ideas are just tinkering and an acceptance that this
>> bidding based divide the bosses have allowed is the way things have
>> to be.
>> That thinking is unlikely to solve the membership problem.
>
>
> No doubt true. The decline in the popularity of bridge, in particular
> in the U.S., has sociological reasons that can't be solved
> by marketing campaigns and are not specific to bridge, nor
> to cards games generally.
Well, that is probably dead right, or at least partially correct. My
reasons for the decline are simply a passing on of what I was told.
But they do fit my own experience in many ways. I started when the game
was becoming increasingly popular and when the move from learning and
practice into regular competitive duplicate was almost automatic for far
more than now.
It happened to coincide with an era when the playing field was flatter
because the new interesting add on bits and pieces were, most often,
added to the same basic stuff we and the "experts" still played,
although the strong club systems were gaining popularity.
Maybe the idea that, less complex = greater popularity is not true,
but the fact that popularity has fallen as complexity has increased,
added to the reasons given to me by relative newcomers, gives this
reasoning a fair lump of credibility.
Thinking back has reminded me of one of my early attempts at duplicate,
in fact to the first table of the evening, against a star studded field
of names. When our first opponents arrived just before play started, I
reached over and took my partners convention card and scratched out the
newly agreed convention ( one discussed for about 2 minutes ) we played
against opening threes, as we were playing against the pair who invented
it. I couldn't face insulting them with our half cocked approach if it
came up.
But we left them happy having used a space consuming sequence using our
newly discovered and sophisticated innovation of cue bidding where we
reached 7 hearts missing an ace.....the ace of trumps. "How the hell do
you cue bid the ace of trumps" we asked each other as we moved off.
Great days though, often slaughtered, but mainly by opponents who, more
or less, played the same stuff as us but just did it better.
LC
Peter Ford
I don't think there's anything equivalent in the EBU, although I could
be wrong. With my basically zero masterpoints total, in the last
twelve months I've played in relatively few events that aren't level
4, and even at level 3 I think we're allowed a lot of things that
aren't standard in the ACBL: multi opening, fairly undisciplined
suction overcalls of 1NT. Similarly, I've played against a fair few
systems, some quite challenging to defend against; notably one pair
who could show nearly all 4-4 hand shapes, 5-9 points, at the 2 level,
and another pair playing polish club.
I think this is more a feature of the lack of any matchpoint
restriction on entering events; for me, matchpoints are almost
entirely irrelevant (although I don't mind picking up fractions of
green points). However, I also get the impression that system
restriction is in general much more liberal here than in the ACBL; is
this reasonable?
Peter
Dave Flower
I think the idea of teaching a standard system to novices is a good
idea, but the idea of a worldwide system is a non-starter. For
example, the EBU would insist on 12-14 opening 1NT, whereas the ACBL
would insist on 15-17.
Nevertheless, a lot could be done on a regional basis - see for
example a separate thread on the sequence 1x-1y-3NT in Acol, where two
different agreements appear to be taught within England, with the
result of confusion for learners.
Dave Flower
Gordon Rainsford
>
> About 60% of ACBL members are NOT life masters. 41% have less than
> 100 masterpoints.
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
This seems like a vast proportion of life masters.
In the most recent listing of EBU ranks, 4% were Life Master or higher
rank, and 0.12% held the highest rank of Premier Grand Master.
One might certainly argue how much meaning these schemes have, but it
certainly means less to belong to a group which includes 40% of
members than one that includes 4%.
lescor
True, but the methods are open to all regardless of level of skill.
>
> I think you over-estimate the amount of difference that is
> attributable to methods. Meckstroth and Rodwell won the Life Master
> Pairs when they were both under 21 (or thereabouts) before they had
> developed RM Precision and spent 100s and 1000s of hours studying
> opponents' methods; Steve Weinstein won a LM Pairs when he was 17 or
> 18. I know these are rare cases, but the point it that their success
> did not require the years and years of experience against (or with)
> complex methods. There are a lot of factors that separate the expert
> from the non-expert, time spent on methods is only one of them.
>
> I don't think duffers can join the ranks of expert (even the area of
> bidding) through study and memorization alone. Bidding, even with a
> complex system, requires the use of judgment. A lot of judgment.
Of course bidding requires judgement, particularly in competitive
siuations, but it often also simply requires system memory, and the more
complex the more need for long explanation.
>
> Fred Gitelman has suggested that it takes at least 10,000 hours of
> play and study for a player with aptitude to progress to the expert
> ranks. When he says "study" he doesn't mean learning the latest xyz
> convention. He means things like thinking through suit combinations
> or reviewing hands to figure out what things will help partner on
> defense.
Who suggested otherwise? This is not relevant to the topic or to
anything I have said. My comment about "expert" related only to bidding
and the irrefutable fact that these sophisticated options can be used by
anyone willing to devote the time to them. Also used by experts does not
make all the users expert.
>
> You make reference to the game being played under more liberal method
> restrictions as being a different game from that played in more
> restricted events by the very fact that there are different method
> conditions: "is this a two queen one rook event?". Perhaps there is
> some truth to that just as Little League is a different game than
> MLB. It seems strange to me, however, that you equate the restricted
> bridge game to being the "pure" game, while you think of the
> restricted baseball game as necessary "special handling".
No confusion there surely. Because of the physical difference.
Soccer kids play 40 minute halves or less instead of 45 for the same reason.
>
> The reality of bridge is that the official rules of the game (The Laws
> of Bridge) do not restrict methods. They set out provisions for
> sponsoring organization to restrict methods, but they do not
> themselves restrict methods. They do make clear that methods must be
> disclosed to the opponents. You could think of bridge in its "pure"
> form to have no systemic restrictions. And, all contests, from the
> World Championships right down to the local club, as imposing some
> artificial restrictions. In chess, there are two bishops and they
> move along a diagonals by rule. In bridge, there is no rule that
> requires a bid of 1S to show a particular hand strength or even to be
> natural. "Standard" bidding is not part of the rules of the game.
>
> Perhaps this "pure" form of the game is unmarketable. Every bridge
> organization that I know of has taken this view and exercised their
> rights to regulate methods.
>
> But, I think you are looking at things a little bit backwards. Your
> position seems to be that the simple, mostly natural bidding language
> that beginners learn is the real bridge and that as system
> restrictions become looser an artificiality is being added to the
> game. I would argue that real bridge has no system restrictions and
> those imposed at every level mean that we are playing some minor
> variant of real bridge.
An interesting idea. It would at least end the constant changes in what
and what not is allowed. Not sure it is the greatest " lets make the
game more popular" marketing tool though?
>
> I do recognize that your concern isn't what "real bridge" is, but
> rather with getting players into the club and getting them to come
> back regularly. And, quite rightly so. I am not opposed to system
> restrictions, in fact I would support more severe system restrictions
> in many situations.
>
> What I take issue with is your apparent opinion that complex methods
> are a bastardization of the game, much like the designated hitter in
> the American League. The auction may be a lesser part of the game,
> but it is what separates bridge from its predecessors. From the time
> of bridge's inception, players have been tinkering with methods,
> whether it be Vanderbilt's strong club system (published in the 20s),
> or takeout doubles, or Stayman, or canape, or weak two bids, or
> relays, this bidding language and its evolution is what distinguishes
> bridge. Without it, we'd just be playing Whist, or perhaps a fancy
> form of Whist if you allow a small handful of bidding methods.
>
> Tim
This is a massive misinterpretation of what I said and I suggest you
browse back a bit to understand my arguments.
I do not advocate that the game the beginners learn (I doubt if I ever
used the term "pure bridge") is what the game should become or that
sophisticated bidding methods have bastardised the game, although I have
posed the question, constantly asked by plenty of others, as to whether
they might have gone too far?
You seem to contradict yourself in with your correct comment about my
views....." I do recognize that your concern isn't what real bridge is"
but at the same time suggest that I advocate simple "pure" bridge as the
standard game. I don't, and never would.
To repeat my opinions concerning membership drop out. I do not see any
progress being made by any marketing policy which just tells people what
many already know and have often tested and too often, it seems,
rejected. I feel that as long the authorities fail to understand why
they have a problem and to look for radical ways to cure it they will
not succeed.
Many suggest rankings changes and such as the answer so that they can
"see their progress" overlooking the fact that most give up wanting to
progress very early. This is just thoughtless tinkering which probably
avoids the real problem. This assumption that "our game is great so why
don't more play I, better tell them again", is not a sensible option.
I think, with the backing of some evidence, that that problem is created
by what has developed inside the game and mainly in just one area where,
unlike the improvement in card play, a virtually never changing skill,
they will suffer unless willing to constantly add or change to compete
with the new and popular. Nobody could argue that this bidding gap has
grown greater over the years so maybe the suggestion that it has proved
divisive has some truth to it?
I do NOT advocate changes in the rules or a general dumbing down with a
return to beginners bridge for all, ( what a diabolical thought) but I
do think that the game needs to develop in a new way which caters for
those lost. This concept of different but equal, EQUAL being the major
factor, rather than, "lets run a few things for the rank and file"
could bear fruit.
There is precedence for this opinion. Cricket is played in many
countries around the world, The internationals were considered to be the
greatest example of the game, These "Test Matches" were played over 5
days (yes 5 days), and extremely tactical and sophisticated games they
often were. The regional ( county ) matches were played over just 3
days, but, more recently they have introduced shorter versions of one
day or even one evening events at club and at international level.
The success of this format it amazing. It has generated millions of
dollars in sponsorship. The reason ? The games are lively and
attractive and the public love them, and one reason is that they are
never marketed as some inferior method of playing the game, but just a
different way.....different but equal.
They play on the same sized pitch, with the same bats, the same balls,
the same scoring methods, in fact the same game as the test matches but
with slightly different rules and restrictions. The game now has its own
kudos and prestige for the winners, as well as great cash rewards, so
the professional experts are keen to compete.
Different but equal is I feel the way bridge should go. The "all-in "
game as it has developed, and the other form which would not be severely
convention restricted or too basic, but with a bidding line drawn to
keep it flowing and not too complex. The way we all played it once.
Said enough on this topic. I will get back to working on my LESCOR
defence to an opening canape preempt of 5 diamonds when holding;
xxx.....A......AKQJxxx....KQ. It's bound to come up!
LC