March 2006 - 61

Partnership
Bridge
By Pamela and Matthew Granovetter
www.bridgetoday.com

Matthew: One of my favorite
bridge strategies is "walking the
dog," where you underbid, know‑
ing the auction won't die, then
bid again later, in order to buy the
contract. Many times the opponents
will let you play it if you walk the
dog. One reason is that they have
"exhausted" themselves with their
own bidding ("the theory of exhaus‑
tion"). Another is that there is an
irresistible urge to punish people
who bid this way (stopping in a
partscore and bidding game only
after being pushed into it), which
means that they will double my final
contract and we will make a higher
 Winsome

& Loathsome

a friend of mine, and I guess the
lesson is that it was bad technique
to start with the A instead of the
A K. They can't bar both suits.
One of the most devastating (and
famous) of such incidents occurred
in a national championship match
where the opening leader held six
solid clubs against a 6NT contract.
He led the A - or, if he was
a wise‑guy, maybe fourth best
- whereupon his partner followed
with another suit, quickly corrected.
Too late! Declarer demanded the
lead of the other suit, resulting in
a five‑trick swing. Would it have
been ethical of the revoker, if he
were aware of what was going on,
to persist in his revoke and take a
two‑trick penalty?
(Editor's note: Nice try, Zeke, but
Law 72B2 - Proprieties, General
Principles; Infraction of Law,
March 2006

score than if I had simply jumped to
game in the first place! I tried this
with my wife the other day, but she
wasn't impressed. She was South.
Dlr: North  7
Vul: N‑S  A J 3 2
AQ J 6 4
A6 2
 Q J 10 9 6 3 2
AK
76
 10 5 4
N
W E
7
8532
S
Q87
KJ93
854
KQ98
 K 10 9
 10 5 4

Intentional - prohibits this. It says
that a player must not infringe a law
intentionally, even if there is a prescribed penalty he is willing to pay.)
Edgar Kaplan, who was the
nearest thing to an official ethicist
that bridge has ever had, used to
advocate a legal ethic. If the rules
permitted, it was okay to do it. If
this resulted in inequities, change
the rules. That seems reasonable,
but the devil is in the details. Does
that mean that it's okay to throw a
match in a round‑robin to eliminate
the stronger team? According to
Edgar's criterion, it should be.
Bridge is still growing up. We
need ethicists of Kaplan's stature to
lead a broad re‑examination of the
laws, rules, ethics and comportment,
designed to serve the ends of fairness,
humanity and a tradition of sports‑
manship. That is the path to survival
and greatness. It won't be easy.
❏

West

North
East
South
1
Pass
1
4
Pass
2
3 (1)
Pass
?
(1) Walking the dog.
My natural bid over 2 is 4,
but I figured they'd just bid 4,
and then where would we be? So
I decided to bid 3, planning to
let them "push" me into 4 (not
that 4 was a sure thing, but I was
willing to risk it).
Pamela: Yes, but East fixed your
wagon with his bold 4 bid. Had
he bid only 3, I would gladly bid
game, and if West tried 4 over
my game bid, I don't think you'd
have any trouble bidding 5 (as
it was, folks, we got only plus 100
and 1 matchpoint against 4 dou‑
bled). Had you bid 4 immediately
over 2, as you should, I would
have been able to bid 5 over 4
because of my very‑strong holdings
in our red suits.
Matthew: Aha! You admit most
Easts would bid a dainty 3 with
those cards, and I would have been
right because we could then play
in 4 and not have to worry about
making a five‑level decision!
The Last Word (Pamela):
Playing poker at the bridge table is
certainly an interesting part of the
game, but it isn't exactly partner‑
ship bridge. Although bidding your
"cards" normally doesn't create a
big bang at the table or the newspa‑
per column, at least this "strategy"
gets your side to the right spot more
often than not.
❏

61
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