Monday, September 23, 2013

So, I guess this fall will be all about sports for me with very little bridge. I guess that’s fine. Fall bridge tournaments tend to interfere with several fun activities like watching football, the baseball playoffs, and enjoying the nice weather on the tennis court and jogging trails and dog parks.

 

Anyway, this is the 5th season of my computer football rankings. The formula is almost unchanged from last season and I guess I can go ahead and put out my first rankings after 4 weeks of the college football season. In 2012, Notre Dame finished as my #1 ranked team, despite losing the “National Championship” game to Alabama, who was a fairly distant #2.

 

NCAA  Football - September 23, 2013 - through week 4Football – Sept. 23, 2013 – through week 4 

Strength off

Rank

W

L

Team

Schedule

Total Rating

1

3

0

ALABAMA

20

96.450

2

3

0

OKLAHOMA

36

92.324

3

3

0

OREGON

78

86.633

4

3

0

CLEMSON

46

86.512

5

3

0

STANFORD

51

86.265

6

4

0

LSU

57

85.726

7

3

0

UCLA

66

82.739

8

3

0

FLORIDA STATE

79

82.068

9

3

0

FRESNO STATE

58

81.069

10

3

1

NOTRE DAME

56

78.753

11

3

0

OKLAHOMA STATE

75

78.235

12

2

1

FLORIDA

6

77.999

13

3

0

WASHINGTON

68

77.318

14

2

1

GEORGIA

2

76.757

15

3

0

ARIZONA

93

76.312

16

2

1

SOUTH CAROLINA

11

75.545

17

4

0

OHIO STATE

118

75.064

18

4

0

MICHIGAN

92

75.057

19

3

0

MISSISSIPPI

67

74.916

20

3

0

BAYLOR

110

74.658

21

4

0

TEXAS TECH

88

74.385

22

3

1

TEXAS A&M

48

74.262

23

3

0

UCF

95

74.001

24

3

0

GEORGIA TECH

87

72.857

25

4

0

LOUISVILLE

109

71.783

In this week’s games, my computer predicts Georgia Tech to win 31-20 over VT and LSU to nip UGA 31-30.

 

Friday, September 6, 2013

Top from a remaining doubleton exceptions?

We had an interesting semi-final match on the final day of the Charlotte regional against Wisdom-Rutledge, Helms-Marks, Joyce^2. I think we all agree that Sean and I were rather unlucky in that match which we wound up losing by only 5. We did our share of good things, but some random things and opening lead guesses screwed us a good bit. Our weak NT wrong-sided a 4S contract, enabling the defense to get their obvious heart ruff. I continually made unfortunate opening leads, allowing marginal games to make. Fortunately some of these were duplicated. One board I had to find a diamond against a 1C-1D (Montreal relay denying a 5 card major); 1NT-3NT auction holding xx, KJxx, Txx, Txxx (I picked a spade; the other table probably picked a heart for the same result). I had to find a heart from Jxxxx, Qx, Axx, xxx against I believe a 1D-3D (inv); 3NT auction. The other table played NT from the other side and p has an obvious heart lead to set. There were some other leads I made that didn't work out so well like when I led from Kx of clubs and found AQJxx in dummy but that was immaterial.

There is one trick 2 play that particularly interests me. I held AJ3, T9xxx, xx, xxx. After a 1NT-3NT auction, Sean led the S6 and dummy had something like T85, xx, Kxxx, AQJx. I took the ace at trick 1 and saw the 4 from declarer. Normally with an initial three card holding, you should lead back the top of 2 remaining and lead back original 4th best if you have three remaining. However, it seems pretty likely that Sean led from a 5 card suit. If it's Kxxxx, I need to lead low now to enable us to take all 5 spade tricks. If it's Qxxxx, it shouldn't matter, and if it's a 4 card suit, it also should matter as long as he continues spades at trick 3. In any case (except KQxxx), Sean will need a side entry to cash the last spade(s) and set the contract. I led back my 3, declarer played the 2 and Sean won the Q, then tanked awhile before deciding that I started with only a doubleton spade and shifting to something else. This is not a problem for partner that I anticipated coming up. I totally understand him thinking I may have only had a doubleton spade but with holding a high heart and diamond, there isn't much else I could have in the side suits so there isn't much to play for (I might have and be able to score the DQ for our 5th trick) besides pounding out the spade honors.

The J at trick 2 only gives up a trick when partner has Kxxxx, and even in that situation, we will still take 4 spade tricks plus whatever side entry partner has. That's enough to set, and partner can't really go wrong on defense that way once he knows I have the J. So, maybe I should lead back the J just to make sure partner knows the spade honor situation rather than trying to get -2 instead of -1 in a team game. I still think a low spade at trick 2 is right, going against the general high-from-doubleton principle.