North Penn Bridge News

Greetings to the

North Penn Bridge Community!

Week of 05/29/2023

From the Club Manager

Dave Dodgson

Attention 0-299 and 0-500 Players! Effective Thursday, June 1 and continuing on subsequent Thursdays, the 0-299 game will become a 0-500/NLM (non-life master) game. This change will provide the opportunity for Flight C players to qualify for the North American Pairs (NAP) and hopefully attract more participants.

North American Pairs. NAP qualifying games occur in June, July, and August. We will have a separate Flight C only section on Thursdays if we get enough players. Check out our webpage for more information.

June Schedule:

June 5-9 - NAP qualifying.

June 12-16 - Royal STaC providing gold, red and silver points.

June 19-23 - NAP qualifying.

June 21 - The Longest Day. Thanks to early donations, we’re excited to report we are more than halfway to our $1,600 goal of raising funds for Alzheimer’s. Let’s keep the generosity going! Click here to give. Or send/bring your check to the club. We hope you are lining up your partners for our Longest Day games on June 21. The 0-50 game starts at 9:30 am followed by lunch and the open game starting at noon. Our June 24 Robot Individual on BBO will also be a Longest Day game.

June 24 - Robot individual at 4 pm.

June 26-30 – Most games will be cancelled due to the Regional Tournament in Valley Forge. Check calendar below for details.

Stay Tuned

The North Penn Duplicate Bridge Club will be Fifty Years Old this year! Plans are underway for a very special celebration. As a pre-curser to the event, we would like to publish historical happenings and anecdotes. If you have a contribution, please contact Toysie Walker at [email protected].

Education

Summer Substitute Mentors Needed. Deb needs some help for some of the summer Tuesday Shuffle & Deal evening classes. She would be most appreciative if you would please call or text her at 973-769-9619.

Shuffle and Deal. Tuesday evenings from 7-9 p.m. and Wednesday mornings from 9:30-11:30 a.m. Everyone welcome!

New Fall Beginner Class. Sundays from noon until 2:00. Spread the word!

Joann Glasson’s Lessons: June lessons will be Monday at 10 a.m. on June 5 and 19. Click here for details.

Partnership

To add your name to the player list or to request a partner for a game, please send an email to [email protected].

Calendar

Click here to see a file you can enlarge.

We update our Facebook page regularly so be sure to check it out. It’s a great way to stay in touch with all the happenings at North Penn.

Tidbits

“When leading from length in a suit bid by the opponents lead FOURTH BEST from holdings such as KQJxx, KQ10xx, QJ10xx, QJ9xx, J109xx or J108xx. Leading low from one of these sequences presumes an outside entry. The idea is not to block the suit or crash honors in case partner has a singleton or doubleton honor.”

From Defensive Tips

by Eddie Kantar

Deal of the Week

by Bruce Schwaidelson

([email protected])

Breaking News:

Magician's Amazing Trick Makes Sure Trump Trick Vanish!

Come One, Come All! Observe our magical declarer as he attempts to make a certain trump loser disappear. Playing in a 6♠ contract, he has a definite side-suit loser, so he must draw trumps without losing a second trick while facing this trump layout:

--------------------------Dummy: ♠AKQ

------------LHO: ♠J863-----------------RHO: ♠7

--------------------------Decl: ♠109542

Looks easy enough until he cashes the Ace and King and RHO shows out. He is doomed, or so it appears, unless he can miraculously find a way to pick up the ♠J8.

Impossible, you say? Perhaps not even The Amazing Kreskin or the great Harry Houdini can get out of this jam, but fortunately Harry’s bridge-loving cousin Barry, who has dubbed himself The Grand Bridgini, is available today. Please stand back as he plays our Deal of the Week and see if you can pick up his sleight of hand maneuvers. He will of course be aided and abetted by his long-time assistant, paramour, and bridge partner, Gina Lola Bridgida.

After 2 passes, Gina Lola (North) opened 2♣, planning to rebid 2NT, but East rudely got in the way by making a preemptive 3♥ call with her 7-bagger. Once The Grand Bridgini joined the fray by showing his rather anemic 5-card spade suit, his able assistant had no problem bidding slam holding all 6 key cards (trump Queen included), 22 HCP and lovely trump support. She elected not to try for the grand, despite her partner’s self-proclaimed title, since he was, after all, a passed hand.

West trusted his partner and led the ♥2 (low from 3 or 4) and The Grand Bridgini looked over dummy and counted his tricks. If all went well, he could foresee 5 spades, 1 heart, 3 diamonds and at least 3 club tricks, with a diamond his only loser. But all did not go well as he soon discovered.

After winning the heart lead with dummy’s Ace and watching East signal to her partner with the ♥K, The Grand Bridgini called for the trump Ace and King. He was dismayed, but not totally surprised, when East pitched a heart on the 2^nd round.

Looking at the full deal, do you see any possible way to make this contract? I sure don’t! Our marvelous magician will need to pull a rabbit out of his hat, so to speak, but let’s presume that’s not legal at the bridge table. But wait… don’t forget we are in the presence of The Grand Bridgini!

Prior to proceeding, our perceptive prestidigitator pondered this perplexing predicament and prepared a pair of plausible plans:

Plan A: No Diamond Loser: There was one surefire way to avoid a diamond loser - find an opponent with a doubleton ♦QJ - but when declarer led a diamond to his king, unfortunately RHO played the 9 and LHO the 8. Plan A had gone “poof.”

Plan B: The Magic Trick (No Trump Loser!): Undaunted, The Grand Bridgini continued with a low diamond to the Ace and smiled as he watched his LHO complete his high-low echo (8 then 2) to advise his partner - and declarer - he held an even number of diamond cards. Believe it or not, Bridgini knew that if (1) East held the missing ♦Q, as West’s carding seemed to indicate, and (2) West held exactly 4 clubs, the contract was a laydown. In fact, if East’s preempt was a 7-card suit, she was marked to be 1=7=3=2, leaving West with 4=3=2=4 distribution.

Before continuing, The Grand Bridgini called out to everyone who might be in the area: “Would anyone like to observe as I make West’s sure trump trick disappear in thin air?”

As this was the final board of the day and everyone else had already played it, a crowd of kibitzers began to gather around his table. They had seen The Grand Bridgini work his magic before and they came running - myself included.

Bridgini ruffed dummy’s remaining heart before leaning over the table towards his partner. That was the signal she should mop his brow with her handkerchief for full effect, of course, as this was all part of his act. When Gina Lola Bridgida obliged, the onlookers were captivated. The ♣K-Q were next. This time the defenders did not give count but Bridgini knew he could succeed only if West held 4 clubs. Here was the position after trick 8, with declarer on lead:

Before playing his last club, Bridgini addressed his admirers: “Please get your magic words ready. I don’t care if you use ‘abracadabra’ or ‘presto chango’… even ‘please & thank you’ will work.” His audience was prepared!

Next came the finesse of the ♣10 followed by the Ace, RHO pitching two hearts while Bridgini discarded a diamond. It was now time for those magic words and the spectators obliged, including a man with a heavy accent who called out something like “heez mudder, heez mudder.” Bridgini thought he might be saying “his mother,” so he suggested: “Please leave my mother out of this and choose some other magic word.” Watch closely what happened next!!!

The Grand Bridgini called for the ♦5, RHO winning the Queen while LHO pitched his last heart. Down to nothing but hearts, RHO was obliged to lead one and Bridgini faced his two remaining cards, the 9 and 10 of spades, so that they were in full view to everyone. Indeed West’s trump trick was about to vanish in thin air! If West played the Jack, dummy would overruff and if he played the 8, dummy would pitch a diamond. The 6♠ contact had miraculously succeeded! Notice that when dummy led a diamond to endplay East, it would not have helped for West to ruff (rather than discard a heart) and then return his ♥8 or ♠J.

If you would like to observe the illusionist’s sleight of hand more closely, you can click here and then continue to hit the NEXT button for a ringside seat. You can even watch in slow-motion.

After the crowd erupted, The Grand Bridgini, unlike most magicians, wanted to enlighten his fans with more detail regarding his amazing trickery. Besides, he knew darn well what the guy with the accent was trying to say. It was not “heez mudder” or “his mother,” it was in fact “he smother.”

The Grand Bridgini’s Reveal: As that man had deduced, this is a fairly rare version of what is called a trump “smother play.” The idea is to endplay the defender who is void in trumps and has no choice but to lead a suit in which the other 3 players are void. To make the smother work, following the throw-in the declarer and LHO must be down to all trumps and dummy must have one fewer trump card plus one side-suit card to shed if LHO underruffs.

Much to the delight of magicians everywhere, the Encyclopedia of Bridge advises that this unusual bridge play is also called “the disappearing trump trick.” Voilà!

Laughter is the Best Medicine

Two little old ladies were playing in a tournament against two celebrated masters.

One of the ladies opened the bidding with one no trump. The master to her left was looking at a hand containing 14 points on which he considered bidding. He turned to the opening bidder's partner and asked, "What kind of no trumps do you play?"

"Strong," she answered, "around 20 points."

Whereupon the master hastily passed and so did the opening bidder's partner. The Dummy laid down 2 queens and a jack and the expert silently congratulated himself for not having stuck his neck out.

But the defense started to take trick after trick and eventually accumulated 9 of them beating the contract 3, undoubled. Game, it developed, was cold in the masters' hand.

The expert with the 14 point hand turned to the dummy and said in an aggrieved tone, "Didn't you say you played a strong no trump?"

"I do," answered the little old lady. "But my partner plays a weak no trump, about 12 points."