[Wackojack]

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At the Griffin's weekly duplicate, this hand sealed the victory of Hideous Hogs team over Papa the Greeks team. At both tables the bidding and lead were identical. South led the 6♥ to North's Ace who then returned the J♥ taken in dummy with the King.

Papa the Greek could see that if he initially played the K♦ he could bring in all 5 diamonds without loss when South has all 4. So he played the King and South played the 2 and North the J. Then he played the 9. Of course Papa could see the blockage in the suit and that he had to take a view on who held the 10. Papa was an expert in bridge and mathematics and knew that the Rule of Restricted choice now favoured playing South for the Jack since in theory North was just as likely to have played the 10 with J10 doubleton as the Jack. Accordingly he ran the 9♦ (South playing the 2) and sadly it lost to North's 10. 4 more hearts tricks followed plus the two top spade tricks meant that Papa was down 4.

At Hideous Hog's table Walter the Walrus was sitting North. The Hog "knew" that Walter with J10 would never play the 10. Walter would want to give the impression that he held a singleton and the play of the 10 when holding J10 looks far less singletonny than does the Jack. The Hog also knew that Papa sitting in the same seat would apply the rule of Restricted Choice and finesse. The Hog calculated that North was slightly more likely to have started with J10 than with J singleton because there is an extra space in the North hand to have the 10. So he played his Queen and the 10 dropped. Rueful Rabbit who was Hog's partner looked very concerned when Hog next played a small diamond to the 8 in dummy instead of cashing his Ace but was relieved to see the 8♦ holding the trick.

Scoring up Papa was livid. Rueful Rabbit was happy but puzzled. Luckily he thought Papa must have miscounted diamonds because who would finesse when you have 10 cards in the suit with AKQ?

Inspired by Wank's comment.

[mikeh]

 Wackojack, on 2015-August-11, 10:33, said:

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Papa the Greek could see that if he initially played the K♦ he could bring in all 5 diamonds without loss when South has all 4.

Papa may have been the butt of many of the Hog's exploits but he was the second best technical player in the menagerie and he would have known that he could never bring home 5 diamond tricks if S held J10xx. South covers the 9 and then covers the 8, and the suit is blocked.

Sorry to be a pedant

[Wackojack]

 mikeh, on 2015-August-11, 11:25, said:

Papa may have been the butt of many of the Hog's exploits but he was the second best technical player in the menagerie and he would have known that he could never bring home 5 diamond tricks if S held J10xx. South covers the 9 and then covers the 8, and the suit is blocked.

Sorry to be a pedant

Oh yes of course, he would have known that. Cancel that bit of text. Nevertheless it would be in character for Papa to finesse invoking the principle of restricted choice. Terence Reece explained it in his 1958 book "The Expert Game". Maybe Papa gave him the idea.

I have just googled this from: http://terencereese....cted_choice.htm

"One interesting thing too that I have observed over the years, is that most club players holding J10 doubleton will play the jack, as the obvious false card………something else to take on board!This means that at my local club, if the Jack appears I will play for the drop, if it is the 10, I will finesse."

[mikeh]

 Wackojack, on 2015-August-11, 16:10, said:

Oh yes of course, he would have known that. Cancel that bit of text. Nevertheless it would be in character for Papa to finesse invoking the principle of restricted choice. Terence Reece explained it in his 1958 book "The Expert Game". Maybe Papa gave him the idea.

I have just googled this from: http://terencereese....cted_choice.htm

"One interesting thing too that I have observed over the years, is that most club players holding J10 doubleton will play the jack, as the obvious false card………something else to take on board!This means that at my local club, if the Jack appears I will play for the drop, if it is the 10, I will finesse."

I've used this principle, without the benefit of knowing that greater minds than I had thought of it, for years. It works for QJ as well as J10. Absolute beginners tend to play the lower one. Slightly more advanced play the higher one to give the impression it is stiff. Even experts tend to develop patterns, since it is impossible for most humans to intentionally act randomly. I suspect that most non-wc experts tend to play the lower one slightly more often than the higher one, simply as a reaction to knowing how bad players play, but even if I am correct in that speculation, what counts is whether the bias outweighs the mathematical odds, and I don't think that it would since I would expect most experts to show only a slight, and erratic, preference for the lower one.

[Jinksy]

 mikeh, on 2015-August-11, 18:02, said:

Even experts tend to develop patterns, since it is impossible for most humans to intentionally act randomly.

I'm not sure it's that hard when you know it's the best play. On a few occasions I've deliberately reached for the centre of two cards and taken whichever one came loose from my fingers first. Sure it's not random, but the bias isn't likely to be anything your opps can take advantage of.

IMO the OP would match Mollo's stories best if HH's alternate were Molly the Mule.

[mycroft]

In these cases, I always pull the one on the left (unless somehow, the doubleton ends up on the hand's extreme right). Because I sort into suits, but not in rank order, it's as close to random as I can make it.

Now, the issue is to know it's "one of these cases" and in particular not one that could mislead partner more than declarer in time to not hitch with the "choice" of play.

[BillHiggin]

Slight threadjack:
A long long time ago, I was playing in a moderate stakes rubber bridge game (at a rubber bridge club). RHO was a top local pro, LHO was a local expert (partner and I were quite overmatched). RHO opened 1♥, and our side proceeded to expose his psych and then overbid to a diamond slam. LHO cashed the ♥A and I needed only to pick up the trump suit which of course was AKTxx in hand opposite 4 small. When I led the ♦K, the jack appeared on my left. I thought for awhile and then played the A, dropping the Q.
LHO screamed "Just my luck to be playing this hand against the only player in the club too stupid to know restricted choice" (he never was a pleasant expert).
However, I had spent a lot of time watching RHO, and knew that he never psyched an opening bid with as much as Qxx in a side suit. So the real unlucky one was my RHO who was playing with someone too stupid to play the honor he would be known to hold.