Illegal psyche?

[Nick Whitten]

East dealer.
South, who holds a “weak 2H hand”, opens 2D (multi style) out of turn, not accepted.
East opens 1C and South now bids 1S (!), and West raises to 6C (which is a reasonable choice and it is a normal contract).
South leads a heart, won by North. Declarer now forbids a heart lead (as in Law 26B). North leads a spade which South ruffs.
Is there any law which says South’s psyche (following his own irregularity which requires partner to pass) is illegal?
There was no damage in the bidding as it happened, but South’s psyche was “safer” because North’s enforced pass.

My feeling is such a psyche should be illegal, maybe it is in some Zonal regulations but it is not explicitly so in NZ.

[Ed Reppert]

If it's not illegal, then it's not illegal. And see Law 73E regarding the legality of deceiving an opponent.

[Allan Joseph]

Very interesting , especially so because I am surprised that a player could be that astute even to consider a psyhce in these circumstances .

By saying that the player is astute does not mean that I would allow the score to stand if there was damage .

Sure , Law 73E allows deception , but both Law 73F and Law 23 do not condone ANY action where the player " could have known " that his action/s were likely to result in the opponents drawing a false inference .
If a player is informed by the director ,( as s/he would be after the 2D unaccepted bid ) , that any call not repeating the denomination originally bid , would result in partner's enforced pass , then without a doubt the astute offender knows that the opponents could well be damaged .

So , although the psyche itself is not illegal , the action of changing the bid denominations is illegal .
Note , I am aware that the Multi 2D , does not yet show any denomination ,but to bid a denomination not actually intended by the original multi 2D is in effect changing the suit .
As a note on the side , to psyche an opening Multi 2D is illegal in New Zealand.
The spirit of the law is fair play .
I would adjust the score if opponents were damaged .

[Ed Reppert]

I don't think your argument makes much sense to me, Allan. You seem to be saying that although this psych was legal, it was illegal. That's not possible. It's got to be one or the other.

We have no evidence as to how astute South is.

[Allan Joseph]

After further consideration , and now pretending to be knowledgeable ,I wish to suggest a different approach .
We have been , or at least I have been ,considering the legality of the psyche on the basis that North has to pass . Why should this be the case ?

The Multi 2D BOOT is subject to law31A2 , and after the director has explained the options , s/he should hang about to ensure that the rectification is carried out .
The director , seeing South's hand knows that the 1S bid is a psyche , but should not comment , because to do so would be giving extraneous UI to E/W . Hence the director is obliged to allow the psyche and because spades is one of the possible denominations contained in the Multi 2D bid , should not prevent north from bidding.

If the director did bar north from the auction, that would be a directors error , subject to Law82C, and further , according to NZ regulations , a 60/60 is not automatic - rather the director should assess the moss likely outcome without the original infraction (the BOOT ) and award that score .

Therefore , IMO, the psyche is legal , north should not be barred from the auction , and provided there were no other infractions , the table result should stand .

[Ed Reppert]

If South repeats (one of the) denomination(s) specified in his original BOOT, North must pass for one round. He did so. Had North attempted to bid (or double) over 6C, then there would be a problem (but the TD should not say anything about South's psych).

I'm not familiar with that regulation, and I don't have time right now to look it up, but what you say here, Allan, is not what the law says. The law says "treating both sides as non-offending". Aside from that, if no table result was obtained, the law (12C2) says to award an artificial adjusted score. and now I have to go.

[Ed Reppert]

Couple of things. Going back to an earlier post, Law 23 does not, I think, apply here because south would have had to have been aware, when he bid 2D, that doing that out of turn could damage the opponents. I don't buy that. And 73F doesn't apply, because attempting to deceive the opponents via a legal call (the psych) is not a violation of any of the proprieties in Law 73.

I agree that the table result should stand.

Re: the TD error (in barring north for the rest of the auction). It didn't matter, because North should have been barred for one round, and he only got one chance to bid anyway. So there's no need to rectify under 82C.

[Nick Whitten]

If a player were to bid out of turn after having psyched (and partners enforced pass prevented an inconvenient raise) Law 23 would surely apply even if there was no evidence the bid out of turn was deliberate.
And “could have known” (it could damage the opponents) does not mean “did know”.

I see a similarity here. South “could have known” at the time he opened out of turn it would give him the opportunity for a no-risk psyche, and made possible only from his own original infraction.

[Ed Reppert]

One could argue that a player always "could have known" that his infraction might damage opponents. That's a can of worms we don't want to open.

[bluejak]

This case looks familiar. We ruled it illegal and adjusted under Law 23.

It has been accepted in a number of situations that actions that silence partner when holding a hand with fewer than three points are likely to have a fairly high success rate. Accordingly we believe this is a "could have known" situation.

The case is known to us as the "Rottweiler" case, being a nickname for the young man who perpetrated this, son of a pretty well known English TD.