[Al_U_Card]

PBS's Mastermind Theatre. Any other budding humorists out there?

[pigpenz]

Poker has done everything that bridge wished it could have done with TV.
Maybe Bridge should have some shady experts like JLall and others playing high stakes bridge on TV with their own money along with a 24 second clock, now that i would watch.

[Aberlour10]

A very old polish joke out of topic:

"If you watch four students talking together at polish university campus,
you can be sure they arrange a rubber bridge session, if there are
only three of them, they are going to start some kind of revolution

Robert

[pigpenz]

Jlall, on Sep 12 2005, 06:06 PM, said:

lol, shady huh?

sure, i could see you sitting there with a baseball cap and neongreen sunglasses with gold chains hanging down on your polyester shirt unbuttoned to your navel

[EricK]

Bid-Up TV (which changed its name to Bid TV in January) was, surprisingly, entirely unrelated to bridge.

Eric

[coyot]

Aberlour10, on Sep 12 2005, 06:33 PM, said:

A very old polish joke out of topic:

"If you watch four students talking together at polish university campus,
you can be sure they arrange a rubber bridge session, if there are
only three of them, they are going to start some kind of revolution

Robert

Actually, if there are only three of them, they might be arranging a bridge session as well... here, in a country that neighbors with Poland, we have the term of "Polish train bridge" describing a common situation where you commute somewhere with 2 friends and a pack of cards - so you deal normally and the dealer plays 2NT doubled

[ArcLight]

For bridge to be worth broadcasting on TV, there has to be some kind of audience that advertisers would like to reach. Most bridge players are not experts and use simple systems.

Therefore ...

Televised Bridge should be entirely natural with no conventions. Maybe allow Blackwood and Stayman. But no other artificial bids. Negative doubles would be ok also.

The bidding sould be simple, but still interesting, like some of Terence Reeses bidding books from the 60's. The card play would still be interesting.

The simpler bidding would be easier for commenators to discuss, as teh action is happening.

[Al_U_Card]

How about, "Bridge Confessional" where top flight players are followed around their pro dates, international competitions etc. The pros would get to voice over their comments about play etc. but there would also be more candid comments about the play and players, innuendo, competitivity. The "dark underbelly" of the bridge world.

Or, in the Reality vein, "Cut-throat Bridge". A sort of extended Indy tournament where prizes are up for grabs, partnerships are made and dissolved a la Mark Burnett Survivor etc.

As far as advertising revenue, the regular TV audience might be attracted, but the 25 million seniors who play kitchen bridge, et al would be a target for the AARP ads......(sorry Justin, you are way minority in this Field...lol)

[badderzboy]

I see no reason why Bridge couldn't work on TV but I suspect to get a footing then you need the gambling element of Poker ie Rubber or alternatively to show it as a team game teams of 8 to increase the 'interesting hands' so you get the competitive element and a chance to show off some skill / judgement .

You need a simple probably natural system so non-bridge people have a chance to vaguely understand with limited frequent gadgets like stayman and transfers say.

You also probably need USA vs Invitational team with the likes of Zia and other flamboyant personalities like a Ryder Cup or Solheim Cup that sort of thing and it might have a chance?

Justin in his Leather jacket might attract the younger female audience lol

Steve

[hrothgar]

ArcLight, on Sep 14 2005, 04:11 PM, said:

For bridge to be worth broadcasting on TV, there has to be some kind of audience that advertisers would like to reach. Most bridge players are not experts and use simple systems.

Therefore ...

Televised Bridge should be entirely natural with no conventions. Maybe allow Blackwood and Stayman. But no other artificial bids. Negative doubles would be ok also.

The bidding sould be simple, but still interesting, like some of Terence Reeses bidding books from the 60's. The card play would still be interesting.

The simpler bidding would be easier for commenators to discuss, as teh action is happening.

Comment 1: I'd argue that the game that you describe is still FAR to complicated for television. There is a very good reason why Poker shows all focus on Texas Hold'Em. The game is exceptionally simple with very few decision making nodes. Its really well suited for an audience with the attention span of a sugar addicted six year old...

Comment 2: Why this obsession with televising "bridge". There are other card games much closer to the one that you like... Consider, for example, "Spades".

Popular game
No complex bidding
Similar problems in card play / defense

[Al_U_Card]

I guess we are too heavily biased by our love of the game....sigh

So it would have to be goulash hands, where the contract is always 3NT and it is played for $100 per trick. No bidding, just nervous card play.

[SoTired]

games that are "made for TV" have little chance. bridge is not popular enough and is just not a good spectator event.

personally, i don't believe that old saw about "millions of kitchen bridge players". there might be many hidden people who know how to play bridge, but they really aren't interested in playing it.

[ArcLight]

>Comment 1: I'd argue that the game that you describe is still FAR to complicated for television. There is a very good reason why Poker shows all focus on Texas Hold'Em. The game is exceptionally simple with very few decision making nodes.

You are probably right. Plus the gambling aspect draws a lot of interest.


>Comment 2: Why this obsession with televising "bridge".

To gain new players. Without gaining new players the game will suffer from the die off of the older players. Obsession is your word, poorly selected I might add.
Since Bridge is part of the Olympics, it makes sense to try and gain new players if possible.


>There are other card games much closer to the one that you like... Consider, for example, "Spades".

Bridge, without all the myriad of systems suits me fine.

Spades has too little bidding.
And no where near the card play, because there is no exposed dummy. Without the exposed dummy, you can only rarely, and through luck, pull of end plays, squeezes, etc. Its harder to draw inferences in Spades as well. Due to the bags, Spades is much more of a rigid card tracking game.

The defensive problems in Spades are different because you cant play to prevent an endplay or squeeze because you dont have enough information.


>Popular game

So is poker, and so is Nascar, and taking drugs. All irrelevant.

>No complex bidding

True, but also too simple for my taste.

>Similar problems in card play / defense

Not at all.


Try playing Spades with a strong partner against other strong players. See how much time you spend thinking about card play techniques vs. just counting the cards and either avoiding bags or going for the set.

[hrothgar]

ArcLight, on Sep 14 2005, 05:48 PM, said:

To gain new players. Without gaining new players the game will suffer from the die off of the older players. Obsession is your word, poorly selected I might add.

Since Bridge is part of the Olympics, it makes sense to try and gain new players if possible.

The word obsession was chosen quite deliberately.

There are a fair number of people who seem to believe that bridge is destined to return to those mythic glory days in which everyone and their neighbor was fluent in this grand game of gentleman. These individuals often believe that this glorious goal can achieved if only we apply the right promotional resources... I've often seen broading bridge on TV as part of this master plan. Curiously enough, getting bridge adopted as an official Olympic sport is often cited as another important goal.

Me, I'm a cynic...

I don't think that the game of bridge is well suited for a medium like TV. I've seen plenty of arguments that we need to gut the game to suit the medium. This has already reminded me of Mai Lai - You know, the whole "We had to destroy the village in order to save it" line of thought.

I do believe that bridge is well suited towards other types of broadcast. BBO is doing great stuff today with Online Vugraph and there is a lot more that we could do. As I've noted in the past, switching to an electronic playing environment would improve online Vugraph capabilities by an order of magnitude. I find it hysterical that the same groups that are so vehement about the need for bridge as an Olympic Sport or bridge on TV are so unwilling to consider building on an existing and successful foundation...

As for bridge as an Olympic Sport: I've considered this movement laughable since day 1. I've always considered it very unrealistic. To me, the most logicial explanation is pecuniary. The International Olympic Committee is rife with financial scandals... I suspect that this is a big part of the appeal for the administrators. As for the pros - they can start selling Olympic medels to well heeled clients...

Recall, I'm a cynic...

[pigpenz]

hrothgar, on Sep 14 2005, 11:27 AM, said:

Since Bridge is part of the Olympics, it makes sense to try and gain new players if possible.

Wow...did anyone read that article about Jill Myers and the urine testing done I think at the Olympiad in Turkey. If theres an enahancement that we could take for bridge I havent heard of it yet.

Over my years playing bridge I have seen players who are very good playing Stoned and drunk, but the one thing they all have in common is that they were very good players even when they were straight

[SoTired]

I agree 100% with hrothgar. 20 years from now, bridge may survive, but it will always be an intellectual game. Try to make it less and it is lost. It will never be anything else. Not a sport and not on TV.

The #1 bridge player in the world is probably Jeff Meckstroth. I truly respect him as a person and a bridge player. But, truthfully, do you think he looks like an Olympic athlete?

20 or so years ago the ACBL, amid falling membership, hired a young Marketing Manager. It only lasted a year. One of his last actions was to publish an article in the ACBL Bulletin about his year's activity. Besides saying goodbye, he wrote about the surveys he performed. One of his surveys was to ask college students what they wanted to learn. I don't remember all the results but I do remember that "Memorizing all 26 Shakespeare sonnets" came ahead of "Learning to play bridge."

[ArcLight]

>I agree 100% with hrothgar. 20 years from now, bridge may survive, but it will always be an intellectual game. Try to make it less and it is lost. It will never be anything else. Not a sport and not on TV.


The point is that if the organized membership drops from 100K to 10K it may lose critical mass. No more bridge clubs. Maybe some national and world championships (I'm not really interested in them).

With few people playing bridge, how will new players be recruited?
Who will try and recruit younger players?
Especially if Bridge has very complicated bidding?

How do you get a new player interested in Bridge, at any level?
If you present them with a complicated bidding system, that take a long time to learn, and that doesn't even address the card play, most will say the heck with it.
The result is fewer and fewer people playing Bridge.

Does it have to be that way?
What would the benefits be of a simplistic bidding system?

Let the new players get started playing quickly. Then if they show further interest, show them other systems, and conventions. I think Standard American is too complex for a new player. Start with Minibridge. Then Big NT. Or some equivalent.

Don't frighten off the new players. Most will not stick around if they have to learn a real bidding system.

Most bridge players enjoy the basics of the game and don't want the complexity a big system. Some of the postors here love systems and gadgets, but they are in the minority, and would certainly have trouble recruiting new players.

Imagine trying to teach a new player MOSCITO. While the system notes are not too long, it would require someone to memorize 8 pages.
Why on earth would a new player want to spend the time to do that?
You will lose 90% of your potential players.

What is needed is a simplistic system, with few conventions. Plus some photogenic flamboyant personalities.


> Try to make it less and it is lost.

Even without complex systems and conventions, its still quite interesting. Try reading some of Reeses books, like Biddiing a bridge hand. If you think bidding is simple without lots of conventions, you may enjoy that book.