Source: Spring NABC Bulletins
Superstitions about Friday the 13th are so prevalent that there’s a name for the anxiety: Paraskevidekatriaphobia.
For all their above average logic and reasoning skills, bridge players are a surprisingly superstitious lot. Take, for example, the legendary Grant Baze. Reporter Nina Schuyler interviewed Grant for his Stanford alumni magazine. “I wasn’t superstitious until I got involved in serious bridge,” he says. In the beginning it was a lucky rock that he carried in his pocket. When the Mamas and Papas came out with “California Dreamin’” in the mid-1960s, that became Grant’s lucky song – he would sing it to himself as he walked to clubs and tournaments. One time, he had his hand on the club’s doorknob when he realized he had forgotten to sing it. He backtracked and began his approach all over again.
On the eve of a tournament, Grant would chant, “Win tomorrow, win tomorrow” before going to
sleep. He also had a lucky pen that he kept with him for 15 years. “I used that pen on the first day of a tournament and won,” Grant said. So if he forgot to bring it, he would leave the bridge table to get it before playing.
Write is might
Grant is not the only one who believes that pens and pencils possess strong magic. “Never use a red pen,” insists Norberto Bocchi (in Italian).
One of those who claims she’s not usually superstitious, Karen Walker says, “I have a thing about the pens I use to write results in my private score card. I carry several, and after a good session I make sure I use the same pen for the next session.
If I have a few bad boards in a row, I change pens in an attempt to break the streak of ‘bad luck.’” Lynn Deas says that in a long event such as a KO, she gets attached to a specific pen “and I must use the same pen every day.”
Numbers and directions
A number of players mentioned directional “preferences” (not superstitions, mind you). Daniel Korbel says he used to sit East until he had a sponsor who insisted on sitting East. “We did very well in a few events and I got used to sitting West. Then we accidentally sat in the wrong direction – he sat West and I sat East – and we had a terrible game.”
Michael Rosenberg always tries to sit East and North, “not due to any superstition, but because if I pick up a hand record months later, I have a better chance of remembering the results.” Larry Sealy doesn’t like to sit West. “The last time I sat West was in 2001, I think.” He also doesn’t like to shuffle a board when vulnerability is infavorable for his side. “This comes from my early days as a more adventurous preemptor.”
Jill Meyers avoids section A. “Having lunch with my non-bridge playing friend, Paula, before a tournament also brings me luck.” “It’s not quite a superstition,” Bart Bramley says, but I have a strong directional preference for East because I sat East in the very first duplicate session I ever played (1965) and I liked it. But I can sit West if I have to.”
Another of Bart’s “not quite a superstitions”is SDAM. “SDAM means ‘six diamonds always makes’. It’s on my convention card. I’ve been playing it since college in the late ‘60s.” A whole group of Bart’s MIT college friends were believers in SDAM. “I can provide many examples of the power of SDAM.”
Peg Kaplan likes 13. “Oddly enough, the number 13 brings me good luck! I won my first regional event starting at table 13, and often get good results on that board, too.”
Joel Wooldridge says that collecting 800 brings him good luck. “What do I try to avoid? Going for 800.”
Clothes matter
Larry Cohen recalls a Spring NABC when he and David Berkowitz were not doing so well in a pair game. Matthew Granovetter invited Larry to Friday night Kiddush, an invitation Larry declined. “But I did tell him that if David and I won the event, I might consider coming the following weekend.” They won the pair event. “The following weekend, we had reached the semifinals of the Vanderbilt. Matthew invited me again for Kiddush. I refused again, but this time I made him a promise. I said, ‘Matthew, if we win our semifinal match (we were trailing at the half), I promise I will wear your big black religious hat for the first quarter of the final.’
Cohen says they won the semifinal match and, as promised, showed up the next day wearing the hat. “My team captain saw it and had a fit! ‘That hat is bad luck. Take it off.’ I took off the hat and we lost the match.”
Matt Granovetter harbors a superstition of his own: “If you can’t find the bid you want in the bidding box, bid something else.”