Grant
A few years ago I got corralled into playing a midnight
Knockout team game when I really wanted to sleep. The
bribe was almost sufficient until I found out that if we
won, I'd have to do it again the next night. We did win,
but fortunately, lost a close match the second night (against
the McKenney winner). Happily thinking that this nonsense was
over, I found out that the number of teams entered required a
playoff for third place in order for a third team to make the
overalls. When informed by the powers that be that this match
was optional, acceptance was the furthest thing from my mind.
It turned out, however, that our opponents-to-be were competing
for the McKenney also, and felt strongly about the seven and a
half masterpoints available to the winner of our match. I agreed
to play under the following conditions: 1) The match was to be
held between sessions (right now) 2) It was to be short, say
seven boards, and 3) winner pays the entry fees. Their captain
readily agreed to these conditions, and since he could only find
six boards, shortened the match further. We lost and everyone
was happy. The next day, the captain of the opposing team, Grant
Baze, came up to one of us and explained that he was so grateful
that we were willing to play and that the conditions suited him
so well that he had intended to take us out to dinner. Since he
was leaving town early that day, he gave one of my teammates
$100 to buy dinner for us instead. We decided to spend the money
on pizza and ice cream for about 20 students and called the gift,
of course, our Pizza Grant.
This year, Grant came to the Caltech-UCLA pro-am and I was able
to play one hand with him. At IMP scoring, we were defending
1NT on the following hand:
| Q6 J9765 A976 A3 | |
J8754 2 KQ83 KQ7 | |
93 AK104 542 J964 |
|
AK102 Q83 J10 10852 | |
West | North | East | South |
Dummy | Grant | Declarer | Me |
1 | Pass | 1NT | All Pass |
| | | |
I found the unimaginative lead of a small club, and the
seven held in dummy. Grant won the second
club and shifted to hearts. Declarer won this with the Ace
and cashed the Q. He exited with a spade to his nine
and my ten. Not yet knowing about the location of the Q
or 9, I continued with the Q, since we needed
a seventh trick from somewhere as far as I could tell. Declarer
happily grabbed this in hand, pitching a diamond from dummy. He
then cashed his club trick, pitching the fifth spade, and led a
diamond to the Jack, King and Ace. When Grant cashed the J,
dummy was squeezed. If he pitched a spade, my spades would be good and
I could overtake partner's Queen and run the suit. We would get
four spades, one heart, and two minor suit aces. Instead, declarer
threw a diamond from dummy, so Grant cashed the Q and continued
with a diamond, forcing dummy to give me the last two tricks with my
AK. A defensive steppingstone squeeze!
Copyright © 1995 Jeff Goldsmith