Izzie

 Imagine this: a Ruth-like man whose tiny hips let his pants drag; who wore open-toe sandals no matter how bad the weather; a voracious reader whose memory for names left him calling even those he knew well, ‘kid’; one whose booming voice could be heard throughout any enclosure; one a powerful man whose standard greeting of “how you doing, kid” acompanied by his versionof a pat on the back could send one reeling across the room.

His name was Israel, or as he usually called in the bridge world, Izzie. When his health forced him to curtail his previous lusty lifestyle, he took up bridge. As he was a pharmacist with a chain of discount stores in the Philadelphia area, he was able to do favors for many of the better players in the area. They in return would occasionally play with him. He became spoiled. Once he came to a national lacking anybody with whom to play. He went to the partnership desk to get a date. As he usually played with good players he insisted it supply him with a good player. He was fixed up with someone who he was told was a very good player.

On the first hand his partner made a mistake. His partner made a mistake on the next hand, also. Izzie became upset and took his partner aside to talk to him.

Izzie said, “I thought you only needed a few points to become a Life Master.”

“Life Master?” said his partner, “I needed a few points to have a few points.”

As he learned to play bridge some of his instructions became garbled. Because of his lack of volume control the directors of his favorite club game often put him in his own room when it was possible. One night I was sitting South with Izzie as my partner. West bid one spade. Izzie bid four clubs. East promptly bid four spades.

Holding nothing exciting special, I passed, as did West, but Izzie persisted with five clubs which was greeted by a loud double which was passed around to Izzie who now bid five hearts! The double was not nearly as loud now. Happy not to be in slam I passed, and that became the final contract.

Izzie had a singleton club and long hearts. Our opponents mistakenly relied on the bidding, misdefended and and allowed Izzie to make an overtrick.

Upset, Izzie turned to me and asked, “Kid, I bid four clubs, Gerber for aces and five clubs for kings. How come you never answered me?”

As he gained experience Izzie became aware that a good declarer could take advantage of his erratic defense. Once we were defending four spades with declarer having shown a two-suiter in the majors. Dummy had three spades and 9x in hearts. Rather than lead up to the KJ7xx in his hand, declarer chose to lead up to dummy’s heart nine. Declarer knew what he was doing, Izzie, with AQ108 to declarer’s left now had a problem. After much thought, he hopped up with his ace instead of merely winning his ten.

Afrer +620 was being chalked up by our opponents I asked Izzie why he had won the first heart with with the ace. He explained, “I thought they were trying to fool me, Kid.”

I could never relax when I was playing with Izzie. Once whe was playing four spades, Izzie ruffed the second heart lead. From the bidding I was positive he had at least one mor heart so I asked, “No more hearts, Iz?

He checked his cards briefly and replied, “No more hearts, Kid.”

I was still sure so I persisted. “Are you sure you have no more hearts?” e cursororily checked his hand, “No more hearts, Kid.”

I tried one last time. “Iz, check among you diamonds. See if you have a heart among them.” I could see him carefully fingering his cards. Once more he said, “No hearts, Kid.”

I gave up, Perhaps he had made a mistake in the bidding. Izzie continued to play until on the sixth trick he firmly placed his hand face down on the table and announced, “Kid, I reneged.”

My favorite Izzie hand happened when we were playing in a Philadelphia sectional mens pair. We had agreed on spades and were exploring a slam.. When Izzie replied five hearts to my Blackwood four no trump. The opponent on my right doubled. I knew from the snswer we couldn’t make a slam I also knew we could make five no trump as well as five spades. I now had the opportunity to pass. When Izzie returnrd to five spades I thought could sign off in five no trump for a top!

I paid off for my greed. At his turn to bid Izzie sat there and thought for a long time and thought. Finally, he said. “”If that’s the way you want it, Kid” and passed!

Upon seeing the dummy Izzie excitedly said, “”You’re right, Kid. You’re always right. We can’t make a slam. You’re always right, Kid.”

As he played the hand and took tricks Izzie repeated, “You’re right. You’re always right. We can’t make a slam, and we’re killing them. We’ll beat them for at least 1,100.”

Seeing what was happening I mumbled, “Izzie. you’re playing the hand.”, but he was too gleeful to listen.

When the hand was finally over, Izzie asked me, How much did we get them for, Kid?”

I finally got through to him, and he realized what had happened. He clapped his hand to his forehead and wailed, “Oh my God, I played the hand! ”

Actually, Izzie had a play to make the contract. He didn’t see it, but it would have saved him at least one trick. Because he missed that play, he became the only person to misdefend while declarer!

To be fair to him, though he was slow enough on defense to give a skilled declarer information, he did manage to play passably most of the time. His major problems came when he seemed to go into a trance and had what he called a blind spot. He was an intelligent man and on occasions even displayed a certain shrewdness while playing bridge. Only the magnitude of what he might do dwarfed any table awareness he might display. His ability to cooperate when I suggested a defense to defeat a cold contract illustrates what he was sometimes capable of when he was not asleep at the table:

 

OL: ♣K		North
		♠	K742
		♥	K9
		♦	K986
		♣	543
West				East
♠	J109			♠	Q863
♥	8653			♥	4
♦	A7			♦	QJ1032
♣	AK97			♣	862
		South
		♠	A5
		♥	AQJ1072
		♦	54
		♣	QJ10

  

West	North	East	South
			1♥
Pass	1♠	Pass	3♥
Pass	4♠	All Pass

  

We were playing in a Philadelphia sectional against a local pair that knew Izzie well. They had reached an aggressuve game that depended on the location of the ace of diamonds. When Izzie saw my deuce and South’s falsecard of the queen of clubs he shifted to the jack of spades. Declarer won in his hand and started to draw trumps. I analyzed our chance toset the contract. From the bidding declarer certainly had the missing ace. Unless Izzie had had an unlikely trump trick, the contract seemed impregnable.

Desperate measures were needed. So reasoning, I prepared the defense by sluffing discarding the queen and then the jack of diamonds as my first discards. It was normal to give Izzie extravagent signals. He tended to miss mere spot cards. These discards were to give declarer were to give declarer a finessing position with the diamond king and nine.

When he held an ace Izzie generally took so long to ponder about winning it that even players at other tables knew he had it. I had a forlorn hope that when declarer led the suit, Izzie  he would duck it and declarer would  finesse the nine.

After trumps were drawn declarer led the club jack. Izzie generally belonged to the ‘bird in the hand’ school. Any he had a chance to win an ace, he took it, but this time Izzie surprised me. He won the ace of clubs, and with no hesitation shifted to the seven of diamonds.  That was better than I could have expected. Declarer was not a terrible player. He knew Izzie’s tendencies and that a finessing position existed. I won my diamond ten when he finessed the nine. We were the only pair to have a plus score in our direction.