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I have wanted to praise Richard Pavlicek since the Philadelphia Nationals in March. Our team lost a match in the Vanderbilt to Richard by one IMP. My teammates were so upset they stayed up all night, going over every hand, trying to find absolution. It takes most players a long time to forgive themselves for losing an important match; personally, I am not able to forgive myself ever, and it takes a long time just to bury the pain. In any case, in the course of their confessions and recriminations (?), my teammates thought they had found a scoring error that would throw the match into a tie. team and we were wrong. However, Richard spots a hand our partners had misscored by an IMP; the match is a tie, we win the playoff. This was the Vanderbilt; that took a special type of integrity sometimes missing in these events. Richard's action also says something about Richard's teammates; he knew they would not want to win a match they were not entitled to win.
I will tell a true story to illustrate how important the Vanderbilt is to those of us who take it seriously. Just over twenty years ago Sam Stayman was playing with Vic Mitchell on some good six person team in the Vanderbilt in St. Louis. I can't remember if it was the round of 8 or the round of 4, but it doesn't matter. After three quarters Stayman's team had a lead of 72 IMP's and Sam went up to his room to go to sleep. The other team made a great comeback and won. Nobody on Sam's team had the courage to call Sam and give him the news, so they finally prevailed upon Jacqui Mitchell (Vic's wife) to call Sam and tell him they had lost. Sam answered the phone and knew immediately that Jacqui would not wake him up unless something terrible had happened. Sam said: "Oh my God, Jacqui, what is it? Did Vic have a heart attack?" "No Sam," said Jacqui, "it's worse."
Editor's note:
Grant Baze, November 18, 1996
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