I am a very weak and lousy backgammon player. I can prove it in four ways.
(1) (a) Every single time Falafel watches me play online, he is always kind enough to open a chat box and tell me how many hopeless checker plays and atrocious cube decisions I have just made.
(b) After I stuck Stick in the finals of Charlotte in Jan 2007, he wrote an article on GammonVillage telling the world what a bad player I am.
(c) I last saw Joe Sylvester in Dallas over Labor Day 1994 at Kent Goulding’s World Cup. Sly beat me 3-0 (format was best three of five 11pt matches) in the semi-finals and then on the front and center of the next issue of the Chicago Point, he told the world what a hopeless player I am.
(d) One of the most benevolent Giants of backgammon made a very kind post last year on this Web site advising bgonliners not to vote for me on their Giant-32 ballot because I am such a weak and lousy player. I totally agree with these four superstars; they cannot all be wrong; indeed, I am honored that they even remember my name; I am even more honored that they would mention my name, even if it is only to inform the world what a pitiful backgammon player I am.
(2) Readers of this Web site see some of the many whoppers and double whoppers I post (“Four Peever Whoppers in the Same Game.”) Of course, I only post a tiny percentage of my whoppers because there is not enough space on the Internet to post them all.
(3) During the next week I hope to post some of my many whoppers and double whoppers in Austria so that bgonliners can see how I fumbled, blundered and whoppered my way to a tournament victory. One example is given below.
(4) Everyone knows what a big steamer and lousy money player I am. Last weekend I lost a HUGE amount in a heads-up nackgammon session to a novice who had never played nackgammon before. I, on the other hand, have played zillions of games of nackgammon over the last eleven years.
How much prize money did I win in Austria? It was twelve times the amount I lost last weekend in London.
Here is just one example of how I blundered my way to victory in Austria:
There are four legal plays in the position shown below. To my credit, I made the third best play and not the fourth best. I spent about fifteen or twenty minutes over the board on this "tough" problem. I kept on shuffling the checkers back and forth between 4/1* 4/3 and 4/3*/off (both of which are blunders). I did extensive arithmetical calculations in my head comparing these two plays. I never considered the only reasonable play, 4/1/off.
After patiently watching me consider two candidates that were both whoppers, my opponent (Tobias Hellweg) rolled 21, fanning with a number that would have hit if I had made the right play. On the other hand, maybe the fact that my opponent was destined to roll 21 makes my play was "right." Very glad I made my whopper. It paid off big time for me.
I would rather make a whopper and not get hit than to make the right play and get hit any day. "I would rather be lucky than good."
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| XGID=-CBaB-----a--aa-a--bbbbb--:1:-1:1:13:0:0:3:0:10 | ||||
 to play 13 | ||||
is Player 2| 1. | XG Roller+ | 4/0ff | eq: +1.404 | |||
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| 2. | XG Roller+ | 4/3* 3/0ff | eq: +1.288 (-0.116) | |||
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| 3. | XG Roller+ | 4/1 4/3* | eq: +1.283 (-0.121) | |||
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| 4. | 3 ply | 4/1 2/1 | eq: +1.204 (-0.200) | |||
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eXtreme Gammon Version: 1.21