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Back to Clocks

Posted By: Barry Silliman
Date: Thursday, 23 October 2008, at 2:16 a.m.

In Response To: Back to Clocks (Bill Riles)

I don't see the need for clocks in backgammon. The tournaments are just fine the way they are. What's the big problem? ;-)

Here is my clock experience from Baltimore. I brought my clock and asked four of my opponents if they wanted to use the clock. I didn't need to ask the fifth opponent because when said clock was observed when I opened my board, the opponent made it clear there would be no clock in play. I had 2 willing and 3 decliners. Don't bother asking who was who as I won't name names.

I saw one other match played with clocks, Koca v. Kazaross in round 2 of the Open. It's quite possible other matches were clocked.

I've been one of the clock proponents of late on this forum, but I'll admit that I took to heart a lot of the things said by David Rockwell with his post where he was clearly frustrated a bit.

I firmly believe it should be each tournament director's call on what clock policy to use for which events. The TD is the one putting their time and toil into the tournament, and they surely want to maximize attendance and revenue.

I have started a Clocks Allowed policy (either player my request it, Bring Your Own Clock) at my local club in Tysons Corner, VA starting in 2009. I have a clock and prior to this weekend I was considering insisting on the clock for every match I played at the club. Now I'm not so sure. I saw some new faces at the Baltimore tournament of local players, who weren't playing at one of the local clubs. (There are three clubs in the Baltimore-Washington area). I want to see these people at the local club, not because I'll make more money (hard to do with a 0% rake), but because backgammon does not deserve to have only a fraction of the popularity of poker or bridge or chess. So if I see one of these newcomers that may have played in Novice or Advanced at Baltimore, I'm not going to potentially scare them off by insisting on a clock.

Bill Riles mentioned in one post that maybe TDs should keep a list of the slow players and clock them. I'm beginning to see some merit to that. Now, there may not even need to be an official list. TDs talk to each other and know most of the players, and they know who the slowpokes are. It's kind of like in sports- officials or referees may know that this player tends to travel in basketball (like that's ever called anymore) or holds in football or whatever, they know who they need to keep an extra eye on. And if they don't know the other team will be sure to let them know.

At my club in 2009, there are some players who are going to get clocked every time I play them. And I know there are some who are going to take advantage of the policy to clock all their matches. That's fine. But I want the local club player to become an ABT tour player, so I know who the big boys are now and can handle the clock, but I don't want to chase away that potential new player who hasn't enjoyed an ABT weekend yet. And I hope that the Open level players at my club will have this mindset as well.

Hank Youngerman said something to me once at the Pittsburgh Open a couple of years ago. (I realize he was involved in a scandal but this was before that broke). The Pittsburgh Open is one of the bigger stops on the ABT tour, perhaps the biggest other than Las Vegas and Michigan. He said that backgammon is thrilled with 200 players, but if a regional bridge tournament, playing for bridge points or whatever they call it, not even for money, had a turnout of 200, the organizers would slit their wrists at such a low turnout. So we ought to carefully weigh the impacts of any changes on attendance.

I think you could take either side of the "will clocks increase or decrease attendance" argument and make a good case, so no, I don't have any black or white answers in this post, just throwing out some grist for the mill, especially since I won't be in Vegas otherwise I'd be more than willing to participate in the clock forum.

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