(Here's another mah jongg tournament story, a little dated because it's from the 2015 card, but the lesson is still invaluable. KNOW YOUR CARD!!)
Greetings and salutations from Bubbe, back home in my own
little corner of suburban New Jersey.
I want to talk about a defensive stunt I pulled at a Midwestern
weekend tournament last weekend. One of the ladies spoke about a legendary
player who “knew what you were playing before you did.” I was told that she
could look at a single exposure, and the discard pile, and know exactly what
you were up to….or she might predict based on her memory of what was passed to
you in the Charleston.
Well, I’ve always been one to test the waters, trying to
defy expectations and predictability. To be honest, I was forced to by
circumstance. My post-Charleston hand was
3336789 7789 89 D
It could have gone in two directions. I toyed with the idea of either pursuing the Singles and
Pairs hand of sevens, eights and nines in three suits
899 78899 778899
or the 369 and dragon
hand in bams
3333 666 9999 DDD
I had no jokers, so I was leaning toward the Singles and Pairs
hand, but had five tiles to go before achieving it.
I was East, and threw out the Soap as my first discard. My
Singles and Pairs hopes were revised, very early, when my first pick was a
joker. I decided to stay in the 369 section. I picked up a six-crak and toyed
with going for 3-6 in bams and 6-9 in craks
333 6666 666 9999
However, when someone threw a
three-bam, I called it and exposed a kong:
3333
I had no Flowers to make the simple
3 kongs, with a pair of Flowers
FF 3333 6666 9999
I hoped for a green dragon so that I could go
for the pair-free hand, pungs in 6’s and dragons and kongs in 3’s and 9’s:
3333 666 9999 DDD
It felt like my opponents were channeling the legendary
maven, and reading my mind. Suddenly all four green dragons were thrown, in
rapid succession. That hand was out of reach, and I already had the kong of 3’s
exposed. I had to think creatively. Maybe I could play kongs of 369 in three
different suits
FF 3333 6666 9999
Someone discarded a Flower, and a second Flower discard was
called for a kong: this meant five Flowers were already played, and I didn’t
have one. I knew it wasn’t likely
that I would achieve a pair of them.
I threw away one of my seven-craks, which was called for a
kong exposure (including a joker). I was able to exchange my other seven-crak
for the joker, so now I had two jokers:
JJ6789 69
9 3333 (exposed)
I picked up a third joker, and realized I was still very far
from a real hand. But what does Bubbe always say, especially in a tournament?
“If you can’t win, don’t lose”—you might pull out a 10-point score for a wall
game. I discarded the eight-bam. Two six craks were thrown before I could say
“boo.”
I picked up a two-bam on my next turn and then a four-dot. A
thought came to me: what if I started to pursue a pung-kong consecutive run
hand, with two and three bams and four and five dots?
222 3333 444 5555
Since it had only just
occurred to me, it probably hadn’t occurred to my opponents, either. Sure
enough, when a two-bam was thrown and I called it, everyone was surprised. My
hand now was
JJ 9 69 4 2J2
3333 (exposed)
Everyone at the table was stunned by the ambiguous exposure.
They looked frantically at the discards and realized that, not only might this
be the pung-kong consecutive run, but somehow the first consecutive runs hand (one
through five)
11 222 3333 444 55
was actually still viable--there were only two discards of the
five-bam, and one of the one-bam. Suddenly my pathetic, confused hand put them
all on the defensive: I watched them break up their hands to avoid throwing a
one- or five-bam, and it ended as a wall game!
Make sure you don’t “give up” too easily—if you can’t win,
don’t lose, and don’t make it easy for your opponents to figure you out! Please
share your defensive war stories at bubbefischer@gmail.com.
Thanks, and talk to you soon!
Bubbe Fischer
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