Congratulations to Terry Beckman
for Going Over 15,000!
This past week Terry Beckman became the second Minnesota player to go over 15,000 master points in a career, joining our editor, Peggy Kaplan, in that rarified category. Terry has been at the forefront of Minnesota bridge for over 50 years. He started his competitive endeavors as a chess player, but he was soon introduced to bridge and, like many top Minnesota players, he found himself at the University’s Coffman Union honing his skills against the next generation of Minnesota players. He graduated to the Minnesota tournament scene, and almost from the beginning he found himself in the top layer of Minnesota players.
In the early years, he played with and against Hugh MacLean, Steve Garner, Howard Weinstein, and David Lehman, to name only a few. In the 1970s, he played occasionally on the Kathy Wei Precision team. His favorite moments were playing in big-time competition. One of his favorites was holding a Yarborough in the finals of a KO match in Chicago against a team that included Ron Anderson (the “Hog) and Hugh MacLean at his table, and Billy Rosen, the star of the 1954 Bermuda Bowl champions, at the other table. The Hog opened a weak 2♠, Terry passed, and MacLean jumped to 4♠. Terry’s partner, Steve Garner, doubled. When the double came around to Terry, Terry looked at his ♠764 ♡643 ♢752 ♣8752, and passed quickly, thinking to himself, “Steve, you’re on your own!”
Terry led a card and felt better when Garner took an ace-king and another ace-king. Garner exited and the Hog looked at Terry and concluded he must have some values to risk passing the double; the Hog went wrong, and the tab totaled 1,100 by the time it was over. The match was decided.
I recall attending a tournament in Iowa in which a local Minnesota player/business owner hired Bobby Goldman and Jim Jacoby to play on his team in the KO matches. He looked around for a good local player to fill out the team, and settled on Terry as his partner. Anyone would have been delighted to play on that team. I kibitzed their matches whenever I could, but needless to say, I spent my time watching Goldman and Jacoby—there wasn’t much to be learned at Terry’s table.
For Terry, bridge has been a large part of his life. He had opportunities elsewhere—both to work and to play big-time bridge, but he declined them. He married his wife Kathy in 1986 and concentrated on his work as a computer programmer in the Twin Cities and on raising Kathy’s two children.
In 1988, Terry had 6,500 master points, placing him solidly in the mix among the leading Minnesota players. From 1988 to 2008, he partially withdrew from bridge, concentrating on his family life, going to work every day and raising the kids. He did continue a casual partnership with Kathy, but trips to Chicago and the nationals were a thing of the past. In one of those years, he played so rarely that he accumulated only 15 points. His total for the entire 20 years was a little more than 1,000 points. In 2008, the kids were out of the house and Terry once again became a formidable force in Minnesota bridge. Playing mostly with Kathy, he once again became a regular on the bridge scene and he began averaging more than 700 master points per year.
Terry soon went over 10,000 points, and then took aim at the next milestone. One of his other goals was to win a national championship which would make him a Grand Life Master. He came within a whisker in the 2017 Fast Pairs in Reno, when he and I fell short by two match points. This was the critical deal:
♠ A J 10 3 2 ♠ K Q 5 4 Koch Terry
♡ A Q J 8 ♡ K 6 1♣ 2♠
♢ Q 5 ♢ A J 6 2NT 3♣
♣ K 9 ♣ A 6 5 3 3♠ 4NT
5♡ 5NT
6♣ ?
1♣ showed 16+ points, and the 2♠ showed almost as many. 3♣ was Stayman, and 3♠ promised spades; 4NT confirmed spades and elicited two keycards; 5NT was the king-ask and 6♣ promised the king. We were suddenly in uncharted waters. Compounding the problem, the director showed up at our table at this point. This was a timed event, and exceeding time limitations resulted in automatic penalties. Terry made the practical bid: 6♡ to show his king of hearts. Bergen and Kantar are the only authorities to have addressed this situation, and both say that a bid of a new suit after 6♣ asks for the king. But the situation was undiscussed. With a few seconds of thought, it might have dawned on me that in an undiscussed position, Terry’s bid was more likely to be a show than an ask. With the director hovering, a few seconds were not available. I settled for 6♠. It was worth 61% of the match points; 7♠ would have been worth 90%, ample to win the event.
Finishing second in these circumstances was disappointing to both of us, but particularly for Terry. But he never said a word, remaining upbeat and encouraging. In this respect, Terry is the perfect partner. Even after partner commits an atrocity at the table, Terry always has a gracious smile and a word of consolation; there is seldom any commentary, and never anything harsh.
The refreshing part of Terry’s game is that he thoroughly enjoys every minute he plays the game. Whether he is at the table or sequestered in his office at his computer, he can play three or four times a day and never tire of the game. More than any other partner I have ever played with, he takes pure joy in almost every hand, whether it is bidding a slam or a close game, working out some tough carding position, or pushing the opponents in the bidding or outsmarting them in the play. He can be positively gleeful about executing a deceptive maneuver. The strength of his game is his level of concentration, which seldom wavers, even late in the day. Unlike most of us, he thrives on good competition: he would rather play in a strong field than a weak one.
Terry got a start on his next milestone in face-to-face games this past weekend. His finest moment was in a tough match in the team game on Sunday. Terry held this hand in fourth position with both vulnerable:
♠ A K J 3 Kerry Koch Joey Terry
♡ K 9 5 4 1♡ Pass 1NT Pass
♢ 9 5 4 2♣ Pass 2♡ 2♠!
♣ K 2 All Pass
Not many would risk hazarding a vulnerable two-level overcall with a four-card suit. Terry inferred that his partner was short in hearts and therefore likely to have length in spades. Partner did have four spades and a singleton heart. It ended in a 7-IMP gain. Vintage Beckman.
P.S. Big thanks to John Koch for his great article about T - and for his team's win on Sunday!
