Author: Mike Hood
Date: 09:01:22 01/07/04
Go up one level in this thread
On January 07, 2004 at 09:50:39, Mark R. Anderson wrote: >On January 07, 2004 at 08:44:36, J. C. Boco wrote: > >>Korchnoi continues to play even though his rating keeps dropping. >> >>I respect him more than any other player. > >I agree, I respect the "old lion" greatly also, including his aggressive play. >Yes, he keeps playing. Bless him, he's the real "Energizer Bunny." Look at >Fischer, who complained for years that the Russians did not play enough when >they were world champs, and then when HE won, he did not play one single game in >competition. What a hypocrite! I totally do not respect him (even beyond his >offensive, anti-semitic, paranoid rants). > >Above all, to say that Fischer is still rated as 2780 is completely ludicrous! >Any of the top players now would thrash him completely with little difficulty. >Chess theory, especially the openings, have changed much in the last 30+ years. >Also, Fischer is much older and has not played competitive chess for 32 years. >That's a h*** of a long layoff for a world-class player! When he beat Spassky >(who is a nice person, which Fischer can't claim), Spassky himself at that time >had just gone out of the top 100, and even that was 12 years ago. Fischer's >so-called "rating" of 2780 puts him at the level of Kramnik. Can anyone here >really even entertain a fleeting thought that the Fischer of right now would put >up serious resistence against Kramnik? And that's what ratings are supposed to >reflect .... a player's current strength, not how they played more than 30 years >ago. By FIDE's logic, Muhammad Ali should be ranked #1 in boxing right now. > >FIDE should de-list players who have been inactive for 2 or 3 years, much less >32. To put a player inactive for 32 years as the #2 player in the world is an >insult to current, competing, hard-working, world-class players, such as >Kramnik, Anand, Shirov, Bareev, Svidler, etc. They have demonstrated their >great strength repeatedly and recently, not over 3 decades ago. Well, sorry, >enough of that .... I grow weary of "Fischer worship" when he does not deserve >it. Fischer played many beautiful games, but that was 32-45 years ago. Let's >admire (in chess terms) people like Kasparov and Kramnik who continue to put >their reputations on the line frequently, even against our beloved chess >programs! > >Mark Anderson Thanks, Mark, I agree with everything you say. My original post was meant sarcastically -- I've surprised Mike Byrne took it seriously -- but it did have a serious message. I wanted to point out an inherant flaw in the way the rating lists are compiled. If you're rating computer programs it doesn't matter much, because Shredder 7 on identical hardware will play exactly as well this year as it did last year. But humans are different. Great players build up their skill over the years, reach a peak, then gradually fade away. Some fade faster than others! When rating humans it's nonsensical to consider games older than 3 to 5 years. Robert Fischer shouldn't be in the rating list, not even as in inactive player. Maybe if a player is absent from the chess scene for one or two years because of illness, family pressure, living in a war zone, or whatever reason, he can still be listed. But only for a couple of years. P.S. I have no wish to knock Bobby Fischer or start a thread defending/attacking him. I was just using him as an example of how the list is "wrong".
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