Clash of Challengers, Part 1

Some time ago, pete wrote an article about who was the very best world champion of all time. He brought all the past world champions from the time that they were at their peaks and gave the following conditions:

• Each of the 16 undisputed world chess champions is teleported to present day at the peak of his playing ability — whatever age that may have been.
• Each player is given modern chess literature, opening books, databases, software engines, and a MacBook Pro.
• Players have one year to study for the tournament, and a stipend of $100,000 USD for the preparation year. (This would mean a huge pay cut for Carlsen, Anand, and Kramnik, but they’ll have to make do.)
• The world champions are free to spend that year however they see fit, whether it’s to acclimate themselves to modern life, catch up on 100 years of Ruy Lopez theory, fall in love with Meg Ryan, or spend countless hours playing bullet on Chess.com.

Format:

• A single-elimination, seeded knockout tournament, each round decided by a 12-game match. 
• Winners advance until one world champion remains. The losers of the semifinals play one extra match for third place.
• The All-Time World Chess Championship begins Tuesday, November 10, 2015 in a sold-out stadium in Arlington, Texas, and simulcast on Chess.com for millions of viewers around the world.

Match Rules:

• The match schedule, rules, and time control are identical (with one exception) to the current world championship: best of 12 classical games, with a tiebreak round at faster time controls in the event of a 6-6 tie.
• The exception: all 12 games will be played, regardless of match score. If we are taking the trouble to reanimate chess geniuses and send them traveling through time, we might as well play all 12 games for pride and posterity.

I decided to do something similar. I would select the all-time best ever players in the world who had not become world champion. Please note that my choices may not be correct; I will exclude some world-class players like Fine, Reshevsky, Zukertort, Ulhmann, Browne, and other such players.

In addition, I thought it would be more interesting to do a mini-match tournament. The way this will work is that whenever one of the players gets paired against another one, they play a match of 12 games, not just one game.

Time to introduce the players! Let us welcome:

Korchnoi

Keres

Nimzowitsch

Morphy

Geller

Rubenstein

Chigorin

Pillsbury

Schlecter

Bronstein

These eight players have been selected from various eras of chess. May the best player win!

Let's continue with 

Player Biographies

Viktor Korchnoi

From wikipedia:

Viktor Lvovich Korchnoi^[2] (Russian: Ви́ктор Льво́вич Корчно́й; IPA: [vʲiktər lʲvovʲɪtɕ kɐrtɕˈnoj]; born 23 March 1931) is a professional chess player, author and until recently the oldest active grandmaster on the tournament circuit. He is widely considered the strongest player to have never become World Chess Champion,^[3] with the main alternative choices for that distinction being Paul Keres and Akiba Rubinstein.

Born in Leningrad, Soviet Union, Korchnoi defected to the Netherlands in 1976, and has been residing in Switzerland for many years. Korchnoi played three matches against Anatoly Karpov. In 1974, he lost the Candidates final to Karpov, who was declared world champion in 1975 when Bobby Fischer refused to defend his title. He then won two consecutive Candidates cycles to qualify for World Championship matches with Karpov in 1978 and 1981, losing both.

Korchnoi was a candidate for the World Championship on ten occasions (1962, 1968, 1971, 1974, 1977, 1980, 1983, 1985, 1988 and 1991). He was also a four-time USSR chess champion, a five-time member of Soviet teams that won the European championship, and a six-time member of Soviet teams that won the Chess Olympiad. In September 2006, he won the World Senior Chess Championship.

In the first part of his career Korchnoi's playing style was characterised by aggressive counter-attack, and by tenacious defence. But in his prime he had become a genuine all-rounder in the style of Fischer. He played equally well with or without the initiative, in attack or defence, tactically or positionally, in the opening or in the endgame. Korchnoi had a plus score against the world champions Tal, Petrosian and Spassky, and an equal score against Botvinnik and Fischer.

Paul Keres

Paul Keres was one of the greatest attackers of all time. He was one of the best in the world during his peak in the 1930's and 1940's, and sacrifices slashed through his play. He is one of the likeliest to win this match.

Aron Nimzowitsch

Aron Nimzowitsch redesigned chess. One of the greatest ambassadors of Hypermodern play, his games included wins over Capablanca, Alekhine, Lasker and other great players of the early 20th century. Players such as Petrosian have great debt to pay to Nimzowithsch for his teachings. His book, My System, is a must-have for all chessplayers wishing to improve their knowledge of the royal game.

Paul Morphy

The first game that was likely shown to you was a Morphy game. Morphy was one of the first to realize the value of time and also of the harmony between the pieces. Each Morphy game is in itself enjoyable and instructive, and he has taught generations of chessplayers through his games.

Efim Geller

One of the greatest positional players of the mid 20th century, Geller was one of the several players that almost became world champion--Keres and Bronstein. He produced many wonderful positional masterpieces and his games should be in ever chessplayer's library.

Akiba Rubenstein

"Rubenstein is the rook endgame from a game that was started by the Gods millenium ago"--Tartakower.

Indeed, Rubenstein's skill for the endgame--and the rook endgame in general, made him the 2cnd strongest player in his peak in 1910. It is unfortunate that a match with Lasker, who was then world champion, could not be organized. Otherwise, chess history may have been very different.

Mikhail Chigorin

Chigorin was a predessecor of Alekhine and Tal. His play was logical--in a twisted, seemingly unsensible way. He utterly confused his opponents and almost becamse world champion. Sadly, in a critical game with World Champion Steinitz, his blunder-prone chess failed and he blundered a simple mate in 2 in an otherwise easily winning position.

Harry Pillsbury

Pillsbury was a straightforward player. But the problem is, his play was hard to stop. He was equally strong in all parts of the game and finished ahead of Steinitz, Lasker, and Chigorin in the Hastings 1895 tournament. A match with Lasker was about to happen, but Pillsbury fell into ill health and soon died. Otherwise, the 3rd world champion may not have been Capablanca.

Carl Shlechter

Shlecther was as close as anyone to winning the world title, but after reaching a winning position against Lasker in their 1909 world title match he unfortunately lost the game. Two years later, he died of starvation, too proud to ask for money for food...

David Bronstein 

Bronstein actually tied a match against Botvinnik, but lost due to the FIDE rules at that time that stated that Botvinnik would keep his title. Once again, Bronstein drew a winning position...

That was our last candidate! I will try to make this an even match up. Round 1 is going to start tomorrow, already Game 12 of most of the matches have started, and Bronstein just opened 1.e4 e5 2.f4 against Chigorin!!! Let me know your predictions in the comments...