KGA: (g5) In the olden days? What is agadmator talking about here?

"Agadmator meant a specific period, one that anyone who has studied the history of chess is familiar with: 1850s, 1860s, 1870s, 1880s."

Then present the games. Show me a game where they played g5 in a high stakes tournament? If it is played like the example I gave, it was only played 1% of the time.

"And because what he said is correct enough already and is common knowledge for anyone familiar with the history of chess."

LOL, yea, if you don't provide proof. Let's see how this is established theory back in the 1850's then. Show me the theory. I don't see it. It may have been played a lot, but not in high stakes games. this is the part you are missing and that is NOT common knowledge. There is no wikipedia page or book that has g5 as the top move from olden times relating to top chess players back in the 1800s, and I doubt KGA was even a top opening in a top tournament in the 1800s. Is there one single source? Please share. 

All I am asking for is one high stakes tournament where KGA was played more often than the Italian. Show me. Make me eat crow.

"Also, the current COVID numbers give plenty of reasons for alarm, and there's no shortange of analyssi from public health experts to back that up."

There were 606,880 deaths of cancer patients in 2019. The current Coronavirus death count is 132,000.

Why aren't you more alarmed about the cancer deaths? Because it isn't reported in your face as much. So, no need to worry right? 

I am not trying to prove it is the best. I am arguing that it isn't an "olden" move. It may have been a frequently played move out of research experimental reasons, but it wasn't to go to move at top tournaments or matches for titles. Good players knew NOT to play it against other good players. Nothing more, nothing less. 

Have at it:

https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?page=6&playercomp=either&eco=C37-C39

You can scroll for pages and pages.

For Agadmator's point, that this was a move that was extremely common in the second half of the nineteenth century, it's immaterial why people were playing it, or whether they were playing it in high-stakes tournaments and matches. Even so, you will find in those pages no shortage of high-stakes games by all the leading players of the day.

Those games listed are largely not high stakes games. That's like showing members' games on chess.com as opposed to the masters' games. You will get inflated numbers which don't represent people playing the best moves, and the numbers don't represent top player choices in high stakes games. 

"For Agadmator's point, that this was a move that was extremely common in the second half of the nineteenth century"

Is it common to attach an ear to the back of a mouse in a lab? Yes, if you are a researcher. But I don't think people would say g5 was the go to move back then. They didn't play it because it was the hip and happening move. 

"it's immaterial why people were playing it, or whether they were playing it in high-stakes tournaments and matches."

It is material. If you play an opening at a memorial tournament or friendly match, you can experiment with openings because losing or drawing with that preparation doesn't affect you as much. If you wait until a WCC match or the Candidates, you are gambling more with little to gain. So, listing chessgames.com games where nothing was at stake only shows the games where they could experiment.

"Even so, you can see no shortage of high-stakes games by all the leading players of the day in those pages."

I will look through some more of them, but so far I don't see a tournament where top players from 1800s chose KGA as their go to opening more than others.

Do you have a TOURNAMENT, not a list of games, but a tournament where high level players at the time played KGA frequently?

The earliest tournament I see from that list is at https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=79271

1st American Chess Congress (1857)

Out of 68 games, I see 3 were KG. Only 1 was with g5. At best we have a tournament so far with ~4% with KG. But strictly speaking, only 1% was with g5. Is there a tournament showing KG played at over 10%? 

To say "common" I think we should at least have 30% from a tournament, don't you think?

Cases in the United States are escalating rapidly at a time when other parts of the world have managed to reduce cases substantially.  That should give us considerable occasion to worry.  (Having lived through this in New York, I can say with confidence that you do not want to reach the levels we reached, where doctors had to decide which one out of every four patients who needed a ventilator could have one, and where corpses had to be buried in mass graves).

Yes, of course people continue to die of cancer, and every cancer death is awful.  But those are deaths there's no easy way of preventing (not that we shouldn't do more). With Covid, the US already has many times as many deaths per capita as other industrialized nations have experienced, and there's now every sign they're going to get much, much worse. If you think that shouldn't be on the news, I don't know what to say.

N.B. This graphic is from almost a week ago. Since then, US cases have continued to break records nearly every day.  We're now at 55,595 new cases per day, a good 17,000 more than the chart shows.

I know this is not a COVID forum, but when people spout dangerous nonsense minimizing the severity of the situation, it's not responsibile to let it go unaddressed.

"Cases in the United States are escalating rapidly at a time when other parts of the world have managed to reduce cases substantially."

That doesn't address Coronavirus. That addresses how US is lacking in battling the virus. If your neighbor lives in a dirtier house, does that mean there is a dirt problem throughout your neighborhood?

"I can say with confidence that you do not want to reach the levels we reached, where doctors had to decide which one out of every four patients"

Again, you are not looking at the severity. What does 1 out of 4 mean? Were all 4 olympic athletes before they died or were diagnosed with Coronavirus? Did they have pre-existing conditions which made them more susceptible to the virus? This is not what is communicated in the numbers.

"If you think that shouldn't be on the news, I don't know what to say."

That's not what I am thinking. You missed what I stated. I said there needs to be more attention on the SEVERITY, not the numbers. The numbers may help with preventing the spread.

But that is like warning people not to eat every meal at McDonald's to prevent nationwide obesity. It doesn't address the obese people with thyroid problems.

To bring the analogy back to chess, the players who played g5 were like the smokers who got cancer, the obese people who became obese because they ate too many McDonald's hamburgers and drank sugary Coke. And they were like the partygoers in the USA who bet on who will get Coronavirus first.

Those that stayed indoors, played it safe, didn't play g5 at tournaments back in the "olden" days.

"when people spout dangerous nonsense minimizing the severity of the situation, it's not responsibile to let it go unaddressed."

I am actually looking to find out the severity. Your graph shows the spread, not the severity.

The spread is indicative of America's lack of action to prevent the spread. It isn't addressing the virus. I hope you understand that.

More spread means more severity.  Not just linearly.  Exponentially. (This is because when hospital systems become overloaded, as is already happened in Houston (a city with *more* hostpitals than most), the outcomes become considerably worse.)

And people are indeed reporting on the severity.  Please read it.

"More spread means more severity."

No, more spread only has the potential of picking up more people. Severity depends on the condition of the individual. Think of it like a tornado. It can't pull up the strong trees, but it can get every house in its path because the houses can't withhold the pull. In between are the weaker trees. They are the 20-50 year olds who are not completely weak or have pre-existing conditions, but they can be the carrier and they can get sick.

My assertion is that those in between cases are the ones who are raising the numbers. The actual death rate is at 4%. So, who is making up the other 96?

Here, as with the history of the KG, your speculation is at odds with what has actually happened.  The g5 KG was astonishingly popular for several decades in the late nineteenth century, at all levels of play.  Coronavirus cases in the US are spiking alarmingly in the US, and with them, death tolls are also on the rise (lagging a few days behind the case increases, as has been true everywhere).  Wherever cases have spiked like this, deaths have spiked too, and there is no evidence that this will be different.  I will of course be delighted if I am wrong in that prediction.

I have no more time for this.

"The g5 KG was astonishingly popular for several decades in the late nineteenth century"

Ok, then provide a tournament. If it is so obvious to you that I am wrong, surely you can show us this in spades. The floor is all yours. Make me eat crow.

"Coronavirus cases in the US are spiking alarmingly in the US, and with them, death tolls are also on the rise"

Losses with g5 are also on the rise when played. I recognize and agree with that. Maybe that is why we don't see high level tournaments in the 1800s, 1900s, or 2000s with KGA g5 being played.

But you could astonish us with your astonishing assertion and tell us a tournament where KG was the main opening top level players played. I would take any century now. It doesn't have to be "olden" times. 

Lol, all this waffle for nothing.

g5 was played because at the romantic era, it was "normal" to keep the pawn and take the gauntlet.

There was no "need" to search anything else for them because it was the move like 2...exf4 was the move or even 1...e5.

It was another vision of chess, during "olden days". And nobody said it was a bad way to play, maybe it is the best! We just discovered more practical lines. But fashion can change u know...

Stockfish prefers g5? U think it can improve all the variations studied in some seconds/minutes?

No one evaluate an opening at move 3 because engines can change their mind if u continue some moves. Nowadays, no computer is able to evalute an opening with so few moves.