What's wrong with 1.b4?

Try ssehc.com

b4 the pawn can be attacked easily and doesn't control the center at all

Please don't blame him... his horse is way too high, and he can't ride off.

big whoop

So, could you objectively tell us why should someone trust mr. Elwert's recommendations, while the man has not played 1.b4 in any of his games? (none featured at the ICCF archive, Mega Database or elsewhere).

Please think independently, and tell us.

Good pick !

My point was that between a forum troll, who plays decent chess, and the GM, my independant thinking about whether the GM plays "antistrategic and clueless moves" is : hmm... Did the forum troll become a GM ?

Come on tiger, naming PeterLeeflang a forum troll is much too harsh. Your English is normally very good, hence should you say 'who is playing decent chess' instead of 'that plays decent chess'. A troll is a person, not a thing. Having a rating of 2385 is imo more then decent chess from my point of view (some 100 points beneath your rating).

I agree with Pfren however that it is very remarkable to write a book without ever playing it and I agree with you that it is quite remarkable to call the play of a GM antistrategic and clueless. That is why I asked PeterLeeflang in the first place and I am still waiting for a concrete answer. I will never start reading two books about b4 in order to understand why a GM made clueless moves in an opening I will never play with white.

But weren't we all very surprised when super GM Gelfand exchanged queens in his first game against Carlsen? Similar words were used. Nobody objected to that. But there were good reasons for that. Now let's wait and see what the answer of PeterLeeflang will be.

Irontiger has a sharp keyboard, that is true, but he is not insulting people for the mere fun of it. As far as I know him, he is in for good arguments and proper reasoning, yet will react sharply when he sees unjustified claims. I like his point of view, but think that he is overreacting this time. I dislike it when people are turned into objects.

Poor grammar, sorry. Post edited. I did not pay attention.

I never intended to insult peterleeflang apart from calling him a troll, and I think this is deserved when saying that a GM played obviously stupid moves without pointing them out.

I am ready to believe the GM made mistakes, but I don't see them.

As Black I've tried 1.Nf3 Nf6 2.g3 b5, which my limited chess library says was initially a Spassky idea and was later taken up by Karpov. I've had good results with it in correspondence. Spraggett played it, although until he makes the positional themes obvious his games are often beyond my understanding.

@Irontiger: that is how I know you :-) and I agree with you that PeterLeeflang should give concrete answers justifying such a strong claim.

Umm, sorry for being thick, but WHO had a rating of 2385, and where?

It's funny when people talk about online ratings as if "he is a 2300 player" isn't it...

"FIDE?"

"No, I mean chess.com"

lol

I think some miss the point.

I will probably never achieve peter's rating on chess.com, I do not think he achieved it by dishonest means, and I do think this measures more or less the playing strength. So he is possibly a better player than I will ever be, granted. I also think a GM is better than him.

But it doesn't change the fact that some of his statements can be questioned even by someone under his rating. If he says "in position XXX Black's activity compensate for the pair of bishops" when I believed it was a clear advantadge for White, I will trust it coming from him, while I would not coming from a beginner. If he says "1.b4 is an excellent move, GMs that lose with it are morons, and buy a book to find a justification", I will find it suspicious, coming from a 2300 as much as coming from a 1300.

Pfren, I think they're referring to peterleeflang and his Online Chess rating on chess.com.

When tournament players identify a player as a rating it's never with an online rating.  This is also true in any instructional material you read.  If an author mentions a 2300 rated player it will almost always mean FIDE (but maybe in context it could mean a national rating).

I would NEVER read an opening book that was not played a lot by the author(s). There are very rare exceptions of course, but the point is you can see if the author can always give a very trustworthy subjective evaluation about the position and if he/she is reliable.

That's why Avrukh is amazing with his opening repetoire books, and even Esserman's Mayhem in the Morra book is great because he has thousands of games played in the morra, and is one of the main advocates in the world. 

I always like an author with experience about said opening.

That being said, I don't believe there is a single good 1.b4 book, because a good book can't change an undesirable opening even with many experiences.

I mean, no serious GM plays it, right? Btw, it's totally playable. End of story.

There's even the funny move 1...c6 with strong ideas of 2...Qb6

It is still a stupid talk. Can someone give variants ?

Nobody takes the useless, engine-corroded chess.com ratings for real. Sad, but true. Only the FIDE ratings have some real value.

His FIDE rating is precisely non-existent.