Keanuinc
this guy! tal 2.0
Greatest Chess Master in History
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simaginfan wrote:
You had to google him!? Hmm!!!
My friend kamalakanta did a small post on him here.
https://www.chess.com/blog/kamalakanta/vladimir-simagin-a-forgotten-hero
Perhaps when I have the time to spare I will do a full appreciation on chess.com. What the article doesn't give is the fact that he was that in correspondence chess even world champions were in awe of him - if you can find them look for his c.c. wins against Rittner and Miliutin for example - and he was the second/trainer of choice at the peak of Soviet chess power. He did not play abroad for various political reasons, which contributes to his not being so well known in the west.
Yeah, I don't recall seeing the name but that's not surprising since he didn't play abroad.
Time for a game. Great attack by Nezhmetdinov.
Nezhmetdinov is one of those forgotten names who has recently been'rediscovered', which is great. I have Petrorosian's own copy of Nezhmetdinov's best games in my library.😁
simaginfan wrote:
Nezhmetdinov is one of those forgotten names who has recently been'rediscovered', which is great. I have Petrorosian's own copy of Nezhmetdinov's best games in my library.😁
I also posted the above game on my other thread, Favorite famous game. If you'd like to share some of your favorites, drop by it sometime.
https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/favorite-famous-game
Most of my favourite games are not famous!! There are 2 of my favourites by well known players on a couple of my blogs. Rubinstein and janowski. Also the game helling - Engels on my most recent post is one which if someone famous had played it, would be in all the anthologies.
https://www.chess.com/blog/simaginfan/milan-vidmar-some-games-and-writings is a great source for Milan Vidmar stuff. 
simaginfan wrote:
Most of my favourite games are not famous!! There are 2 of my favourites by well known players on a couple of my blogs. Rubinstein and janowski. Also the game helling - Engels on my most recent post is one which if someone famous had played it, would be in all the anthologies.
It's not necessary that a game be famous - as long as it's brilliant, interesting or unique.
ohduckme wrote:
i like Milan Vidmar because he has a cool sounding "secret agent" kind of name. He also has awesome looking mustache
Is that a vote for Milan Vidmar?
I'll take advantage of the lull in the action by posting the current standings.
Current standings:
Paul Morphy: 7
Bobby Fischer: 7
Garry Kasparov: 3
Magnus Carlsen: 3
Aron Nimzowitsch: 2
André Danican Philidor: 2
Mikhail Tal: 2
Emanuel Lasker: 1
Igor Ivanov: 1
Alexander Alekhine: 1
Vishy Anand: 1
Paul Keres: 1
Max Euwe: 1
José Raúl Capablanca: 1
Gioacchino Greco: 1
Karpov could beat most of the players on the list.
troy7915 wrote:
Karpov could beat most of the players on the list.
Perhaps. But you understand that we're evaluating masters on a relative basis - not on an absolute basis. Obviously Philidor and Morphy would be no match for Carlsen. Today's masters have enormous advantages over yesterday's. Check out my opening post. It explains how we're comparing masters of different eras.
By the way, Karpov hasn't received a nomination yet. Do you want to nominate him?
The point is why hasn’t he? Do others go by whether or not they like the person, his statements, his behavior, his face (!) ?
I mean, ‘relative’ is one thing, but to not ‘nominate’ someone because of his face/style as a person is quite another.
If one is looking strictly at the chess player, not at the person Karpov, it is impossible—even in a relative sense— to comprise a list without him making it.
If that happens, it makes you think twice about the value of the whole idea.
troy7915 wrote:
The point is why hasn’t he? Do others go by whether or not they like the person, his statements, his behavior, his face (!) ?
I mean, ‘relative’ is one thing, but to not ‘nominate’ someone because of his face/style as a person is quite another.
If one is looking strictly at the chess player, not at the person Karpov, it is impossible—even in a relative sense— to comprise a list without him making it.
If that happens, it makes you think twice about the value of the whole idea.
I don't think anybody disputes that Karpov is one of the game's all-time greats. But so far nobody has nominated him as the best. Is that unfair? Everybody is entitled to his opinion. In fact, even though I gave you the opportunity, you haven't nominated Karpov. Why then do you complain that he hasn't been nominated?
"Do others go by whether or not they like the person, his statements, his behavior, his face (!) ?"
The problem with Karpov is that he played Kasparov in five matches without winning any of them in spite of all of them being played when Kasparov was quite young (Kasparov was more than 150 Elo below his peak when he won the title against Karpov after in all 72 match games). Karpov also faced Kasparov in numerous tournaments, finishing ahead of him only once.
So, even if one can come up with various more or less logical ways to decide that Lasker is greater than Kasparov or Fischer greater than Smyslov or Carlsen greater than Anand, it is more or less impossible to come up with any way to rank Karpov as greater than Kasparov.
puddyporridge wrote:
I vote for Bobby Fischer and Magnus Carlsen
You know what happens when you vote for two candidates for the same office? You guessed it. Neither vote counts. If you want your vote to count, you've got to vote for only one.
fabelhaft wrote:
"Do others go by whether or not they like the person, his statements, his behavior, his face (!) ?"
The problem with Karpov is that he played Kasparov in five matches without winning any of them in spite of all of them being played when Kasparov was quite young (Kasparov was more than 150 Elo below his peak when he won the title against Karpov after in all 72 match games). Karpov also faced Kasparov in numerous tournaments, finishing ahead of him only once.
So, even if one can come up with various more or less logical ways to decide that Lasker is greater than Kasparov or Fischer greater than Smyslov or Carlsen greater than Anand, it is more or less impossible to come up with any way to rank Karpov as greater than Kasparov.
I agree. I've said before in this thread that Karpov's problem is that he was the guy between Fischer and Kasparov. It's impossible to think of Karpov without thinking of either of them. Karpov was a great player but I think most believe he was not as great as those two.
Apparently troy7915 thinks Karpov is being discriminated against because of his personality and looks. I doubt that. He was simply overshadowed by the performance of the champions who came immediately before and after him. If I was going to rank those three on the basis of character, that would an easy call.
1. Kasparov is a good man who has demonstrated great moral courage.
2. Karpov was just a chess grandmaster; if he distinguished himself otherwise, I'm not aware of it.
3. Fischer was a despicable human being.
Yo Smyslovfan - great name by the way!
Indeed, there is one opposite bishops ending in particular - from a correspondence game - that is exceptional. Also a game, against kasparian I think, that is given in the Kamalakanta post which features possible the most incredible move ever seen in an over the board ending. Reversing the compliment, Smyslov was one of the great endgame artists of all time. Huge fan!