True but the same number of opponents can be beaten in matches. A single game is still a single game, even against a lot of opponents. Actually it's not possible to make so many matches but it's very unbalanced in favor of tournament achievements right now.
20 years peak range
| #1 | Garry Kasparov | 2856 | |
| #2 | Anatoly Karpov | 2818 | |
| #3 | Emanuel Lasker | 2809 | |
| #4 | Alexander Alekhine | 2781 | |
| #5 | Viktor Korchnoi | 2766 | |
| #6 | Vassily Smyslov | 2759 | |
| #7 | Paul Keres | 2755 | |
Hint: He played today and won his last 2 matches against the Worlds #1 ranked player in Blitz.
Kasparov for those playing the home game
People have a lot of intelligent things to say in this thread, about how to compare across the generations. Several posts back, I rattled off "Lasker Lasker" without putting in any justification, but I guess nobody rose to that bait. Well, then, to explain, some thoughts ...
I meant to indicate how "great" Emanuel Lasker was on the basis of the degree of CONTRIBUTION he made to the game. I'm trying to do a sort-of subjective judgment of the player within his time's context. Oddly, Morphy and Philidor both arrived on the scene, beat everyone, and then (it might be said) left the scene rather unchaged after their departure. Lasker, relative to those examples of Morphy and Philidor (as I have, perhaps wrongly, characterized them) is the grand-master most different from them.
During Lasker's time, he came into his championship right at a time when people couldn't really rely on international competition to be accurate and fair -- travel times, difficulties among world congress rules, wars between the various competing nations, etc.. Despite this context, he managed somehow to establish that a world chess championship could be held, tenaciously, for a remarkable period of time. He made sure he was world champion, just as effectively as he made sure he consistently beat people at the chessboard following the rules of chess. The two are different competitions, and I credit Lasker with being among the first to effectively exploit the differences.
Well, best? I'm not sure if Lasker would necessarily beat Fischer or Kasparov (if we could do the time-travel necessary to bring them together, which we can't) but I think that would be, because the game has successfully moved on. Nobody had ever heard of "hypermoderns" when Lasker first achieved his title. Well, plenty of the concepts would have been available to them, but not in the codified form which (for example) Carlsen and Polgar must have studied as beginners.
Lasker was a grumpus -- making sure not to play against someone if he wasn't at his best; resisting many attempts by challengers to play against him (the "London Rules" were created in response to Lasker's interpersonal ... ehm ... "resistance" during challenge negotiations). But I'm of the opinion, that he was a grumpus because he really felt that he needed to be, since arrangements could have been very detrimental. From Lasker's point of view, defending the title meant, among other things, defending it against poorly arranged (for him) challenges. So, he took tactics and strategy one step further -- beyond the board. Perhaps a similar tactic to a recent group of women who had to be constrained by new FIDE rules not to reveal unreasonable amounts of cleavage ... heh ...
Furthermore, Lasker's grumpiness was part and parcel of his playing style. He played "the man not the board" more than many other grandmasters. As I understand it, this rather psychological approach was something almost revolutionary during his time, since the knowledge of the game had gotten to the point where some experts were claiming that chess studies had finally arrived at a "perfect" level of analysis (oh! the hubris!). The flush of excitement at the new scientific discoveries of the turn of the century, the fall of ancien regimes across Europe, gave modern technical analysis the appearance of being the necessary, insurmountable wave coming in the future. But in the face of that historical context, Lasker just looked the game in the eye and said, in effect, "Well, you underlings analyze scientifically all you want; I'll beat your science with my personality-based approach anyway." And generally he did. So, that's why I'm impressed with him.
Sure, maybe Emanuel Lasker wasn't THE GREATEST by what most people mean when they ask the question, who was the greatest chess player of all time. I don't really think that question can be answered. But Lasker was THE MOST TENACIOUS, whether or not that was because he was (also) GRUMPIEST, and (most important to me) he was THE PSYCHOLOGICAL-EST, especially compared with the context from which he arose. His life story and the story of European history during his life suggest to me that he rose a very very great distance above where he and his contemporaries started.
Contrary point: I think Garry Kasparov went a VERY long way this past weekend, to demonstrating that he may deserve to be thought of as best of all time. I don't exactly know how blitz-chess compares to non-blitz, but ya know, it was really quite impressive a performance for some older guy who spends most of his time in politics ...
Hint: He played today and won his last 2 matches against the Worlds #1 ranked player in Blitz.
Magnus Carlsen wasnt playing .
Hint: He played today and won his last 2 matches against the Worlds #1 ranked player in Blitz.
Magnus Carlsen wasnt playing .
No but Garry was.
fischer is the greatest .
he defeated taimanov 6-0,he defeated Larsen 6-0.the only player he found it hard to defeat was mikhail tal
"the only player he found it hard to defeat was mikhail tal"
He had a -2 score against Geller, an even score against Korchnoi, and -5 against Spassky a bit into his last event before retiring...
If you look at chess history it will not take long to realize there are a handful of players who might legitimately be considered "the greatest in the history of chess".If you are looking for the strongest ever in absolute terms,then it is easy,it has got to be Carlsen.As regards "greatest" however,in my view,Lasker and Kasparov stand out as the greatest due to their being insanely successful as world champions, but I can certainly see why others may choose Capa,Alekhine or Fischer for different reasons.
Thank you for sharing such an in-depth analysis of Emanuel Lasker. In my formative chess playing days he was a mentor through whatever games and writings of him I could find. Considering my impression of his personality type, we could have been close friends on and off the chess board. You are pretty much spot on with your perception of the man. Love the guy, i also muze at the fact that he always smoked cigars during play. A Nic habit and maybe a distraction too! Thanks!
Oh yah, another Lasker fan! Glad of it! (New Orleans is my home, so I will have to remember to give Morphy a little credit, too.) But I've always been impressed with the Lasker "contribution" -- to wit, that winning the off-the-board competition was as big as winning over-the-board, or even bigger; and that over-the-board methods and schools, such as Scientific or Hypermodern or Romantic or whatever, only help when you're actually over-the-board.
Let me correct myself a bit. I have mischaracterized Philidor. He actually did leave the "scene" different from its status when he arrived, by his major introduction of the use of pawn structure. I was hunting my limited mental database for someone (like Morphy) who basically had little posthumous impact. Morphy was playing, and then gone, kapoof, and after his presence the remaining players in the world didn't really have to modify their theories due to his impact. They went on playing as they had done before his arrival. I'm sure there are examples of other people who were tops but had limited impact like Morphy, but Philidor is, I now realize, a pretty bad example. Y'all can come up with your own suggestions ...
He didn't even get one of them right! Capitalization counts in spelling.
I would say Kasparov, since he had more longevity...This topic is really a matter of opinion...Carlsen and Anand a close second and third.
"Carlsen and Anand a close second and third"
One might come up with some reasons to place Carlsen top five already but it's difficult to see how Anand could be one of the three greatest players ever. He was maybe the best player in the world for a year or two with a small margin, but had quite underwhelming results as World Champion, when he went five years in a row without winning a tournament. Maybe top ten but I wouldn't go higher than that.
"The reason why some players got beaten bad in matches despite their high rating, is because some of them were more of a tournament player, and since matches between players are not organized as frequently as the number of tournaments, the rating system can not give a reasonable assesment of player's strength"
I'm not sure if I think there are tournament and match players, and that it is matches that show the players strength. I think the rating system is doing a fairly good job, then one can overestimate it just as well as one can overestimate a match result, but at least the ratings are based on all games against all opponents, so they can't get it all that wrong in the end.