Fishing Pole Trap

Anyone know why it's called the Fishing Pole?

I don't know if this is true or not, but someone here on the boards said they thought it was named that because Fischer invented it.

Yeah I read that post.  I've never heard that anywhere else though. 

Yes, plus I read the two latest books about Fischer (Endgame and Bobby Fischer goes to War) and neither of them mention the trap.

And yo, peep this:  By the time Fischer was 12 years old he was playing high-level competitive chess out of New York City, right?  So why would he bother propagating some cheesy trap that any average 1200 rated player can pick up on in half a second?  The Fishing Pole would not have been part of Fischer's milieu.  Make sense?

It seems sort of obvious, doesn't it?  Kinda like baiting the hook and hoping for that bite...

Read an interesting article about a similar trap earlier except with the rook instead of knight to accomplish the same purpose. 

http://www.chess.com/article/view/the-fischers-patent

There's just no need to try and kick the knight and weaken your kingside structure. Let it sit there and ask itself what it's doing.

This is really a great trap and similar positions come up from time to time in many different games, sometimes in the opening sometimes in the middle game. This is not some cheesey trap for a 1200 player. Chess Master Bill Wall advocates using it on his web page. The fishing pole is a variation of the Berlin Defense in the Ruy Lopez. It is called "fishing pole" because the Knight is bait and the Rook's file is the fishing line.  I have found that sometimes I am in a losing position in the middle game and I can set a trap of this kind and once in a while I pull off a win with it, even when I normally would have lost the game. 

The problem with the early Ng4 move is that it loses a tempo. The knight will have to move back to safety sooner or later. Giving white even more initiative in the opening is a bad idea.

I think simply bxn followed by d4 is playable versus the FP.

Cogwheel's line (#16) is the only one where I can see the fishing pole used reasonably (until move 8).

However, it pretty much forces after some time the trade of Black's light-squared bishop which is his only compensation in the exchange variation.

Cogwheel : in your lines, 8...Qf6 ? loses a tempo compared to ...gxf3 9.Qxf3 Qh4 ; and after 13.Kg2 White is not doing fine : he survived but lost a pawn, for a questionable lead in development (it would hardly compensate half a pawn).

Here's an example of the Fishing Pole position used in a middle game, in this instance the Fishing Pole is on the queen side and the opponent tries to escape but he is  nonetheless forced into a bad position and mate would have been his fate had he not run out of time. This was a 5 minute blitz game that started out as Muzio Gambit. It illustrates how the Fishing Pole can destroy the opponent.

Black resigned there?! He had Rf7 winning the queen. 0-1.

Hardly a game to prove a point.

EDIT: Just seen the game was won on time, hardly destroyed.

Nonetheless the Fishing Pole slowed him down, he had a winning game by the 22nd move and he was so upset by the brilliance of the sacrifice that he lost time trying to defend it and in blitz time is of the essence.

That says nothing of the quality of the move, which is what was being debated.

Otherwise you could say randomly throwing your queen away is good because it might slow someone down in blitz. He had an easily winning game.

I admit Qxf6 was a blunder, but Qe6+ would have won, the clocks were running down on both sides. 

frank124c, I hope this is a joke. You are using a beginners' game full of mistakes to prove the idea of the fishing pole is great ?

And I can't see how Qe6+ instead of Qxf6 would have won : there is a knight on g5, remember how they move ?

@frank: really neat fishing hat :-)

Absolutely devastating if two conditions are met:

1. Your opponent has never seen this tried before.
2. While analyzing the position after capturing the minor piece, your opponent doesn't see Qh4!

I used to employ the tactic all the time when I was climbing in bullet but eventually gave it up at ~1400 elo when most knew better than to take.   

You'd have to be a fool to play this in a game that isn't ridiculously short. The simple explanation is it's only a matter of time before you have to move the knight again.