Kasparov said that fischer had the greatest distance between him and his peers. of modern gms. he said fischer was 15 years ahead of the field. again the present gm's can always learn from the past. like newton said "if I have seen farther than others it is only because I stood on the shoulders of giants."
Morphy, Capablanca greatest natural talent. reshevsky (greatest to never win) fischer man it's too hard. I respect fischer for doing what he did self-taught against a system of schools that's amazing. Karpov and Kasparov, stayed strong so long.
I heard that fischer brought a lot of new ideas to the table which in the 70's is harder to do than in the 20's. and many ideas today that gm's find are computer aided.
this is a tough question I cannot answer I like Kasparov, Karpov and fischer as strongest recent players.
but man Fischer to have elo of 2785 in 1972????
and kasparov to have an elo of 2851 in 1999. 27 year difference for 66 elo points? pretty amazing.
Many people have their own views about who is the best chess player ever and I suppose you could never really say for 100% due to the rating differences throughout time... eg. it was a lot harder for someone like Capablanca to get to 2851 (world record by Kasparov) than it is nowadays.
This may be a very harsh statement in some people's thinking but looking at the following table, I think it is a joke how such players as Lékó and Bareev can be higher than the greats of the game like Tal but as I have already said the average Elo rating of top players has risen over time. For instance, the average of the top 100 has risen from 2645 in July 2001 to 2665 in July 2006. Many people believe that this rise is mostly due to a system artifact known as rating inflation, making it impractical to compare players of different eras.
So, what is your opinion... who is the best player ever and how have these modern susperstars made their way up the ranks so quickly?
I am sure many people will have different views so lets see what you think...