(#427) That person is a liar.
I'm gonna tell them that you said that.
(#427) Fischer was an absolute horrible human being. Horrible. Never nice to anyone.
Leave his personal life outta this, okay ? That's unfair and dastardly. Ohh, & BTW, did you ever sit down & have a cup of coffee with him ?....I didn't think so.
this richie guy is dangerously similar to what's that other's dude name, rdecrico or whatever it was, reb will probably remember him.
Besides, BF was scared to play younger players than him. He avoided them like a haunted house (think Karpov). But when he did ?....he lost - like to Garcia-Palermo and many-many others thruout his 60's tours. He couldn't absorb their energy 'cuz youth draws energy from the elders.
....and that is the secret weapon he never wanted anyone to know about. But the truth is outta the sack now....'cuz you just heard it from me.
this richie guy is dangerously similar to what's that other's dude name, rdecrico or whatever it was, reb will probably remember him.
I think you are correct ... " a rose by any other name " 
In any event only a complete moron would claim that Fischer was never nice to anyone . I apologize to morons .
As a european player, I'd like to answer the question in the headline.
No, we think Fischer was way ahead of his time and one of the greatest players in history.
- but some americans like to claim far more than that - eg. that he is unquestionably and by a wide margin THE greatest player of all time, and that if we could bring him back in a time machine, he would crush Carlsen and all the other world class players in a blindfolded simul.
When we - non-american players - are faced with fantastic claims like that, we start to go, like, ehmm... No. That would be Chuck Norris. Or God.
Fischer was good, but not THAT good (ie. not as good as the (common) fantastic statements along the above lines).
In short:
Fischer was an amazing player, unquestionably the best of his generation, but some people praise him like he was some sort of God, and that's when we Europeans like to take things down a bit. Just a notch.
That's probably what you've heard, and then you wonder: 'Oh, they think he's not THAT good?'
Yes, we we think he is not as good as God. We are quite sure he was a chessplaying human being, who happened to be very, very strong. 
MindBoggle: The "Fischer Boom" got ahold of them and then never let go of their emotions. They got all hung up on the chess movement starting in 1972 as it got all mixed up w/ politics & war & which country was better.
They haven't fooled us tho' any....
....
Something of a smaller scale is what's happening in Norway right now.
Who gives a crap about this match? It means virtually nothing and has no place in a conversation about how good Fischer was. His chess career ended in 1972, so this is all about what was and what might have been.
You're not getting off so ez there Jeffy.
Go back & read about how world-watched these games were. The hellahype was humongous !
Agreed. But I don't agree that it shouldn't have been so. I would say the same thing to those people as I say here - this match has no meaning outside of Fischer's delusional mind and Fischer's and Spassky's pocketbooks!
My Dearest Jeffy,
I consider myself one of the more knowledgeable ppl here on Mr. Chess Dot Com about the negative side of BF's chessplaying ability. I have purposefully taken the counterstance 'cuza all these geewhiz fanboyz holding their collective cheeks in hand.
I have proven time repeatedly & exhaustively eternal that BF had occasional flaws buried in his game that would now & again rear themselves at random.
Pleez....I will allow noone, & I mean noone, to excuse his play in 1992 'cuza its meaninglessness. Assume & correctly that he tried his hardest. But like every other player in his mid-40's ?....he couldn't live up to his past 'cuz he wasn't any good anymore. He had been scuttled to the rank-n-filers....just another GM patzer.
That needs to be accepted & yet it refuses to be 'cuz emotions get in the way as we lead with what beats under our shoulders and not what thinks above it.
End of story here. But, if anyone wants to keep going ?....I will certainly accommodate. I am warning you tho', I know alotta about the goods & bads of BF's chessplaying dayz.
w/ <3....Lola
I wonder what God's rating would be ?
A perfect rating is somewhat below 3600. It's hard to calculate exactly, but Kenneth Regan used 3571 for his models.
There would not have been any cold war if General Paton had been allowed to continue on into Berlin.Eisenhower didn't allow it.He suspended Paton's tank division petrol rations needed to do so when Paton's men were on the edge of Berlin.Paton was shocked at what he saw in the behaviour of the Red Army and concluded that WW2 was fought against the wrong side.His post war aim was to leave the army and do an intensive speaking tour of the US to inform the public of his views.He never got to do that due to a car crash in peacetime Germany one quiet Sunday morning.Sent to hospital,he was recovering and was ready to be flown to the US to continue his rehabilitation when he suffered a sudden and unexpected deteriation in his condition and died.Parts of his medical records are missing and no autopsy was performed despite him being a 4 star general.
There would not have been any cold war if General Paton had been allowed to continue on into Berlin.Eisenhower didn't allow it.He suspended Paton's tank division petrol rations needed to do so when Paton's men were on the edge of Berlin.Paton was shocked at what he saw in the behaviour of the Red Army and concluded that WW2 was fought against the wrong side.His post war aim was to leave the army and do an intensive speaking tour of the US to inform the public of his views.He never got to do that due to a car crash in peacetime Germany one quiet Sunday morning.Sent to hospital,he was recovering and was ready to be flown to the US to continue his rehabilitation when he suffered a sudden and unexpected deteriation in his condition and died.Parts of his medical records are missing and no autopsy was performed despite him being a 4 star general.
Well that's interesting. . .
There would not have been any cold war if General Paton had been allowed to continue on into Berlin.Eisenhower didn't allow it.He suspended Paton's tank division petrol rations needed to do so when Paton's men were on the edge of Berlin.Paton was shocked at what he saw in the behaviour of the Red Army and concluded that WW2 was fought against the wrong side.His post war aim was to leave the army and do an intensive speaking tour of the US to inform the public of his views.He never got to do that due to a car crash in peacetime Germany one quiet Sunday morning.Sent to hospital,he was recovering and was ready to be flown to the US to continue his rehabilitation when he suffered a sudden and unexpected deteriation in his condition and died.Parts of his medical records are missing and no autopsy was performed despite him being a 4 star general.
Those are some bold and unrelated statements.
That needs to be accepted & yet it refuses to be 'cuz emotions get in the way
You're drawing some wrong conclusions there. First, Fischer's play isn't "excused" because the match was "meaningless". The match was "meaningless" simply because Fischer wasn't playing good chess anymore, regardless of how hard he tried (and I'm sure he tried his hardest). (Not to mention the second reason it was meaningless - that Fischer was delusional that it could be called a World Championship.)
Second, he wasn't playing below his potential as much because he was over 40 as because he hadn't been playing competitive chess, or preparing properly, and because he was mentally ill. So yes, most people decline in physical/mental abilities over age 40 and he would have been past his peak anyway, but there were other factors that played a bigger role.
Is this an excuse? No, not really. The point is Fischer was great in 1972, and then basically his career was over, by his own doing. A lame 1992 match doesn't change the fact that he was great in the 60s-72.
Now as to his accomplishments in '67-'72. I mean to this day, people still can't believe it. Fischer crushed (not beat, but crushed) Taimanov 6-0. Fischer crushed (not beat, but crushed) Larsen 6-0. Fischer then blew away Petrosion 6.5 - 2.5, winning the last 4 straight. You can't say that Fischer only won because his opponents were older - they earned their right to be there by beating younger opponents to begin with. Fischer couldn't help it that some older guys beat some younger guys in order to get to play him.
Fischer gained a far higher rating than any player in history up to that time. 20 straight WINS (not merely undefeated) against the best competitors in the world in interzonal and candidates matches. 8 first place tournament finishes in a row. Highest single match performance rating ever (against Larsen). Kasparov himself said that no player in history ever dominated like Fischer's "incredible" 12–0 score.
Again, comparing his career with Tiger Woods', were they the greatest players of all time? I suppose that depends on how you look at it. Woods will never match Nicklaus' tournament record (we assume, now). And in that sense, of an overall career, Fischer cannot really be called the best of all time either. However, having personally lived through both of these dominant eras, each person was the greatest of all time given the conditions at the time, for a certain period of time. Woods dominance of the sport for the period of time that it lasted was simply unparalleled, regardless of whether that dominance lasted as long as some people wished. So was Fischer's performance. It's sad that it came to an abrupt end, but saying that he didn't play much good chess afterward is missing the point, because it's already obvious he didn't have any longevity and can't compete with other champions in that sense.
Those are some bold and unrelated statements.
The kind of leading, innuendo-style statementst that get people fired up about conspiracy theories, but ultimately have no satisfying evidence.
How do you like me in my combat boots ?
Am I cute in my combat boots ?
How do you like me in my combat boots ?
I'm so happy....in my combat boots !
..... from Bobby to Bikini
really?
Do you really wanna know who the best chess player was of all-time was ? (how many wuzzies wuzzat ?)
Well, I'll tell you....
It was way back on a dark & cold Halloween Nite back in 1892 (how many backs was that ?) that Anisya Prokhorova gave birth to a child.
You see ?....the bitter winds that travered the mighty banks of the Moskva River was preparing to bring forth an historical change. A child was born outta wedlock (w/ the key subsequently thrown into the river in a fit of rage) near the turn of a century past. This Bolshevik-to-be bundle of bouncing joy showed incredible ability to retain, obtain, sustain, regain, & basically just feign stuff on the 64-squares of life....as we know it.
....who was he ?
Oh come on lolo, this is not kindergarden although it looks like it most of the time - you can only fool fools and you know that