FIDE Grand Prix - Baku 2014

Caruana looks to be in some trouble.

Looks like this will be his first loss since August 8th.  Pretty crazy.

That's what he gets for playing that Scandinavian junk.  

I was hoping for a Qa5 scandinavian, sadly it was a Qd6.

Game annotated from TWIC website:

The Nakamura game, also from TWIC:

Caruana lost again. 

Games from TWIC:

So where are the idiots who claim Fabiano is cheating? I think his run is largely luck, but luck runs out eventually, and there were glimpses of it during Sinquefield final rounds. So are they going to say Giri is cheating now?

Anyone but lenier can still win. The bottom tablers have been beating the  leaders which explains the tight pack. I also think someone will win out from the group currently in the lead but who? If you look at the remaining match-ups it favors Caruana. If he can beat dominguez with black today then he has the best shot. Naka will have a chance vs Mamedyarov but I doubt he can beat Radjabov with black so best case for him is probably 1.5/2.0 in the remaining two games. The others are playing each other mostly so anythying can happen but I expect cagey games with no one wanting to risk it all with some insane attack.

Debistro Giri is not even in this event. He has risen without having to face Aronian, Carlsen, Caruana, Nakamura and others. When he runs into them in future events and maintains or increases his rating we will know the truth. Same with Wesley So. He is collecting points off 2500 and 2600 players. Big deal.

I mention Giri because his rating has shot up due to a string of wins. Sure, he isn't playing against the top guys in Baku, but if Andreikin can beat Caruana, everyone above 2700 is fair game. And since Giri and So most likely will enter the top 10 soon with such steady results (wait, they are already top 10), so my contention was - why pick on Caruana for his steady rise? That said, I maintain Carlsen is in a league of his own. As a real 2800, his results against all others barring the occasional upset, is rock solid.

Dominguez has been a whipping boy this event.  

Tomashevsky has been unbeaten this whole tournament, as well as being the lowest rated player. Can Caruana beat him tomorrow? A draw would be painful for his rating...

FIDE has just announced that the third leg of the GP cycle will take place in Tbilisi, rather than Tehran, and that Georgia's top player Baadur Jobava will replace Iranian Grandmaster Ehsan Ghaem-Maghami in the three GP events that the latter was scheduled to play in. See the link below:

http://www.fide.com/component/content/article/1-fide-news/8332-grand-prix-announcement.html

Iran doesn't seem like the best idea to hold a major chess event.  I doubt Gelfand would want to go there for starters.

Caruana had said previously that he didn't want to go to Iran either.  

The upside to Iran is they have, hands down, the best looking women on the planet.  Quite the conundrum.

That's sad, it would have been nice to see a chess event somewhere different.

Huh?  Best looking on the planet? That's a bold statement...

@SilentKnighte5,

I doubt Gelfand would be allowed in the country as an Israeli.  For once FIDE did something right and moved the tournament to a place where everyone can compete.  The tournament had no business being in a place where some competitors were barred.