Has the Scandinavian Defense become fashionable?

Has anyone gone over the second most common response: 2. Nc3? 

Oh... OK, now I get it.

Sam Collins is the holy spirit for you... or at least, a high priest: You believe what he says without any concrete proof, or even bothering reading his gospel.

I'm sorry to say that I won't bother about his proof. Collins is a good writer, and gets extra points because he actually PLAYS the openings he sells. But while I do not think that he is analysing Dzindzi-style (i.e. hiding the best opponent replies under the carpet), I also think that his claim about an "easy white edge" in the Scandi is ridiculous. Heck, even in the rather unsound tactical lines Smurfo advocates in his book (himself says unsound- I keep an element of doubt in reserve) white has no easy life, and an open road to an advantage. At all.

I studied the Scandinavian because a young man I study with (we're both learning) likes to play it a lot and he played it well.

I agree completely. Possibly in the 3...Qd6 lines white can achieve an edge with a fianchetto set up, and against 3...Qa5 white may cause black problems with a quick Bc4, Bd2 and Nd5. But it is by no means correct to say that white can achieve an easy edge. In fact the opposite is true - I have beaten 2100 and 2200 strength players in under 25 moves with the Smerdon lines. The Scandinavian is a serious try for black and white ignores it at his peril!

When I see assertions like, "You just blindly believe anything any guy says", I find myself contemplating how perceptions can be something other than flawless.

Since you identify no specific sentence as the justification for what you write, I am afraid that I can not help you with improving your methods for arriving at conclusions.

What IM Sam Collins actually wrote was, "White has a relatively easy time getting an edge" (emphasis added), and, as I indicated, the comment appeared in 2005, so, in any event, there have been more than a decade of developments since then. I don't see anything about the Chess magazine April 2016 report on +2400 opening usage.  How long is that going to continue?

Who said anything about it dictating what is good and what is bad? Please answer with a quote or a clear admission that you have no quote.

I never said that the chess magazine is of no significance. There were three questions in the first few sentences of my post #67 comments. I imagine that most have no trouble getting the point. Is there any value in discussing something with someone who does not deal with what I actually write?

My guess is that others do so.

I am not going to try to guess what specifically it is that you "understand" about my point and what is unclear to you. If my questions are something you would rather not talk about, I imagine that I will manage to cope with it somehow.

No, he referred to White having a "relatively" easy time getting an edge. This was after discussions of 1 ... e5, 1 ... c5, 1 ... e6, and 1 ... c6.

I think that I have some idea about the difference between "relatively easy" and "easy". Does jengaias perceive no difference? Does jengaias perceive a difference and nevertheless think it is okay to omit the word, "relatively"? What?

By my count, that is three choices ("otherwise" being the third choice). People can make their own conclusion if I choose "otherwise".

"... When playing 3...Qd6, Black may come under some pressure, bit it's still less than in case of other queen moves (i.e. to a5 or d8). ... I feel that 2...Nf6 is somewhat weaker than 2...Qxd5. ..." - GM Sergey Kasparov (2015)

I have absolutely no plans to find the GM and ask him anything. (More tomorrow.)

I looked up my stats. Hundreds of games. To my surprise, I've been on the Black side of the Scandinavian at least 200 times (Black scores 49%--better than average). The games in my database as a whole (I'm usually White) have White scoring almost 52% (a little below average). Of course, my play on the Black side has some impact on the overall score.

chess.com player name slavenov play this defense with a lot of success

When I moved to Portugal I was shocked by the popularity of the scandinavian defense , it seems everyone there was playing it as black and this included some of their strongest titled players like IM Rui Damaso and GM Luis Galego . 

The Scandinavian Defense is popular in the scholastic pool I play in.

In the Scandinavian, black will be able to maintain a neat pawn structured

well played

"IS"? If we go back about 12 years, we can find:

"3 ... Qd6?! is a little more dodgy [than 3 ... Qd8]. Sermek has tried it out a few times, but personally I think the queen gets in the way here." - (not yet IM) Sam Collins (2004)

As little as about a year later (the time of the "... relatively ..." quote), IM Sam Collins was referring to the "body of theory" "developed" by 3 ... Qd6, and no longer putting "?!" after it.

Remember about 13 days ago when we saw (in another opening discussion), "... things ... constantly change. ..."? Does jengaias want to claim that the 2004 comment was a "HUGE" mistake in 2004?

I don't see any identification of what is perceived as head bowing.

How does current information availability compare with what was readily available back when The Complete French was written? In any event, it seems to me to be worthwhile to pay attention to the word choice: "many times" instead of "always". Specifically, in the case of 1 e4 d5, we have possible clues.

"... When playing 3...Qd6, Black may come under some pressure, bit it's still less than in case of other queen moves (i.e. to a5 or d8). ... I feel that 2...Nf6 is somewhat weaker than 2...Qxd5. ..." - GM Sergey Kasparov (2015)

I didn't notice that in the Complete French quote.

Again, the actual quote: "... While there can be no doubt about the opening's playability, it seems unlikely to become as popular as the main defences to 1 e4 since White has a relatively easy time getting an edge. ..." - IM Sam Collins (2005)

I made no pretense of searching for everything written by IM Sam Collins on the Scandinavian. On the other hand, someone, other than me, appeared to tell us what 3...Qd6 "is" for Sam Collins. Does jengaias have any comment on whether or not it would be appropriate to make such a statement on the basis of writings from about 12 years ago, when writings from about 11 years ago are different?

Well, a quick search at chessgames turned up four pre-2004 victories of Ramil Hasangatin with the Scandinavian.

2001: Jaroslav Olsar had the White pieces and a rating 129 points lower.

2001: Dusan Schwarz had the White pieces and a rating 325 points lower.

2001: Ladislav Kotan had the White pieces and a rating 135 points lower.

2003: Manuel Bijaoui had the White pieces and a rating 326 points lower.

A similar search at chessgames turned up one pre-2004 victory of Drazen Sermek with the Scandinavian.

1999: Leon Mazi had the White pieces and a rating 135 points lower.

A similar search at chessgames did not turn up any pre-2004 victories of Slavko Cicak with the Scandinavian, but there is a record of a 2010 victory along with the rating of the player (Franklin Mungroo) of the White pieces. It was 412 points below that of Slavko Cicak.

The chessgames records are obviously far from complete, but the information there does seem to me to suggest a potential pitfall to looking at win-draw-loss numbers.

Is it The Complete French quote or some other source that is making a claim about what is "impossible"?

Well... now it's really becoming annoying.

Here are some stupid questions for yiblai (since the answers are more than obvious):

1. If that Collins statement isn't valid because "it was made 12 years ago", then why did you use it as an argument on the first place?

2. Isn't some nonsense said 12 years ago still nonsense?

3. Do statistics play chess?

4. Do you have any arguments of your own, or you didn't find any to buy at a reasonable price?

I brought up the 2004 statement and compared it with the 2005 statement because the two together suggested a change in the Sam Collins view 11 to 12 years ago. I am sorry if this was not made sufficiently clear for you.