How good is the Backyard Professor?

As you mentioned in an earlier post, a lot if beginners cannot tell the difference.  What they can do, however, is soak in the humor and encouragement he fosters.  Look, BYP is not for everyone.  Some of his humor  I like, some I don't.  I admit he sends me to the anaysis board to think more.  For sheer improvement, I need to study Chess Informant and Doveretski.  It reminds me of the 1000  best short games of chess, the chessplayers candy.  Sometimes, I like the candy BYP gives me.  

Ever watch two beginners play in a tournament.  Bettet have a good heart.  But they both have fun, eve  though each made horrible errors.  When you stop the fun in chess, you stop the player from returning.At the beginner level, they need to have fun,  BYP is fun and candy.

Did I say that? I don't remember.
Anyways, I think that time is much too valuable. I think that the big problem with this is that someone might think they are acquiering valuable concepts, but in reality they would be wasting their precious time.

If they turn stronger latter on, having realized that they lost their time, they might feel deep sorrow for this, being that you are only a young person once in your life.

Does this make sense? It happens not only with this chess professor, but with all type of issues.

IMO 200 points is too close, because that's more a difference in performance than a different class of knowledge. I wouldn't have much to teach an 1800. We could play some games and do some analysis, but I wouldn't try to teach them anything, the difference between us would be very small.

Similarly if I had a coach, I'd want them to be at least 400 points stronger, because that way I can be sure some of the mistakes I'm making will look like fundamental errors to them. By pointing out the big errors that I don't know I'm making it will help me improve.

Beginners in all endeavours flay around finding their way in the dark.  People learn in different ways.  But take fun out of learning, then you have a lot of people who give up on chess.  I hate math.  But i  the beginning of the computer age, I found a program, very silly, that explained Alegebra so that I could understand it.  I would go back to it  because it was fun.Talk to students about teachers whom they learn from.  It is the teacher who makes learning fun and encourages further inquiry. Hope that makes some sense.

Let's say beginners need to know were to lay their feet, and someone points out quicksands. What would you think of that?

I've never had (or even heard of) a good teacher who told students factually incorrect things.

No matter how good their intentions, or high high their charisma, that alone can't make them a good teacher.

Anyway, back to the 200 point thing.

Here's an example of something a much stronger player told me that helped me when I was 1800, and I don't think someone only 200 points above me at the time would have known to say it.

I was playing a tournament game, and I thought I was a better player than my opponent, and so I chose the move 6.Qc2. I knew this probably wasn't the best move, but thought it was a solid way to do something my opponent probably hadn't seen.

The guy looking at the game said he understood my intention, but this was a bad move because sooner or later the c file will probably open, and the queen will be misplaced there. So it's like losing a tempo because I'll probably have to move her again.

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This was useful for me because it applies in all sorts of situations.

For example in the game BYP showed, he said Be2 by white was the "conservative" choice, and Bd3 was the alternative.

In fact Bd3 is not sensible for at least 2 reasons. First is it's staring at g6, a pawn that's defended by two pawns. This is usually a bad development square in such a case (not to mention with no pawn on d5 there's no e4 break)

Second is in such a structure often the d file opens up, and putting your minor piece there will block your rook. Actually the alternative was Bc4. By attacking f7 this move makes it uncomfortable for black to play Re8 (which prepares e5).

Now, I didn't fault BYP for that in my rant (I'll call it a rant I guess) because that's too high level to be useful for a beginner. (There were one or two dozen other such mistakes by the way...)

But see, it's not like I don't understand what is and isn't useful for a beginner just because I have a 2000 rating. I faulted him for things that really would help a beginner, like the decoy pawn in the endgame... or for being inconsistent (he says the bishop is bad, and black will lose because of it, and says trading it off is a remedy, but then glosses over the times when black chose not to trade it off).

And, you know, faulting him for getting terms like "pin" wrong.

He gives a 60 second speech about a pinned knight that isn't even pinned.

Do you think that's useful for a beginner? Because they'll eventually have to relearn what pin means.

Yes, the c file might open.  But your idea of preparing the thematic e4 looks like a viable plan to me.  I would lime to see the specifc variation he would give to refute your idea or a better alternstive.  Yes theory says do nit put the bishop on thst diagonal but numerous examples could be found where it wads the correct placement.  Do not put your bishop i  front of a pawn.  Exceptions to the rule. Could name more but suspect you know exactly what I am talking about.

That doesn't make sense to me. If you play c4 the C file would be semi -open, perhaps with chances of pressuring up c7.  Why would the queen be misplaced? from c4 it has vacuated the d1 square for the rook. Perhaps you are not going to play c4 but e4, it could be useful to support e4, or perhaps there would arise tome trick in the future with ng5 with threats on h7

Perhaps qc2 is not the best move, but I don't think your reasoning seems very convincing.

Going back to your argument, if you play c4 it is bassicaly a catalan with one tempo down, and  in catalans is extremely common to take c4 with the queen with pressure on the c file.

That was kinda the cool thing to me though, there was no refutation. It's like the move 1.a3. There's no refutation, it's just a waste of time.

There's no way I'll ever lose a game for playing a move like 6.Qc2... but against a strong player it will be a waste of time

My point is yopu said the queen would be misplaced on the c file. In catalans is common to pressure the c file with the queen. What do you think of that?

After c3 it's unlikely white will be playing c4 any time soon. The idea is more like black will play (at some point, not right away) c5, Rc8, and cxd. 

Sure, white could play a catalan a tempo down.

That's sort of my point though... it's a wasted tempo.

And like I said, white will never lose a game because of 6.Qc2. It's not a terrible move, it was just an idea I started to apply to other position as well i.e. choosing my development in terms of which files are likely to open later.

I like to see a strong otb master comment on that.  C5 is coming, but what should you play that is better.  To the guy with his quicksand example.  Of course not. But again, take the fun of the learning, and you are left with players who leave chess early.

My point is that with all that fun you might think you are standing on firm rock.

In chess, you never know whether you are on firm ground.  Many positions ate simply unlclear.  Chess really is a jungle one must walk cautiously.

Zirab.  Found the bookj. It is from the Jusupov school series.  Probably vol. one.  Fundamentals.  Though this example looks like it would be under endgame technique. He usually is good about given credit to his source.  But he mentions being tired in the video and said in another ihs house was damaged.  So suspect he has other things to think about.

So you have not yet found the specific Dreev-Arkhipov game?

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