Kasparov Murders Fischer!

Alert! Fischer lovers playing kissy-face!

Gibberish thread... Kasparov's quote was very directly speaking about the Fischer who was alive at that very moment playing his sad and bizarre "world championship II" match against Spassky.  If I recall correctly Fischer was at that time, embarassingly, refering to himself as the "true" world champion, despite his unwillingness to actually play Kasparov or Karpov, or anyone else actually resembling a top 5 player (and if you think any of them would have ducked that mega-payday  you're a dope). In that context Kasparov had every right to say, "Fischer? He sucks now, my cat could beat him." -- Kasparov didn't, he told the truth: Fischer's around 2650 now... a monstrously strong chess player, strong enough to take a game here and there from anyone -- but not the #1 player, not really close. 

And Fischer must have agreed, because if he disagreed, all he had to do was pick up the phone, call GK's management and challenge him to a match. He sure never did.

The "one chess event after his 72 match with spassky" is true in essence, but not completely technically. He played in some rapid events IIRC prior to negotiations for his title defense blowing up. He is believed to have played quite a bit online during his "missing" years.

I didn't say BF was a coward -- I said BF didn't think he could beat GK. And of course he couldn't... look at his match with the 2560 rated spassky of 92. Fischer won 8 games,  Spassky won 4, with 9 draws. You think '92 GK would have dropped that many (any?) games against Spassky!?! Please. I don't feel like doing the pointless reseach...but if you've got some time to waste try digging up GK's record against 2560 rated players in '92.

Here's a great bit from Spassky and Fischer after the match in Yugoslavia... this is taken from the (London) Times Online:

...Spassky generously wrote a letter to President Bush, urging the US to show leniency over Fischer’s sanctions-busting game in 1992. “Arrest me,” wrote Spassky. “Put me in the same cell with Bobby Fischer. And give us a chess set.” “He was trying to make me sound like a weirdie,” Fischer responded. “I don’t want Spassky in my cell. I want a chick.”

Just to note, Fischer did play 3 games against the Greenblatt computer in 1977, winning all of them handily.

if he was 2785 then than now in 2010!!!!! when he knows modern theory he would kill kasparov but as said only a OTB game would shut us all up.

I don't think you could prove it with statisitics or Kasparov claiming Fischer would die. Respectfully, I disagree. The only way I believe to prove Kasparovs theory would be a game, which now is impossible.

By the time of that quote Fischer was noticeably mentally ill. It's surprising he played as well as he did in the '92 match.

As someone pointed out, since one of them is a dead guy, at present, a match would be pretty unfair even with odds.

I wonder if there is chess in Heaven or if it's a game more suited to a warmer climate? I haven't kept up. Is there still a purgatory?

  None of the engines from that time period could pose a serious challenge to a GM.

 The point is, no one really knows what Fischer's rating would be today.  2300, 2600, et.al., are just guesses, and if Bobby had actually developed his repetoire alongside today's modern software, the way many current champions have done, his rating would probably be very close to theirs.  Mental stress may have shortened his career, but in his prime, there were few people who could come close to his level, in terms of strength and burst capability.

"Arpad Elo was of the opinion that it was futile to attempt to use ratings to compare players from different eras; in his view, they could only possibly measure the strength of a player as compared to his or her contemporaries."

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methods_for_comparing_top_chess_players_throughout_history

Yes. That is a horrible malady to be stricken with: Jackass disease. That's why the '92 match just shows that Fischer could fight the "jackass disease" and still beat Spassky. Wow!

 Very true, but, unfortunately, we can't transport young Kasparov or Fischer to a different era, or at least not now.

Right, I just mentioned it because there was some earlier discussion about Fischer's activity between 72' and 92'. I was surprised to learn of these games, as I, like most people I think, thought he'd completely disappeared after 72'.

Ok so why don't we clone Fischer and when he grows up give him a computer ,Chessbase Etc and see what he can do in this generation.

He was always a jackass, but he became deranged. Just listen to his voice in interviews in the early 70's and compare it to 20-30 years later. It's scary. He went from being eloquent and soft spoken to a slurred and raspy rambling lunatic.

 Here are some more FACTS :   Fischer is the ONLY player to ever win a candidates match with 100% score, he did it TWICE. Fischer is also the only player to win a major tournament ( US Championship ) with 100 %. Fischer is also the only player to win 20 games in a row against all GMs. Fischer is also the only challenger in WC history to be 100 points higher rated than the Champion when they met, Fischer wins by +4 and still loses rating points !  Until another "great" comes along and does at least one or two of these things , there can be no doubt who the best ever is if you go strictly by results. Fischer also beat Petrosian 4 straight in their match in 1971 and Petrosian had never lost 4 straight in his career , after becoming a GM.

As a music historian and an amature chess historian (aren't alot of us!?) I'd ssay that Reb is absolutely correct.  In fact it reminds me very much of how Beethoven's shadow loomed so large over the world of music and composers in the 19th century.  Every composer, for generations was compared to Beethoven. Every composer looked at Beethoven as something to either emulate (to some degree, say like Mendelson and Brahms) or as someone to rebel against (as say, Berlioz and Lizt).  

I think there is analogy to chess with openings and how so many of the most popular lines of fisher's generation have been relegated to the sidelines of the current common opening GM book. What I mean is that beetween Beethoven, Mozart and Hayden they wrote probably hundrends of piano "sonatas". The piano sonata being the quintessential solo piano piece of gravitas.  For the following generation or two of virtuso pianists (Lizt, Chopin, Schuman, Mendleson,Brahms, etc...) there were probably less the 15 written all together.    They had to go a different way to show their indivduality, just as I think our modern chess players had to find different openings to stake out there own territory. 

How many category 17 tournaments were there in Fischer's time ?  Any ?

 My point is that otb ratings are bloated today and they have these closed elite tournies only among the top players to keep their ratings bloated. Fischer's generation didnt have these at all did they ?  In any event.... if Fischer had such events when he was 2785 he would be 100 points higher than the #2 guy ! I dont believe Kasparov , or any of today's greats , would play in an event in which the closest one to them was 100 points lower, do you ?  Look at Kamsky's recent result in the world open and you can see why the top players do NOT play in Open events...

Who would have been the top players to play such elite events in Fischer's era ? Who would have been the participants at a Linares or Corus or Dortmund ?  Something else recently happened that only reinforces my idea that many of todays elite players have bloated ratings is the result of the teen aged GM from Viet Nam in Dortmund. He was the lowest rated in the field but finished 2nd. Kramnik had to win his last game just to finish with 50 %.  I think the elite players should be forced to play 2 or 3 Open events each year . Also , I think all the elite events should have one or two non elite players that qualify through powerful tournament performances as the young vietnamese GM did.