Magnus:King of the Endgames

i honestly believe he is one of the greatest if not the greatest endgame players of all time

OMG!!! Superking, you're starting to soften your view on Magnus? Finally?! Wow. Its about time, glad to see you come aboard. Everybodys been trying to tell ya. Welcome.

Magnus sometimes seems to be the king of the swindle-win.

In his game against Radjabov today, Carlsen reached a drawn position, but Radjabov made several blunders. Hikaru Nakamura was watching the game live and was astounded at the number of blunders a +2700 rated player could make in a simple endgame. 

Kramnik and others have hinted that part of what is going on with Carlsen isn't purely down to chess, but psychology. He keeps pushing, and his opponents begin to believe they will make mistakes. Once that doubt enters the game, Carlsen seems bound to win. 

Carlsen is absolutely amazing, but he is being helped by some otherwise very strong players.

This is the 2nd game he has eeked out a win against Rajdabov in as many months...

I think the only difference between Carlsen's wins and other Super-GM wins is that it's easier to see the psychological side in effect because it takes place during endgame.

I mean are you telling me that Kramnik doesn't have psychological wins out of the opening? Or that Nakamura doesn't get helped along by his opponents making 'simple' tactical blunders in complicated middlegames?

EDIT: Also I'd like to remind everybody of the many, many endgames that Carlsen pushes and still doesn't win. No-one ever seems to point those out

so according to you, magnus wins by luck.... yeah hes just the highest ranked player in the world, not by skill oh no but by "psychology"

no one will take you serious if you think magnus is only good cause his opponets make mistakes

first of all, he did not say that, you heard what you think he said, not what he actually said. How is this luck btw? Outplaying your opponent in a long, boring endgame?

Magnus is the best player in the world at endgames because he is patient. He waits for his opponents to make mistakes, but also often plays the best moves in conjunction.

How else are you supposed to win "drawn/dead drawn" endgames?

Magnus is probably the most accurate player in the world when it comes to playing strong moves

"psychology" is just an excuse, magnus wouldn't be number 1 in the world, if he didn't have skill

psychology can decide a game's result easily. If you don't believe in this, you  clearly have not play a long chess game. There are many examples of psychological advantages one can have over another.

but you have to have SKILL to go along with it... you really think magnus got to where he is at, because of psychology and not pure skill

of course, but smyslov fan did not say it was due to solely because of the psychological advantage, did he? No! He said because of chess skill too.

didn't magnus play the most accurate movies in candidates?

Let's assume hypothetically that Radjabov lost for mostly psychological reasons -- that Carlsen affected Radjabov psychologically. Well, for Radjabov to be affected psychologically, I would imagine he has an expectation for Magnus to fight fiercely, and/or play very accurate moves. Either way, Radjabov's "fear" of Magnus is not coming out of thin air, but from an expectation that he's in for a difficult fight. Indeed I look at that as testimony to Carlsen's skill, as super GMs are not kind enough to fear their opponent (and thus make simple blunders for their opponent to exploit) as if it were a courtesy.

Superking I'm proud of you. You've shown that you can completely change your stance 180 degrees and argue the opposite side too. Good for you. Not long ago, like last tournament-ish, you were actually claiming Carlsen WAS a product of luck because he was winning drawn games due to opponents mistakes. Well done my good man, continue these cool posts ol' chap.

this.....sounds  extremely logical

For me the provocative part is that he says Magnus is being helped by his opponents. Yet all you can do in chess is challenge your opponent with ideas, take advantage if they mess up, and don't mess up yourself. If Kasparov didn't have "victims" that would mess up for him then he could never win no matter how well, or even brilliantly, he played.

"Help from stronger players" is just not going to let you consistently be the #1 rated player in the world, as it takes into account your overall results, not just those of one lucky tournament. If he is winning due to some psychological effect, again that's a part of your attributes -- I'd love it if I found a way to have a psychological effect on people while playing chess; in fact I'm sure we all try to do this in some ways.

The thing is, Carlsen didn't play the endgame today at an especially high level. He did push hard to win and took some risks. But Radjabov had to make several mistakes, some of them quite blatant, for Carlsen to win. 

One of the ways Radjabov showed he was intimidated was that he spent ten minutes on an absolutely forced move when he only had 11 minutes on the clock! It just didn't make any sense. Not to me, not to Nakamura, not to any of the titled players watching the game.

For those interested in the game, here it is. I set the focus of the game to where Radja inexplicably spent ten minutes on a forced move. He had already made numerous mistakes ("blunders" according to Nakamura), and would make more. Here, the mistake wasn't the move itself, but the amount of time he spent on it.

Carlsen said this in an interview after the game:

Carlsen was quite criticial of his own play saying that it was only when Karjakin got rightly ambitious did he find chances. Carlsen thought after 25.bxc5 he would have to trade queens in return for his e-pawn and play for a draw. Karjakin played 33.Ng6? very quickly and must somehow have overlooked Carlsen's powerful attack. 37.e5 was a final blunder after which there was no chance.

Carlsen exploits the minor mistakes of his opponents better than other players, and he makes fewer mistakes himself. That's how chess games are won. If nobody made mistakes, every game would be drawn. Some people here act as if players other than Carlsen win purely by their own efforts, without their opponents making mistakes, but this is not possible if chess is drawn (as most people, GMs and otherwise, believe).

The new tactic appears to be "well of course Magnus is more accurate, punishes mistakes more, and makes fewer mistakes himself, yes, he plays better chess and more consistently, but it's by psychology I tell you, [so we can keep pretending that he's not the best player in the world at the moment, which is what we were going to do anyway]."

so carlsen spots mistakes his opponets make, while many other GM's would overlook them or not catch them?