Soldierpiper wrote: Max also was according to Korchoni the last honourable president of fide. What say you?
What was wrong with GM Friðrik Ólafsson his succesor? Wasn't he honorable?
I don,t know enough about him to make that call. Regards
Max Euwe was no way one of the weakest champions .
Who would you say was? Somebody's got to be the shortest giant in the room.
Couldn't have been Euwe. That dude was eight feet tall!
See post #11 for your list of match-play World Champions who might be weaker than Euwe. I already stated that I think Euwe and Spassky are the two "shortest giants in the room".
See post #20 for the original poster's strenuous disagreement with your already-stated list.
It seems he had the audacity to think your list might not be entirely authoritative, and dared to have his own opinion. I thought I might solicit it.
Thank you, Bopgun! I may be silly to presume that people are capable of having their own opinions and that well-informed, opinionated posters such as Reb and yourself won't be intimidated by strong argumentation. The list of match-play world champions is authoritative.* My opinions of them are less so.
I sadly agree with Reb that the two most likely to be weaker than Spassky are either Tal or Smyslov. I rather doubt it was Smyslov though, because of his dominance of chess in the 1950s and his match record against Botvinnik. If you include the 1948 match-play tournament, the two players were exactly equal in World Championship matches.
Botvinnik, for all the Dark Lord tactics that were used to keep him in place, really did deserve the "Patriarch" moniker. Very few players in history have ever been able to hold the title for (parts of) three decades as Botvinnik has.
Lasker's an interesting case study too. I was a fan of Schlecter growing up and that match still feels wrong to me. I've read several hagiographies of Lasker, but Rubinstein, Nimzovich and even Schlecter may have been better than him during his tenure. Still, 27 years is a long time and he was clearly the best player in the world for part of that time.
Petrosian was the first defending champion since Alekhin to successfully win a title defense! But he needs to be considered among the weakest in part because of his poor tournament record. I still disagree with Atos' description of the 1969 match as Spassky winning "rather handily". It was a tough fight even with Petrosian being in poor form. Petrosian was close to winning the match in places.
I'm glad to see that so far, nobody has mentioned Kramnik or Anand. It's easy to point to today's top players and suggest they were weaker than others. However, when we consider their illustrious company, Kramnik's results need to be studied. He was one of only a handful of champions to win a match with no losses, and only Capablanca had previously managed to do it as the challenger. His victory over Leko was exceedingly close. However I think history will view his victory over Topalov as perhaps one of the more resilient efforts by a world champion.
Anand's tenure is still to early to pass any real judgement. His defeat of Kramnik was very convincing and his victory over Topalov already feels like a fairly solid one despite the fact that the regulation match was drawn.
Please see my thread on Lasker regarding his 27 year reign.
As for your last group mentioned I agree. However I do not rank Topalov with the other 3 ( and believe him far stronger than those 3 ) for 2 simple reasons. 1: He was the highest rated player in the world for sometime and 2 ) He did win in impressive fashion San Luis 2005 which was a DRR of elite players. Such a tournament is a better test for a WC than the knock out formats the others won which I see as more of a lottery. However, I still think match play is the best way to find the strongest player in the world.....
Max Euwe was no way one of the weakest champions .
Who would you say was? Somebody's got to be the shortest giant in the room.
Couldn't have been Euwe. That dude was eight feet tall!
land of the giants most of us will not get there !
I was writing in the literal sense. Dude was really eight feet tall:
Yes it is true but he has the high set iconoclast degree by having been contended with what he had proven the whole world over. I had one book written by Max Euwe regarding "Master vs Amateur" where he demonstrated what all of us including grandmasters often disregarded. He is highly a mind set of supreme gentle giant ever.
Yes it is true but he has the high set iconoclast degree by having been contended with what he had proven the whole world over. I had one book written by Max Euwe regarding "Master vs Amateur" where he demonstrated what all of us including grandmasters often disregarded. He is highly a mind set of supreme gentle giant ever.
I agree, and didn't Smyslov outscore Botvinnik in their 3 matches? He was one of the greatest positional/intuitive players, and if I recall was strongly influenced by Nimzovich. Certainly one of the best end-game players of all time.
I think Euwe's greatest contribution to chess has been his writing.... he must be the most prolific writer of all the world champions . No ?
And who was the least prolific, Fischer I would guess ?
Euwe was an all-rounder:
What I really want to know is how to pronounce his name.
I've been saying "yoo" for all these years...
Two syllables.
Kind of partway between OO-wuh and ER-vuh. There'd be a hint of that "R" sound to an American ear, and the "W" is a little softer than an English speaker is used to.
Euwe is no better than Morozevich, and he isn't a world champion...
In one respect you can make the arguement that Ewue was indeed one of the weakest if not the weakest WC. But he was not a "professional" full time chess player. So in that regard id say that what Ewue accomplished was pretty amazing.
He beat aguably one of the greatest players of all time for the WC,
Well said & true enough.
I have had at least 1 GM tell me that Botvinnik is the most overrated of the world champs. I have always thought too much is made of Lasker's long reign because back then they virtually hand picked their opponents. Lasker also went a very long time without defending his title so his long reign is rather artificial imo, due to this. He also played several opponents that was far beneath him.... such as Marshall. Steinitz on the other hand didnt duck anyone and played many world championship matches.