dannyhume wrote:
… while Steinitz had this sudden surge of inexplicable genius into his forties?
Inexplicable? Steinitz was an exceptionally intelligent player, active in a rapidly growing chess world.
Paul Morphy's Rating>2638
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dannyhume wrote (~3 hours ago ago): "... Steinitz as a geriatric citizen did well against a young dominant champion Lasker …"
kindaspongey wrote (February 9, 2018):
… Steinitz won five, lost ten, and drew four.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
dannyhume wrote:
… Steinitz, in fact, did better against Lasker than did Tarrasch or Marshall in their matches, …
Do we know that 1908 Lasker was the same as 1894 Lasker?
dannyhume wrote:
… Lasker ... was still dangerous into the 1930's. ...
In the 1921 match, Lasker lost four, drew ten, and did not win any.
dannyhume wrote:
… Morphy's ... original dominance in the 1850's-60's, and this in turn is based on the games Morphy actually DID play against contemporaries of Steinitz, ...
At the time of the major successes of Steinitz, the chess playing population was very different from that of 1857-8.
Morphy lived at a time when the world's population was only about
1.3 billion. Kasparov and others had a lot more competition. It was about 1999 when the world's population reached 6 billion.
There is far more and better competition now.
kindaspongey wrote:
At the time of the major successes of Steinitz, I see no reason to doubt that his opponents were better than those players faced by Morphy in 1857-8.
They were the same age and had many common opponents. Yes, time had passed, but there were folks who played both in the differing "eras"... If Steinitz could get better at an older age, then there is no reason to believe Morphy wouldn't have either
kindaspongey wrote:
dannyhume wrote
… Do you think Morphy peaked in 1858 and was on the decline at age 22 …
We don't know what would have happened during the two decades after 1857-8 because, for the most part, Morphy chose not to be involved with the serious chess world during the two decades after 1857-8.
We can infer that Morphy's playing strength would continue to rise, as did Steinitz and Anderssen. He wouldn't be the only chess player to magically stop improving at the age of 25 while everyone else got better.
kindaspongey wrote:
dannyhume wrote
… Do you think Morphy peaked in 1858 and was on the decline at age 22 …
We don't know what would have happened during the two decades after 1857-8 because, for the most part, Morphy chose not to be involved with the serious chess world during the two decades after 1857-8.
That's right, he CHOSE not to be involved because he didn't take the game seriously and still dominated everyone, showing no signs of decline. Somehow that argument is being used against him.
kindaspongey wrote:
dannyhume wrote:
… while Steinitz had this sudden surge of inexplicable genius into his forties?
Inexplicable? Steinitz was an exceptionally intelligent player, active in a rapidly growing chess world.
And somehow Morphy wasn't an exceptionally intelligent player, who happened to be of similar age and dominated their common opponents more convincingly?
kindaspongey wrote:
dannyhume wrote (~3 hours ago ago): "... Steinitz as a geriatric citizen did well against a young dominant champion Lasker …"
kindaspongey wrote (February 9, 2018):
… Steinitz won five, lost ten, and drew four.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
It was close til Lasker got a nice streak in. Regardless, still a better performance than either Tarrasch or Marshall did against Lasker.
kindaspongey wrote:
Do we know that 1908 Lasker was the same as 1894 Lasker?
So you are saying that a dominant world champion at the very start of his reign at the age 25 (the age when Morphy QUIT) can STILL IMPROVE and BE FAR BETTER at the age of 40?
kindaspongey wrote:
dannyhume wrote:
… Lasker ... was still dangerous into the 1930's. ...
In the 1921 match, Lasker lost four, drew ten, and did not win any.
Against another player many consider the GOAT, when he was at his greatest playing strength, 20 years younger than his opponent, and who, nearly century later, still comes closest to matching modern computers in top move choices.
Brixed wrote:
Morphy is what happens when a brilliant mind discovers chess—then grows bored of it.
He introduced the world to a new, superior way of playing, one that seemed so obvious to him at a mere glance, but one that left the rest of the world stunned.
Staunton was wise to avoid him; he would've been steamrolled by Paul's engine-like vision.
Granted, Morphy showed some weaknesses when facing styles and positions that he wasn't familiar with, and this is the aspect of his game that draws the most criticism. Though he also showed an aptitude for learning and adapting. He corrected after his losses and became the stronger for it.
Facing Morphy in a match was like facing a hydra—if you're lucky enough to cut off one of his heads in one game, in the next game, you'll find two heads facing you.
It's also worth keeping in mind that Morphy only played a few hundred games that we know of—he was essentially a beginner by today's standards, where the average master has played thousands of games.
Yet, even as a relative beginner, Morphy's level of play was profound, and he found resources in positions that many of today's masters would be hard-pressed to find.
Imagine how polished (and universal) he would've been had he stuck around and played for another ten years or more.
^^^^This.
Scary to imagine. Would love to have seen him stay interested and read about him playing both Steinitz AND Lasker... I would say it would be even more interesting than seeing Fischer staying interested and playing Karpov and Kasparov.
Jun 20, 2018
0
#396
Natalia_Pogonina wrote:
That is definetely incorrect. With the rating difference of 338 (as in your formula), he would have been expected to score 88 points out of 100 against other masters. Of course, he didn't. Another approach is to actually look at the games (and it quickly becomes obvious that he was nowhere around 2638 strength).
When you look at the moves played and compare the quality of play of Morphy to players today, he was about 2350 strength by today's standard. Kenneth Regan did the hard work of actually analyzing his moves, and not just the known game results.
There have been some sites such as Edo and Chessmetrics where the statisticians started with the premise that a world champion must be at least 2700 then proceeded to show that Morphy was 2700 strength. At least Jeff Sonas, the creator of Chessmetrics, agreed that the method of analyzing the quality of moves would be a better tool for comparing players across time.
I know @Batgirl is a contributor to the Edo site and has helped to fix some of the more blatant errors of the earlier iterations of Edo. But the basic problem is that Edo assigned ratings for players in the 1860s, then worked out how much better Morphy was based on his assigned ratings. Edwards, the creator of the Edo system, repeatedly talks about estimating ratings and assessing a player's rating based on extremely limited data. There's a better way to measure chess skill when there is a relatively limited number of games to analyse.
Added: I've tried to add some of the links to the rating sources, but they didn't show up. Here's Edwards' explanation of the Edo system. It's worth a careful read. He obviously spent a great deal of time on the project, but also obviously made some faulty assumptions at the very beginning.
http://www.edochess.ca/Edo.explanation.html
Jun 20, 2018
0
#397
Btw, there are people who think I show Morphy disrespect by stating he was 2350 strength. In Morphy's day, that was a tremendous achievement! He showed the world how to play open positions, and rarely had to worry about opponents reaching the endgame. Morphy was the best player the world had seen until Steinitz reached his prime. Our chess legacy is poorer because he refused to play Steinitz.
Brixed wrote:
... he also showed an aptitude for learning and adapting. He corrected after his losses and became the stronger for it.
Facing Morphy in a match was like facing a hydra ....
Morphy faced 1857-8 opponents.
Brixed wrote:
... Morphy ... found resources in positions that many of today's masters would be hard-pressed to find. ...
Carlsen-2961 Kramnik-2868 Kasparov-2816 Fischer-2775 Anand-2759 Karpov-2698 Capablanca-2664 Tal-2636 Spassky-2619 Smyslov-2618 Botvinnik-2602 Euwe-2547 Alekhine-2547 Petrosian-2543 Lasker-2498 Morphy-2409 Steinitz-2323
https://www.chess.com/article/view/who-was-the-best-world-chess-champion-in-history
… Do you think Morphy peaked in 1858 and was on the decline at age 22 …
We don't know what would have happened during the two decades after 1857-8 because, for the most part, Morphy chose not to be involved with the serious chess world during the two decades after 1857-8.