Why 2000-2199 OTB ("experts") are weak players

I wasn't sure how to handle it. They were doing things like Nh3-g5-xh7 and of course their opponent doesn't recapture... they only want to hop over pieces. I didn't want to tell them they weren't allowed to play that way because I think for kids it should just be fun... but obviously this wasn't really helping them play better heh.

im just starting to play chess then i suddenly read this post. bye chess.

The whole examination here, though it shows deep thinking, still begs the question: "Then how did they get an OTB rating over 2000?  They had to have a strong grounding in tactics and a basic understanding the strategic ideas behind the openings they use.  I say "basic" because I heard NM's say the only thing they want out of the opening is to reach a playable middle game.  You need to recognize patterns, basic traps, etc. in order to feel confident about not leaning too hard on memorizing variations.

Against peers, you always end up having to guess. That's basically what cherub is saying. And when you're strained strategically, you can even miss simple tactics... Carlsen - Anand world championship match had a game with a double blunder (both of them missed the same simple tactic).

2000 vs 1600 and the game might have no big mistakes at all from the 2000. Depending on how badly the 1600 plays, the expert may have a very high match with the engine's top 3 moves.

That might help put it in perspective.

Actually, haven't you considered that the reason why most people on chess.com are around 1000 is because when they register now they automatically get a 800 rating, and when they registered in the past, people had a 1200 rating? The average between those two is 1000, and I believe many just play a game or two and leave their accounts untouched forevermore. The active players in the site shouldn't be more than 50-100 thousand (if that much!) or so, but there's still probably subscriptions in the millions...

Yes, there are a (at least) a couple of things going on here. The first factor is the rating initialization you mentioned.  The second factor is that higher rated players are more visible because people who play more often tend to be better than people who play less often on average, so we don't see the lower rated players around as much (whether it be online or at tournaments/clubs).  This gives us the intuitive impression that the average player is stronger than the actual average player - we think what's around us is the norm.

It would be interesting to see what the average chess.com ratings of players is given various minimum activity requirements, but I'm not sure that's possible. Does anyone know?

Yeah, there's no way I'm 99.5%-99.9% on chess.com active players, given my stats. If 80% of players on the rankings are inactive (and certainly all of them would be lower rated than me), then that would put me at around 97-98th% or something. 

In fact, my USCF OTB rating, although a few years old, puts me at 97% or something, which is still not for all active players, but still much more accurate than chess.com.

But then again, most of that 97% are not that serious about chess - they haven't studied it seriously or anything, I'd bet. 

Cherub_Enjel wrote: 

*Calculation is pretty poor - often can't sort out complications that well. The last tournament I played, I went 2.5/3 against 3 2000+ FIDEs, when I should have gone like 1/3 if my opponents had just crushed me / swindled a draw through a tactical sequence in a complicated position. This happens very often in many other situations I've seen.

So bottom line - if they get a complicated position / critical move, the chance they'll get the move right is maybe slightly higher than if they just pick a random move from the list of plausible candidates, and that's pretty bad, given all the tactical training. 

 I think you being too harsh on yourself, for an expert to see five moves ahead is walk in the park. When come to calculating is not how far you look but how accurate is your assessment. I look at few candidate moves ( three and maybe four), when it becomes to tree like branches and holding all our analysis, yes, expert suck at this. But expert are awesome when it comes to straight line calculation,that is why we beat the lower rated players, they can't calculate that far. I remember I did a slight dubious sacrifice, I won't lose and had a draw but my opponent had to find the correct continuation,my opponent lost because he could not calculate all the necessary lines to find the draw. I was playing a master rated 2300 uscf in our position I had to sacrifice the exchange to have a playable game, I thought oh I be down an exchange and I didn't want go to that,and I lost because I was too passive. After the game I show master the position where I was considering to sac the exchange, he immediate said you should of done that; in my part is bad evaluation but it taught me to trust my evaluation and you must play active against masters.

intermediatedinoz wrote: you are probably not a chess player 

 I have to look at the source of my antanganist critique and how strong is he, well, you definitely qualify to be a duffer.

Record vs Opponent's Rating (Pre-event)

 A record you can only dream of having and a title you don't have. So I when describing how to analyzing a position you are at lost, never even consider any candidate moves or tree branches because you don't know how to and you are a one mover type. There will be a bunch of experts analyzing a position and a player like you suggest a one mover and with no plan, met your type many times. If you don't have constructive comment to make better be silent and hold your peace.

Just ignore the trolls lol. Some bad troll was trying to bait me as well a page or two back, I believe. 

And the game continues to be fun. Even with its maddening complexity that we fail to understand, and its glaring simplicity that we miss.

Yeah, I'm not debating that it's fun. 

lol  My avatar is Alekhine and yours is two men kisses, we can see where your desires are at, and it is not on chess.   And you have not played one game here, maybe you are here just to troll. 

Cherub_Enjel wrote:

*They even make tactical blunders somewhat often in simple-ish positions. In my games vs. 2000+ FIDEs, most don't make simple blunders that often, but a few have, more than I've expected. They won't blunder one simple tactic / game, like 1600s do, but maybe once per 5-6 games or something, which is, in theory, a free win to a much lower rated player who can convert against them. 

*Tactical Pattern recognition is incredibly basic - This is part of the reason they aren't very good at calculating. I've spent a lot of time on chesstempo.com doing pattern recognition training, and the unfortunate thing is that although I sometimes take 30-60 seconds to finally see a glaringly basic 2-move tactic *when I was looking for a tactic*, other experts don't seem to do much better. 

I think you are too hard on yourself, you might had a bad game and starting doubting yourself and you probably have study plan to get where you want to go. When first was at chess.com my tactical trainer rating was 1900 to low 2000 and now its at 2200 and going to 2300. I put a lot time in tactics and endgame, I know at the end I will have good results in my games because of my training. If we study correctly we increase in strength. I don't know your goals in chess but I think you reach them, keep persevering in them. 

candidate master is given to anyone who breaks 2200 otb with a fee of 60 dollars  , if you break 2200 otb and looze games afterwards you can aquire the candidate ma$ter .

    National Master dosent cost a dime. Break 2200 and maintain 2200ish till the tournament is over. FREE 

   P.S. neverever underestimate your opponent! regaurdless of rating

i live in the bay area, and players are a lot more competitive out here, standards for rating groups are generally 100-200 points higher than they would be in other places

 Well 2200 USCF is not 2200 FIDE... 2200 Uscf would be around 2000 Elo.