Why super GMs agree to early draws?!

Is it really necessary to agree to a draw after 17 moves?  It seems like they are taking the easy way out, avoiding risks, skipping out on their job, which is to play the world's best chess.  If Carlsen had played on, maybe he could have found a way to win the last game at Altibox, and thus the tournament.  It just seems excessively cautious or lazy or conservative, to stop playing in a middlegame like this one.  Seems like the game has just gotten started, not ready to end.  Like the players are just mutually agreeing not to even try.  If two boxers showed up in the ring and never threw a punch, this is what it might look like:

Carlsen has a world championship coming up.  Im sure he has things he doesnt want to reveal.   

I fight to the bitter end in all my matches!  The match above is boring.

Yes with the advent of engines draws should be referree'd and not allowed. In a game its silly now adays-imagine if the major sports did it? It just a way for the players to control the outcome-and Im sure they are not below conspiracies, especially when it comes to the professional levels.

Yeah, I'm aware that the draws are common at their level, that's the point of my thread... It doesn't seem fair to the chess community that super GMs can just skip taking any risk & draw this early.  Why not just agree to a draw after 1. e4 e5 ?  This kind of behavior doesn't do any good for the future and reputation of the game.  Surely there was a continuation of some sort that they could have played after move 17 in this position, no?

It is known that the endgame is the most complex and difficult part of the game-especially when reference games are scarce and since they can only memorize the various lines to a certain point it gets risky. Plus they would have to really play it out  and show what they are really made of. 

One thing for sure it would separate the  playing field. Agreed to draws prior to the game oare not really in the true spirit IMO. Anyone can make a mistake. For example todays winner against So did it with a 10% less accuracy/precision rate, So made the second to last mistake and Fab got lucky.

If So had won or they had agreed to a draw the tournament would have had a different outcome

 In the book "Better Chess for Average Players", IM Harding says:

"Masters sometimes agree draws in only about ten or fifteen moves -- in fact the draw may well have been agreed before sitting down to play -- because they want to protect their position in a tournament when they are Black, or because they are playing a friend or compatriot.  Most masters have agreed this kind of draw at some time or another"

Still think this practice doesn't smell like poop?  To me it does.

Bronstein offered this explanation in his annotations to a 13 move draw between Petrosian and Averbakh in round 8 of the 1953 Zurich Candidates Tournament:

"If one desires an explanation of such quick draws, which occur in every tournament, one must keep in mind that such an event lasts more than one day. Many things happen over the course of thirty rounds that have a bearing on the fighting abilities of the people who play chess. In the present case, Petrosian's peaceable disposition and Averbakh's too, in part, may have been due to the previous round, which went badly for both. After the extra rest day they gave themselves with this eighth-round game, Petrosian went on to win three straight games in good style (an exceptional achievement by any standard in such a strong tourney); while Averbakh, though perhaps not quite so fortunate, still fought with great verve in the rounds that followed.

"In major tournaments, one must ration one's strength, not for the individual game, but for the entire event, taken as a whole. The history of chess events -- and that of many other sports as well -- contains many cases in which one of the participants forged ahead at the outset, only to lose game after game towards the end (and not against his post powerful opponents, either), finishing far behind the winners."

But it was the last round, he doesn't need to conserve his strength for this fall... 

"Smells like poop"! I agree.

"In a middlegame like this one"

Well, by move 17 it is a pretty dead position.

Although saying so feels weird because Caruana is managing to win petroff after petroff hah. So who knows, maybe something could have happened later.

But as is usually the case, it's almost entirely white's fault for the position being so dead so fast. Maybe Carlsen could have played 1...c5 or 1...g6, gone for a worse position on purpose, then played for a win (which is what black has to do when white is trying to draw) but this wasn't a must win game. Basically Carlsen played reasonably, and MVL killed the position.

 That is why chimpanzee dont like playing chess!🤣😃😄😅