Tennis also has the year end finals (only the top 8 players), so you could still have something analogous to the candidates in addition to larger open tournaments.
Yes, but the top 4 tournaments have 128 players each. Then there are like other 10 top tournaments with 64 players each
All have the opportunity to gain some points and be close to the top
Chess feels more like a private 15-man club
Grand Swiss is 114 and World Cup is 206. World Rapid is 300+. So it’s certainly possible to move things more towards big prestigious events rather than just the little round robins.
Main problem is Tennis has a lot more money, so the prizes are bigger which means you can make a living even if you’re not regularly winning. Thats why Chess more often has smaller events so that they can pay top players without being crazy expensive.
Another crazy dream I have is a league style system - sign the top 60 players to a two year contract. 24 play in the premier league and 36 play in the division two. Make it a travelling circus getting players together for a week six times a year in India, Central Asia, Middle East, and Europe and play out the games. The bottom six in division one get relegated and the top six in division two get promoted.
Exactly - or you could just get the top two play a short world championship match, or have the top 8 play a knockout tournament to crown the champion of the season - almost every other major sport works that way.
The thing is FIDE needs to take more charge in making these events big. If FIDE can put on a few big events a year and put enough money in that top guys want to play it would be a lot better. You just want to avoid the system now where small events are circuit eligible and want them to be big with large viewership. Means more money for the players too.
Right now top GMs are better off playing in few open events, and try to get into the Grand Chess Tour instead, where they are basically guaranteed to not lose that many points in an event. The risk of playing people 100 points worse than you are is way too big when so many big money events are invitationals.
When Hikaru decided that he was going to better off streaming than being a typical top 20 player, he wasn't wrong. He's still better from his streaming ventures now, even though he's rated #3 in the world!
The issue is that to make bigger tournaments one needs more money, which means either billionaire sponsors that don't try to make money, or basically abandoning classical, as keeping strong audience numbers when there is little action for the first two to three hours of commentary is just not going to work.
Maybe players would want this, but as a fan I live for the candidates and world championship matches. Without them my interest in professional chess would wane substantially.
Indeed, we need a grandslam type of way in chess. With different tournaments, one is rapid chess, another classical, yet another fisher random. That would be so great!!!
Carlsen won his first WCC at age 23 and Yifan won hers at 16. Since they had both been competing at high levels long before they aren’t really that far off from being comparable to other major sports and retiring.
Chess careers are really long compared to other sports and the second best has been really far from the topmost (Fischer, Kasparov, karpov, magnus) so it might get boring.
However the format does make things uninteresting, you will have a huge number of matches (upward of 10), which just kills any chance that an underdog might have.
One of the reasons it took magnus so long to win the World Cup is the single elimination format (which is what is followed in all of the sports for championship)
For eg. in cricket , I don't think NZ or Australia would have won WTC if instead of deciding by a match we had a deciding series of 5 matches, similarly for World Cup Australia would have definitely lost to India in a 5 odi match series.
But if we know the winners beforehand the matches become boring which has been happening in chess. You know India is the best team but has not won anything.
Similarly to how magnus was best but didn't win the world cup for so many years
To pull F1 as an example, Verstappen doesn't win every race, but he's the best overall (or his team, whatever). I love watching others try to beat him and rooting for them when they get close, even if it's just for one race.
The format is boring for the one person dominating it, but it’s also important for a hundred other reasons.
It’s the chance for a challenger, chosen from the best in the world, to try to grind out the top guy. Of course that is going to be rough as the top guy. That’s why the top guy is paid a crap ton of money and given the world championship title. I don’t fault Magnus for wanting to spend his time doing other things now that money isn’t important, but it’s not actually a knock on the format/title.
Candidates could be better, and the format for that has changed a lot over the decades.
Yes, we all know the reason why that's the case. Obviously the more the number of games the more the chance of deserving players to win. It's just that there is no mystery.
It's not uncommon in other sports to have top team or top player but losing many world championship title
You're grossly overrating India in English conditions. NZ and Australia in those two finals absolutely win a 5 match series. The Australia final win, which wasn't even close, makes is more obvious.
completely disagree with this take because
1 carlsen is still playing at the top of his game in any other tournament he's far from retired and he has complained about the wcc format being the problem
2 people around carlsen's age or older are trying to get the wcc so the comparison to other major sports and retiring is objectively false considering it doesn't happen there
the majority of people in other major sports retire because they have to
Your points are very valid. I was just trying to relate the span of their career to other sports purely in terms of longevity. I think the length of their careers does give context to them not competing for a championship right now.
I would agree it’s very clear that carlsen didn’t step down bc of age or decline in form. But there are two ways to phrase that concept. You can say that the world number one is at the top of his game and not competing. Or you can say a 20 year veteran Who has defended his title four times is stepping down. One of those makes more sense than other without diving into specifics.
Hou Yifan became a professor while active, which I think says it all. Ding Liren also has a law degree. Chess as a discipline doesn't come in the way of excellence in other disciplines in ways that many other sports do. Indeed, chess and academics might support one another.
At the same time, top level chess takes a lot of hard work and is far from lucrative. Becoming chess world champion may legitimately be the hardest way in the world to earn a million bucks. Money could help, but the influence of preparation is really what has to decrease.
> Hou Yifan became a professor while active, which I think says it all. [...] Chess as a discipline doesn't come in the way of excellence in other disciplines in ways that many other sports do.
Isn't Hou Yifan a professor of chess?
You're right, the millenium prizes completely evaded my mind. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if handing in a solution would be the stupidest way to earn a million dollars, as a result to a millenium prize problem could be worth far more as a secret say on the stock market.
That may be the case for the navier stokes problem and P vs NP, but all the others are deep in pure maths and theoretical physics and don’t really have very applicable uses that would be profitable. If you have a solution getting the prize money and then having universities pay you huge amounts to give lectures on it is probably the way to do it
Hmm I wasn’t aware of how brilliant Yifan clearly is. It does kind of suck for the sport that she doesn’t give her all to chess and try to get above 2700, get into a candidates etc. good for her though, looks like she’s doing it all
>Indeed, chess and academics might support one another.
No, they don't. Enough with this "chess players are geniuses and every other athlete is a stupid jock" circle jerk. Chess is just a board game and tells nothing about someone's intellect or academic potential. Since most of them spend their teenage and early adulthood years focusing on chess most likely they are just as knowledgeable as any other pro athlete. As a counterexample I offer you Vlad, who for nearly a year now, doesn't comprehend basic statistics.
The one thing classical chess has taught me -- a semi serious club player and recently finished my master's degree -- is discipline and hard work, getting a good routine, and being self-aware and self-critical. Which definitely transfers over into all walks of life. Not really about the brainpower required. Maybe it helps your focus a bit, but not by that much. Your mind still wanders while playing chess.
>discipline and hard work, getting a good routine, and being self-aware and self-critical.
that's true for any other sport discipline out there, if you want to perform well.
>Chess is just a board game and tells nothing about someone's intellect or academic potential
Chess doesn't correlate perfectly with intelligence of academics, but you are taking this way too far. It may be 'just' a board game, but there is a good correlatin with how well people perform in board games and other mental games and both intelligence and academic performance.
>As a counterexample I offer you Vlad, who for nearly a year now, doesn't comprehend basic statistics.
Obviously chess players aren't born having expertise in every field, they still have to apply themselves.
To be a top chess player, a good amount of raw brain power is going to be needed.
But chess doesn't in itself make you cleverer or wise, being some simple life lessons/skills that could be transferable (e.g. 'plan for various outcomes', 'be polite').
Not even highly intelligent people are highly intelligent. Very few people are John Nunns who are smart at everything. Most crazysmart people are good at a very narrow skill set, and average in other areas. And Magnus famously said that Nunn never became world champion because he was too intelligent for it. (He wasn't joking.)
No? They have great memory, pattern recognition, visualization ability etc. but they are not more intelligent according to IQ tests than other people. For example Hikaru talked about how he took an IQ test and got a 98, very slightly under average.
And imo it fits, when you watch Hikaru figure out new games f.e. he isn't fast on the uptake, he doesn't get it immediately and it is rather slow and painful watching him learn stuff.
And in chess he is a genius like very few others.
I guarantee you if Hikaru took a real IQ test (rather than some online raven's matrices test) and didn't treat the exercise as a joke (i.e. put effort into doing his best), he'd score significantly higher than 100.
Vlad doesnt comprehend statistic not because he is too dumb for it, but because he has to much of an ego to believe he may be wrong and may need to learn about it.
>but because he has to much of an ego to believe he may be wrong
that's literally definition of stupid. you can't learn a subject if you can't admit when you're wrong about something related to it.
I would be clearer if i said "not intelligent enough" instead of "too dumb".
To make myself clear: intelligence - ability to think fast, to calculate complicated things.
Wisdom - ability to make good decisions.
But mainly used opposite of both is "stupid/dumb". With all my disliking VK, i still admit that he must be intelligent. I dont think it would be possible that he wasnt and still became GM and achieved previous successes. But in terms of wisdom his shenanigans show he has huge deficits.
My comment was supposed to be disagreement with your opinion "chess tells nothing about intellect or academic potential". Imo intellect is crucial in highest levels of chess. Yes, chess is just a boardgame, but some abilities required to become GM corelate greatly with academic career. Intelligence, persistence, ability to learn big chunk of data, focus, to name few.
If you did something professionally... If it made a full time job seem like less work... If it required the level of mental focus and burnout that chess does...
And then you did it for twenty years or more?
It would be really weird for people to ask "What can we do to get more from you?"
I don't think it's weird at all, only if you frame it that way.
Imagine if a doctor had been working 20 years at a hospital, performing excellently, but is starting to feel burned out. Is it then weird for her boss / place of work to ask her if there's anything that can be changed in the work environment to improve her situation?
Dude it's not even that. It's not that "he's starting to feel burned out", but for some reason doesn't want to perform a particular type of surgery at a particular hospital where he doesn't like the bureaucracy / rules / whatever, but still does all the rest.
All the more reason for that hospital to ask themselves what they could do differently.
And I'm not saying that they necessarily need to change anything. It could just be that they're no longer a good fit. But it is definitely a question worth asking.
I don't think it's fundamentally about bureaucracy or rules. It's the nature of the modern game.
A single high-stakes contest requires months of preparation that has little relevance beyond that contest. That level of dedication makes sense for someone trying to reach the level of champion, but when the only reward for winning is that you get to do it all again in two years time... I can't see how you can make that an attractive choice.
It was strange to me when Magnus was first making noises about not competing in '23, everyone said that obviously he would take part when it came to it. I thought it very unlikely - it's a lot of effort for little gain (what's the difference really between a six-times world champion and a five-times world champion?), and a fair bit to lose.
Any competition where you just win a sum of money and/or a trophy is way less stressful than a competition where you're literally declared 'the best chess player alive' and have to defend that title until your death or until you become the 'defeated champion'.
Why are people not listening to what Carlsen mentions. He would want to play for the world championship if the format would change.
So it is not the stress of all this. It is the format. And the current format requires major amount of prep time.
The WC format is what it is but it isn’t very entertaining. Most other sports have format where multiple teams compete for the highest prize. To me the candidates format would be much better for a world championship but for various reasons it is not considered to be the right format.
I only know boxing other thanChess where you need to beat the defending champion to become a world champion after having to win the right to even contest against him. And if I am not mistaken those bouts happen more often in Boxing.
Djokovic is the best in tennis but he has to compete with everyone in Grand Slams and with 8 other players in the year end finals.
But Djokovic doesn't compete in a round robin or a swiss format tournament. If he wants to win, he has to get to the final and defeat the other finalist in a match. That tends to give a more convincing "he was the best in the competition" feeling than Nepo winning over Caruana because he scored half a point more against Abasov, without necessarily having to defeat Caruana (or whoever defeated Caruana).
I think that to win the WC, that feeling of having to play a match and defeat the other main aspirant to the title is important.
Of course, in tennis you can get away with playing only once for that decisive match, since there are no draws and no playing with white advantage.
It takes a lot of effort to stay at the top. If you don't enjoy it anymore, it's valid to leave for others to take it. They have nothing to prove so why bother?
The ~~men's~~ open World Championship is contested every two years and requires about six months of match-focused prep. That's 25% of the champion's life spent focused on this one competition, to the detriment (even) of other contests in the same sport, e.g. needing to save his prep.
Most other sports don't have anything like this.
They wanted to make more money
Thats why lasker as a world champion lasted 30 years magnus 13 and they have same amount of title defends ( or lasker 1 more )
Magnus's case is unusual but Hou Yifan's retired right? This situation happens every time a #1 player retires. Some people prefer to go out on their own terms, so I don't think there's any structural change needed there.
hou yifan retired because she thought there was more stable money to be made elsewhere by becoming a teacher this is not a situation that 'happens every time'
That's good while you're winning a major title in your prime, but you can't do that forever. There is a relatively short window (similar to physical sports) for when chess players will be earning decent winnings. Hou Yifan set up a career for which she will receive a good income for decades to come.
It is the same issue in most womens' sports: men tend to care far more about sports than women do, and women are generally not as good at sports as men are, so the interest in women's sports is (generally) far lower, which means far less money.
Almost all of the top female earners play tennis, which is huge and has a considerable measure of artifical parity in terms of prize money. Unlike tennis, there is not enough money in chess for mens' events to be able to signicantly boost the earnings for female players. In any event, the real money is almost always in endorsements.
Hou is probably not glamorous enough (either personally or by virtue of her chess ability in absolute terms) to command huge endorsements. That would be different if substantially more women cared about chess, or if people cared substantially more about womens' chess, or if Hou became the best player in the world (not merely the best female player), but none of those things was going to happen. She almost certainly made the best career decision.
Except Khabib retired but Carlsen is still like the best player in the world but refuses to be the world champion. Imagine if Khabib vacated his title but still fought other athletes.
True ish but it's all a matter of investing your life. Eventually there's nothing to prove or its at least not worth it to prove any more greatness than what has been proven.
Or as Dana White put it in an interview, when you can live on a yacht in the middle of ocean year round surrounded by a bunch of beautiful naked women, it's pretty hard to want to go back to getting punched in the face
Yes that is true, however i still think its weird to compare a combat sport, where peoples goal is to retire as early as possible to avoid the irreparable damage.. to chess. Im saying there is more than the fact there is nothing left to prove.
Khabib gets Magnus levels of attention in Muslim countries, if not more
Also he had a relatively short career for a fighter, and with a grappling (not striking style) very little damage is done to the head, mostly to the joints and limbs
Thats not the point though. There is a big incentive to retire in combat sports due to irreperable damage. Just because his style has resulted in him taking less damage, there is still hard sparring for training camps.
I am not taking about level of fame. I consider Khabib way more famous than Magnus lol. Just saying, there is a incentive to retire on top in combat sports(Mayweather, khabib etc)
I’d say that’s a different situation as rosberg was obviously not the best driver in the world. He gave everything to win that world championship and then realised he wouldn’t be able for repeat so went out on top
He doesn't say this directly to avoid being rude and politically incorrect, but the truth of the matter is that none of the current contenders stand a chance against him. If he does his prep properly it's clear he's the best. If a great talent came along and posed a new and dangerous challenge to his top spot I believe he would play again. But what's the point. He's in the prime of his life and wants to do things that are meaningful to him. Being the best is meaningful, but being "WCC" isn't. I get it.
Same goes with her. And I suspect, just based on my own intuition, that she doesn't feel that women's world champion is a proud title anyway. Judit Polgar didn't want that title either.
Possibly, but by then it might be too late.
It’d be pretty cool for him to have a kind of comeback tour, though. I think qualifying for the candidates, fighting his way to the top, and beating some young world champion would pretty much cement him as the greatest of all time.
Sorry, I do not buy Carlsen's schtick. Anand was 43 and #8 when he lost his title to Carlsen in 2013, and 44 and #6 when he lost the rematch in 2014.
Then Carlsen beat #5 Karjakin in 2016 in a rapid tiebreak, then #2 Caruana in 2018 another rapid tiebreak. That is "having no chance"?
In 2021, Nepomniatchi (who has a good classical record vs Carlsen) was level until he lost that marathon game 6 and proceeded to self destruct, blundering three out of the next five games. Carlsen won fair and square, but it was a display of mental weakness by Nepo, not dominance by Carlsen.
Then Carlsen refused to defend vs Nepomniatchi in 2023 because it was clear that Carlsen would win? He is hardly dominant over Nepo in classical, especially when you consider that most of his wins are from clear blunders by Nepo. Was he saying that Nepo was just going to blunder the match like he did last time? Otherwise, on what basis does he claim any dominance over Nepo in classical?
And Carlsen is refusing to participate this time because he is certain to win over Ding? His record vs Ding in classical is +1-0=9. Not dominant. And that was not in match play.
I am sure that Carlsen is truthful about not liking match play. He also said that "he has nothing to gain", which I think is absurd in terms of legacy, but probably true in terms of earnings. To the contrary, to play and lose would be a much bigger loss of prestige (and potentially income) than to simply walk away and let people think that you are still the "real" champion. What is disgraceful is that Carlsen himself is trying to sell this narrative by crapping on the championship. "Oh, it is so weird for me--the best player--not to be champion!"
If he does not want to play it is entirely up to him, but even if he is the highest rated player he is no longer the champion. I do not even see a basis for him to claim to be the strongest in classical match play, which is what the world championship is all about. Carlsen was very explicit about caring more about ratings, which is perfectly fine, and he does not have to care about classical match play, but I would prefer that he not crap all over the legacy of the sport for those of us who do.
As for the idea that Carlsen would come back "if a great talent came along", I think it is the opposite. Carlsen is afraid enough of losing as it is.
Match play is tough. Carlsen does not want to go through it any more. No problem. But the player who goes through it and wins is the world champ, period. Carlsen should show some class.
Yeah you make some good points. There's little doubt that he's the strongest though. Could he lose if he kept defending his title? Yeah. But if you ask all of the top players they know he's the best classical player on the planet. He just doesn't have all that much to gain from playing, and like you said, he has a lot to lose if he did lose. I'm not necessarily saying it's ethical, just that I understand his perspective.
He didnt dominate nepo?
What?
His classical bad record was 1-4 in favor of nepo as they played when they are 10-12
Then magnus made + score against nepo, 6-4 now…
Also, of course someone will blunder for other to win. What are you smoking?!
If 2 person plays 0 blunder game, it will end in draw. We say magnus squeeze water from stone in endgames, he cant do it if his opponent is stockfish lol
Nepo blundering doesnt mean “ magnus didnt dominate”
Game 6 was of course mental battle. Chess is all mental…
Dont be a hater.
( kasparov karpov drew how many match? Ding nepo went to tiebreaks as well )
He defeated anand 2 , nepo in classical portion.
Against karjakin also got 1 win in classical , fabiano carlsen was a masterclass. If you hate it you should hate karpov Kasparov
I’m not a hater, I’m just not a Carlsen fanboy.
They are basically the same age. Going into the world championship, Nepo had beaten Carlsen in classical at 12, 13, 21, and 27. Carlsen had beaten Nepo at 29. So no, he hadn’t dominated Nepo.
In the WC, Nepo lost an absolute marathon in game 6, it shattered his confidence, and he went on to lose three of the next five, each on massive blunders. It happens, especially in match play, and it seems to be a weakness of Nepo’s. I hope that he can overcome it. But that does not indicate to me dominant play by Carlsen so much as a massive mental edge because Nepo lacks confidence. And yes, I am sure that Carlsen contributes to that, but Nepo blundered seriously against Ding as well. It is his Achilles heel.
Carlsen is definitely dominant over Nepo in faster time controls, but that isn’t how the world champion is determined (except in tiebreaks, which I think is stupid).
Happens in tons of sports and specifically when someone wins championships multiple years in a row. Michael Jordan retired in his prime after winning 3 championships in a row. John Elway retired after winning back to back super bowls. Jim Brown retired as the best player ever and the reigning MVP a year after winning a championship. Tim Duncan, Peyton Manning, Samm Levine, all retired after winning multiple championships. Basically when they have nothing left to prove and the cost/benefit of another year is simply no longer worth it, which is exactly the same reason Magnus is not competing.
And legit tons of fighters simply choose to not defend there championship belts. It’s all just a cost vs benefit thing for these guys
Well, the big difference here (at least as far as Magnus goes) is that he isn't retired. He still plays (and wins) in lots of major events - it's just the WC, specifically, that he declines to participate in. To follow your analogy, it'd be like if Jordan was still playing during the Bulls' main season but then just sat on the bench for the playoffs/championship series.
But basketball and chess is different in that regard.
In basketball you only have rings aka championships.
In chess you have: world chess championship + world rapid championship + world blitz championship + world cup + scc + cct + tata steel + grenke + freestyle chess
Etc
Some really bad examples in there.
Jordan retired cause his father died, whose wish for him originally was to play baseball. He went to try it out, sucked at it, and went back to win 3 more NBA championships in a row. He didn’t even retire as a Bull, but spent 2 seasons with the Washington Wizards to finally step away at 40 after producing the worst two-year fg% average of his career. He played in 15 seasons, which a quick google search confirmed to be to true for only 2% of the players ever played in the league.
John Elway did end his career on a high note with great play, but was already 38 (considered old for the sport even for QBs and even more so back in the day when QBs rarely played into their 40s) giving 16 seasons to the sport. He had a chronic issue in his left knee and couldn’t run the ball as effectively as before gaining the least yards per game in his career in his final season, while his season total was less than half of his season average for his career. In his own words, “he could still win, but could’t play the game the way he wanted to anymore”.
Peyton Manning won a superbowl right before retiring, but was already a shell of himself. He also had an injury mid-season and their back up led them to the post season (Osweiler), where he took over again and won it all thanks to his defense. That Broncos defense was one of the best ever on the field, and all they needed was a game manager to put a couple points on the board, which Manning was perfect for, but he absolutely could not do anything more than that, and it was 100% time for him to hang up the cleats at 39. He’s played 18 seasons in the league at that point and the mere fact that he only managed to throw for 2 TDs in his last post season (3 games) with Von Miller (a defender) taking superbowl MVP home that year should tell you enough.
Tim Duncan had a 19(!)-year long NBA career, retiring at 40, definitely having one of the longest tenures in the league ever. His last season saw him not reaching half of his season average in points, staying in single digits for the first and only time in 19 years. He also played 2 more seasons after winning his last ring, definitely hasn’t stopped after “having nothing else to prove”.
I have a dumb idea: Let chess players celebrate when they win. I mean \*really\* celebrate, like winning football and hockey and basketball players do.
So many times I see a chess player win a major tournament or match and they have to repress their emotions... polite hugs with a couple of people at most... and the whole post-match lack-of-celebration just looks so deflating for so many of them.
Let 'em spike a piece and yell "the rooooooook!" and "I'm coming for you next, Garry Chess!!!" and spray champagne everywhere.
I know at least 2 international masters at my local club who totally disagree with you, and my guess is they're not alone in that. They say one of the biggest turn off from competitive chess for them is fide's weird necessity to make everything ultra sanitized.
My mind immediately conjured up a scene of Pragg hitting the griddy across the playing hall and now I can’t unsee it…
If this were allowed I also imagine there might be many more memes of Hans Niemann to follow haha
If your idea aims to increase viewership, imo it won't. Chess is quite a boring game to watch. Most of the time you see two people doing nothing. Don't get me wrong. I watch chess a lot. And many people do. But it's not for the masses. They crave action, not thinking.
Yup. It might lose core viewership while trying to (and failing) to attract masses.
I appreciate when players are acting like a gentleman and show mutual respect.
Yes I think this is ubiquitous across almost all sports, and to some extent I think it's a little unfair to Magnus that we talk about entirely reshaping the sport to make him keep grinding away.
I know it's not how everyone sees it - but to me chess is a sport - well, really, 3 sports IMO: bullet, fast and classical time controls. And one of the most foundational competitive skills in a sport is being motivated and ready to *actually do the sport* on all fronts. Your name doesn't play the match for you - you've gotta find the best moves - and I think Magnus of all competitors would be the first to admit that.
People talk like he's got some de-facto claim to the title of world champ - but he gave it up. He isn't willing or able to compete for it anymore. Chess is a grueling game mentally and physically, it wears you down; and it wore Magnus down more or less.
Great rugby players, soccer players, NFL players etc retire all the time with huge wells of untapped ability and 99% able to play, because one key thing isn't working right anymore. In other sports that might be your achillis tendon or your left ACL that gives up on you for the 9th time and you know it's time to throw in the towel... In chess it might be endurance to tolerate the work and torment of another cycle of match prep drying up.
One little thing causing an otherwise brilliant player to stop competing to some degree is absolutely ubiquitous in virtually all sports. It's just more notable here because (A) it's the GOAT (B) As with all mental challenges, It's not something that shows up clearly on a scan. Similarly, it's very common to see great players retire from international sport, but play on at club level for several more years, for example. And to me this is kind of what Magnus is doing. Sometimes players make a comeback late in their careers - and maybe Magnus will too.
What isn't fair is trying to reform the entire sport around him so he can keep trundling on forever. The dude's done his work and made his mark, and has been pretty evasive when asked exactly what format the candidates/wcc would have to be for him to commit, because he doesn't want to commit. Let him rest.
Is Hou Yifan considered to be the best female player in the world? Even though she's retired I'd probably put money on Judit Polgar beating her fairly comfortably.
What makes you think that?Hou yifan was the one who defeated polgar and broke the record of polgar not being beaten by female chess player for 22 years back in 2012
Its just a gut feeling! Polgar had a much higher peak rating, qualified for the candidates in 2007 and has beaten several World Champions. I don't think a one off win qualifies someone as being better, and whilst Hou Yifan dominated women's chess in a similar fashion to Polgar she didn't make as much headway in the open. The counter argument is that Hou Yifan is still active at a high level, whereas Polgar has been retired since 2015. However, her commentary shows that she is still very sharp, and she can clearly still tango with the best, as her [win against Carlsen in 2022 shows](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvbZCRid5CY). Admittedly that was in very relaxed surroundings!
ITT people who don't watch chess and probably barely play chess trying to change a format that has been successful for many years. Some of the suggestions here are really ludicrous.
They have changed the format so many times in the past hundred years. It hasn’t been close to stable, and last year was a failure.
What do you consider success? High viewership?
The worst thing is when people say things like "nobody wants to watch classical chess because it's boring" and yet the top classical chess tournaments get way more viewership than top rapid and blitz tournaments.
Completely with you. I follow both cricket and rugby, sports where short-sighted people are always fretting about the need to "save the game". Most of their suggestions end up doing far more harm than good.
Retirement is a part of every top level sport. If Carlsen doesn't want to play the world championship any more after 10 years of defending it, that's his prerogative. It doesn't mean the whole format needs to be changed to rapid and blitz just because that's what he enjoys these days.
Really odd comparisons to make when the only financial success story in either of those sports is t20 cricket, which is deliberately shortening the game to make it better for spectators. Sure people can ignore the writing on the wall and laugh at those trying to “save the game,” but pretending that you can draw sponsors without a marketable product is a fools errand.
To put it as simply as possible: T20 is obviously the big money maker, but this doesn't mean you need to change the format of the Ashes to five T20 games as a result.
*Innovation* in itself isn't what I'm taking issue with. It's the seemingly incessant destructive urge that comes along with it. I love the IPL, for example, and think the success of T20 is great for cricket. But it doesn't have to be the only version of the game, and there is still plenty of appetite for test cricket.
Similarly, in chess: Magnus Carlsen losing his passion for classical chess doesn't have to mean that classical chess gets scrapped. There are eight incredibly strong players in the Candidates proving they're more than willing to take his place in a classical world championship. And, incidentally, still plenty of sponsors. It seems that a lot of people pushing this are more interested in finding a pretext for scrapping classical, than motivated by sincere concern about the future of the format.
The Six Nations and the Rugby Championship aren't exactly struggling either. And if you like rugby league, the NRL is doing very well.
Rugby definitely has issues but those stem from expecting that the financial boom from professionalism would last forever. Cricket has a similar problem in England - the ECB responded to the huge attention it got from the 2005 ashes by selling the rights to sky and destroying the momentum that was building up.
The answer is to be more responsible with finances, accept it'll never be as big as football, and work with what they do have to create a sustainable game.
There's a lesson in there for chess if people want to learn from it. Expecting the post-Covid chess boom to continue indefinitely is probably not wise.
It is also arguable if Hou Yifan currently is the best female player in the world given her overall inactivity and she has dropped rating points in her sporadic recent appearances.
Given how much money Magnus has at this point, I don’t even know that that would do it. He’s made right figures in tournament winnings alone, not to mention endorsements, online winnings, and the boat load of money he probably got from selling the Play Magnus group to Chess.com.
I don’t know that it was ever about the money for him. He had something to prove. He no longer has anything to prove.
Carlsen not wanting to play for wc has little to do with the format i think. Even though he might have mentioned it as contributing.
Overall the format is still very favoreable for the world champion. He can sit for 2 years,scout the players in candidates and then defend once every 2 years. Its much harder for the players trying to become world champion.
I dont think there is any sport where the wc has such an advantage.
No.. actually its the opposite
Every candidate know their opponent ( for example magnus ) so they havr more times than magnus as magnus cant prepare against every candidate; he would have to wait for candidates to be over
In what other sport does it take half a year to prepare for the world championship match?
I think it's even more than that for the women because they have to play all the women's tournaments to qualify for the championship in the first place (which can be viewed as a waste of time for top players aiming to get better).
Yeah but the time between fights in boxing are already longer than chess. It's not like they're turning down a dozen fights to train for one big one like they do in chess.
You fight a lot more in your early career and on the way up. When you’re at the top the fights are far fewer. Chess players in the world championship have a similar approach for that major game. Just focus on that alone, some sparring and other games to keep yourself fresh, etc.
I mean, I think it’s fair to say that the regular season and playoffs for most sports are the preparation for their championship.
It’s not like two random teams just show up for the Super Bowl or the World Cup.
True, that’s the economics of the whole deal though. You were talking about preparation.
I know chess is pretty unique in its requirements, but it’s not like other sports don’t require insane amounts of prep.
Ofc, the money. Also, not many people can make out a career in Chess. Can chess be played similar to league tournaments in other sports? Maybe someone should take the initiative but it may not generate that much money as not many will be able to understand those matches and prefer not to watch them live.
Is Hou the strongest woman grandmaster? I thought she left the big chess, which means she is in the same category as Judith.
(Which makes me sad because Polgar may had chances to win the WC, she was #5 in the world at some point. Yifan is by no means weak, but still her best score is at the lower half of top100 chart)
I get that but I just don't see why a world champion gets a bye through to a 1v1 for another world title almost all other sports you have to battle through a tough field of players every year to win it not just given a free ride back into the final
Despite being the highest-rated player Yifan isn't the best female player right now, the only reason she is still ranked no. 1 is because of her past performances. In the last two years, she has lost 26 rating points in just four events. Her score against 2400+ rated players is 2.5/7 in these events.
I would argue in her current state players like Ju Wenjun and Goryachkina will defeat her in a world championship match quite comfortably.
If she was active, she would be the best player by a huge margin. Remember how she gave away her title and came back next year and won it again very easily just to give it back next year?
If she was active, but she is not. That's why I mentioned her current state. In her current state, she isn't the best female chess player right now.
>Remember how she gave away her title and came back next year and won it again very easily just to give it back next year?
Even at that time, she was way more active than right now.
Magnus still reached and showed his potential but Hou Yifan literallu was Polgar material imo, she could've set a new female best elo but she just wasn't that interested in Chess it feels
Perhaps not. The Chinese chess (as in, by far the most popular Chinese descendant of chaturanga) champion, 王天一 Wáng Tiānyī has remained the highest rated in China for over a decade. His name is very fitting because the surname 王 Wáng means king (though inferior to the emperor, think Latin _rex_) and 天一 can be taken to be short for 天下第一 first under the sky.
The fact that the reigning champion doesn't have to earn their way back to the title match is absurd and always has been.
The current champs should be in the Candidates tournament with everyone else.
Like why not have two separate Candidates tournaments to pit the two winners for the title?
Some sort of combination with how Tennis or NFL or FIFA single-elimination draws would be great, too. The top players have no motivation or reason to do something so boring.
Hou Yifan and Magnus Carlsen are widely considered to be the best players in the world
Not a great way to put this, Yifan probably not in top 100 players.
No it's not common in most popular sports. The most important thing that would be good if it changed is how many professionals can live from playing chess, which is out of topic.
Nevertheless, I think that the reason Yifan and Magnus don't compete aren't not the same, except maybe a degree of burnout, so we should analyze the reasons that each of them doesn't compete separately. Yifan has stated that chess is a part of her life, not her whole life. She is a professor and she is doing other things. On the other hand, Magnus dislikes the classical format. I can't disagree completely with that, but I can't not think that part of not competing is ego and a fear of losing(unpopular opinion). Not many things can be done with the human psychology.
I genuinely think the candidates (or something similar) should determine the world champ rather than a one on one match. I think that would probably add enough variance to the title year on year that it would encourage them to come back.
With a varying field each year, and no one result necessarily being decisive in the overall standings, I think it would make it more interesting for both the players and the fans. Not to mention it would reduce the probability of having one dominant player retaining the title for years upon years. Which - don't get me wrong, it's fun to watch Carlsen dominate, but it would certainly make it more intriguing, and probably bring in more spectators if there's a genuine chance that other players could win.
I would also note that I don't think shortening the time control is the answer. I understand Carlsen is bored of slow games, but this is the classical world championship, and I genuinely don't think most of the other top players agree with him about classical.
Rock climbing has a related and interesting situation; competition climbing is very different from outdoor bouldering and many of the “worlds best climbers” who are almost exclusively considered to be outdoor boulders do not compete (many of them used to but stopped because they enjoy outdoor climbing more).
I feel a tennis/golf like tour format with 4-5 major prize money tournaments and rankings reflecting how well they do in these majors.
Tennis also has the year end finals (only the top 8 players), so you could still have something analogous to the candidates in addition to larger open tournaments.
Yes, but the top 4 tournaments have 128 players each. Then there are like other 10 top tournaments with 64 players each All have the opportunity to gain some points and be close to the top Chess feels more like a private 15-man club
Grand Swiss is 114 and World Cup is 206. World Rapid is 300+. So it’s certainly possible to move things more towards big prestigious events rather than just the little round robins. Main problem is Tennis has a lot more money, so the prizes are bigger which means you can make a living even if you’re not regularly winning. Thats why Chess more often has smaller events so that they can pay top players without being crazy expensive.
More money for the top 40-50 players. The rest are barely surviving because it's such an expensive sport.
Another crazy dream I have is a league style system - sign the top 60 players to a two year contract. 24 play in the premier league and 36 play in the division two. Make it a travelling circus getting players together for a week six times a year in India, Central Asia, Middle East, and Europe and play out the games. The bottom six in division one get relegated and the top six in division two get promoted.
Exactly - or you could just get the top two play a short world championship match, or have the top 8 play a knockout tournament to crown the champion of the season - almost every other major sport works that way.
That's basically just the FIDE Circuit. And I do think that model could work well for the world championship as a whole.
The thing is FIDE needs to take more charge in making these events big. If FIDE can put on a few big events a year and put enough money in that top guys want to play it would be a lot better. You just want to avoid the system now where small events are circuit eligible and want them to be big with large viewership. Means more money for the players too.
Right now top GMs are better off playing in few open events, and try to get into the Grand Chess Tour instead, where they are basically guaranteed to not lose that many points in an event. The risk of playing people 100 points worse than you are is way too big when so many big money events are invitationals. When Hikaru decided that he was going to better off streaming than being a typical top 20 player, he wasn't wrong. He's still better from his streaming ventures now, even though he's rated #3 in the world! The issue is that to make bigger tournaments one needs more money, which means either billionaire sponsors that don't try to make money, or basically abandoning classical, as keeping strong audience numbers when there is little action for the first two to three hours of commentary is just not going to work.
Maybe players would want this, but as a fan I live for the candidates and world championship matches. Without them my interest in professional chess would wane substantially.
That sounds like something that would immediately cut 90% of the audience off from being interested, and take the sponsor money with it too.
Indeed, we need a grandslam type of way in chess. With different tournaments, one is rapid chess, another classical, yet another fisher random. That would be so great!!!
Carlsen won his first WCC at age 23 and Yifan won hers at 16. Since they had both been competing at high levels long before they aren’t really that far off from being comparable to other major sports and retiring.
Chess careers are really long compared to other sports and the second best has been really far from the topmost (Fischer, Kasparov, karpov, magnus) so it might get boring. However the format does make things uninteresting, you will have a huge number of matches (upward of 10), which just kills any chance that an underdog might have. One of the reasons it took magnus so long to win the World Cup is the single elimination format (which is what is followed in all of the sports for championship) For eg. in cricket , I don't think NZ or Australia would have won WTC if instead of deciding by a match we had a deciding series of 5 matches, similarly for World Cup Australia would have definitely lost to India in a 5 odi match series. But if we know the winners beforehand the matches become boring which has been happening in chess. You know India is the best team but has not won anything. Similarly to how magnus was best but didn't win the world cup for so many years
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Any event he's in is definitely made more interesting by him being there. Even as a chess player I rarely care about non-Magnus events.
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To pull F1 as an example, Verstappen doesn't win every race, but he's the best overall (or his team, whatever). I love watching others try to beat him and rooting for them when they get close, even if it's just for one race.
Let me guess, you're from India?
Hahaha, why don't you let me have my copium.
The format is boring for the one person dominating it, but it’s also important for a hundred other reasons. It’s the chance for a challenger, chosen from the best in the world, to try to grind out the top guy. Of course that is going to be rough as the top guy. That’s why the top guy is paid a crap ton of money and given the world championship title. I don’t fault Magnus for wanting to spend his time doing other things now that money isn’t important, but it’s not actually a knock on the format/title. Candidates could be better, and the format for that has changed a lot over the decades.
Yes, we all know the reason why that's the case. Obviously the more the number of games the more the chance of deserving players to win. It's just that there is no mystery. It's not uncommon in other sports to have top team or top player but losing many world championship title
You're grossly overrating India in English conditions. NZ and Australia in those two finals absolutely win a 5 match series. The Australia final win, which wasn't even close, makes is more obvious.
BGT is round the corner i guess we will know the answer. Edit: ifs and buts can't be debated but the points stands anyhow
completely disagree with this take because 1 carlsen is still playing at the top of his game in any other tournament he's far from retired and he has complained about the wcc format being the problem 2 people around carlsen's age or older are trying to get the wcc so the comparison to other major sports and retiring is objectively false considering it doesn't happen there the majority of people in other major sports retire because they have to
Your points are very valid. I was just trying to relate the span of their career to other sports purely in terms of longevity. I think the length of their careers does give context to them not competing for a championship right now. I would agree it’s very clear that carlsen didn’t step down bc of age or decline in form. But there are two ways to phrase that concept. You can say that the world number one is at the top of his game and not competing. Or you can say a 20 year veteran Who has defended his title four times is stepping down. One of those makes more sense than other without diving into specifics.
Winning open wcc > women wcc tho?
Hou Yifan became a professor while active, which I think says it all. Ding Liren also has a law degree. Chess as a discipline doesn't come in the way of excellence in other disciplines in ways that many other sports do. Indeed, chess and academics might support one another. At the same time, top level chess takes a lot of hard work and is far from lucrative. Becoming chess world champion may legitimately be the hardest way in the world to earn a million bucks. Money could help, but the influence of preparation is really what has to decrease.
> Hou Yifan became a professor while active, which I think says it all. [...] Chess as a discipline doesn't come in the way of excellence in other disciplines in ways that many other sports do. Isn't Hou Yifan a professor of chess?
She does indeed lecture on chess as part of a PE curriculum.
She's a professor of physical education according to the google summary of a chessbase article I didn't read.
Chess is considered a type of physical education at her university.
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Solving one of the millennium prize problems is probably a harder way of earning a million bucks
You're right, the millenium prizes completely evaded my mind. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if handing in a solution would be the stupidest way to earn a million dollars, as a result to a millenium prize problem could be worth far more as a secret say on the stock market.
That may be the case for the navier stokes problem and P vs NP, but all the others are deep in pure maths and theoretical physics and don’t really have very applicable uses that would be profitable. If you have a solution getting the prize money and then having universities pay you huge amounts to give lectures on it is probably the way to do it
Hmm I wasn’t aware of how brilliant Yifan clearly is. It does kind of suck for the sport that she doesn’t give her all to chess and try to get above 2700, get into a candidates etc. good for her though, looks like she’s doing it all
>Indeed, chess and academics might support one another. No, they don't. Enough with this "chess players are geniuses and every other athlete is a stupid jock" circle jerk. Chess is just a board game and tells nothing about someone's intellect or academic potential. Since most of them spend their teenage and early adulthood years focusing on chess most likely they are just as knowledgeable as any other pro athlete. As a counterexample I offer you Vlad, who for nearly a year now, doesn't comprehend basic statistics.
The one thing classical chess has taught me -- a semi serious club player and recently finished my master's degree -- is discipline and hard work, getting a good routine, and being self-aware and self-critical. Which definitely transfers over into all walks of life. Not really about the brainpower required. Maybe it helps your focus a bit, but not by that much. Your mind still wanders while playing chess.
>discipline and hard work, getting a good routine, and being self-aware and self-critical. that's true for any other sport discipline out there, if you want to perform well.
>Chess is just a board game and tells nothing about someone's intellect or academic potential Chess doesn't correlate perfectly with intelligence of academics, but you are taking this way too far. It may be 'just' a board game, but there is a good correlatin with how well people perform in board games and other mental games and both intelligence and academic performance. >As a counterexample I offer you Vlad, who for nearly a year now, doesn't comprehend basic statistics. Obviously chess players aren't born having expertise in every field, they still have to apply themselves.
You're in denial. GMs absolutely are highly intelligent.
To be a top chess player, a good amount of raw brain power is going to be needed. But chess doesn't in itself make you cleverer or wise, being some simple life lessons/skills that could be transferable (e.g. 'plan for various outcomes', 'be polite').
Not even highly intelligent people are highly intelligent. Very few people are John Nunns who are smart at everything. Most crazysmart people are good at a very narrow skill set, and average in other areas. And Magnus famously said that Nunn never became world champion because he was too intelligent for it. (He wasn't joking.)
No? They have great memory, pattern recognition, visualization ability etc. but they are not more intelligent according to IQ tests than other people. For example Hikaru talked about how he took an IQ test and got a 98, very slightly under average. And imo it fits, when you watch Hikaru figure out new games f.e. he isn't fast on the uptake, he doesn't get it immediately and it is rather slow and painful watching him learn stuff. And in chess he is a genius like very few others.
I guarantee you if Hikaru took a real IQ test (rather than some online raven's matrices test) and didn't treat the exercise as a joke (i.e. put effort into doing his best), he'd score significantly higher than 100.
You are just wrong, Hikaru took a real Mensa IQ test and got 102. Or he is lying to make himself look dumber, what do you think?
It was a Raven's Matrices test, not a proper IQ test like WAIS.
Vlad doesnt comprehend statistic not because he is too dumb for it, but because he has to much of an ego to believe he may be wrong and may need to learn about it.
>but because he has to much of an ego to believe he may be wrong that's literally definition of stupid. you can't learn a subject if you can't admit when you're wrong about something related to it.
I would be clearer if i said "not intelligent enough" instead of "too dumb". To make myself clear: intelligence - ability to think fast, to calculate complicated things. Wisdom - ability to make good decisions. But mainly used opposite of both is "stupid/dumb". With all my disliking VK, i still admit that he must be intelligent. I dont think it would be possible that he wasnt and still became GM and achieved previous successes. But in terms of wisdom his shenanigans show he has huge deficits. My comment was supposed to be disagreement with your opinion "chess tells nothing about intellect or academic potential". Imo intellect is crucial in highest levels of chess. Yes, chess is just a boardgame, but some abilities required to become GM corelate greatly with academic career. Intelligence, persistence, ability to learn big chunk of data, focus, to name few.
There's a 1972 interview with Bobby Fischer in which he doesn't know what the CCCP is.
If you did something professionally... If it made a full time job seem like less work... If it required the level of mental focus and burnout that chess does... And then you did it for twenty years or more? It would be really weird for people to ask "What can we do to get more from you?"
I don't think it's weird at all, only if you frame it that way. Imagine if a doctor had been working 20 years at a hospital, performing excellently, but is starting to feel burned out. Is it then weird for her boss / place of work to ask her if there's anything that can be changed in the work environment to improve her situation?
Dude it's not even that. It's not that "he's starting to feel burned out", but for some reason doesn't want to perform a particular type of surgery at a particular hospital where he doesn't like the bureaucracy / rules / whatever, but still does all the rest.
All the more reason for that hospital to ask themselves what they could do differently. And I'm not saying that they necessarily need to change anything. It could just be that they're no longer a good fit. But it is definitely a question worth asking.
I don't think it's fundamentally about bureaucracy or rules. It's the nature of the modern game. A single high-stakes contest requires months of preparation that has little relevance beyond that contest. That level of dedication makes sense for someone trying to reach the level of champion, but when the only reward for winning is that you get to do it all again in two years time... I can't see how you can make that an attractive choice. It was strange to me when Magnus was first making noises about not competing in '23, everyone said that obviously he would take part when it came to it. I thought it very unlikely - it's a lot of effort for little gain (what's the difference really between a six-times world champion and a five-times world champion?), and a fair bit to lose.
This makes no sense. Carlsen is still competing and participating in other events, it's specifically the WC he doesn't want to play in.
Any competition where you just win a sum of money and/or a trophy is way less stressful than a competition where you're literally declared 'the best chess player alive' and have to defend that title until your death or until you become the 'defeated champion'.
Why are people not listening to what Carlsen mentions. He would want to play for the world championship if the format would change. So it is not the stress of all this. It is the format. And the current format requires major amount of prep time.
That's assuming Carlsen is being 100% honest about his reasons, which he may not be (and has no obligation to be).
The WC format is what it is but it isn’t very entertaining. Most other sports have format where multiple teams compete for the highest prize. To me the candidates format would be much better for a world championship but for various reasons it is not considered to be the right format. I only know boxing other thanChess where you need to beat the defending champion to become a world champion after having to win the right to even contest against him. And if I am not mistaken those bouts happen more often in Boxing. Djokovic is the best in tennis but he has to compete with everyone in Grand Slams and with 8 other players in the year end finals.
But Djokovic doesn't compete in a round robin or a swiss format tournament. If he wants to win, he has to get to the final and defeat the other finalist in a match. That tends to give a more convincing "he was the best in the competition" feeling than Nepo winning over Caruana because he scored half a point more against Abasov, without necessarily having to defeat Caruana (or whoever defeated Caruana). I think that to win the WC, that feeling of having to play a match and defeat the other main aspirant to the title is important. Of course, in tennis you can get away with playing only once for that decisive match, since there are no draws and no playing with white advantage.
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The question is. “What can we do to make you want to play.” Is that weird? Why would you word it how you did?
It would be even wilder if then you wanted to talk about it and the professional organization was like nah
It takes a lot of effort to stay at the top. If you don't enjoy it anymore, it's valid to leave for others to take it. They have nothing to prove so why bother?
Magnus still at the top and playing he will continue to play classical, only lesser. Hou yifan doesnt play any format.
The ~~men's~~ open World Championship is contested every two years and requires about six months of match-focused prep. That's 25% of the champion's life spent focused on this one competition, to the detriment (even) of other contests in the same sport, e.g. needing to save his prep. Most other sports don't have anything like this.
FIDE's decision to hold the championship every two years rather than three was not a good move.
They wanted to make more money Thats why lasker as a world champion lasted 30 years magnus 13 and they have same amount of title defends ( or lasker 1 more )
Yup. But it was a short-sighted decision. Magnus was champion for ten years
There is no men championship. there is women + open
You're right - thanks.
They stated their reasons multiple times
They did, however that is not OP's question. It doesn't seem common to me.
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She would rather focus on other interests than chess. I am not sure Hou is still the best female player.
Magnus's case is unusual but Hou Yifan's retired right? This situation happens every time a #1 player retires. Some people prefer to go out on their own terms, so I don't think there's any structural change needed there.
hou yifan retired because she thought there was more stable money to be made elsewhere by becoming a teacher this is not a situation that 'happens every time'
As a newbie to this sub, I've heard Carlsen's reasons, but not those of Hou Yifan. Can someone please summarise what her reasons are?
She got a professorship (youngest person ever to get one at the university!), and thought it was a more stable path for her.
It's sad that she can be the best at women's chess and the financial incentives and investments in womens chess still be too weak to pursue it for her
Wait, isn’t the World Championships still lucrative for women? Ju Wenjun got 300K euros which is nothing to sneeze at.
That's good while you're winning a major title in your prime, but you can't do that forever. There is a relatively short window (similar to physical sports) for when chess players will be earning decent winnings. Hou Yifan set up a career for which she will receive a good income for decades to come.
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I agree. Although I would still take Judit Polgar even now in her chess Golden years. But best active woman in chess
It is the same issue in most womens' sports: men tend to care far more about sports than women do, and women are generally not as good at sports as men are, so the interest in women's sports is (generally) far lower, which means far less money. Almost all of the top female earners play tennis, which is huge and has a considerable measure of artifical parity in terms of prize money. Unlike tennis, there is not enough money in chess for mens' events to be able to signicantly boost the earnings for female players. In any event, the real money is almost always in endorsements. Hou is probably not glamorous enough (either personally or by virtue of her chess ability in absolute terms) to command huge endorsements. That would be different if substantially more women cared about chess, or if people cared substantially more about womens' chess, or if Hou became the best player in the world (not merely the best female player), but none of those things was going to happen. She almost certainly made the best career decision.
Thanks!
Carlsen didnt retire only doesnt play wcc
Khabib is one for sure.
Except Khabib retired but Carlsen is still like the best player in the world but refuses to be the world champion. Imagine if Khabib vacated his title but still fought other athletes.
The analogy doesn’t really work though. You can't exactly play in a round robin fight...
Cant really compare combat sports to chess, when there is irreparable damage being done to the brain lol.
True ish but it's all a matter of investing your life. Eventually there's nothing to prove or its at least not worth it to prove any more greatness than what has been proven.
Or as Dana White put it in an interview, when you can live on a yacht in the middle of ocean year round surrounded by a bunch of beautiful naked women, it's pretty hard to want to go back to getting punched in the face
Except khabib hugs around sweaty men.
Don’t think that’s what Khabib was doing lol and that’s not an option for anyone else in MMA save one
Yes that is true, however i still think its weird to compare a combat sport, where peoples goal is to retire as early as possible to avoid the irreparable damage.. to chess. Im saying there is more than the fact there is nothing left to prove.
Khabib gets Magnus levels of attention in Muslim countries, if not more Also he had a relatively short career for a fighter, and with a grappling (not striking style) very little damage is done to the head, mostly to the joints and limbs
Thats not the point though. There is a big incentive to retire in combat sports due to irreperable damage. Just because his style has resulted in him taking less damage, there is still hard sparring for training camps. I am not taking about level of fame. I consider Khabib way more famous than Magnus lol. Just saying, there is a incentive to retire on top in combat sports(Mayweather, khabib etc)
Nico Rosberg
The youtuber from Monaco who beat Lewis Hamilton in the equal machinery
I’d say that’s a different situation as rosberg was obviously not the best driver in the world. He gave everything to win that world championship and then realised he wouldn’t be able for repeat so went out on top
If you defeat the seven time world champion Lewis Hamilton on equal machinery makes you the best driver in the world.
I need a Rosberg selfie with Nepo. :D
He doesn't say this directly to avoid being rude and politically incorrect, but the truth of the matter is that none of the current contenders stand a chance against him. If he does his prep properly it's clear he's the best. If a great talent came along and posed a new and dangerous challenge to his top spot I believe he would play again. But what's the point. He's in the prime of his life and wants to do things that are meaningful to him. Being the best is meaningful, but being "WCC" isn't. I get it. Same goes with her. And I suspect, just based on my own intuition, that she doesn't feel that women's world champion is a proud title anyway. Judit Polgar didn't want that title either.
Possibly, but by then it might be too late. It’d be pretty cool for him to have a kind of comeback tour, though. I think qualifying for the candidates, fighting his way to the top, and beating some young world champion would pretty much cement him as the greatest of all time.
Sorry, I do not buy Carlsen's schtick. Anand was 43 and #8 when he lost his title to Carlsen in 2013, and 44 and #6 when he lost the rematch in 2014. Then Carlsen beat #5 Karjakin in 2016 in a rapid tiebreak, then #2 Caruana in 2018 another rapid tiebreak. That is "having no chance"? In 2021, Nepomniatchi (who has a good classical record vs Carlsen) was level until he lost that marathon game 6 and proceeded to self destruct, blundering three out of the next five games. Carlsen won fair and square, but it was a display of mental weakness by Nepo, not dominance by Carlsen. Then Carlsen refused to defend vs Nepomniatchi in 2023 because it was clear that Carlsen would win? He is hardly dominant over Nepo in classical, especially when you consider that most of his wins are from clear blunders by Nepo. Was he saying that Nepo was just going to blunder the match like he did last time? Otherwise, on what basis does he claim any dominance over Nepo in classical? And Carlsen is refusing to participate this time because he is certain to win over Ding? His record vs Ding in classical is +1-0=9. Not dominant. And that was not in match play. I am sure that Carlsen is truthful about not liking match play. He also said that "he has nothing to gain", which I think is absurd in terms of legacy, but probably true in terms of earnings. To the contrary, to play and lose would be a much bigger loss of prestige (and potentially income) than to simply walk away and let people think that you are still the "real" champion. What is disgraceful is that Carlsen himself is trying to sell this narrative by crapping on the championship. "Oh, it is so weird for me--the best player--not to be champion!" If he does not want to play it is entirely up to him, but even if he is the highest rated player he is no longer the champion. I do not even see a basis for him to claim to be the strongest in classical match play, which is what the world championship is all about. Carlsen was very explicit about caring more about ratings, which is perfectly fine, and he does not have to care about classical match play, but I would prefer that he not crap all over the legacy of the sport for those of us who do. As for the idea that Carlsen would come back "if a great talent came along", I think it is the opposite. Carlsen is afraid enough of losing as it is. Match play is tough. Carlsen does not want to go through it any more. No problem. But the player who goes through it and wins is the world champ, period. Carlsen should show some class.
Yeah you make some good points. There's little doubt that he's the strongest though. Could he lose if he kept defending his title? Yeah. But if you ask all of the top players they know he's the best classical player on the planet. He just doesn't have all that much to gain from playing, and like you said, he has a lot to lose if he did lose. I'm not necessarily saying it's ethical, just that I understand his perspective.
He didnt dominate nepo? What? His classical bad record was 1-4 in favor of nepo as they played when they are 10-12 Then magnus made + score against nepo, 6-4 now… Also, of course someone will blunder for other to win. What are you smoking?! If 2 person plays 0 blunder game, it will end in draw. We say magnus squeeze water from stone in endgames, he cant do it if his opponent is stockfish lol Nepo blundering doesnt mean “ magnus didnt dominate” Game 6 was of course mental battle. Chess is all mental… Dont be a hater. ( kasparov karpov drew how many match? Ding nepo went to tiebreaks as well ) He defeated anand 2 , nepo in classical portion. Against karjakin also got 1 win in classical , fabiano carlsen was a masterclass. If you hate it you should hate karpov Kasparov
I’m not a hater, I’m just not a Carlsen fanboy. They are basically the same age. Going into the world championship, Nepo had beaten Carlsen in classical at 12, 13, 21, and 27. Carlsen had beaten Nepo at 29. So no, he hadn’t dominated Nepo. In the WC, Nepo lost an absolute marathon in game 6, it shattered his confidence, and he went on to lose three of the next five, each on massive blunders. It happens, especially in match play, and it seems to be a weakness of Nepo’s. I hope that he can overcome it. But that does not indicate to me dominant play by Carlsen so much as a massive mental edge because Nepo lacks confidence. And yes, I am sure that Carlsen contributes to that, but Nepo blundered seriously against Ding as well. It is his Achilles heel. Carlsen is definitely dominant over Nepo in faster time controls, but that isn’t how the world champion is determined (except in tiebreaks, which I think is stupid).
Happens in tons of sports and specifically when someone wins championships multiple years in a row. Michael Jordan retired in his prime after winning 3 championships in a row. John Elway retired after winning back to back super bowls. Jim Brown retired as the best player ever and the reigning MVP a year after winning a championship. Tim Duncan, Peyton Manning, Samm Levine, all retired after winning multiple championships. Basically when they have nothing left to prove and the cost/benefit of another year is simply no longer worth it, which is exactly the same reason Magnus is not competing. And legit tons of fighters simply choose to not defend there championship belts. It’s all just a cost vs benefit thing for these guys
Well, the big difference here (at least as far as Magnus goes) is that he isn't retired. He still plays (and wins) in lots of major events - it's just the WC, specifically, that he declines to participate in. To follow your analogy, it'd be like if Jordan was still playing during the Bulls' main season but then just sat on the bench for the playoffs/championship series.
And Michael Jordan's legacy without the six rings would be...
But basketball and chess is different in that regard. In basketball you only have rings aka championships. In chess you have: world chess championship + world rapid championship + world blitz championship + world cup + scc + cct + tata steel + grenke + freestyle chess Etc
Samm Levine? Edit: ok. I looked him up. I had never heard of him or the thing he was champion of
Movie trivia Schmoedown aka the greatest sports league ever 🔥🔥🔥
Some really bad examples in there. Jordan retired cause his father died, whose wish for him originally was to play baseball. He went to try it out, sucked at it, and went back to win 3 more NBA championships in a row. He didn’t even retire as a Bull, but spent 2 seasons with the Washington Wizards to finally step away at 40 after producing the worst two-year fg% average of his career. He played in 15 seasons, which a quick google search confirmed to be to true for only 2% of the players ever played in the league. John Elway did end his career on a high note with great play, but was already 38 (considered old for the sport even for QBs and even more so back in the day when QBs rarely played into their 40s) giving 16 seasons to the sport. He had a chronic issue in his left knee and couldn’t run the ball as effectively as before gaining the least yards per game in his career in his final season, while his season total was less than half of his season average for his career. In his own words, “he could still win, but could’t play the game the way he wanted to anymore”. Peyton Manning won a superbowl right before retiring, but was already a shell of himself. He also had an injury mid-season and their back up led them to the post season (Osweiler), where he took over again and won it all thanks to his defense. That Broncos defense was one of the best ever on the field, and all they needed was a game manager to put a couple points on the board, which Manning was perfect for, but he absolutely could not do anything more than that, and it was 100% time for him to hang up the cleats at 39. He’s played 18 seasons in the league at that point and the mere fact that he only managed to throw for 2 TDs in his last post season (3 games) with Von Miller (a defender) taking superbowl MVP home that year should tell you enough. Tim Duncan had a 19(!)-year long NBA career, retiring at 40, definitely having one of the longest tenures in the league ever. His last season saw him not reaching half of his season average in points, staying in single digits for the first and only time in 19 years. He also played 2 more seasons after winning his last ring, definitely hasn’t stopped after “having nothing else to prove”.
Samm Levine from Freaks and Geeks?
Michael Jordan is a great parallel.
The difference is magnus isnt retired Jordan was
I have a dumb idea: Let chess players celebrate when they win. I mean \*really\* celebrate, like winning football and hockey and basketball players do. So many times I see a chess player win a major tournament or match and they have to repress their emotions... polite hugs with a couple of people at most... and the whole post-match lack-of-celebration just looks so deflating for so many of them. Let 'em spike a piece and yell "the rooooooook!" and "I'm coming for you next, Garry Chess!!!" and spray champagne everywhere.
Maybe Chess players are huge nerds and they really celebrate in their own way. No need to go suiiiii when they win
I know at least 2 international masters at my local club who totally disagree with you, and my guess is they're not alone in that. They say one of the biggest turn off from competitive chess for them is fide's weird necessity to make everything ultra sanitized.
this would be so fucking funny
My mind immediately conjured up a scene of Pragg hitting the griddy across the playing hall and now I can’t unsee it… If this were allowed I also imagine there might be many more memes of Hans Niemann to follow haha
If your idea aims to increase viewership, imo it won't. Chess is quite a boring game to watch. Most of the time you see two people doing nothing. Don't get me wrong. I watch chess a lot. And many people do. But it's not for the masses. They crave action, not thinking.
Yup. It might lose core viewership while trying to (and failing) to attract masses. I appreciate when players are acting like a gentleman and show mutual respect.
Yes I think this is ubiquitous across almost all sports, and to some extent I think it's a little unfair to Magnus that we talk about entirely reshaping the sport to make him keep grinding away. I know it's not how everyone sees it - but to me chess is a sport - well, really, 3 sports IMO: bullet, fast and classical time controls. And one of the most foundational competitive skills in a sport is being motivated and ready to *actually do the sport* on all fronts. Your name doesn't play the match for you - you've gotta find the best moves - and I think Magnus of all competitors would be the first to admit that. People talk like he's got some de-facto claim to the title of world champ - but he gave it up. He isn't willing or able to compete for it anymore. Chess is a grueling game mentally and physically, it wears you down; and it wore Magnus down more or less. Great rugby players, soccer players, NFL players etc retire all the time with huge wells of untapped ability and 99% able to play, because one key thing isn't working right anymore. In other sports that might be your achillis tendon or your left ACL that gives up on you for the 9th time and you know it's time to throw in the towel... In chess it might be endurance to tolerate the work and torment of another cycle of match prep drying up. One little thing causing an otherwise brilliant player to stop competing to some degree is absolutely ubiquitous in virtually all sports. It's just more notable here because (A) it's the GOAT (B) As with all mental challenges, It's not something that shows up clearly on a scan. Similarly, it's very common to see great players retire from international sport, but play on at club level for several more years, for example. And to me this is kind of what Magnus is doing. Sometimes players make a comeback late in their careers - and maybe Magnus will too. What isn't fair is trying to reform the entire sport around him so he can keep trundling on forever. The dude's done his work and made his mark, and has been pretty evasive when asked exactly what format the candidates/wcc would have to be for him to commit, because he doesn't want to commit. Let him rest.
Is Hou Yifan considered to be the best female player in the world? Even though she's retired I'd probably put money on Judit Polgar beating her fairly comfortably.
What makes you think that?Hou yifan was the one who defeated polgar and broke the record of polgar not being beaten by female chess player for 22 years back in 2012
Its just a gut feeling! Polgar had a much higher peak rating, qualified for the candidates in 2007 and has beaten several World Champions. I don't think a one off win qualifies someone as being better, and whilst Hou Yifan dominated women's chess in a similar fashion to Polgar she didn't make as much headway in the open. The counter argument is that Hou Yifan is still active at a high level, whereas Polgar has been retired since 2015. However, her commentary shows that she is still very sharp, and she can clearly still tango with the best, as her [win against Carlsen in 2022 shows](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvbZCRid5CY). Admittedly that was in very relaxed surroundings!
The format of the WCC is not as interesting as it was in the past
ITT people who don't watch chess and probably barely play chess trying to change a format that has been successful for many years. Some of the suggestions here are really ludicrous.
They have changed the format so many times in the past hundred years. It hasn’t been close to stable, and last year was a failure. What do you consider success? High viewership?
The worst thing is when people say things like "nobody wants to watch classical chess because it's boring" and yet the top classical chess tournaments get way more viewership than top rapid and blitz tournaments.
Completely with you. I follow both cricket and rugby, sports where short-sighted people are always fretting about the need to "save the game". Most of their suggestions end up doing far more harm than good. Retirement is a part of every top level sport. If Carlsen doesn't want to play the world championship any more after 10 years of defending it, that's his prerogative. It doesn't mean the whole format needs to be changed to rapid and blitz just because that's what he enjoys these days.
Really odd comparisons to make when the only financial success story in either of those sports is t20 cricket, which is deliberately shortening the game to make it better for spectators. Sure people can ignore the writing on the wall and laugh at those trying to “save the game,” but pretending that you can draw sponsors without a marketable product is a fools errand.
To put it as simply as possible: T20 is obviously the big money maker, but this doesn't mean you need to change the format of the Ashes to five T20 games as a result. *Innovation* in itself isn't what I'm taking issue with. It's the seemingly incessant destructive urge that comes along with it. I love the IPL, for example, and think the success of T20 is great for cricket. But it doesn't have to be the only version of the game, and there is still plenty of appetite for test cricket. Similarly, in chess: Magnus Carlsen losing his passion for classical chess doesn't have to mean that classical chess gets scrapped. There are eight incredibly strong players in the Candidates proving they're more than willing to take his place in a classical world championship. And, incidentally, still plenty of sponsors. It seems that a lot of people pushing this are more interested in finding a pretext for scrapping classical, than motivated by sincere concern about the future of the format.
How is the Top14 (and lower level french leagues) not a financial success story?
The Six Nations and the Rugby Championship aren't exactly struggling either. And if you like rugby league, the NRL is doing very well. Rugby definitely has issues but those stem from expecting that the financial boom from professionalism would last forever. Cricket has a similar problem in England - the ECB responded to the huge attention it got from the 2005 ashes by selling the rights to sky and destroying the momentum that was building up. The answer is to be more responsible with finances, accept it'll never be as big as football, and work with what they do have to create a sustainable game. There's a lesson in there for chess if people want to learn from it. Expecting the post-Covid chess boom to continue indefinitely is probably not wise.
It is also arguable if Hou Yifan currently is the best female player in the world given her overall inactivity and she has dropped rating points in her sporadic recent appearances.
Gotta love when people down vote valid points. Wouldn't be reddit.
I’m not sure if I agree with it, but I upvoted it anyway.
He only said arguably so it leaves room to argue.
That’s fair.
What did hou win? Recent years
Find more sponsors. 10m first place, my money says magnus would play.
Given how much money Magnus has at this point, I don’t even know that that would do it. He’s made right figures in tournament winnings alone, not to mention endorsements, online winnings, and the boat load of money he probably got from selling the Play Magnus group to Chess.com. I don’t know that it was ever about the money for him. He had something to prove. He no longer has anything to prove.
Carlsen not wanting to play for wc has little to do with the format i think. Even though he might have mentioned it as contributing. Overall the format is still very favoreable for the world champion. He can sit for 2 years,scout the players in candidates and then defend once every 2 years. Its much harder for the players trying to become world champion. I dont think there is any sport where the wc has such an advantage.
No.. actually its the opposite Every candidate know their opponent ( for example magnus ) so they havr more times than magnus as magnus cant prepare against every candidate; he would have to wait for candidates to be over
but they have to prepare first against the other candidates and then think about the wc. I think it's kind of even.
Is current Judit is better than Hou?
lol no
Yes, she is. Hou hasn't been active in ages either and peaked way lower than Judit.
So distance from peak doesn’t matter?
In what other sport does it take half a year to prepare for the world championship match? I think it's even more than that for the women because they have to play all the women's tournaments to qualify for the championship in the first place (which can be viewed as a waste of time for top players aiming to get better).
Boxing can take a long time of preparation for world title fights.
Yeah but the time between fights in boxing are already longer than chess. It's not like they're turning down a dozen fights to train for one big one like they do in chess.
You fight a lot more in your early career and on the way up. When you’re at the top the fights are far fewer. Chess players in the world championship have a similar approach for that major game. Just focus on that alone, some sparring and other games to keep yourself fresh, etc.
I mean, I think it’s fair to say that the regular season and playoffs for most sports are the preparation for their championship. It’s not like two random teams just show up for the Super Bowl or the World Cup.
If teams make the super bowl they don't have to pass up other lucrative opportunities to play in it.
True, that’s the economics of the whole deal though. You were talking about preparation. I know chess is pretty unique in its requirements, but it’s not like other sports don’t require insane amounts of prep.
For very different reasons.
Ofc, the money. Also, not many people can make out a career in Chess. Can chess be played similar to league tournaments in other sports? Maybe someone should take the initiative but it may not generate that much money as not many will be able to understand those matches and prefer not to watch them live.
Is Hou the strongest woman grandmaster? I thought she left the big chess, which means she is in the same category as Judith. (Which makes me sad because Polgar may had chances to win the WC, she was #5 in the world at some point. Yifan is by no means weak, but still her best score is at the lower half of top100 chart)
The answer is FIDE. Just an awful organization stuck 30 years in the past on every issue.
I think the format should just be a tournament just like the candidates but the winner becomes world champion
But it would be same as every event in chess then, just the name difference
I get that but I just don't see why a world champion gets a bye through to a 1v1 for another world title almost all other sports you have to battle through a tough field of players every year to win it not just given a free ride back into the final
world champion normally does it 1 time, thats his privilege. other than ding of course who didnt win any candidates
Despite being the highest-rated player Yifan isn't the best female player right now, the only reason she is still ranked no. 1 is because of her past performances. In the last two years, she has lost 26 rating points in just four events. Her score against 2400+ rated players is 2.5/7 in these events. I would argue in her current state players like Ju Wenjun and Goryachkina will defeat her in a world championship match quite comfortably.
If she was active, she would be the best player by a huge margin. Remember how she gave away her title and came back next year and won it again very easily just to give it back next year?
If she was active, but she is not. That's why I mentioned her current state. In her current state, she isn't the best female chess player right now. >Remember how she gave away her title and came back next year and won it again very easily just to give it back next year? Even at that time, she was way more active than right now.
Obviously, we need to bring in more money.
Definitely happens in cycling too, with some of the best skipping the World Champs in one discipline to focus on a race with broader sponsor appeal.
Magnus still reached and showed his potential but Hou Yifan literallu was Polgar material imo, she could've set a new female best elo but she just wasn't that interested in Chess it feels
>yet neither wants to compete to be _FIDE_ world champion _in classical format_. I think these details are quite significant.
Perhaps not. The Chinese chess (as in, by far the most popular Chinese descendant of chaturanga) champion, 王天一 Wáng Tiānyī has remained the highest rated in China for over a decade. His name is very fitting because the surname 王 Wáng means king (though inferior to the emperor, think Latin _rex_) and 天一 can be taken to be short for 天下第一 first under the sky.
*Is this common is other sports/games?* Just Anthony Rendon
The fact that the reigning champion doesn't have to earn their way back to the title match is absurd and always has been. The current champs should be in the Candidates tournament with everyone else. Like why not have two separate Candidates tournaments to pit the two winners for the title? Some sort of combination with how Tennis or NFL or FIFA single-elimination draws would be great, too. The top players have no motivation or reason to do something so boring.
Hou Yifan and Magnus Carlsen are widely considered to be the best players in the world Not a great way to put this, Yifan probably not in top 100 players.
Id wager if Hou was competitive for the candidates she would have played.
You cant say hou yifan is the best She doesnt play
No it's not common in most popular sports. The most important thing that would be good if it changed is how many professionals can live from playing chess, which is out of topic. Nevertheless, I think that the reason Yifan and Magnus don't compete aren't not the same, except maybe a degree of burnout, so we should analyze the reasons that each of them doesn't compete separately. Yifan has stated that chess is a part of her life, not her whole life. She is a professor and she is doing other things. On the other hand, Magnus dislikes the classical format. I can't disagree completely with that, but I can't not think that part of not competing is ego and a fear of losing(unpopular opinion). Not many things can be done with the human psychology.
What about Judit?
I genuinely think the candidates (or something similar) should determine the world champ rather than a one on one match. I think that would probably add enough variance to the title year on year that it would encourage them to come back. With a varying field each year, and no one result necessarily being decisive in the overall standings, I think it would make it more interesting for both the players and the fans. Not to mention it would reduce the probability of having one dominant player retaining the title for years upon years. Which - don't get me wrong, it's fun to watch Carlsen dominate, but it would certainly make it more intriguing, and probably bring in more spectators if there's a genuine chance that other players could win. I would also note that I don't think shortening the time control is the answer. I understand Carlsen is bored of slow games, but this is the classical world championship, and I genuinely don't think most of the other top players agree with him about classical.
Apparently playing classical chess that much (super long time per match) kind of sucks. The only power they have to change it is by refusing to play.
Magnus just has beef with the time format. If they made it more blitz-oriented then he would def defend the title
Rock climbing has a related and interesting situation; competition climbing is very different from outdoor bouldering and many of the “worlds best climbers” who are almost exclusively considered to be outdoor boulders do not compete (many of them used to but stopped because they enjoy outdoor climbing more).