Bobby Fischer: An Appreciation

Bobby Fischer (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer) doesn’t get the respect he deserves nowadays for being the greatest of all time chess player. I see way too often that people are picking Kasparov and sometimes now, too, Carlsen. They claim Fischer’s lack of longevity hurts him. I concede that, too. But, he was not the flash in the pan of 1972 that people claim. No, Fischer is more than this.

I developed a rating system that is better than the Elo rating system. It took me about three and a half years to do this. So, take my word for it that this rating system is good — really good. I have used it to find out some amazing things about chess history that have been overlooked. And, one thing that keeps coming up again and again is just how good Fischer was.

I must add that I have not completed my analysis of chess history — far from it. But, I have done enough to see some pretty obvious things. The first and foremost is that Kasparov is not the greatest player ever. He was definitely a dominant world champion that had quite a few fine tournament results. His matches against Karpov were not dominant, though. But, I can say that I have done a number of Kasparov’s best tournaments and found that he has two tournaments that are Generationally Great — a category name for a performance that is outstanding for that generation. This is clearly impressive, but it is not as impressive as a Historically Great performance. I have not found any Historically Great performances for Kasparov.