Tuesday
Feb152011
Hikaru Nakamura Officially an Elite Player
Tuesday, February 15, 2011 at 6:34PM Or at least that's my spin on his decision not to play in this year's U.S. Championship. He claims that he is doing so in order "to focus on working toward his ultimate goal of one day winning the World Championship." Even if he feels he has more or less outgrown non-super-GM events, it's still a pity for U.S. chess, and not a great way to reward one of the very, very few people in the US putting up some real money for chess. Even Gata Kamsky is playing, and in his case it really would make sense if he jumped out, considering that his Candidates match with Topalov starts just over a month after the Championship concludes.
HT: Daniel Parmet
tagged Nakamura
Nakamura
Reader Comments (16)
That makes me a sad panda.
A curious decision by Nakamura, I feel. National championships are as good as anything on the road to the top title, surely? Bobby Fischer had no problem in all the US Championships he played! :o)
It is wonderful news to see Yasser Seirawan has accepted a wild card.
Surely Seirawan's return to chess is worth a mention?
[DM: Looks like you just did it. Btw, I don't care very much for "surely..." statements. If you think something is interesting, then say it (if it's relevant) without insinuating that I was somehow supposed to. Thanks. :)]
It is a shame as the St. Louis CC has done a lot to make the US Championship a first class tournament. Some of the ones in the past seemed more like a weekend Swiss than the top tournament in the US. What seems disingenuous is Nakamura won't be involved in the World Championship cycle for at least another year.
[DM: I don't disagree with Nakamura's general philosophy here. He _has_ gotten more serious in some obvious ways, like cutting way, way back on his ICC play. To achieve what he wants does take decisions of this sort and planning years in advance. I just wish he hadn't made this particular decision, in part as a chess fan and in part as someone who wants to see more sponsors of chess in the United States.]
I think the 2nd part of your last comment really hits the nail on the head Dennis. What US company or person (Rex or otherwise) is going to want to sponsor US Chess players to never play in the US? They won't even play the most anticipated event of the US Calendar year (US championship) then I as I sponsor won't want to sponsor them. My sponsorship dollars mostly go in local media exposure... which come from events like the US Championship (the only likely event to get a mention in non chess magazines or newspapers).
Hikaru Nakamura will never even play in a match for the championship, let alone win it. His success at Wijk aan Zee notwithstanding, he is not in the same class as Carlsen, Kramnik, Anand, and Aronian - none of whom, incidentally, has nearly the ego that Nakamura does. His refusal to play in the US Championship only confirms my impression of him as a selfish ingrate who takes his talent and those who helped him realize it for granted.
And Dennis, how could you miss TWO opportunities for a "don't call me Shirley" joke?
[DM:Is there any basis for these claims about his prospects? Nakamura's results have been excellent - especially when you realize he's only had the chance to compete with the top players in classical events for one year. There's no doubt that Nakamura hasn't always behaved ideally, but whether one approves of his behavior has nothing to do with his prospects. Fischer and Kasparov often behaved terribly and had colossal egos; if anything, that often helped them to succeed. Whether he will become world champ is something to be decided in the future, and he's an underdog if only for the trivial reason that every single individual is an underdog relative to the rest of the world. (E.g. Suppose you take Carlsen, Anand, Aronian and Kramnik and put them in a 4-man event for the world championship. Even if you think Carlsen has better chances to win than Anand does, and better than Aronian, and better than Kramnik, his chances are not better than Anand's + Aronian's + Kramnik's altogether. If you add more people, the chances go down even more.) But I don't see any reason, given Nakamura's rate of development, to think that he won't be in the mix starting in a year or two.]
It is a smart move by Hikaru. For the last few decades those who make it into the 'super elite' tournaments spend most of their time playing each other rather than the rest of the world. This enables them to risk less rating points and save preparation time. Players such as Shirov and Ivanchuk who play everywhere often drop out of the top 10, which can be scary when your living is tied to your rating.
And isn't the general advice given to players of all levels to avoid playing down?
While it would be good for the chess promotion in the USA to have Hikaru in the US Champs it will be even better if he can make a successful run at being #1 in the World.
[DM: Why not both? My point wasn't just about general chess promotion, but about cultivating the individual who sponsors the event and started the St. Louis club. If it were a generic, USCF-sponsored championship I'd be much closer to your point of view.]
It is a particularly churlish decision on the part of Nakamura considering that he LIVES in St Louis. Reminiscent of the one whose name should not be mentioned (in polite company).
Remember how Nakamura won his second US Championship title in 2009 and told Macauley Petersen, "Seven more 'til I pass Fischer"?
I agree with those saying Hikaru should play. Just to see the clash with "my" generation represented by Yasser would be enough to keep me glued to the games. The top of the table is "elite" enough to be good practice. As bracelet and necklace makers know well, one should not fight the hand that beads you.
[DM: Ba-dum bum.]
From a Dutch perspective:
- After winning the US Championship for the first time, Nakamura declined several Corus B invitations thinking he should be invited straight to the A group (he said so himself after winning the crown group this year). Apparently then the US Championship was strong enough that the winner is automatically a world elite player, even if he doesn't (yet) have the corresponding rating?
- After playing Corus/Tata A and winning this year, he doesn't play the US Championship. Apparently now the event is too weak to be interesting for a world elite player with mid-term world championship ambitions?
What will happen if Nakamura actually becomes world champion? Will any event be too weak for him??
I'm not sure I agree with Hikaru's decision, but I want to disagree with those who characterize his decision as a poor treatment of the St. Louis Chess Club (or US chess in general). I decided to go to Hikaru's blog to get his perspective, and discovered that he is giving lectures and simuls in Memphis and St. Louis this month. Yes, St. Louis...so I don't think that Rex Sinquefeld is going to feel abandoned. There are many ways to support the royal game.
[DM: That's positive, to be sure, though a lecture in St. Louis is less than completely amazing, as he actually lives there.]
What exactly is on his schedule which the US championship might interfere with?
I looked at the USCF web site article about the US CHampionship and the participants.
It was SO poorly written that it was unclear whta the dates of the events were as some
were scheduled for May and others for March. It did not say March of what year, though.
Perhaps I simply have difficulty reading English.
There is one and only one reason for a player to decline an invitation to play in his nation's
championship tournament, in my opinion. Ok , two reasons.
1) The event in question conflicts with another, more critical event on the player's schedule.
2) Playing in the event would require the participant to reveal opening preparation that would
be used against them.
In this case, it is unclear to me what events on the "global tour" might conflict with the US Championship.
It is apparently not one that any other US player will participate in.
Again, given that he LIVES in St. Louis and the event is being held essentially at his "home club" the
decision to not play can and should be interpreted as nothing less than an insult to the organizers of
the event, to those who created his home club out of thin air (I mean from their own checkbook) over the
past few years, and to the US chess community in general, which deserves to see the games of its best
players in the country's championship event.
It is bad enough that the championship might not be held every year.
These are, of course, just my opinion.
@JH: He didn't say that it interfered with his schedule. Also, I think there are plenty of legitimate reasons not to play in a national championship, the basic one being that he has more to lose than to gain by playing. The main reason for him to play, I think, is to help cultivate and reward one of the very few individuals putting money into American chess. From a purely competitive standpoint, his decision is entirely reasonable: if he wins, big deal, he was the favorite anyway. He will make some money and could gain a few rating points, but if he loses, then it looks bad AND he risks dropping out of the super-duper elite pack.
As for owing the US community in general, that's amusing. He has provided us with countless hours of entertainment, both with his OTB chess and with his performances on the ICC, and helped put the US back on the map. We, on the other hand, have given him...what, exactly? As for the St. Louis club, remember that Nakamura moved there _after_ it was built; it wasn't the other way around.
I didn't mean to put words in his mouth, but his statement seemed to imply that it would interfered with his ability to focus on the world championship.
I think cultivating and rewarding those who have built the St Louis chess scene is important. But more important, I think is the implicit obligation of a champion to defend their title. Think of it like boxing. What kind of champion are you that win's a belt then spends as long as possible avoiding a bout against someone that has a chance to beat them?
I view the current circumstance as akin to the "Crime against Caissa" committed by the winner of the 1972 World Championship match. If he were being required to go through a qualification process just to get to the point where he could defend his title, I could understand that, but he is not.
Perhaps I do not have enough rating points to comprehend his situation.
This is a classic issue with the chess world going back more than a century: Those who win a title or a champion
[DM: Looks like your comment cut off at the end - I didn't snip it! About your current argument, two points. First, he isn't the U.S. Champion. He won the title in 2009 and is the highest-rated player in the U.S., but the champion is Gata Kamsky. Second, I don't see much of analogy with Fischer in 1975. Fischer didn't abdicate to move on to some greater challenge; he simply quit playing altogether. If he had decided not to bother defending his world championship because there was some sort of solar system championship he wanted to prepare for, then you might be on to something.
You don't need a big rating to understand this. All that's required is the experience of having achieved a challenge and wanting to achieve a bigger one.]
@Dennis replying to JH: "As for owing the US community in general ... We, on the other hand, have given him...what, exactly?"
Maybe you neglect, or underestimate the amount and effect of American support for Nakamura on the Internet? At various levels and in various ways: individual chess fans commenting on blogs (not all, but many of them may be Americans), prominent bloggers like you and Mig, ICC as an institution.
It may have played a role for Nakamura's first Corus A invitation - at the time, it wasn't "invevitable", he was #28 on the January 2010 Elo list (a bit higher on earlier lists). Even now, Nakamura gets more support on the English-language Internet than Karjakin, and more invitations.
I don't say this is/was right or wrong, deserved or not, nor do I mean to imply that it SHOULD affect his decision to play the US Championship. All I say is that the US chess community did 'something' for Nakamura.
[DM: Nakamura also gets a lot of garbage from his internet audiences too. Really nasty things are often written about him on ICC, for instance, many from fellow Americans. I find your comparison of Nakamura with Karjakin rather surprising, considering that Karjakin first played in Dortmund in 2004 and Wijk aan Zee in 2006, Foros and World Cup events in 2007, and Amber and the Tal Memorial in 2008. Nakamura didn't play in any Grand Slam events until Wijk aan Zee in 2010, did he? Maybe it should be this way - I'm not making a statement one way or another about that. But it's hard to believe Nakamura gets more invitations than Karjakin, at least when we're talking about the events that really matter.]