December 2002 Archives

Although it was on the rumor mill last summer, New In Chess magazine mentions in their new (#8/2002) issue that they've heard rumors of "serious plans" for a shuffle chess match between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky. I don't know if they missed the first rumors, mentioned by GM Ian Rogers in August, 02, or if this is new information. If they had anything concrete they would have listed it, so don't hold your breath.

Last I heard, the match was going to be in Reykjavic, Iceland, the site of their famous 1972 world championship match. But Fischer was demanding live, uncensored TV time and that wasn't going to happen. Considering the X-rated radio interviews he's given in the past few years, that's no surprise. (Including one gleefully celebrating 9/11 the day after it happened.) The great Bobby has been using his chess fame to get media time to promote his virulent anti-Semitic (and now anti-American) ranting.

When I met Fischer in Argentina in 1996 he could act normally for long periods but would always end up back at "it's the Jews, they're trying to get me." He could talk chess, even real chess and not "Fischerandom" and make jokes, although he was mostly in his own world. From listening to him on the radio in the past few years he is deteriorating rapidly. Sad to say, but in his current state having him back in the public eye is a disaster.

A long article in the renowned Atlantic Monthly recapped his plunge. Not much new and there are some outsider imprecisions, but a good and accurate chronology.

Fischer has his own web page here: http://home.att.ne.jp/moon/fischer/ PLEASE BE WARNED that there is a lot of profanity and offensive content. He mentions the Atlantic article at the end of the page, but only to refute a stupid bit about toilets that the Atlantic writer should never have put in. Still, reading Fischer's ravings is depressing for any fan of his brilliant chess.

At 10am GMT, the Salt Lake Tribune ran a financial news service report stating that Garry Kasparov is being sued by First International Bank of Israel. Story is here. I spent almost three years with Kasparov Chess Online, from its beginning in July, 1999. I certainly wasn't privy to these financial dealings, but it sounds bizarre to me. So many KCO board members had conflicts of interest that the company was practically doomed from the start, although the site itself did well.

To my knowledge, Garry hasn't been much involved with KCO since having a big battle with the investors in mid-2002. The Israeli money-men thought it was more important to employ a group of Israeli programmers costing over $100,000 per month than have Grandmasters, writers, and other chess people costing a fraction of that.

Instead of cutting back, they went down with the ship over Kasparov's protests. The investors insisted on cutting all the talented Moscow employees that Kasparov considers family (and who ARE family in at least one case) and their relationship went downhill after that.

Kasparov got tired of watching them throw money away and make a mess of the website that had his name all over it. I'm not surprised he bailed out. It looks like the question now is if he is allowed to leave at all.

The annual Hastings tournament is one of the oldest regular events in the world. 12-year-old GM Sergey Karjakin is breaking many records this year, and in a few days he will play in Hastings. It seems likely that he will be the youngest player ever to play in the main event. Judit Polgar played in the 92-93 event at 16 (and won first place!).

The biggest laugh in the post-event press conference with the two K's came as a surprise to the speaker. When asked how he had prepared for the match, Karpov earnestly began, "I spent a few days in Kansas..." and was interrupted by laughter and amused applause from the crowd.

The baffled Karpov, who really had been training in Kansas (apparently with recent emigre Alexander Onischuk), thought for a second that he had said something dumb until realizing that we weren't laughing AT him. Of course he had no idea that to a crowd of New Yorkers, just having a Russian chess champ say he was in Kansas (or Iowa, et al.) is hysterical.

The Kasparov-Kramnik rapid match in New York on December 19th and 20th brought out just about every local chess VIP. It also brought out a collection of what must have been a dozen very young, attractive, Russian-speaking women with too much make-up and dressed in the latest Victoria's Secret fashion. GM Lev Alburt seemed to know them all by name, but somehow I don't think they were chess students.

According to Vladimir Barsky of Russia's 'Chess Weekly' Viktor D. Baturinsky died Saturday night, December 21, 2002. Colonel Baturinsky was once vice president of the USSR Chess Federation and also a former director of Moscow's famous Central Chess Club. Most will know his name from when he was head of Anatoly Karpov's delegation in his 78 and 81 world championship matches against Viktor Korchnoi. Both matches were filled with surreal sideshow antics on both sides. In 1978, hypnotists, suspicious yogurt, mirrored glasses, chanting yogis, and refused handshakes stole the show. A former secret police official, Baturinsky was one of the real 'heavies' of the Soviet chess scene for decades. He authored or co-authored many books, including several Karpov books, wrote a collection on Botvinnik, and owned one of the largest private chess libraries in the world.

Kasparov admitted to having been distracted in recent days by waiting to see if his match against Deep Junior was going to happen or not. After two postponements it was finally announced on the second day of the K-K match. "I'm not used to not knowing if I'm playing next month or not," said Kasparov. Waiting for Fritz ruined 2002 for Kramnik, and Kasparov is missing Wijk aan Zee thanks to this match against Junior. He also missed it in 2002, but because of the flu.

If you followed the K-K games on the internet you had a much better view than if you flew to NY and were present at the site. For day two, Karpov showed up at the last moment and the sensory board software wasn't booted yet. Kasparov had been cooling his heels and wondered aloud to arbiter Carol Jarecki why Karpov's clock had not been started, considering that this was a rated game. (FIDE rapid list) He had a point, and the game was started, with no board images in the room and no automatic move transmission on the internet. The problem persisted for the second game so they set up the "bald-spot cam," a camera pointed straight down at the board (and at the top of Kasparov's head). It looked like a checkers game from that angle. The best view of the board was from outside in Times Square!