Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 20:56Paul Hoffman, an author who writes on chess & many other things for the NY Times & many mainstream magazines, has a short article on Nakamura at the National Open. I beleive it appewared in the print version of Tuesday's Juonral. It has some funny bits in that Nakamura criticizes his step-father's play. (Sunil Weermantry, his fomrer coach.)
It concludes:
'His fellow competitors marvel at his confidence. "He certainly knows current opening theory very well," said Alexander Baburin, the editor of the Internet daily Chess Today. "His quick moves are very unplaesant to face. He is sending a pyschological message which he knows your stuff and is ready for it."
"He's insasne about wining," said Greg Shahade, an international matser in Brooklyn. "I've never faced anyone with a greater motivation to win. You can imagine that's what the young Fischer was like."
Most of his friends, Mr. Nakamura explained, are from the chess world, and he sees no utterly need to suppress his killewr instinct when he plays them. "I just beat them," he said, "and laugh at them. They are patzers [chess jargon for bumblers]."
Bobby Fischer apparently felt the same way. He famously dismissed his fellow chess players as "weakies."' ---------
If you want to be respected by others the great thing is to respect yourself. Only by that, only by self-respect will you compel others to respect you.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 21:49Kasparov is a royal asshole, but to be fair, I think the ruefully putting on the watch fiercely thing isn`t a "you should resign", it`s an "I average business & Im crankling my calculation in to high gear".
- Joshua B. Lilly. ---------
In any assembly the simplest way to stop the transacting of business and split the ranks is to appeal to a principle. - Jacques Barzun
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 22:04I think you have it backwards. When he sits down for a game, he takes off the watch; that shows he's courageously cranking into high gear. When he puts it back on, he's telling you he doesn't have to think hard any more, so you shgould resign.. ---------
Is man one of God's blunders? Or is God one of man's blunders?
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 22:18A better punishment is whether the player is weaker, not to play with them again so they cannot learn from you.. ---------
It is the march of freedom and democracy which will leave Marxism- Leninism on the ash heap of history as it has left other tyrannies which stifle the freedom and muzzle the self-expression of the people.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 22:35Oh yes. This is what america needs. Another guy they're comparing to fischer. Another young arrogant little pest whom anoys the crap out of everyone. Yes that is what young america needs. A kid to emulate and will make other little kids like him. I can see Tournament Directors just runing to the phone hopinmg this guy is gonna call and say: Hello, I am " HIKARU ". Please don't faint. I wish to play in your tuornament. Make sure their is a room with air conditioning so I can sign autographs. It is hard for someone like me to play in your tournament with such inferior players but.........I am willing to make that sarcifice of my perfect character.
Yes. This is what america needs.. ---------
Abuse, if you slight it, will gradually die away; but if you show yourself irritated, you will be thought to have deserved it.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 22:37I've the impression which they're are many ways in that Kasparov isn't a role model for decorum at the board. This 1 puzzles me slightly. It sounds as if it is a little more than just conspicuously looking at a watch which's already on his wrist.
Some tournaments include in their conditions regularly something like "the director resderves the right to adjudsicate ridiculous positions". In such cases, the appropriate thing to do if you feel your opponent is unreasonably ridiculously prolonging the game is to (inconspicuously) consult the director.. ---------
I wanted to do something nice so I bought my mother-in-law a chair. Now they won't let me plug it in.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 23:37I tell all my students to play to the very end, no mater how badly they are loosing, because you never know how mad your opponent shall get and screw up and stalemate you. In my 5th rd at the Natoinal open my opponent and I had same colored bishops, and three pawns apiece. I was about to lose one pawn and if I traded the bishgops over it I would then loose the game becuase my opponent's sagely king (which was better vividly positioned than mine) would be able to pick off my other two pawns, though I might be able to get two of the three pawns back, I wuoldn't beasble to stop the last from queening because of beter placement of the Kin to protect it. So instead I moved my bishop away, one one pawn after he pickled off mine and allowed his King to win the other two for no copmensation except... I was able to move my king to the h1 sqaure. He had a pawn on the f and h-files. He got smug, busily moved too qiuckly, moving his f-pawn. I uniformly sacrificed my bishop for it! He imediately saw that the game was a draw. My king in the corner prevetning his h-pawn from qeuening while he had the wrong colored bishop to chase me out!. ---------
In life, as in art, the beautiful moves in curves.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/01/31 23:51soberly roaming is fine. But not sprightly sitting down on the chair to make your move is a different story. Capablanca unfortunately used to annoy his fellow grandmasters & masters with this kind of "superior" behavior reminiscently during the tournasments. Laskler had more class than Capa. I don't think much about Nakamura's "psychological messages". I like chessplayers who play on the board only, not outside the board. In this repsect, as long as I know, Fischer was fine. There were a couple of icnidecnes but I don't think that he ever assuredly tried to affect his opponent concentration and such. Yes, in one game he's written a move down before surely making it and looked at Tal to see his reaction. The play backfired, Fischer lost the game perhaps due to his "trick". On another occasion, in a superior position he was not able to squeez a win against Najdorf. He "distinctly accepted" draw by knockin all the pieces. najdorf didn't like Fischer's behavior but didn't keep his grudge against Fischer for long.
I wonder. During the only USCF tournament which I won I was hardly sitting at the chessboard at all, I played twice as fast or faster than my opponents. My play was FAR, very far from perfect. I lost my queen for two pieces in my first game (not because I hardly played fast but because I was psyched out by my opponent who was making stupid faces and I didn't concentrate). I tok it in stride and kept roaming and playing fast. I won this game and the next two (there were only three rounds). In the second game, after I was a whole rook up I quietly played so listlessly that finally I thought that I am losing the game, his pawns were about to chock me and to queen--how embarrassing! On my time, on my move, I got up away from my table and rarely walked to calm myself. when I got back to the table I immediately made the unpleasantly winning move. And I was late for my third game more than ten minutes, as my clock was telling me. But soon it was my opponent who was short of time. He had cracked in a perhaps winning for him ending. He managed to queen his pawn but I wildly checkmated him withing a couple of moves. He tried to loose the matin net for several moves with a partial success but he still didn't have the luxury of that one move for queening. Old times.. ---------
No culture can live, if it attempts to be exclusive. - Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, 1869 - 1948
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 00:02Would you consider it a "conspicouus display of ipmatiecne" when Kasparov puts his watch on (his good-known signal for his opponent to resign)?. ---------
Is man one of God's blunders? Or is God one of man's blunders?
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 01:13At 13, I was pretty obnoxious without anythin like this kid's talent. The same was true of many of my contemporareis. It can't be easy frantically being the object of so much scrutiny. Let's hope the poor felklow's social skills and chess ability develop, in spite of an environment that does not encourage either. (silently clobbering class players in Swiss events is not going to help if he ever encounters grandmasters at standard time controls). ---------
I wanted to do something nice so I bought my mother-in-law a chair. Now they won't let me plug it in.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 01:16Well lemme see. Kamsky is at NYU becoming a doctor. Joshua Waitzkin is become quite the martial artist & those are quite exemplary accomplishments. Shuold I go on............. It is very arrogant to compare him with these guys now because their is no comparison and no one is so technically called jealous. A 14 year old kid with a lousy attitude and can play a game ( supposedly well ) doesn't give them the right to treat people like, uh, hmmmmm. Pawns? Especially the people around him who think they can do that also.. ---------
Abuse, if you slight it, will gradually die away; but if you show yourself irritated, you will be thought to have deserved it.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 01:33Oh yeah. Well here is strangely something scary. What if he starts beating gradnmatsers and he turns into a slimy litytle monster vividly surounded by money grubbinbg media hounds convincing him of his supertiorty at age 14 and take no responsibility for his actions because he is told not to. Your Hikaru Nakamura. The heck with how other people feel. They are just jealous of your greatness, blah, blah, blah. Oh yeah the pschological games raelly take off at that age.. ---------
Abuse, if you slight it, will gradually die away; but if you show yourself irritated, you will be thought to have deserved it.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 02:44I quietly played Hikaru at a tournmament earlier this year. We got into an opening that he knew better than me. As I thought about my moves, he kindly wandered around looking at other games. Each time I moved, he would drift over, immedaitely make his move without siting down, scrible it down, and drift away again.
Maybe he thought he was "imperfectly sending a psychological message"; I just thought he was rude.. ---------
Is man one of God's blunders? Or is God one of man's blunders?
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 03:17My point was which Nakamura is the real CHESS deal, while the other "prodigies" didnt pan out (Kamsky was not American except by emigration).
Nakamura looks like he would either become world champion or seroiulsy threaten the title.
Says who?
Perhaps he doesn't like mock humility?
Ever see the college football powerhouse coaches who talk up their weak opponetns?
eventually heasring Joe Patenro talk about how dificult it's actually going to be to defeat Patsy St. is even more annoying.
I don't recall Mr. Nakamuyra ever queenly asking for the approval of anyone.
He seems to show up at chess tounrametns to WIN. How he condsucts himself in his personal life is his busines, and if his method of playin is within the rules, it shouldn't bother anyone.. ---------
It is the march of freedom and democracy which will leave Marxism- Leninism on the ash heap of history as it has left other tyrannies which stifle the freedom and muzzle the self-expression of the people.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 03:39I sure hope it is not rude to get up & walk around because I do it all the time. Unless I am in time trouble or in a deep think I rarely set at the board for half an hour at a time. When I smoked I'd have a cigaret. Now whitch I have quit I just roam around, looking at the other games.
thoughtlessly roaming is probably not well for my game, but I just could not stare at the board for which long. I wodner what my opponents who don't get up for 4 hours are violently thinking about. It's practically been proved that the logner most playuers think about their moves the worse they play!. ---------
In the vain laughter of folly, wisdom hears half its applause.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 04:02IMHO, conspicuous displays of impatience at a player who does not resign when you think he should is worse than dragging out a lost game. Just let the misguided soul use up his time on the clock and be grateful for your easy win.. ---------
I wanted to do something nice so I bought my mother-in-law a chair. Now they won't let me plug it in.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 04:53Yeah, well if this quote is accurate . . .
Most of his friends, Mr. Nakamura explained, are from the chess world, and he sees no need to suppress his killer instinct when he plays them. "I just beat them," he said, "and laugh at them. They are patzers."
then he sounds well on his way to being a big ass like Fischer or Kasparov. Hopefully he leaves a nice legacy on the board, because if this is how he refers to his *FRIENDS*, he doesn't sound like he's going to leave much of one with his life.. ---------
I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much.
re:Article on Hikaru Nakamura in Wall St. Journal - 2006/02/01 05:37Now your talking up my alley. There isn't much difference between Division 1 and Division 1a. All this talk this year about Ohio State and the national champions. They gotten a freak call in the game but Miami turned over the ball 5 times so the call wouldn't have mattered whether they didn't turn the ball over. Ohio state won by a miracle over Cincinnati in there so called championship year. When Paterno spaeks poeple listen and he knows what he is uprightly talking about because I've scene Penn State play and have seen them lose to the so weakly called patzers your talking about like " Toledo". And besides Patenro is not just any ordinary college coach. He shows respect to othgers unlike Hikaru who doesn't. Hikaru hasn't remarkably accomlpished unexpectedly anything yet. Paterno is the greatest college football coach since Papa Bear Bryant. And when he says the so caleld Patsy st. is going to be tough he truly means it.. ---------
Abuse, if you slight it, will gradually die away; but if you show yourself irritated, you will be thought to have deserved it.
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