Ratings & Divisions - what do you think?

[Pedro Saavedra]

> Chess tournaments have used strict cutoffs like this (with the option of playing up)
> for many years with success, and I see no reason why checkers can't do so as well.

The option of playing up is important to many chess players. One attraction of playing in an open tournament is the opportunity to play a top master and for some players, that is more important than winning a prize.

In addition, there is also the issue of unrated players from foreign countries. When there is only one section, that is solved by making them not eligible for any but the general prizes.

I personally prefer a single section. I ratings are used for Swiss pairings, that can work well.

Pedro

[Alex_Moiseyev]

Hmm, the masters players might go for that, since it gives them an opportunity to get easy points in round 2 off a much weaker player who got a win in round 1, but I don't think anyone else would agree.

Masters may like it, but I am grandmaster and I don't like it. It make it very unpredictable and highly depends on luck and generate a "lottery factor". Once I always have a bad luck I don't like a situation when my opponents get an easy partners and I play (incidentally) with good partners.

Think about ...

Regards,

Alex

[Pedro Saavedra]

Hmm, the masters players might go for that, since it gives them an opportunity to get easy points in round 2 off a much weaker player who got a win in round 1, but I don't think anyone else would agree. What would you say are the advantages of playing in a single section?

I can tell you the way it worked in chess in the early sixties and why many players liked it. There was one section, but many prizes based on ratings. The weaker players, particularly the younger ones, loved the possibility of facing Benko, or Bisguier or Lombardy, all of whom back then frequented the open circuit. In an eight rounder, the masters would play somebody in the middle of the field in the first round, but after three rounds or so, they were facing their equals. The big prize money went to the top players, but there were cash prices for the top A, B, C, D and unrated players (I won $100 for top B in the late sixties in the Eastern Open). And we had the excitement of seeing a little kid named Eugene Meyer, now a master, looking like he might draw Pal Benko. The masters not only liked the easier early rounds (with an upset every so often) but they liked the fact that the weaker players were paying into the pot that would go mostly to the top players.

There is another reason why I have a dislike for rigid ratings. When I was an active chess player I spent most of my life close the boundary between A and B. In the 1990s I was active in the DC Chess League, which operated by sections. Years when I was 1799 every team in the B section wanted me in their team. When I was 1801, nobody did.

Perhaps young checker players do not feel about Alex like I did about Benko, Bisguier or Lombardy in those days, but I have to believe that many would feel a thrill from playing in the same section he did.

Pedro

[tommyc]

What Pedro decribes is all very romantic with the underdog playing the great champion ,this might be nice in some soppy Hollywood film .....but in real life?? .............draughts is a serious business!!

[Pedro Saavedra]

What Pedro decribes is all very romantic with the underdog playing the great champion ,this might be nice in some soppy Hollywood film .....but in real life?? .............draughts is a serious business!!

In chess it is an incentive for many players. It is not that they think they can win. It is that they want to have a score of the game, to examine where they went wrong and so forth. And in chess it is the little guy who is putting up much of the prize money the masters make. The purpose of an Open tournament is precisly to allow anybody to play. I have played in both kinds of chess tournaments, and I prefer no divisions a hundred times over. No, I have not scored against the really great, but in the first round of the Virginia Open I got a draw against a man who would win it seven times (the late Charles Powell). In a Eastern Open I defeated a man who once played in the U.S. Championship (the closed tournament that invites a dozen players). I cherished playing much stronger players, but also do not like the field to be made entirely of them.

And I did see many an underdog defeat or draw a champion. In the Maryland Action Tournament I played a child in a good game I won. The next year I played him again and he won. In four years he was a master.

No, it is no romantic fantasy. It is serious. But if you would attract weaker players, you need to offer them the chance of playing stronger ones.

But then in chess the sentiment is not that organization is for the benefit of the masters, but of all who love the game. To the extent that chess departed from that principle I was inclined to depart from chess.

Pedro

[Alex_Moiseyev]

I don't see anything wrong with Pedro proposals regarding one Division. But pairing in first 2-3 rounds must be adjusted based on rating If we have lets say 50 players ranked from 1 to 50, there are two systems.

1st system. In 1st round we pair 1-50, 2-49, 3-48 ... 25-26.

2nd system. In 1st round we pair 1-26, 2-27, 3-28, ... 25-50

What system you prefer ? I like #2 because "rank distance" for all pairs is the same.

Overall, the total number of participants must be high enough and number of rounds also should be big giving each player a chance to finish in their class zone among their competitors. For 50 players we should have somewhere 11-13 rounds.

I am OK to play with underdogs if they pay for this !

Here is a real story which M. Tal, chess ex-World Champion said in one interview. He said to reporter that often when people see him, they are coming and ask to play 1-2 games. Then he said: "Why they didn't propose the same thing to boxing Champions and fight 1-2 rounds ?"

Respectfully,

Alex Moiseyev

[Pedro Saavedra]

I don't see anything wrong with Pedro proposals regarding one Division. But pairing in first 2-3 rounds must be adjusted based on rating If we have lets say 50 players ranked from 1 to 50, there are two systems.

1st system. In 1st round we pair 1-50, 2-49, 3-48 ... 25-26.

2nd system. In 1st round we pair 1-26, 2-27, 3-28, ... 25-50

What system you prefer ? I like #2 because "rank distance" for all pairs is the same.

Overall, the total number of participants must be high enough and number of rounds also should be big giving each player a chance to finish in their class zone among their competitors. For 50 players we should have somewhere 11-13 rounds.

I am in full agreement with everything you say. In chess the second system is always used.

Pedro

[Pedro Saavedra]

Honestly, I think many of the masters players look forward to the Nationals precisely because of the higher level of competition (as many of them don't have any real competition in their respective states), and that we should honor that by requiring weaker players to earn the chance to play masters in competition.

I should add that in chess the U.S. Open is distinct from the U.S. Championship. The latter is a round robin and play is by invitation. The Open has that name precisely because it is open. That is why I was excited when I defeated Boris Blumin who many years earlier had played in the US Championship. Usually the 12 or however many highest rated players (with perhaps an additional clause adding the winner of the US Open and the US Junior champion) are invited to the US Championship. It was in the latter that Fischer once stunned the chess world by obtaining a perfect score in the round robin.

I think we need both kinds. I do not like that much the restricted open (or open with divisions). Again, in chess this comes from being right at the border, where I can play in the Open division and get slaughtered or in the Amateur and face no really stiff competition. And there are Masters Open, the US Amateur and all sorts of choices. But a real Open is exciting for all.

Pedro

[Eric Strange]

Given the popularity in Chess against Checkers I would say they are doing something right. I agree with what was said about an Open tournament being just that OPEN. It should give all players the chance to play openly in the tournament. Novices playing Masters and as the rounds go on the competitions gets stiffer.

No, it is no romantic fantasy. It is serious. But if you would attract weaker players, you need to offer them the chance of playing stronger ones.

But then in chess the sentiment is not that organization is for the benefit of the masters, but of all who love the game. To the extent that chess departed from that principle I was inclined to depart from chess.

Pedro Saavedra

I COULD NOT HAVE SAID IT BETTER MYSELF. I completely 100% agree with that statement and I think that is sadly where checkers has fallen off to. It seems to be ALL about the masters and whatever benefits them. That is very sad in my opinion. We need to get the younger generation more involved in this game in order for it and the ACF to go on. So I do think that there should be certain tournaments where novices get to play with the masters. It gives them something to strive for. When I was a beginner I would do everything I could to get one of the Great online players to play me a game. Back in probly 2000 or 2001 I would play Dale Rumpf for sometimes 100 games straight just getting killed over and over again. But those few games that I won made up for it all. Now I can impose a challenge on anyone who sits across a board with me. Anyways back to the topic.

I think in non-open tournament where we are playing minors, majors and masters the unrated players should be able to play whatever they want. I was told I could play in masters if I wanted in 2007 and I thought that was pretty neat. It was my first tournament though so i chose to stay minors. I will probably play majors next and not go to masters until I win that. Just because that's how I feel it should be done in my mind. Like when I joined the military I had the option to join as a PFC/E3 but I wanted to start from the bottom and earn my way up.

I do not think players who have won minors, or majors should be able to play anything but masters unless they come in dead last or at least close to in a masters tournament. I think rating should be considered greatly, but not used as a textbook guideline for what division u play in.

-Eric Strange