Only 13 Players Have Hit 2800. Ding Liren Will Probably be the Next Super 2800 GM

That's not a hugely enterprising guess.  He's the only top 5 player who's never been there and he's very close now.  Karjakin is the next highest rated never to reach the milestone but he's never really been close.  Ding should play some patzers in FIDE rated games and get there now.

What surprised me is that Carlsen climbed so high!!  2889 is crazy!  Almost 2900.  Yowsa!

Also, there are people who argue strongly that there has been no rating inflation since ELO has been instituted.   I'm no mathematician or statistician, but it seems like there has been.   At least a little.

I think it's like a pyramid.  The bigger the base, the higher the tip, and with more and more people playing chess and filling out the lower ranks (like 1500 or so FIDE), it leads to there being more 1800s, 2000s, 2200s, etc.  The realistic peak is definitely higher.  I also think that FIDE lowered their minimum rating, which has the same effect.  One other new innovation (although I'm not sure it matters here) is that any win against a rated opponent gives the victor at least 0.8 points, meaning Ding could get to 2800 by beating a handful of 1000s, if the games were FIDE rated.  This could lead to inflation at the top when the big guys play in open tournaments and have a couple of easy rounds or play a weak team in a domestic league.  I think if the opponent is 400+ points below your rating you get 0.8.  Carlsen gets the same rating boost from beating a typical IM as he does from beating a complete beginner .

Wow he does? That is interesting! Noice fact.

"I think it's like a pyramid.  The bigger the base, the higher the tip, and with more and more people playing chess and filling out the lower ranks (like 1500 or so FIDE), it leads to there being more 1800s, 2000s, 2200s, etc.  The realistic peak is definitely higher.  I also think that FIDE lowered their minimum rating, which has the same effect.  One other new innovation (although I'm not sure it matters here) is that any win against a rated opponent gives the victor at least 0.8 points,"

That's as good an explanation for rating inflation as any that I've seen.

His main rivals? Karjakin? Countrymen Yu Yangyi? 

If you buy into the notion of inflation in chess ratings, then you have to accept that today's players are fish. Not only have they not learned from past generations or from computers or any other advances, they are actually getting worse!

There are only two players in history who have been able to manage a +2800 rating for five years or more. Carlsen's rating has actually gone down since 2014, and the next best players are on a carousel. Right now, Caruana is the second best player in the world, but there have been half a dozen who were #2 in the last few years. 

All this shows that today's players must be getting worse unless rating inflation is a myth.

Players these days start younger, there is more information, players have more access to that information, and there more strong tournaments available for them to improve their skills.

So it's not a fair comparison, and today's very top GMs are better than the top GMs of, say, Fischer's day. I'm not sure who would dispute that.

There has been a slight, steady, ELO ratings inflation over the years.  It is a fairly well understood artifact of the method, having to do with lower-rated players in the entire pool dropping out.

Fischer in 1971 was the most dominant player of all time.  He was rated a full 125 points higher the defending champion Spassky.  If I recall correctly, the USCF published a rating, in their ELO-based system of over 2800, during his run for the title.

Symslov fan makes a valid point ... with modern training techniques (Fischer tended to be a lone wolf) and the use of computerized databases of games played, Fischer using 1960s-70s technology would be at a severe disadvantage versus the elite today.  So would Mikhail Tal!  But over the board, they both struck fear in their opponents' hearts - something which cannot be measured during play.

I believe a Bobby Fischer of today, in his 1970-1972 prime playing form, would dominate any of the current supergrandmasters in a set match.

It isn’t just a question of giving Morphy access to modern tools, Caruana and Carlsen have been chess professionals since a very young age, while Morphy was an amateur that played a few dozen serious games in his career. While Carlsen and Caruana have played top GM opposition in hundreds of games, Morphy never faced similar opposition. 

The pyramid example is not quite right though. It depends on the average skill level of the players who join and remain active. People joining could just as easily cause the top ratings to go down.

And your story is odd too. it makes it sound as if IMs were more common than 2000-2200s.

Anyway, at every level players today are simply better, because there's both more information and more access to that information. 2000 today is better player than 2000 40 years ago.

If a player wants to make a repertoire today, for example, they can get apps, or visit websites that both instruct you on the moves and drill the move orders into your memory.

You can also do endgame exercises this way.

And of course tactics.

Can you imagine many years ago, wanting to improve your tactics, and you had no puzzles? Well, there were 1 or 2 books, but one was too easy, and the other you'd already finished. So that's it. No more puzzles.

Bobby Fischer had to teach himself Russian just to read books. You think the average players back then were good?

”You think the average players back then were good?”

And half of them were worse!

@fabelhaft haha, nice one

And as for practice, there were how many international tournaments a year back then?

Looking at chessgames.com, Magnus Carlsen at age 27, has more games played than Botvinnik, Petrosian, or Spassky.

And if the average skill level goes up, the ratings of course go down.

It's only if the average active player is very unskilled that the pyramid example makes sense. Standing on top of weak players would indeed make the ratings climb.

It's fun conversation, but it's really hard to compare the great players of one era with the great players of another era.  

I'm originally a Fischer fanboy who then became a Kasparov fanboy.  But Magnus is pretty awesome.  Normal and a really nice ambassador for the game around the world.  But I'm rooting for Fabio for the upset!!

A new player at our club asked me a few weeks ago who was better, Carlsen or Fischer. I said the usual stuff, about how you can't compare.

Not only can we ask "What if Fischer had been born in 1990?"

We can also ask "What if Carlsen had been born in 1943?"

And even though Fischer, fresh out of the time machine, wouldn't beat Kasparov or Carlsen, what he achieved is, at least in some sense, greater than either of them. So I might be a Fischer fan... but I don't think I'm unrealistic.

As for Carlsen vs Caruana, if Fabi stays in form, I think he has a really good shot. Their live ratings are very close, and of course Caruana won Norway ahead of Carlsen (not their individual encounter, but still).

Imagine having to play a 12 game match vs a player rated only 19 points below you, who recently out preformed you in a tournament... would you be confident?

Hmm, Carlnes Magsen vs Caruano Fabiana

Eh, not such great names

My favorite of this type remains Aron Levonian.