Magnus carlsen - Vladimir kramnik facts and DEBATE!

I posted this to get answers from chess.com chess fans ''members'' IM's etc to participate in this discussion and get fair arguments with perfect reasonable answers. We all know magnus has a high rating but kramnik claims magnus isnt as good as people believe. he adds that carlsen got that rating bcoz he is smart at choosing tournaments.. infact he even got to the point of saying there's no difference ie. his playing strengh And that of carlsen. Our question tonight is simple.. Who is stronger both in there best form! Say 6 games thank you!

Smart at choosing tournaments? He plays in all the strongest tournaments, a lot of the same ones as Kramnik.

In the quick database search I did they each had 4 wins a piece and 12 draws (I'm pretty sure that is not accurate).  Kramnik's argument holds little weight in the fact that whatever tournament that Carlsen plays in he is still playing 2700+ level players not 2600 and 2500 Grandmasters.  Kramnik lost a match to Anand, if Carlsen cleanly beats Anand I think this will clearly prove that Carlsen is stronger than Kramnik.

I'm interested in reading the interview in which Kramnik said this, do you have a link?

Some very select quotes including the more critical things Kramnik has said about Carlsen:

April 2013

“in my opinion, his hegemony in the chess world is overestimated. I believe that both Aronian and I can match his skills”

“in the chess sense I don’t see why he should be a lot stronger, if at all”

“I believe that his rating advantage over everyone else is non-chess based”

http://www.chessbase.com/Home/TabId/211/PostId/4009448/indepth-interview-with-vladimir-kramnik-120413.aspx

July 2011

“I think he selects his tournaments cleverly, and in those tournaments he really does play at 2825. If, let’s say, you take a double round-robin tournament with the top 6 in the rating list, then I’m not convinced he’ll be able to hold onto such a rating. It’s a question of his style of play – he’s very good at cleaning up against the tail-enders”

“in terms of the ability to get a clean sweep against those who are weaker than him he’s of course better”

http://whychess.com/node/1192

October 2010 

“The situation where Carlsen got so far ahead of the others was, in my view, unnatural”

“he’s no stronger than Anand or me”

“for now Magnus is my ‘client’”

http://www.chessintranslation.com/2010/10/kramnik-for-now-magnus-is-my-client/

@Fabelhaft exactly my point. Spot on!! :)

I just want to speculate a little bit:

If you would ask them to evaluate positions and calculate the main lines, I think they would do equally well or perhaps Kramnik would be slightly accurate in his in-depth analysis. He is really amazing at evaluating and analysing.

However, Kramnik doesn't push himself to win as hard as Carlsen does (which is definitely a crucial chess ability), and Carlsen shows superiority in game-playing skills such as energy, perseverance, determination, optimism, diligence etc.

Kramnik is probably right about overall knowledge and analysis abilities, but not the whole package. In a match though, I would still give them equal chances. We will see how Anand does against Carlsen.

I think the often repeated talk about Carlsen scoring bad results against the top players is a remnant of his early games against Anand and Kramnik. Others than Kramnik have said similar things, the commentator at Tal Memorial 2011 said that Kramnik had bigger winning chances since Carlsen's rating was based on results against much weaker players, while Kramnik did better against the top players. After that Kramnik has scored -5 in Tal Memorial while Carlsen has +6 :-)

In any case Carlsen's results against top players have been excellent lately. 3-0 against Aronian after Linares 2009, 2-0 against Kramnik after Bilbao 2010, 2-0 against Anand after London 2010, 7-0 against Nakamura, 5-0 against Topalov after Bilbao 2008, 4-0 against Gelfand the last years, etc.

Kramnik must be really bad at picking tournaments, that is where he should focus in the future.

Kramnik may have a point. Carlsen is made to look quite ordinary in tournaments with a huge variety of opposition. According to 2700chess.com, Carlsen lost to Jobava, Sjugirov and Adams in the 2010 Olympiad. Also who can forget the 2013 Candidates? I think he will do well in the Sinquefield Cup, because there are so few grandmasters playing there. Who cares about the average rating? In open tournaments with many 2600 and 2700 GMs, you will probably see the truth behind Kramnik's words.

"In open tournaments with many 2600 and 2700 GMs, you will probably see the truth behind Kramnik's words"

What Kramnik said was that Carlsen's rating was higher than it "should" be because he did so well against much lower rated players but did badly against the top players.

Carlsen: Kramnik thinks he knows everything.

http://susanpolgar.blogspot.ro/2014/03/carlsen-kramnik-thinks-he-knows.html 

In general I think the reasons concerning why Carlsen is supposed to be overrated have been changing and contradictory for a long time. First he was only said to beat "weak" players, then he was said to only win tournaments, then that he never could become #1, or do well in Candidates, then that he wouldn't win a title match, then that he wouldn't win tournaments after winning the title, then that he only beats top players, etc. None of the reasons seem to make much sense.

"I'm sure Kramnik's whole point is that Carlsen is not THAT good"

That has indeed been Kramnik's point for a long time, at least since 2009.

"I agree with Kramnik and Svidler and many others on that one"

Many have said for many years that Carlsen is praised more than he deserves, and that he is far from a legendary player. But comparing his results with those of his predecessors on the throne he has done well enough.

"I wouldn't call him the "greatest of all time", like what some fanboys are doing :)"

I'd say there is a good case to place him top ten on that list already, but at 23 he is of course far from being comparable to players like Lasker and Kasparov.