Real reason why carlsen is forfeiting his classical title

Ok so all this "lack of motivation" stuff is only to fool the masses. The real reason why carlsen is leaving his title is the SAME EXACT reason why many of the top professional esport players have left tournaments.. MONEY.  With carlsen being a successful twitch streamer plus being a successful personality in Norway and getting ads and such, it would be extremely foolish of him to continue an endeavor (defending his classical title) since it basically means way too much work for way too little pay.

He has to start preparing for months in advance, postpone his advertisements, his twitch streaming time has to be cut short so he will lose out on a ton of money. I guarantee you, you would never see carlsen forfeiting his blitz and rapid titles since it's a short affair. Lasts for 3 days and gets him money.  Increase classical world championship prize pool to 10 million dollars and u will see a statement of carlsen that "I am starting to feel motivated again"..

Keep in mind chess community, this is nothing new. This is very common in esports. Dafran, the top ranked overwatch player and the most successful streamer of the game, left his team Atlanta Reigns and only participated in small time LANs(lasting only 2-3 days) instead of the overwatch league which could last many more days. He took up streaming full time too. 
Scream, the pro esports player of CSGO is the same. Left tournaments to focus on his twitch and only appeared on short LAN events.

So yes, it makes sense that chess players would do the same. I knew this was coming.

Interesting… in the present day money sure is everything. Do you think Carlsen really lost passion for the game?

I don’t think it’s about the money. Atleast as much as your suggesting. I think he just knows he is the best and he doesn’t have any good challenger so it kind of gets boring and not worth it defending against all these player leagues below him.

I think I would need to see proof that Carlsen loses out on anywhere close to as much money as Dafran does by not streaming. It just always seemed to me that Dafran was a much bigger streamer than Carlsen.

Also, a couple notes about Dafran — it sounds like the OWL atmosphere in general could be toxic to players. I remember a story by Surefour about how he told one of the teams he was playing on that he was depressed, and his team sent him a letter saying that it was against his contract to be depressed. Just as an example of how badly managed OWL seems, and as another potential explanation to Dafran’s leaving OWL.

Second note — Dafran took several months away from streaming to learn farming — hence why he changed his OW name to Farmer. So I think it wasn’t just the money talking in Dafran’s instance — even if money could have been a legitimate additional reason for his leaving OWL, it wasn’t his only reason.

 Those sources are going to evaporate once he's no longer world champion.  How much money do you see Kasparov making off streaming?

You are comparing overwatch and csgo with chess?

I thought he looked bored during the match. He's prepared for months and sacrificed other things in his life to defend against a guy who hangs pawns and bishops after losing one game. He wants a worthy challenger and has stated he'll only be motivated to play against Firouzja. 

Carlsen has the Saitama mentality, bored with his craft as a result of lacking worthy challengers.

He said he would continue to fight if its Alireza

This post is bizarre.

The title insinuates as if Magnus has already prepared mentally to give it up. That's nonsense.

Even if his next challenger isn't Alireza, the likelihood of him forfeiting the championship is near 0. He's a competitive guy, chess is his life, he's good at it, and world chess champion is the highest accolade in chess. Maintaining it has huge benefits for his image, income, advertisement, all the things you said he would have to halt for the championship. 

Realistically, he has plenty of time to stream and make money before the next championship comes around, the reason he said he might give up the next championship if it isn't alireza is because he's an impulsive person in some way. He'll feel different about it after the rapid championships which comes up soon probably.

I’m so happy you all have set up camp in the Mind of Magnus. Every champion of any endeavor hangs it up at some point. They either get bored with the lack of competition, younger (next) champions arrive on the scene, or they simply wake up one morning and realize there is so much more to living than preparing for sixth championship. If they stay too long, there are plenty of arm-chair quarterbacks who announce they should retire and move on. If they retire too soon we all seem to wonder “what’s wrong with Magnus?” I say, “good for you my Norwegian friend, go and enjoy the fruit of your labors. Enjoy life!” 

No, he still has passion. It's just that streaming is a lot more effective than a long tournament. It's like dafran once said in his stream that anyone with a brain and a successful streaming career would chose streaming over long tournaments since not only do you have the flexibility of time, you also have the freedom of work.

For example, if carlsen doesn't feel like playing chess some day, he can stream himself cooking... that would also get him tons of views. Hell, dafran once streamed himself taking a walk in the park, that was his most popular stream too.

Scream was the same. He isn't as funny as dafran but his good looks made him popular among the female playerbase of the game and gave him a lot of attention. He quit the major CSGO events soon after his streams started becoming more popular

Only players who don't have successful streaming careers would choose long tournaments. Notice how hikaru completely quit classical chess since his streams became more popular. It's just the logical choice.

My brother this is what every single successful streamer does. In chess also hikaru quit classical, magnus was soon to follow.

Imagine this, you have two options. Either you can take a job where you have to follow guidelines, follow a strict travel schedule, hire a team to do the homework.... or another job where you have to stay home, no one has any control over your decisions, you choose your own working hours and if you don't want to work someday it's entirely your choice PLUS you get more money for it... will u think?

This has been a concern in the esports community for a long, long time. Many top players have quit big leagues in favor of streaming provided they have some charisma, are funny or are good looking. If a person has either of those his streams will definitely become popular

if that's the case then why bother defending rapid title too lol?

Carlsen's passion far outweighs money.  I just think hes getting tired.  Hes been at the top so long.

You should also have pointed out that dafran also streamed his farming.... not to mention his youtube channel was still active during that "farming" session.

Dafran himself have stated, many times,. that streaming is just a much much better money maker than OWL

yes since both are esports

I can sense that you came here after hearing hikaru speak about it lol... don't mind hikaru, the man doesn't even have the sense to understand basic jokes. He himself quit classical just for money.

I guarantee you that regardless of who the challenger is, if magnus's stream continues to grow then there is no way he would ever defend his title again. Magnus is smart and it's "EXTREMELY" stupid to work harder for less pay.

I dont watch Hikarus content, he's a scumbag. this is just my opinion.

I don’t think this is the case. Because Carlsen said he would defend the title against Alireza. Which means that Carlsen IS willing to put in the work and sacrifice to defend the title if he will enjoy doing so. 

What you say may be true, time will tell all. As for what I’d do? That is completely irrelevant. My point was and remains: only Magnus knows (or any champion, pick one) when it’s time to walk away from classical chess events and do something, anything else. Only he will know the reasons why, unless he feels the need to tell the world, which i highly doubt will happen.