Quote:
Originally Posted by The Yugoslavian
I noticed that via Twitter! I meant to actually post here about it but the forum seems so dead.
Have you found many prodigies not on the watch 4 years ago but seem to be main prodigies now? Or do you suspect it will just be a bunch of super young players who shouldn't really have much buzz surrounding them unless they make additional leaps?
I haven't yet found any 15+ year olds who need to be tracked that I wasn't already looking at in 2016. Adding quite a few new 10-13 year olds though. Prodigy watch is on the back burner, just slow casual updates, while I focus on Tata Steel (and because Covid really screwed up all the kids' trajectories). I may find more when I start updating it more aggressively in February.
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Yugoslavian
Also, poor Nils. Wins the first two games, may be having the tournament of his life....1.5% chance of winning the whole thing. Of course, it's a long tournament but it's just gotta be so tough for guys like him who realistically have no chances to win top events.
I like what they do for this tournament by having not just the strongest players in the world, but so many of them just have no chance to win (or ever win) this level of tournament. Firouzja does in the future. Duda does, Esipenko, and then it's just Magnus/Fabi/Giri/Maxime. All the rest of the guys are forever drawing dead.
Yeah, it's just too long of an event. 13 games is enough of a sample size that there's just no real chance for a weaker player to get so lucky that they win. Though it's worth keeping in mind that while I calculate odds of winning, there are other reasonable goals. A lot of those players would be super happy with a top five finish, and that is certainly possible for them.
I'm glad you've been reading it!