Possibly the Worst Game Ever Played Ever by Anybody Ever

[@Slywolf1992]

This is the most scorched earth, nuked from orbit, takedown of a chess game commentary I’ve ever seen. Absolutely savage.

[@dertfert745]

inexplicably he made the best move

[@sylver76]

But it's fair. Seriously, if you see a game like that on ELO guesser, I doubt you'd guess anything above 1500. Probably less. Opening with a free knight, then hanging a rook for no good reason, and then a bishop for nothing. What the hell is going on here?

[@Tazer183]

i can listen to Finegolds commentary on another tab, not knowing exactly where the pieces are. The entertainment is still there

[@sergiobarros_]

lmao I could listen to it lebowski style

[@sandwedge]

@@sergiobarros_ that is such a good reference, now I understand why he listened to bowling

[@sameash3153]

​@@sergiobarros_ I've often wanted to record an over the board game and listen to it like in that movie

[@andrew_owens7680]

I can put it on a tab with the sound off and I still get a smile just knowing it's him.

[@MislavIvkovic-sx8vd]

Alireza and Also Nepo are Great players they can Also make big blounders Caruana Also they are famous for blounders

[@gmatsue84]

Man that looks like one of my games. Cheers to Nepo and Alireza for making me feel a lot better

[@OwenKraweki]

I wish my blitz games were half as good as this

[@nikolay4101-s7r]

Someone should hack this into Gothamchess's computer for his next guess the elo episode

[@GMPranav]

LMAO I think Levy is smart enough to remember this game

[@Trynottoblink]

I would laugh my ass off holy shit

[@alexlalonde202]

Oh my god that would be so good

[@danlorett2184]

In the latest Guess the Elo he had a game where he guessed the players were ~1200. They were both over 2000. Oof.

[@ozll9898]

The craziest part of this is Nepo's chesscom account is 3151 and Alireza's is 3141. If played online, it would be one of the highest rated games ever played with the average rating of 3146 lol Someone should definitely do this

[@matthewossi4060]

I paid for the entire evaluation bar, im gonna use the entire evaluation bar

[@zacharyheflin6794]

So magnus will retain his title again, is what I got out of this

[@-_Nuke_-]

yeah, unless he gets crazy

[@sesanti]

They are going to be playing classical chess, not blitz or rapid. So this does not tell you much.

[@zacharyheflin6794]

@@sesanti I get that but rapid/blitz is a reflection of your intuition IMO. I argue magnus’ intuition is simply more consistent and that in the long run will be the determining factor.

[@astrobullivant5908]

Well, this is a blitz game, so we don't really know.

[@GMPranav]

I mean, that was decided the moment Candidates was over.

[@topofsm]

"The more blunders the more exciting it is" Heartwarming to hear that Ben Finegold thinks my games are really exciting.

[@kevinbyrne4538]

"the Worst Game Ever Played Ever by Anybody Ever" ? There are so many contenders for that title.

[@Tx66]

But not in the 2700s

[@danlorett2184]

I literally watched a game with 23 blunders, where white was at one point +23 and ended up throwing it away, endgame was king + 2 rooks + 2 pawns (white) vs king + 2 rooks + 5 pawns (black). How'd the game end? Black took white's two pawns, white blunders BOTH rooks and has just a king left, black promotes TWO QUEENS and then accidentally stalemates the game after trying 4 moves to checkmate with TWO QUEENS AND TWO ROOKS. I swear to god, I wanted to claw my fuggen eyes out.

[@kevinbyrne4538]

@@danlorett2184 -- Sounds familiar: In one game, my opponent had only his king, but I had my king, a rook, and a freshly promoted queen. I was low on time so I rushed and .. stalemate. Argh. That's why some people say "Never give up" -- even in a completely lost position, your opponent may blunder or run out of time.

[@johnzeena4378]

I just saw this on eloguessr and I figured these two were around 950.

[@stopwritingthatreplyjohnat6638]

Yeah, this looks like a game I would make fun of 2 1700s for playing not a game between the best prodigy of the current century and the world championship challenger

[@tomasscholtus]

Wow, that’s an incredibly weak game for GM standards. Its hard to believe this, knowing how strong these guys are. They both just blundered multiple pieces, insane… Maybe they were trolling or something.

[@dion3062]

drunk?

That is the classic autistic reaction to almost everything.... "Maybe they were trolling"...

[@anonymousAJ]

Blitz

[@tuddgrimley8532]

The Soviet chess teams were the scariest thing in the world until the U.S. released Bobby Fischer from his embryonic chamber. The Soviets were like wow rude that's not fair you literally bioengineered a chess super soldier, that's not in the spirit of the game. And Fischer was like screw you guys, you don't know how hard it is to be born this way, with no purpose in life but to crush the Soviets. Eventually a software virus caused Fischer to target Jewish people, so he was decommissioned. Today there are many different bioengineered super soldiers around the world such as Yao Ming, Vassily Komatsky and Tosin Abasi. We all have to learn to live with the inexorable march of technology.

[@contextinvideos]

your storytelling is amazing

[@sunritroykarmakar4406]

wow this is suspiciously similar to my games

[@multiYellowHorse]

sus

[@slylataupe1697]

9:05 i have a possible explanation. All the players have been so used to play on the internet that 2D vision is now at their pick whereas at the same time their 3D vision of the board decreased for not playing at all IRL. Don’t you agree Ben ?

[@dwestside6945]

I agree to a point where I've played online for a while, then it takes me a few games to be comfortable otb, but at their level it's no excuse. they dont go in blind, they prepare. this seems like 2 players have a bad game vs eachother.

[@tuddgrimley8532]

@Sly Lataupe right perhaps being stuck in 2D vision otb it's like playing Fog of War chess but they can only see their own back rank?

[@slylataupe1697]

@@tuddgrimley8532 maybe lol

[@patstaysuckafreeboss8006]

Hikaru and magnus dont have this problem

[@gm2407]

@@patstaysuckafreeboss8006 They probably visualise their choice of board regardless of what is on front of them all they have to do is remember the pgn as it happens.

[@trent797]

Maybe their board vision has taken a hit over the last year.

[@alvarosoares3530]

I agree with you, maybe using the computer too much made some damage on their board vision

[@Ben-xj2rf]

Ian won the candidates lol

[@alvarosoares3530]

@@Ben-xj2rf yeah, but in those games they had a couple hours on clock. On blitz games it's way different and they haven't much time to calculate, that's why the board vision is important to avoid blunders

[@danlorett2184]

Firouzja was really playing poorly in this tournament. Nepo is a strong player but I guess he put a bunch of spaghetti in his pockets and it all started falling out in the middle of this blitz game.

[@vinegarsalt4675]

Kasparov agrees with Ben, there is a recap somewhere on youtube. Make this mistake 10 to 100 years ago & you are down the bin

[@dylanloew]

I'm looking for this, where'd you find that??

[@stopwritingthatreplyjohnat6638]

Kasparov is insane. He's probably one of the idiots who would argue that rating inflation is real without any basic mathematical understanding of how currency or inflation works

[@sahirde]

Kasparov is honestly hard to watch for me, you can just feel the ego

[@deegobooster]

@@sahirde classic Russian attitude

[@alexlalonde202]

Where can I watch thi

[@-_Nuke_-]

I agree with Ben, I've seen many supergm games and that one was literally the worst...

[@Evilanious]

"He's not me, he's him." Never change, Ben.

[@swolejszo]

I had to click when I read the title just to see if Ben found one of my games to analyze.

[@monkerud2108]

i guess magnus is going to have to lose his title to dementia

[@carsenarsen8634]

Pragguuuuuuuu

[@chucknick44]

I miss daily dose of Ben Finegold :(

[@AbhishekKumar-uu4uj]

Interpol arrested him

[@Bif-c1f]

Then one day when Fermi was playing tennis, he realised where the other chess elite grandmasters were going wrong.

[@dekippiesip]

Are you refering to the physicist Enrico Fermi?

[@MrDanDant]

Btw. Soviet Team in Chess Olympiad 1960 was Tal, Botvinnik, Keres, Korchnoi, Smyslov, Petrosian, two (in that time future) world champions as a reserve, Botvinnik was the best 2nd board of the tournament. In Chess Olympiad 1962 Tal was barely 2nd reserve. That's how Soviets were dominant.

[@12jswilson]

Ben forgot Lev Polugaevsky of Soviets that never had a chance of making the Olympiad but would be board 1 for almost any other country.

[@edwardbottle1018]

I'm confused. Polugaevsky represented the USSR olympiad time seven times

[@superscienceshow]

This is something I do not understand about gm games. In the 17 wc game between Fischer and Spassky I run a game report and there are 40 key moments. Loads of mistakes and blunders but they get 97% 98% ratings.

[@Spartacus11]

Yes for classical games, I'm sure it was the same for Carlsen vs Fabiano in their matchup. This is Blitz with a lot of these moves played being down to seconds. And after playing so much online chess it can be tricky to get back to over the board fast format as moving pieces with a mouse is a lot faster. Low quality game regardless, of course.

[@philipxu6020]

almost as bad as my games.

[@prestonbarnes8065]

This is why Nez said "he who analyzes blitz is stupid." It's just a race to the bottom. Let them race!

[@benjaminsmythe8967]

It's 3/0 - it's not 30 second chess. You can still play and not walk into this...

[@GoldenPierre25]

@@benjaminsmythe8967 It's 5+2 tho

[@benjaminsmythe8967]

@@GoldenPierre25 Even MORE reason not to play so poorly.

[@fink7968]

Wait this was 5+2? Honestly yeah, not really a fair game to analyze. I thought they were talking about old school blitz as in 30+2 or 45+0 etc

[@sameash3153]

​@@fink7968 there's no reason a game of chess should last longer than 2 minutes

[@beeble2003]

C'mon. You can't use a blitz game as evidence that today's players aren't as good as players from the past.

[@VARMOT123]

This game is horrific even for a blitz game

[@tasinrashid2380]

I think reason why they're playing below par is that they got used to playing online. OTB habits aren't coming back to them ( rapid and blitz). It will come soon.

[@soullesspits425]

People are better at chess now than they were a hundred years ago btw.

[@chucknola484]

still theory

[@MV-ch3mm]

Morphy > you and me, so you are mistaken.

[@adrians3267]

@@MV-ch3mm logical

[@spiritofmodernity9679]

Only due to theory and memorization. Morphy would eat Magnus if Magnus didn't have modern theory. And if Morphy had modern theory, Morphy would actually innovate.

[@-_Nuke_-]

"better at Chess" is a meaningless sentence better at what? calculation, theory, tactics, positional understanding, time management, strategy? All of them combined? no, today's GMs are not necessarily better than GMs of the past at all of these things combined

[@thomasdoggett9919]

Ben is hilarious, needs to be a top chess KZbinr asap.

[@mercylessplayer]

Already is

[@TheHeavyassaulter]

If he plays more than he is storytelling then he will be!

[@abelchess8430]

@@TheHeavyassaulter I think most of us are here for the stories not game.

[@inafridge8573]

Dude kinda invented top chess youtuber

[@will8602]

ben finegold looks and acts like he was born in the slug dimension

[@mustooch]

gothamchess and hikaru should review these games on a guess the elo video without knowing it was nepo and firouzja

[@georgiykireev9678]

Levy would probably recognise it considering how recent and memorable it is

[@zuludoctor]

Ben this was great. We need more of this of you calling people out regardless of their status. Spare no room and spare no one regardless of their title. Fair game. Everyone gets called out. Beast mode.

[@marypoppins989]

Sees title, Oh my god, he saw my game

[@puzzLEGO]

3:48 was the idea queen c5 check?

[@kirkobayne]

Me seeing the title of this video, me imagining myself at the end of the video, "frankly, terrible"

[@daviddieffenderfer]

When you don’t give God a gun

[@SahnigReingeloetet]

This in a Guess The Elo would make Levi quit

[@suezuccati304]

At least Firouzja lost in the opening faster than i usually do

[@gm2407]

Korchnoi was so good that when he played for Switzerland he won gold at the olympiad. When he played for Soviet Union he couldn't make the team many years.(I dont know that for a fact as I cant find team details) Soviets won the 10-21st Olympiads with the most medals. Then the 24-29th. Then Russia won 30-35th. Just think 1950-1970 any of Botvinnik, Smyslov, Tal, Petrosian, Spassky. Bronstein, Korchnoi, Keres, Geller, Kotov. Stein (I hadnt even heard of him till Ben said his name) was in candidates tournaments and won soviet titles when Spassky was playing in them.

[@deegobooster]

“The more blunders the more exciting it is” and that’s why Pogchamps was so exciting

[@alex2005z]

My games are the most exciting thing ever

[@georgiykireev9678]

Unironically agree. Watching chess newbies that you know from somewhere else play is a very different kind of entertainment from sweaty 2700 tournaments

[@andrew_owens7680]

I imagine if India put up a team now, it would be like the Soviet team. My prediction is, Indian world champion within a decade.

[@VARMOT123]

Gukesh is already the challenger and arjun is world number 5

[@sohitdhawan7545]

3:30 BEST part lmaoo

[@morniclegreen3534]

Oh you actually weren't hyperbolic. Very interesting

[@951genni]

I came to see my game reviewed

[@zlizek6093]

love your stuff ben !

[@farzadyousefian8877]

I enjoyed Ben's analysis but it's a bit unfair to think Firouzja or Nepo cheat in online games only because they played a single terrible game in blitz. Both of them have played tons of superb games (close to engine moves) in person.

[@vektor3958]

Nobody is cheating

[@deanmcintyre4334]

TWIST: it was max deutsch wearing a mask of nepos face

[@vidhanp482]

they aint used to the wood no more

[@kdub1242]

Uri Geller was a very strong and powerful mentalist/psychic/telekinetic dude. It's just that during that fateful Tonight Show visit, the "vibes" were "bad," and he wasn't feeling "strong." But his powers are amazing, far beyond science.

[@Amoeba_Podre]

In my land we call those scammers

[@kdub1242]

@@Amoeba_Podre That's what I mean. That appearance did not tank Geller's obvious nonsense scam career. Like I said, he's strong and powerful, beyond science, and apparently beyond common sense.

[@douglasquaid7550]

you should make the lichess engine analyze the game, that engine is ruthless

[@tanmaymukherjee1874]

I think they were using ALPHA ZERO....

[@Pakadork]

Wow, this isn't actually a clickbait title..

[@floofygod]

Maybe the reason ELO is higher now, is because you are able to play against way more rated opponents.

[@beeble2003]

No, Elo ratings just drift upwards over time. Elo ratings are only valid for comparing players in the same timeframe. If, today, A is rated 2700 and B is rated 2710, you can conclude that B is a slightly better player. But if A was rated 2700 in 1980 and B is rated 2710 today, you really can't conclude anything.

[@HS-mu8fp]

GM Ben Roast Finegold

[@sufficient_material]

watching this video after the great players of the present video about Alireza gives whiplash

[@gm2407]

Short time control games really does make for imperfect chess. On a side note I have seen other games where Faruja walks the knife edge where he could hang mate any minute in the opening. Maybe his prep is about drawing his oponents towards the weakness the trapping them when they attack imperfectly.

[@ratnamani8228]

This Game will give me Nightmares. 😭

[@dude157]

So bad even I can see the mistakes.

[@Jacob-lo3hw]

every move has a color.."

[@EdwardPorian]

Nope, one of my games is. I'm terrible

[@oisinoc8533]

Were you or your opponent over 2700?

[@colincunningham5820]

@@oisinoc8533 maybe combined?

[@oisinoc8533]

@@colincunningham5820 mayyyyyyyybe

[@alex2005z]

@@oisinoc8533 if you multiply the elo it gets there

[@lqtmn]

Chat with a good Uri Gellar joke? Suspicious!

[@akshaypanchal23]

I'm really happy that this guy didn't watched absolute nightmares that I play 🤣🤣

[@vladn6031]

They're just not used to playing OTB cuz most of their games are online these days.

[@human_that_much3626]

They’re not used to using real pieces maybe?

[@aref6561]

most of these moves were less than 5 seconds on the clock lol, without context lol

[@snared_]

is this true or how has his last 2 years of results been?

[@LukePettit]

Saul's brother is Rev Green in Clue Tim Curry is the star Surprisingly funny movie

[@leisurecreature5472]

Anybody else getting a Dr. Finkelstein and Sally vibe?

[@Harrier_DuBois]

but what was the time control?

[@gersonselema4506]

Wow horrible horrible chess😭😭all hope I had in Nepo beating Carlsen is down the drain

[@Mike7mcdonald]

Well just remember Nepo won the Candidates just a couple months ago. And he obviously played well to do that

[@GMPranav]

Why would you hope for that? May the better player win.

[@littlebumgorf]

I’m shocked too, this is so bad

[@wideboii4523]

Blundering the rook instead of mate in 2, this really looks like one of these 100 rated baka mitai videos

[@polymorphicprocrastination5345]

Nah nah nah, you guys don't get it. Nepo lost because Firouzja pressed the clock too hard

[@dylancole919]

Bring back the great tactics of chess! Morphy/Fischer style

[@xjxuzi171]

why didn't you post the PGN in the description?

[@aeyt5037]

I must be like dumb but how is queen c5 not a mate in 2 in 3:36? I don't see any escape squares for the king and only queen can block, and after taking it would be mate?

[@aeyt5037]

Nvm figured it out

[@matteopriotto5131]

I thought that too, but then I realized black can also block with Qc6

[@zombieheart8312]

Let’s see ben against alireza lol

[@sylver76]

If Alireza plays like this, hanging a knight on move 11, Ben would crush him. Ben's not the best player around, but he is very technically sound and he is consistent. Give Ben that position against Firouzja, and I'd bet the house that Ben wins at least 9 times out of 10.

[@skycaptain95]

Ben's specialty is not blundering. He doesn't necessarily play the best move, but he makes fewer mistakes than the other guy.

[@shishankdahiya5016]

This game looks suspicious

[@sohamnandi5457]

Video Title: Me: Yeah that's my kind of games all right Features Two Super GM's 😶

[@hylic2637]

Wait, so the one exception to not being able to castle when an opponents piece has vision on the squares in-between the king and rook is when the square the piece has vision on is ultimately outside of the castle afterwards? 3:23 Huh. I've never seen that happen before. I think I just learned something new about the rules of chess unless Finegold pulled this game out of his ass. Lol, I just can't believe I've never seen that happen before.

[@skycaptain95]

The rook is never affected by the restrictions on the king. You can't put a rook into check.

[@hylic2637]

Right, yeah one day later and it's obvious now. While I know quite well that you can't put a rook into check... lol... I completely missed the fact that the king never goes through the b8 square, only the rook does. I was very tired last night.

[@beeble2003]

@@hylic2637 If it's any consolation, Viktor Korchnoi had to ask the arbiter if it's legal to castle in a position like that. In his World Championship Candidates Final against Karpov. The one that was _de facto_ a World Championship match because Fischer refused to play.

[@jimmytwostones]

The truth hurts

[@WeaselProbably]

6:14 someone do something with this

[@kiasmorningstar]

So you can take any chess engine of your liking, screen capture and place as permanent window over the top of your current window. Since you may be a good player, you play at your best, when in a questionable or as someone says dubious position you reference the the engine. You however try and not look at the engine because you think you still have a sliver of pride, because you are in fact a decent player. When playing the game is not fun anymore, winning is all you have, and you desperately look at the engine just for the momentary sensation that you are not as bad as your dropping confidence makes you feel. Who knows, I am probably way off. Epic props Ben and Karen for the Welcome back, Kotter reference!

[@Sniffhow]

Blitz Chess is a mistake. we need FischerRandom tournaments, not blitz

[@r.t.5767]

+1

[@thanosbambi]

supergm playing like a fellow 900 very cool

[@marshmelows]

3:39 CALLED IT LMAO

[@SethingtonIII]

Magnus would have punished all of this and made quick work of sloppy play. That's what was missing from this. Real competition that does not waver, that being Magnus.

[@VARMOT123]

indian chess olympiad in 2030 will be real scary too .it could be one of the greatest modern day chess olympiad teams. pragg,nihal sarin,gukesh,arjun erigaisi,raunak sadhwani and leon mendonca

[@dylancole919]

I felt the same way watching these high rated players for a while... I think the best thing that our high rated players of today have done is popularized opening theory to the masses. I thank them for that but I am also not saying that I am prepared to beat their ass either lol

[@Demian_R]

Oh, Blitz, so not Chess. 😆

[@rezajaberi9588]

I guess everyone who has watched Alireza`s matches will easily disagree with you! Forgetting about the opening where it seems he did not know this line, rest of the mistakes all happened under huge time pressure for both opponents. Why shouldn`t we watch other matches where he brilliantly beat Vlad, Levon, and others in Paris. Let`s also think how ended up 2nd in the Norway Chess and how he made such a fantastic result in the Wijk ann Zee. These matches were not online man ! So let`s don`t even think of cheating about someone who has constantly proved himself as aa star.

[@ktmasterpiece.460]

i thought this was H3H3

[@MislavIvkovic-sx8vd]

If it was bullet maybe was still a nice game 😂😂😂

[@AdamCHowell]

Both paid to loose?

[@Halibut86]

The perils of blitz chess... Time controls were a mistake.

[@alex2005z]

Ah yes, just let people think forever. I guess if you want that there is daily chess

[@TheVoiceOfLiberty1]

Please do So v. Nepo! Finest game I've seen in a while

[@michalrehacek3462]

He won't do So.

[@TheVoiceOfLiberty1]

@@michalrehacek3462 Ha!

[@givenchauke3125]

wow what a team ,who plays on board 1 there wow

[@fundhund62]

When analyzing with an engine, everything is always obvious. Try these guys over the board.

[@thefrancuteleac]

The point is they were making horrific blunders that they aren't supposed to do. If you didn't know who they were, you would think the game was between some 1500 players. You don't need an engine to spot the blunders they made, because they are so obvious.

[@alex2005z]

Some of the mistakes are obvious. Where they thinking at all? Or were they playing blindfolded?

[@fundhund62]

@@thefrancuteleac They weren't obvious at all. Once a strong GM explains it, everything seems obvious.

[@swallowtail7718]

@@RAbra-qj9qm lol this is a 5+2 format stop defending bad plays

[@Sksahu_123]

Great video go Ben make some more quick analysis