Great Players of the Past: José Raúl Capablanca

Check out Ben's Chessable courses here! www.chessable.com/author/BenF... GM Ben Finegold discusses games of José Raúl Capablanca in the Great Players of the Past series. This lecture was recorded March 6, 2018 at CCSCATL.
Games Discussed:
Jose Raul Capablanca vs. Frank James Marshall
New York (1918)
Jose Raul Capablanca vs. Savielly Tartakower
New York (1924)
Ossip Bernstein vs. Jose Raul Capablanca
Moscow (1914)
Jose Raul Capablanca vs. Marc Fonaroff
Casual Game New York (1918)
Aron Nimzowitsch vs. Jose Raul Capablanca
New York (1927)
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#benfinegold #chess #JoséRaúlCapablanca

[@gsoos]

Go Casablanca, my favourite movie

[@kdub1242]

Play it again, Ben!

[@lasshrugged]

For old times' sake!

[@earlpayne9482]

here's looking at you

[@andreitiberiovicgazdovici]

Ingrid Bergman is enchanting in her role. And we also have a masterful Bogart, perhaps his best performance in his career. Great movie.

[@tomswiftyphilo2504]

hah!

[@danielreymond]

Wikipedia: According to Arnold Denker, who was told by Edward Lasker, a 36-year-old Bernstein in 1918 was arrested in Odessa by the Bolshevik secret police whose purpose was to investigate and punish "counterrevolutionary" crimes. Bernstein was to be shot by a firing squad for serving as a legal advisor to the banking industry.⁣ On the day of his execution, Bernstein watched as the firing squad lined up before him. At the last minute, a commanding officer asked to see the list of prisoner names and recognized Bernstein's name as he was a chess enthusiast. After confronting Bernstein about his identity, the commanding officer offered him a deal he couldn't refuse.⁣ They would play a game of chess. If Bernstein won the match, he would win his life and freedom. However, if he drew or lost, he would get shot along with the rest of the prisoners. Bernstein won in short order and was released. He escaped on a British ship and settled in Paris.[1][2]

[@Deucely]

Man, this is a past from the blast. Keep 'em coming!

[@osvaldobenavides5086]

Ben, the Grandmaster of Comedy! LMAO!! Funny stuff!

[@matthewviramontes3131]

Ben should do a spinoff of this series and do a "Great chess engines of the past", such as Deep Blue, Deep Thought, and others.

[@alexanderbustamante2267]

there are others? O:

[@rakib17874]

Mainly others.

[@spodule6000]

CoKo III

[@f.d.3289]

There were LOTS of great engines before Deep Thought -- Chess 4.x in the 1970s (the first to beat IMs), Belle, Cray Blitz and HiTech in the 1980s. There's also a game from a Soviet 1960s chess engine called ITEP that is prett impressive, at least considering its time.

[@alm5851]

My favorite player!

[@antoniobreaux1584]

Who did Capablanca defeat? Don't know but I'll Lasker

[@thorobreu]

12:49 If Bg3 then Qf7 mates. You need to insert Bh2 so that after Kf1 Bg3 Qf7 Rf7 comes with check

[@MrBonified66]

Capablanca had two names. One for each of ya.

[@jamesdeanzbeans]

Always a joy my guy.

[@NewGrow-kb1bg]

I really enjoyed the 2nd to last games ending

[@whatthehirsch7385]

You are welcome

[@thiagomennabarretoguedes2835]

You should make a new Capablanca lecture.

[@f.d.3289]

About the Marshall - Capablanca match: Marshall originally declared it to be the US Championship (Cuba at the time had been annexed by the US). After he was crushed by Capablanca, he said it wasn't a US Championship because Cuba wasn't a US citizen after all, and some guys reminded him of old US Champion Showalter (I think) who hadn't played for 10 years, and then he went and crushed that old man and finally got his cherished title.

[@mydevice2596]

It's deja vu all over again!

[@climatedeniersbelonginasyl4191]

Cover Capa v Sultan Khan...unbelievable game!

[@pelax9066]

😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊

[@qazzaqstan]

When Ben asked who was the strongest Cuban player my thought was I have no idea now that Leinier moved, and then it was Leinier anyway

[@mizofan]

Capablanca, my favourite

[@msd4629]

Go ben

[@peterflom6878]

Bur stay there

[@justchessminiatures1167]

Carlos Torre lecture, please please

[@gm2407]

@38:44. That ending is like the Opera game only if it went to mate it would be even less material on the board for white. Love the sacrificial combinations and how black will be forced to desparado the Queen and Rook to no availe.

[@WastrelWay]

Capablanca was also a baseball player. I think he played for the Cuban national team.

[@gm2407]

@23:24 I saw a Morphy game where he plays the Dutch against Horwitz and moves the king up to the sixth rank. It was an awesome endgame.

[@vorpalinferno9711]

Finegold should cover Frank's immortal 800 elo game.

[@andrewkarsten5268]

@15:09 “this isn’t good D, that’s some pretty bad D” Unfortunately a phrase I’ve heard too many times, and never in reference to my chess😔😔😭

[@vigilante8374]

Reminds me of the time in St. Louis with Ben talking about the good knight with the bad bishop, and he had to stop himself from commenting further lest he get fired.

[@yotoober1]

Also btw- what would Ben's ELO/USCF be today if he had to play in a classical t/c tnmt with GMs? 🤔 Would he still clock a ELO perf rating of 2500? Jus' wundrin'? I mean if you play 30 games with opponents rated avg 2100, then you add 400 = 2500 Perf rtg = current rtng + 400 x [(W - L}/# games] Right?

[@yotoober1]

Forgot to add must go 30-0 against the 2100s players

[@AthosRac]

Please show the Capablanca favorite game, against Smyslov.

[@bjorngillefalk8965]

Don't badmouth Steinitz. He took on the toughest opponents he could find., as opposed to the tough guy who took his title.

[@yotoober1]

"Great lectures from the past" on one of the All Time Best, Jose' "I don't need to study chess openings, I am the theory" Capablanca. The Original Stockfish "human chess machine" going 9 years w/o a tnmt loss. Yes they said, but you only played one tnmt a year back then. To which the answer was, yes, so there were less opportunities to stay sharp, easy to get rusty. Well said Jose. Alekhine never would have beaten me in my prime, but yes he out prepared me and I got caught in traps that I had to figure out over the board, not an easy thing to do, but could never out calculate me OTB in an equal position.

[@thinboxdictator6720]

You think Alekhine outprepared him? 😂😂😂 No.

[@not2tired]

Great chess players have 7 middle names so their Wikipedia articles can be longer.

[@stefanf922]

He's on the 2700 list now, #16

[@12jswilson]

And plays for the US. Very suspicious

[@Miketar2424]

Is there a reason Ben uses the word 'suspicious' a lot? When he uses it for a chess position or piece, does that mean something in chess terms, or is it more of a Finegoldism or joke?

[@tellahsage6477]

It's one of the classic Finegold in-jokes :)

[@robertomariani626]

From how I saw him using it in general: "this bishop is very suspicious" "I used to be good, now I'm suspicious", kinda means "bad" or "quite bad", there might be exceptions but it's the general meaning.

[@mothecat776]

Hey Ben. When someone says I gained space... Tell them if you want "space" move to Wyoming....

[@letsmakeit110]

pff, everyone knows the nimzo indian was named after mr indian

[@WhiteThunder121]

Poor Archer

[@farhanwkwk2233]

3:40 Lmao!!!

[@h0wnr681]

I stopped the video to watch "Chess Fever", actually not bad for a near 100 year old movie. There's a pretty funny bit where the main character keeps finding kittens in his pockets, also Capablanca steals his girlfriend.

[@suezuccati304]

Ofc he did

[@strangelyrepulsive77]

buy a gooder laptop/deskto/cooler or use fewer cores/threads

[@jefftoll604]

Capablanca's opponents couldn't handle the truth....and the truth ....

[@daev3000]

The truth hurts.

[@dansdendanable]

I wanna hear about his Casanova moves

[@rickdynes]

AIRPLANE ❤

[@mlliarm]

Spanish people have two surnames. The first is the father's and the second the mother's. So "Graupera" was his mother's surname. I guess Cubans too followed this tradition.

[@caparamiro8864]

Good video . I learned a lot interesting things but also disliked 2 details_ 1)Who told you that Capablanca ever said so about leaving Cuba because that country was not good? And 2) Why did you talk in such way about Juan Corzo whom Capablanca beat at the age of 13 to become the Cuban chess Champion when pronouncing his name?

[@mwatkins0590]

51:27 born '83 but only 34 years old, very interesting.

[@pablofleitas5967]

In the description it says this lecture was recorded in 2018, so it's ok.

[@jimrogers7460]

I don't get it. These talks are aimed at amateurs. But after he finally gets thru the analysis and jokes... he then just speeds thru the moves. I doubt the players made them that fast when they had the actual game. I find that extremely frustrating. Having to constantly stop and rewind and look at the position to see what happened is annoying.

[@ribbonsofnight]

Would amateurs be able to spend 15 minutes looking at key positions. I want to see 5 games at this speed sometimes. If I want an hour on 1 game I can find that elsewhere.

[@jimrogers7460]

@@ribbonsofnight i don't understand your comment. The point is why not, when showing the actual moves spend 10 or 15 seconds - the players spent lots of time, no doubt deciding on the moves - rather than suddenly speeding thru 5 or 6 moves in 3 seconds - as if we can possibly follow that. It's terrible form for a "Teacher". Does he want to teach or just insult?

[@innosanto]

Change the speed

[@camlop8635]

I play just like Capablanca but way better

[@pelax9066]

Lp😊😊

[@random9-548]

"Great Videos of the Past" Nobody? No? Uhmm, great audience...

[@pelax9066]

0l P😊

[@examiningdata7952]

He will lose to stockfish and cry 💦💦💦💦

[@user-ts2co4ov5h]

PLEEEEEEEEEASE Dont analyze super famous games AGAIN. Show lesser know games, so we can learn something new.