LiamToo wrote:
Taylor Kingston wrote:
LiamToo wrote:
That Bxh2!! was the most brilliant move that Fischer ever made. It was
even a draw after that but, it had to be done. It was simply a stroke
of genius.

As far as I know, this interpretation is unwarranted by the facts. I
believe the final verdict is that objectively, 29...Bxh2? was a bad
move, one that turned a theoretical draw into a loss. Extensive
analysis by Olafsson and Timman, on pages 38-40 of "Fischer World
Champion" (New In Chess, 2002) demonstrates this. That Spassky later
erred, playing 36.a4 instead of 36.Kg4, does not change 29...Bxh2? from
a bad move to good. The path to a draw allowed by 36.a4 was as narrow
as a wasp's waist, and Fischer failed to find it, playing 39...f5?
instead of 39...e5, and so ultimately he lost.

If Fischer were a poker player, he could have been a great
one too. As they sat down to play, Bobby saw poker tells from Spassky.
He saw fear.

Highly debatable. Fischer himself said "I don't believe in
psychology, I believe in strong moves."

What would a genius do to strenghten Spassky's confidence and make the
entire match interesting? Bxh2!! and then game 2.

I would instead tend to agree with Edmondson's assessment that,
psychologically speaking, it was 11...Nh5 in game 3 that beat Spassky,
if such a thing can be attributed to any single move.

Have you read the opinion of Karpov on this move? If not, then research
it. It's similar to mine.

I would guess you are referring to pages 343-345 of "Russians versus
Fischer (2nd edition, 2005), which has extensive comments on this move
by various Soviet players and officials: Botvinnik, Bondarevsky,
Krogius, Spassky himself, and Karpov. They contradict each other to a
great extent, and I see no reason to give more credence to any of them,
including Karpov, over Fischer himself or those close to him. Karpov's
analysis sounds more like an overly dramatic after-the-fact concoction
from a Hollywood screenwriter, or a TV psychologist trying to sound
omniscient, than anything that actually went through Fischer's mind
when deciding to play 29...Bxh2.
While I can't rule out Karpov's scenario, Occam's Razor inclines one
toward simpler explanations, like "Fischer miscalculated."