Anders Thulin wrote:


tomic wrote:

But you must discount Kasparov's ELO rating cause inflation of the rating
(5-10 rating points every year).

Why should that be relevant?

If Kasparov's rating was compared to Fischer's, I would agree. But since
it's each player's distance to the second player, I'm not sure why inflation
must be taken into account.

Unless you argue that inflation is different for different players or
different Elo ratings?

The OP noted that the difference was the same, approx 175 points. In
Fischers day 175 points was a bigger number than 175 current points.
Judging inflation isn't easy but I believe that many accept that some
rating inflation has taken place and a logical conclusion from the OP
would be that lead over the runner up was bigger and therefore Fischer
was stronger.

To be perfectly clear, I don't actually think this argument is very
convincing, but personally I'd guess Fischer was futher ahead. It's very
nearly impossible to compare the two era's; so much has changed that
you're talking about VERY different environment. ON another note I"d add
that Fischer is also in the lead in the "strange" category. Gary has his
moments, but FIscher is still Fischer.