In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel free to
do so -

On Tue, 1 Jun 2004 07:11:17 -0400, "Gunny Bunny"
wrote:


In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel free to
do so -


Carlos Torre
A Grandmaster strength player are age 25 who took off all his clothing
in the middle of an important chess tournament. He spent most of the
rest of his life in mental institutions.

Raymond Weinstein, an international master who is still locked up in
the nut house.

Sam Sloan

Fischer of course.

Gunny Bunny wrote:

In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel free to
do so -





--
Groeten
van Rob
---
There are only two true Beliefs:
Belief in oneself and belief in each other.
All other beliefs are only superstitions.
[Aurichius]

"Sam Sloan" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 1 Jun 2004 07:11:17 -0400, "Gunny Bunny"
wrote:


In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel free
to
do so -


Carlos Torre
A Grandmaster strength player are age 25 who took off all his clothing
in the middle of an important chess tournament. He spent most of the
rest of his life in mental institutions.

Raymond Weinstein, an international master who is still locked up in
the nut house.

Sorry, I forgot one "Sam Sloan"

"Joshua B. Lilly" wrote in message
...
I`m just curious, but why Steinitz and Alekhine? Wouldn`t Torre be a
better
choice than one of those two? Rubinstein, Fischer, and Morphy all
demonstrated traits of losing their marbles, but Steinitz and Alekhine? I
guess I don`t understand the criteria for "kook".

Please don't top post!

Alekhine was famous for his eccentrics. He drank very heavily and was
nicknamed "Ale-and-Wine." In a few tournaments he was found in a field
drunk. He would urinate on the floor in other events. He married four times
to women 20 to 30 years older than he. In addition, he was a confirmed
member of the Nazi party, then he tried to deny it. He believed he was
being followed in 1946

Steinitz had delusions of telephoning people without any phone. He thought
he could emit electrical currents and move chess pieces at will. He even
claimed to be in direct contact with God and occasionally beating Him at
chess with pawn odds.






"Gunny Bunny" wrote in message
.. .

In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel
free
to
do so -

"Sam Sloan" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 1 Jun 2004 07:11:17 -0400, "Gunny Bunny"
wrote:


In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel free
to
do so -


Carlos Torre
A Grandmaster strength player are age 25 who took off all his clothing
in the middle of an important chess tournament. He spent most of the
rest of his life in mental institutions.

Raymond Weinstein, an international master who is still locked up in
the nut house.

Sam Sloan

Those three all definitely belong on the list.

"Taylor Kingston" wrote in message
...
Sam Sloan wrote:
"Carlos Torre ... who took off all his clothing in the middle of an
important
chess tournament. He spent most of the rest of his life in mental
institutions."

Both statements are categorically false. Mr. Sloan is no authority on
Torre.
A much better source is "The Life and Games of Carlos Torre" by Gabriel
Velasco.

Taylor Kingston

Allegedly, the Mexican master, Carlos Torre, was found running down Fifth
Avenue in New York in the nude.

"Gunny Bunny" wrote in message
.. .

"Sam Sloan" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 1 Jun 2004 07:11:17 -0400, "Gunny Bunny"
wrote:


In my opinion:

1) Rubenstein
2) Morphy
3) Fischer
4) Alekhine
5) Steinitz

Anyone care to add onto or change the order of the list, please feel
free
to
do so -


Carlos Torre
A Grandmaster strength player are age 25 who took off all his clothing
in the middle of an important chess tournament. He spent most of the
rest of his life in mental institutions.

Raymond Weinstein, an international master who is still locked up in
the nut house.

Sorry, I forgot one "Sam Sloan"



LOL

"Gunny Bunny" writes:

"Joshua B. Lilly" wrote in message
...
I`m just curious, but why Steinitz and Alekhine? Wouldn`t Torre be a
better
choice than one of those two? Rubinstein, Fischer, and Morphy all
demonstrated traits of losing their marbles, but Steinitz and Alekhine? I
guess I don`t understand the criteria for "kook".

Please don't top post!

Alekhine was famous for his eccentrics. He drank very heavily

That doesn't make him particularly eccentric. Other
world class chess players who were heavy drinkers include Tal,
and Mason. Other habitual drunks of GM strength are numerous.
I watched an IM put away five beers in an important ($) game
vs another IM. Steinitz and Tchigorin drank during their
match games, Blackburne claimed always to have a drink or
two before a game.

and was
nicknamed "Ale-and-Wine."

Yes. Though I think he mainly stuck to hard liquor.

In a few tournaments he was found in a field
drunk.

That was Mason. I don't know of any case in which
this happened to Alekhine.

He would urinate on the floor in other events.

There is a story of his doing this, once. But no real
evidence for it, as far as I can tell.

He married four times
to women 20 to 30 years older than he.

Three times. His first wife was his own age. But
that was a marriage of convenience. He needed her
to get out of the USSR. It's weird, I agree. On
the other hand at least one of his wives had a
fair amount of money. Even for Alekhine being a chess
player didn't result in a fabulous income.

In addition, he was a confirmed
member of the Nazi party,

No he was not. For a start they probably wouldn't
have accepted him.

The question is whether or not he wrote a number of
anti-semitic articles for a Nazi publication. He
denied writing them, which, true or not, was a wise
thing to say in 1946, not at all eccentric.

then he tried to deny it. He believed he was
being followed in 1946

By this time he was having a bottle of brandy with
breakfast, according to witnesses (who may of course
have been exaggerating a bit).


Steinitz had delusions of telephoning people without any phone. He thought
he could emit electrical currents and move chess pieces at will. He even
claimed to be in direct contact with God and occasionally beating Him at
chess with pawn odds.

Someone who has read a biography of Steinitz can comment
on these. I recall reading that the claims regarding
his last years are frequently unfounded.

Steinitz said that God himself couldn't give him pawn
and move. By which he meant that his play was good enough
that even a perfect opponent couldn't give him those odds
and draw.


William Hyde
EOS Department
Duke University

Gunny Bunny wrote:

Steinitz ... claimed to be in direct contact with God
and occasionally beating Him at chess with pawn odds.

_
Part of the problem with this subject is that one does
not know what stories to believe.

Page 42 of The Psychology of the Chess Player by
Reuben Fine: "One story says that [Steinitz] claimed
.... that he could give God Pawn and move."

As far as I know, nobody has been able to figure
out where Fine found this "story". The closest
thing to a source appears to be this quote from
page 9 of Irving Chernev's book, The Bright Side
of Chess: "Steinitz had enough [confidence] to
say once that he did not believe even God could
give him Pawn and move odds!" If this is Fine's
source, he seriously garbled the story.

It seems quite plausible that Steinitz might have said
something like what Chernev described. He was plagued
by people who claimed that, even with a pawn
advantage, he would have lost to Morphy.
(This was after Morphy's death.) It is
quite possible that Steinitz (who ridiculed
play at odds) may have believed and claimed
that the advance of chess knowledge and
his own understanding of it were sufficient
to ensure that with a pawn advantage he
would not lose even against perfect play.

It should be mentioned that Steinitz did behave
strangely at times during the last years of his
life, but nobody has found anything pre-Fine
to support the Fine version of the pawn advantage
story.