Dennis Monokroussos writes:
Reuben
Fine was on the short list of the world's greatest players from the
mid-1930s through the late 1940s, and is perhaps the only player to have a
total plus score in his games against world champions without being a world
champion himself (based on some non-trivial minimum number of games). From
his breakout win at Hastings 1935/6, to his tie for first (but behind Keres
on tiebreaks) in the 1938 AVRO event (designed as a Candidates' event to face
Alekhine), to his (declined) invitation to play in the 1948 The Hague/Moscow
world championship match-tournament, Fine was a legitimate contender for the
highest title throughout most of his all-too-short career.
Unfortunately for chess (but fortunately for his bank balance), he retired
from the game at an early age to pursue and utilize a Ph.D. in psychology;
still, even in his relatively brief career, Fine produced many high-quality
games. In his Lessons From My Games (p. 163), he even picks out his best game,
a win with the White pieces against Czech great Salo Flohr, from the aforementioned
AVRO tournament in 1938. Fine introduces the game as follows:
“No doubt opinion as to what is one's best game would differ considerably
among the masters. In my own mind I have always stressed accuracy above everything
else; whatever happens then flows naturally out of the position. In the following
game Flohr made one slight error in the opening; I was able to exploit it to
the fullest.”
It really is a brilliant game, lauded by no less an authority than Garry Kasparov
(My Great Predecessors, vol. 4 page 34). I think you’ll enjoy our tribute
to this great player, and those shopping around for an anti-Winawer system
may find Fine’s opening choice of practical value as well. Hope to see
you this Monday night! (9 p.m. ET)
Dennis Monokroussos'
Radio ChessBase
lectures begin on Mondays at 9 p.m. EDT, which translates to 02:00h GMT,
03:00 Paris/Berlin, 13:00h Sydney (on Tuesday). Other time zones can
be found at the bottom of this page. You can use Fritz or any Fritz-compatible
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Dennis
Monokroussos is 38, lives in South Bend, IN (the site of the University
of Notre Dame), and is writing a Ph.D. dissertation in philosophy (in the philosophy
of mind) while adjuncting at the University.
He is fairly inactive as a player right now, spending most of his non-philosophy
time being a husband and teaching chess. At one time he was one of the strongest
juniors in the U.S., but quit for about eight years starting in his early 20s.
His highest rating was 2434 USCF, but he has now fallen to the low-mid 2300s
– "too much blitz, too little tournament chess", he says.
Dennis has been working as a chess teacher for seven years now, giving lessons
to adults and kids both in person and on the internet, worked for a number
of years for New York’s Chess In The Schools program, where he was
one of the coaches of the 1997-8 US K-8 championship team from the Bronx, and
was very active in working with many of CITS’s most talented juniors.
When Dennis Monokroussos presents a game, there are usually two main areas
of focus: the opening-to-middlegame transition and the key moments of the middlegame
(or endgame, when applicable). With respect to the latter, he attempts to present
some serious analysis culled from his best sources (both text and database),
which he has checked with his own efforts and then double-checked with his
chess software.
Here are the exact times for different locations in the world