Carlsen withdrawal after loss to Niemann

[CornfedForever]

While it's easy to think of ways in which Niemann could have cheated, on reflection, I feel that the evidence isn't strong enough to make that accusation in this case.

I am happy with people on this forum discussing the evidence and the technical ways it could be done (there are plenty), but it seems to me that the evidence isn't strong enough for GMs and officials to start saying things in public.

On the basis of what I've read, if I was a juror, I think I would feel obliged to say "not guilty", because the evidence isn't strong enough. However, if the question was, "Would a GM be able to cheat at slow time controls if they chose to do so?", my answer would be, "Absolutely yes!"

The problem however...is that the trial is not yet over and the 'suspect' has not officially even been accused.
Magnus has intimated...but not served the papers.
He is really going to look bad if nothing comes of this.

Sad...but like I said, I think we might be seeing King Magnus in a Shakespearean meltdown: Abdicates this throne... his company was failing to the point he had to sign it over to the 'enemy'... and the young princes are starting to pick him off left and right.

Clouds are gathering all about the kindgom...

[Graham Banks]

Paranoia and insanity – by Jacob Aagaard
News
hans
calrsen

JacobAagaard
Trainer

1
10h
I believe a lot of you will have seen the crazy events in St Louis over the last 48 hours. I felt an obligation to share facts and thoughts with you, and then allow you to make up your own mind.

The background is that Magnus Carlsen lost a not-too spectacular game against Hans Niemann on Sunday. Magnus is the GOAT, Hans is 19 and rated just under 2700. With the win, he passed the mark for the first time.

Monday Magnus did not show up to the game and released a tweet with a Mourinho comment of “if I say what I want to say, I will be in big trouble – and I don’t want to be in big trouble.” Quickly the team of internet detectives combined this and increased anti-cheating

First of all, my personal relationship with Hans Niemann: I met him at a camp in St Louis in 2019. He was about 2450 and clearly a socially awkward character that had a feeling that all eyes were on him all the time. But he was smart, funny, and likeable. It was a good camp and we had some laughs. At the time he was talking about quitting chess a lot, but it was clear that the issue was he cared so much and had not found a mental position that worked for him.

We were sort of in contact on and off over the next two years. He was 2500 18 months ago and playing all the time. His attitude had changed. Instead of being scared of admitting that he wanted to be great, he now gave it his all. Traveling from event to event. Playing good games, bad games. Uncompromising. His rating increased a lot over the summer. Over 100 points. He reached 2630 or so by the autumn when he came to visit in Glasgow. At that time, he had also joined our academy, although I doubt he ever got around to using it much (and did not renew in 2022).

Our training session was a week. It was meant to be a camp, but no one else could make it. Hans was difficult to train. I tried to do calculation and endgame training with him (he had requested endgame training). At first, I showed exercises from recent games (last 18 months) that I really liked. He knew them ALL. I was astonished by his memory. I was astonished by his intuition. Both were off the charts for what I have seen training Shankland, Gelfand, and other 2600+ and a few 2700s.

There were obvious big holes in his chess, but to be honest, I see big holes in the game of Giri, Aronian, Mamedyarov, Firouzja, and other top players. When I get a 2650 student, I usually try to find out what part of their game is at a much lower level. There is always some area of chess where they are just blank. Maybe they cannot really visualise. They don’t know how to make simple decisions. They cannot calculate a line till the end. All three examples of real 2650 players I have worked with.

Hans’s confidence in his own intuition and his surprise when it was wrong was a recurring theme of the week he was here. Another was that whenever I came to his room, he was looking at chess. Playing through ALL games from all tournaments on Follow chess.

I have seen nothing out of the ordinary in the last two days. Hans playing reasonably well against opponents that are not playing that well. His big confidence. His awkwardness in front of the camera. His highly intuitive way of thinking. His lack of accuracy in variations. Him blundering when suggesting things, he thinks he might have looked at.

I also did not see anything out of the ordinary from Carlsen. Entitlement. Lack of responsibility. Lack of accountability. A Norwegian troll army ready to defame a man who only 400 days ago was a minor. Carlsen has acted badly in many situations after losing in the past. In that way, he reminds me of Federer, who was a badly behaved teenager. Become the best player in the world and behaved excellently. Then started losing to Djokovic and needed a period to adjust to reality.

People say that Carlsen does not behave badly when he is losing in his Meltwater Tour to Praggnanandhaa. It is partly because it is like Federer losing a set. It is partly because Praggnanandhaa is deferential to Magnus. Hans is not. Hans wants to kill the king. Wants to take the throne. He has no remorse over this at all.

Some people on Twitter is saying that Nakamura and Nepomniachtchi are backing up these accusations of cheating. I watched the Nakamura YouTube video and found it to be ridiculous, but also void of an actual accusation of cheating. When Nakamura is saying that no 2700 calculates this poorly, he is flat out wrong. I can also show positional mistakes from Nakamura that undermines the credibility of the playing strength of the former no. 2. Mistakes that Hans would simply not believe a GM had made. Because they are his strengths and Nakamura’s weaknesses.

There are many GMs who are suspicious. There are also many GMs who think this is ridiculous. There are also many GMs that are without real skills outside playing chess in exactly one way.

” This guy doesn’t look like cheater doesn’t behave like cheater and doesn’t play like cheater. Altogether this doesn’t provide 100% guarantee but still…” – Alexander Khalifman

“…It was more than impressive.” – Ian Nepomniachtchi

Comments about the preparation for the game with Carlsen were bizarre. Hans gave the reason he anticipated a g3-line. Which for me is already reason enough to check various g3-lines. He showed additional moves he remembered from his preparation. Sure, one of them was a blunder and his memory was inaccurate regarding the actual evaluation. The narrative for this being indications of cheating must include an explanation of how the game reference came in. First, it was that there was no such game. Then it was some other nonsense.

We all know that it is possible to send signals of moves in a highly sophisticated operation. It requires technology. It requires an accomplice. It requires a high level of risk-taking and stupidity. But what it does not offer is a reasonable way for a game reference to be conveyed. This is a sign of preparation.

So far, what we have seen is a case of a young man overperforming and being awkward. Especially, in the situation where he is asked about the game with Firouzja. Trying to point out that he looked and felt awkward in the situation created by Carlsen’s withdrawal.

My main argument is that it always has to be about the moves. The moves were nothing special. The thinking was fully consistent with what I have seen when discussing chess with Hans.

“Magnus behaved like an entitled brat” is at least an equally reasonable theory. This is not new behaviour. Those saying he has never accused anyone of cheating, never withdrawn and never behaved badly (as if this alone would be evidence of anything), are simply underinformed. I don’t want to be a part of a smear against anyone, but to me, it is incredible that all just assume that Carlsen is a good guy. And this after 20 years of seeing how bad a loser can be.

There are people online who say that “Niemann almost definitely cheated” based on just utter rubbish. From those with little knowledge or competence, you will get the greatest certainty. It is called Dunning-Kruger.

Obviously, I do not have certainty that Hans did not cheat. Nor do I have certainty that Carlsen has never cheated. It is reasonably well established that Hans cheated online at some point. This is simply a different thing. Compare it to cheating in Homework Club. There are times when people have cheated on their homework and I ignore it. Because it is not a big thing. It does not make me believe that they will start on advanced Mission Impossible-style careers as advanced cheaters. It is of course possible to do it, but it requires advanced behaviour to beat top tournament security far beyond what we have seen from people cheating, which is usually compression socks and phones in the toilet, to point to a famous case.

What I have seen when people are cheating, is a loss of confidence in themselves and an acceleration in the cheating behaviour. And when accused, they usually get angry and go on the offensive. The innocent are confused and saddened.

In this case, I have not seen moves or behaviour that are out of character for Hans, nor have I seen anything that looks like computer-influence moves. I have not seen behaviour typical of losers.

What I have seen is the nasty side of the Internet and poor behaviour from various individuals, who are totally within my experience of them as human beings. You may disagree with my presumptions of what happened here, but the simplest explanation is often the right one. Magnus could not accept that he could lose to someone he thinks of as “a joke” and came up with a different explanation. And the internet is full of his fans, happy to make meat out of it and they all know that Hans’ hair works as an antenna. And they know it with certainty.

Jacob Aagaard

[CornfedForever]

Thanks Graham - we needed that. And I hope everyone heard Han's post game comments today.

[lkaufman]

Paranoia and insanity – by Jacob Aagaard
News
hans
calrsen

JacobAagaard
Trainer

1
10h
I believe a lot of you will have seen the crazy events in St Louis over the last 48 hours. I felt an obligation to share facts and thoughts with you, and then allow you to make up your own mind.

The background is that Magnus Carlsen lost a not-too spectacular game against Hans Niemann on Sunday. Magnus is the GOAT, Hans is 19 and rated just under 2700. With the win, he passed the mark for the first time.

Monday Magnus did not show up to the game and released a tweet with a Mourinho comment of “if I say what I want to say, I will be in big trouble – and I don’t want to be in big trouble.” Quickly the team of internet detectives combined this and increased anti-cheating

First of all, my personal relationship with Hans Niemann: I met him at a camp in St Louis in 2019. He was about 2450 and clearly a socially awkward character that had a feeling that all eyes were on him all the time. But he was smart, funny, and likeable. It was a good camp and we had some laughs. At the time he was talking about quitting chess a lot, but it was clear that the issue was he cared so much and had not found a mental position that worked for him.

We were sort of in contact on and off over the next two years. He was 2500 18 months ago and playing all the time. His attitude had changed. Instead of being scared of admitting that he wanted to be great, he now gave it his all. Traveling from event to event. Playing good games, bad games. Uncompromising. His rating increased a lot over the summer. Over 100 points. He reached 2630 or so by the autumn when he came to visit in Glasgow. At that time, he had also joined our academy, although I doubt he ever got around to using it much (and did not renew in 2022).

Our training session was a week. It was meant to be a camp, but no one else could make it. Hans was difficult to train. I tried to do calculation and endgame training with him (he had requested endgame training). At first, I showed exercises from recent games (last 18 months) that I really liked. He knew them ALL. I was astonished by his memory. I was astonished by his intuition. Both were off the charts for what I have seen training Shankland, Gelfand, and other 2600+ and a few 2700s.

There were obvious big holes in his chess, but to be honest, I see big holes in the game of Giri, Aronian, Mamedyarov, Firouzja, and other top players. When I get a 2650 student, I usually try to find out what part of their game is at a much lower level. There is always some area of chess where they are just blank. Maybe they cannot really visualise. They don’t know how to make simple decisions. They cannot calculate a line till the end. All three examples of real 2650 players I have worked with.

Hans’s confidence in his own intuition and his surprise when it was wrong was a recurring theme of the week he was here. Another was that whenever I came to his room, he was looking at chess. Playing through ALL games from all tournaments on Follow chess.

I have seen nothing out of the ordinary in the last two days. Hans playing reasonably well against opponents that are not playing that well. His big confidence. His awkwardness in front of the camera. His highly intuitive way of thinking. His lack of accuracy in variations. Him blundering when suggesting things, he thinks he might have looked at.

I also did not see anything out of the ordinary from Carlsen. Entitlement. Lack of responsibility. Lack of accountability. A Norwegian troll army ready to defame a man who only 400 days ago was a minor. Carlsen has acted badly in many situations after losing in the past. In that way, he reminds me of Federer, who was a badly behaved teenager. Become the best player in the world and behaved excellently. Then started losing to Djokovic and needed a period to adjust to reality.

People say that Carlsen does not behave badly when he is losing in his Meltwater Tour to Praggnanandhaa. It is partly because it is like Federer losing a set. It is partly because Praggnanandhaa is deferential to Magnus. Hans is not. Hans wants to kill the king. Wants to take the throne. He has no remorse over this at all.

Some people on Twitter is saying that Nakamura and Nepomniachtchi are backing up these accusations of cheating. I watched the Nakamura YouTube video and found it to be ridiculous, but also void of an actual accusation of cheating. When Nakamura is saying that no 2700 calculates this poorly, he is flat out wrong. I can also show positional mistakes from Nakamura that undermines the credibility of the playing strength of the former no. 2. Mistakes that Hans would simply not believe a GM had made. Because they are his strengths and Nakamura’s weaknesses.

There are many GMs who are suspicious. There are also many GMs who think this is ridiculous. There are also many GMs that are without real skills outside playing chess in exactly one way.

” This guy doesn’t look like cheater doesn’t behave like cheater and doesn’t play like cheater. Altogether this doesn’t provide 100% guarantee but still…” – Alexander Khalifman

“…It was more than impressive.” – Ian Nepomniachtchi

Comments about the preparation for the game with Carlsen were bizarre. Hans gave the reason he anticipated a g3-line. Which for me is already reason enough to check various g3-lines. He showed additional moves he remembered from his preparation. Sure, one of them was a blunder and his memory was inaccurate regarding the actual evaluation. The narrative for this being indications of cheating must include an explanation of how the game reference came in. First, it was that there was no such game. Then it was some other nonsense.

We all know that it is possible to send signals of moves in a highly sophisticated operation. It requires technology. It requires an accomplice. It requires a high level of risk-taking and stupidity. But what it does not offer is a reasonable way for a game reference to be conveyed. This is a sign of preparation.

So far, what we have seen is a case of a young man overperforming and being awkward. Especially, in the situation where he is asked about the game with Firouzja. Trying to point out that he looked and felt awkward in the situation created by Carlsen’s withdrawal.

My main argument is that it always has to be about the moves. The moves were nothing special. The thinking was fully consistent with what I have seen when discussing chess with Hans.

“Magnus behaved like an entitled brat” is at least an equally reasonable theory. This is not new behaviour. Those saying he has never accused anyone of cheating, never withdrawn and never behaved badly (as if this alone would be evidence of anything), are simply underinformed. I don’t want to be a part of a smear against anyone, but to me, it is incredible that all just assume that Carlsen is a good guy. And this after 20 years of seeing how bad a loser can be.

There are people online who say that “Niemann almost definitely cheated” based on just utter rubbish. From those with little knowledge or competence, you will get the greatest certainty. It is called Dunning-Kruger.

Obviously, I do not have certainty that Hans did not cheat. Nor do I have certainty that Carlsen has never cheated. It is reasonably well established that Hans cheated online at some point. This is simply a different thing. Compare it to cheating in Homework Club. There are times when people have cheated on their homework and I ignore it. Because it is not a big thing. It does not make me believe that they will start on advanced Mission Impossible-style careers as advanced cheaters. It is of course possible to do it, but it requires advanced behaviour to beat top tournament security far beyond what we have seen from people cheating, which is usually compression socks and phones in the toilet, to point to a famous case.

What I have seen when people are cheating, is a loss of confidence in themselves and an acceleration in the cheating behaviour. And when accused, they usually get angry and go on the offensive. The innocent are confused and saddened.

In this case, I have not seen moves or behaviour that are out of character for Hans, nor have I seen anything that looks like computer-influence moves. I have not seen behaviour typical of losers.

What I have seen is the nasty side of the Internet and poor behaviour from various individuals, who are totally within my experience of them as human beings. You may disagree with my presumptions of what happened here, but the simplest explanation is often the right one. Magnus could not accept that he could lose to someone he thinks of as “a joke” and came up with a different explanation. And the internet is full of his fans, happy to make meat out of it and they all know that Hans’ hair works as an antenna. And they know it with certainty.

Jacob Aagaard

I found Jacob's above message as well as Hans' interview tonite to be rather compelling. He confessed to cheating 3 years ago on chess.com to raise his rating (not in a money event), expressed regret for it, and denied having cheated in any online or OTB game since then. His explanation of other issues that have been raised was credible. I believe him. Magnus probably knew about the online cheating 3 years ago and so I can also see why he believed that Hans was cheating this time too, but the circumstances were very different. I look forward to many future events by both players, though probably they will never both play in the same event again.

[CornfedForever]

I found Jacob's above message as well as Hans' interview tonite to be rather compelling. He confessed to cheating 3 years ago on chess.com to raise his rating (not in a money event), expressed regret for it, and denied having cheated in any online or OTB game since then. His explanation of other issues that have been raised was credible. I believe him. Magnus probably knew about the online cheating 3 years ago and so I can also see why he believed that Hans was cheating this time too, but the circumstances were very different. I look forward to many future events by both players, though probably they will never both play in the same event again.

+1

To me, it sounds like Magnus needs to elaborate on his withdrawal...or offer a public apology.

That said...

The one thing which baffles me is - after beating Magnus, why did chess.com "close" his account and 'uninvited him' from the Global Chess Championship?
This after Danny Rensch came up to him at the Miami tourney and apparently had a very good conversation....then again with someone (else?) from chess.com just 3 days ago in St. Louis.

So...why and why now? I don't think chess.com even has anything to do with the Sinquefield Cup; so I can't imagine how or if the two could be intertwined. Perhaps I am missing something.

[pepechuy]

Hi to all.

I do not think that Neiman cheated. This is my opinion. I have no more information that the one available to the general public.
And I will not change my opinion unless some strong evidence of cheating is shown (playing some good games is NOT evidence of cheating).

The next paragraphs are speculation on my part.

Perhaps Ken Regan (anti-cheating expert) has already been asked. I do not expect him to go public with any findings (positive or negative). I guess he would inform FIDE and/or the organizers. He analyzes games with engines in a very sophisticated way, much better than any of us. You can look up his research work on this subject.

Also, suspecting that an opponent cheated is not a good reason to withdraw from a tournament, I think it is actually counterproductive.
Maybe Carlsen thinks that a member of his team is selling information to the opponents. Or that one of his computers has been hacked. Both of these are better reasons to withdraw.

I have never met Carlsen in person. I have only read several of his interviews.
To me, it is clear that he is extremely proud.
My wild guess: he has already realized that giving up the world championship was a bad decision. He can still change his mind and sign the contract once FIDE sends it to him; BUT, proud as he is, he will not go back now after telling the whole world he was relinquishing the championship.
And he is now in a process of regret: he regrets and keeps regretting that bad decision.
And this regret is affecting his decisions on matters unrelated to the championship.

Ok, too much speculation for today.

Greetings.

[jdart]

I don't know. Carlsen and the St. Louis Chess club are being very quiet about it. I assume they are in the position of having suspicious but they do not have proof and so will not go public. The tournament is going on, with Niemann, which certainly would not happen if the organizers had proof.

[DrCliche]

I found Jacob's above message as well as Hans' interview tonite to be rather compelling. He confessed to cheating 3 years ago on chess.com to raise his rating (not in a money event), expressed regret for it, and denied having cheated in any online or OTB game since then. His explanation of other issues that have been raised was credible. I believe him. Magnus probably knew about the online cheating 3 years ago and so I can also see why he believed that Hans was cheating this time too, but the circumstances were very different. I look forward to many future events by both players, though probably they will never both play in the same event again.

Cheaters almost always claim they didn't cheat. Non-cheaters almost always claim they didn't cheat. No matter what the truth is, we should expect any statement from Niemann to have the same surface-level content: denial. Given that, It probably doesn't make sense to adjust your prior probabilities on the basis of the surface-level content of Niemann's interview today.

It's interesting to note that in his hagiography of Niemann, Aagaard opined that cheaters often get angry and defensive when confronted. Aagaard should have warned Niemann he was going to write that, because that's exactly what Niemann did in his interview today! If you believe that Aagaard has insight into the habits of Niemann, cheaters, or people in general, as it seems you do, it probably makes sense to adjust your prior probabilities on the basis of Hans's angry and defensive denial appearing consistent with behavior that Aagaard has identified as being the hallmark of cheaters.

And please note that I'm not claiming to have any relevant opinions about the drama, just that whatever probability you assigned to the possibility of Niemann cheating before his latest interview, it seems to me that his interview should have driven that probability higher.

I'm also curious whether there's any precedent for the extent to which Niemann wasn't able to competently verbalize even the slightest understanding of positions from his games and prep. (An observation apparently also made by Nakamura.) To my ear, Niemann sounded completely out of his depth, and all the while Ramirez (a 2550) ran circles around him.

Aagaard says it's perfectly normal, but I generally don't expect to be surprised by perfectly normal things, and I've certainly never observed anything like Niemann's Round 3 and 4 interviews before.

[RubiChess]

Thinking about the relationship of interviews and the truth reminds me of this:

Everything is speculation. Niemann is innocent until someone has a proof of cheating. On the other hand: "Wer einmal lügt, dem glaubt man nicht und wenn er auch die Wahrheit spricht". (no idea if there is something equivalent in english).

Regards, Andreas

[Chessqueen]

Thinking about the relationship of interviews and the truth reminds me of this:

Everything is speculation. Niemann is innocent until someone has a proof of cheating. On the other hand: "Wer einmal lügt, dem glaubt man nicht und wenn er auch die Wahrheit spricht". (no idea if there is something equivalent in english).

Regards, Andreas

Anyone who lies once is not believed, even if he speaks the truth. Or once you lie nobody will ever believe you again except Trump followers
But we should believe him since he has never cheated over the Board before.