Is Magnus Carlsen the GOAT? Of course he is

Magnus Carlsen has just won the World Blitz Championsip. His score in the tournament was 12 wins, just 1 loss and 8 draws.

He now has 5 World Rapid Champion titles (2014, 2015, 2019, 2022, 2023) and 7 World Blitz Champion titles (2009, 2014, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2022, 2023).

He's certainly the best in these short formats since they've been played regularly. Hard to say whether he's the best ever as these short formats didn't have a world championship prior to 2006.

As for real chess, that's a more complex question. Peak Kasparov and peak Fischer would be in that discussion.

I think he’s the best ever. Every year there’s some new chess prodigy that you think will overtake Carlsen — Firouzja, Abdusattarov, but it soon fizzels out.

Objectively there is not much doubt anymore, currently there more strong chess players than ever before and Carlsen is completely dominating. Classical chess, fast time controls, rating list, OTB, online everything. Simply the GOAT.

@ClayAndSilence said in #2:
> He's certainly the best in these short formats since they've been played regularly. Hard to say whether he's the best ever as these short formats didn't have a world championship prior to 2006.
>
> As for real chess, that's a more complex question. Peak Kasparov and peak Fischer would be in that discussion.
If Carlsen had 100 titles, ppl still mention bloody Fischer! Sorry that im angry, but Fischer are waaay out of this discussion! Objectively Kasparov was the goat, he was the only one.
When ppl mention Fischer, Tal and compares this context to Carlsen, they are completely blind!
Carlsen are the goat with a milestone because of the total of achievments, and not only because of 5 times world champion in classical...he will be the goat for maby the next 50 or 100 yrs.
Carlsen are only 33 yrs, and maby he will retire when he is 45...imagine the achievments then.
And objectively, when Carlsen beated Nepo for the titlematch, in my opinion, that was the moment he surpassed Kasparov to be the goat.
But if you want to be unserious when you mention Fischer into this context, i will be unserious too, then i mean Lasker is the goat. Lasker were world champion for 27 yrs. You see how stupid this is?

@Devil_fish said in #5:

> But if you want to be unserious when you mention Fischer into this context, i will be unserious too, then i mean Lasker is the goat. Lasker were world champion for 27 yrs. You see how stupid this is?

Relax friend. :) I only said Fischer should be in the conversation. At his peak, he was a mile ahead of all his peers, in a very strong era for chess. I personally don't think he's the best ever. Like you, I think peak Kasparov is the greatest of all time.

When Kasparov was at his peak, he was wiping the floor with everyone. If you study his games, it's frightening the way he just steamrollers great players. Carlsen doesn't generally do that in classic chess - he grinds opponents down in end games, or draws lots of matches and edges people out in tie-breakers. He's still one of the greats, but second to Kasparov in my opinion, but that's all these are - opinions. There is no objective way to measure players across generations.

@ClayAndSilence said in #6:
> Relax friend. :) I only said Fischer should be in the conversation. At his peak, he was a mile ahead of all his peers, in a very strong era for chess. I personally don't think he's the best ever. Like you, I think peak Kasparov is the greatest of all time.
>
> When Kasparov was at his peak, he was wiping the floor with everyone. If you study his games, it's frightening the way he just steamrollers great players. Carlsen doesn't generally do that in classic chess - he grinds opponents down in end games, or draws lots of matches and edges people out in tie-breakers. He's still one of the greats, but second to Kasparov in my opinion, but that's all these are - opinions. There is no objective way to measure players across generations.
No, Fischer shouldnt be in this discussion at all, not into this context. Mention Fischer into this context, is almost to say Kramnik are the goat, that kind of achievments. When that to say, Kramnik are the second strongest chessplayer trough history.
Even Anand are much more goat than Fischer. Fischer had "only" 1 official and 1 unoffical world titles, and retired when he was 28. Enough said.

Nobody ever considered Fischer the greatest simply because he won in 1972.

They considered him as one of the greatest, because of his dominance. He destroyed the competition. His ELO rating was 120 points higher than Spassky, the second closest competitor. At that time, he was around 2785 and Spassky was like 2660. Nobody had ever seen a chess player seperate themselves from the competition to such an incredible degree.

This is the third time you've posted about Carlsen being the best ever. And as explained to you multiple times, it's simply not possible to objectively compare across generations. It's like trying to compare Ronaldo to Pele, or Messi to Maradona, or Jordan to James, or Brady to Montana. All anyone can do is guess. Kasparov, Carlsen, Lasker, Capablanca, and Fisher were all incredible players. All of them deserve to be recognized as the greatest of their generation.

@Grumpymantooth said in #8:
Nobody had ever seen a chess player seperate themselves from the competition to such an incredible degree.

Morphy

If we're counting Fischer where's Capablanca in this discussion lol? Silly.

It's simple: the GOAT's are Magnus and Garry