Friday, December 19, 2008
Wildcard Game #7
Wildcard #7: IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 1-0
Just as last year, we Game of the Week judges seemed to be headed towards a large argument when choosing the final Wildcard for the GOTY contest; hence, to avoid all the turmoil that was clearly going to be inevitable when coming to a consensus on the final game, we decided to use a fairly democratic system for choosing it. One of us would pick nine candidate games to start off, the second would narrow those nine games to three, the last would narrow those three to one, and presto we'd have it! A fairly agreeable system to all of us, and after a random selection, I wound up being in the first spot, Greg the second, and Jonathan the third. My nine choices were (in order of when they were played from earliest to latest)
IM Bryan Smith (PHI) vs IM Eli Vovsha (QNS) 0-1
FM Slava Mikhailuk (SEA) vs FM Peter Bereolos (TEN) 0-1
GM Julio Becerra (MIA) vs GM Pascal Charbonneau (NY) 1-0
FM Todd Andrews (TEN) vs IM Jan Van de Mortel (CHC) 0-1
IM Angelo Young (CHC) vs FM Peter Bereolos (CHC) 1-0
IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 1-0
IM Sam Shankland (SF) vs FM John Bick (TEN) 1-0
GM Larry Christiansen (BOS) vs IM Dmitry Schneider (QNS) 1-0
IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs SM Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (BOS) 1-0
and then Greg narrowed it down to:
GM Julio Becerra (MIA) vs GM Pascal Charbonneau (NY) 1-0
IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 1-0
GM Larry Christiansen (BOS) vs IM Dmitry Schneider (QNS) 1-0
and Jonathan picked:
IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 1-0
and so with that the Game of the Year entrants are set! The twenty games are:
Week 1: GM Alex Shabalov (NY) vs SM Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (BOS) 0-1 Article
Week 2: IM Vinay Bhat (SF) vs IM Emory Tate (CHC) 1-0 Article
Week 3: GM Pascal Charbonneau (NY) vs GM Sergey Kudrin (PHI) 1-0 Article
Week 4: IM Lev Milman (CAR) vs GM Alex Shabalov (NY) 1-0 Article
Week 5: SM Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (BOS) vs IM David Pruess (SF) 1-0 Article
Week 6: IM Alex Lenderman (QNS) vs FM Oleg Zaikov (CAR) 1-0 Article
Week 7: IM Alex Lenderman (QNS) vs IM Dean Ippolito (NJ) 1-0 Article
Week 8: GM Sergey Erenburg (BAL) vs SM Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (BOS) 1-0 Article
Week 9: GM Sergey Kudrin (PHI) vs GM Larry Christiansen (BOS) 1/2-1/2 Article
Week 10: GM Jaan Ehlvest (TEN) vs GM Sergey Erenburg (BAL) 1/2-1/2 Article
Quarterfinals: IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs GM Vinay Bhat (SF) 1-0 Article
Semifinals: FM Oleg Zaikov (CAR) vs SM Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (BOS) 1/2-1/2 Article
Championship: GM Larry Christiansen (BOS) vs IM Marko Zivanic (DAL) 1-0 Article
Wildcard #1: IM Alex Lenderman (QNS) vs IM Emory Tate (CHC) 1-0 Article
Wildcard #2: GM Joel Benjamin (NJ) vs GM Sergey Erenburg (BAL) 0-1 Article
Wildcard #3: GM Patrick Wolff (SF) vs IM Marko Zivanic (DAL) 1/2-1/2 Article
Wildcard #4: IM Dmitry Schneider (QNS) vs GM Eugene Perelshteyn (BOS) 1-0 Article
Wildcard #5: GM Jaan Ehlvest (TEN) vs IM Rogelio Barcenilla (ARZ) 1-0 Article
Wildcard #6: FM Bruci Lopez (MIA) vs GM Gregory Serper (SEA) 1-0 Article
Wildcard #7: IM Davorin Kuljasevic (DAL) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 1-0 Article
And so now everything leading up to the GOTY contest is complete; what's left is to allow our judges the adequate time to make their selections and then reveal those selections to you readers. So keep a close eye on the USCL website as the results will start being released in early January, and this year's Game of the Year winner and the $500 prize that goes with it will be revealed in early February!
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3 comments:
Huh. No one thought of Esserman - I. Schneider from the Finals?
What was wrong with that game? (That's not a rhetorical question, I'd really like to know what the judges felt about it).
It seems Marc got passed over in the awards department after such a great season. No GOTWs, no wildcards, a controversial second for board three All Star (I refer to the dropping of Lenderman to the board 3 prize, because the judges felt he was overshadowed by Kulj on bd. 2), etc.
That's a shame.
-Biased Matt
P.S. I admit I haven't looked at every game, and even if I did, I'm not qualified to judge them. I'm really asking the collective if there were seven other games better than Marc's.
It felt like white was almost strategically winning after 14 moves without doing anything special. Most people felt at that point that Esserman would win pretty easily via multiple methods, and while it was a relatively nice attack, it wasn't as attractive as some other games. The arc of the game sort of reminds me of Christiansen vs Schneider, which was just on the edge of making the contest in my opinion.
Anyway it would've been a very reasonable choice, and probably was one of my few choices, but I understand why it wasn't chosen.
I have a much simpler and shorter explanation, Marc got shafted( again).
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