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Hikaru Nakamura once said that the line between a great chess tournament and a horrible one is paper thin.

You might be asking yourself:

1. Who is Hikaru Nakamura?

2. Why is Mojo talking about him?

3. Aren't chess koans that apply in zenlike ways to the rest of life the exclusive domain of Doc?

Here are your answers: 

1. Hikaru Nakamura is one of the top ten chess players in the world, and maybe the best speed chess player in the world.

2.  I was once (May of 2017) a 900 rated chess bum trying to retool my game to cut down on blunders, get my bishops and knights in better positions and protect against hyper aggressive openings with quick setup so that I wasn't playing from a hole in the middle game losing to nine year olds.  Enter Hikaru.

One of Hikaru's three minute blitz games he played today

When you watch Hikaru, his larger pieces are behind a wall of pawns until about 10 moves into the game and don't move out until they are ordered to do something awesome.  This is the opposite of beginner chess players, who move their light square bishop, their queen and a knight into the middle of the board and work from there.  The problem with that chess theory is that you are buying the bottle with some of your best pieces before you have tasted the wine of who your opponent is, and what his or her plans are.  The general concept that I didn't have to go all in by move five was a revelation for me.  I applied myself to the King's Indian, one of Hikaru's fave forms, pictured above.  The King's Indian is characterized by a bishop secure in a pawn fort capping a kingside castle.  There are usually knights on D2 and F3 forming an interlocking chain.  Playing with this theory bumped my rating 200 something points with much room for improvement.  In the future, I want to move my pawns like Hikaru, with a whole wall oozing forward in tentacled waves like an evil and very hungry sentient blob.  Not quite there yet.

A BUM GETS A TITLE SHOT

The first time I played Doc, June of 2017, he mauled me like Jack Dempsey in a bad mood.

Game 2 of the first series was particularly brutal.  Doc attacked my king and queen at the same time with a knight on move 11, and the game went downhill from there.  

Stop da Fight. Mojo v. Doc June 2017 Game 2 of 5

If you didn't know, Doc is about the twenty thousandth best chess player in the world, while I am about 1.1 to 1.4 millionth best.  The gap between us is not insignificant.  This last week, July 2017,  I had a few good wins, and like all boxers, started running my mouth about how I deserved a title shot and the champ was ducking me.  Doc graciously obliged to a three game series of 10 minute blitz, where each side gets 10 minutes on their clock.

THE FIGHT STARTS JULY 26, 2017:

Before the game, Doc had been talking trash about punishing isolanis, which is a Latin or French term of derision for ineffective or useless pawns as Doc says.  We forted up, traded about half our pieces, and, not content with the verbal lesson on isolanis, Doc lined up four pieces against on my poor little D4 pawn, who was doing his best to prevent kingside invasions.  Observe:

What did the D4 pawn ever do to Doc?

THE CHAMP TAUNTS AND PUTS HIS ARMS DOWN

My two knights didn't stand a chance against such an onslaught, and I didn't want to put my dark square bishop into the mosh pit, because I thought it had the keys to Doc's whole kingdom if some miracle happened and I could get rid of his dark square bishop.  I soon decided that I couldn't catch up with Doc's beat down of my isolani, so I hatched a different plan, I'd take one of my castles out and attack the pawns on A5 and B5 after I lost the knight on C2 in the hopless isolani battle.  

It happened just so.  we traded both sets of knights, my isolani disappeared, and my castle was on C5 ready to fry some pawns.  Doc retaliated by taking my pawn on B2 with his dark square bishop.  I took the pawn on B5, and then this happened:

White to Move

Doc, who was up a pawn, which against him usually means gg, was still thinking about the lesson he taught me about protecting isolanis, or about Chris Sale or something.  He threatened a castle trade, but forgot that his dark square bishop was still stuck on B2 and ripe for hammering.  Just so.  After that, I saw my dark square bishop vision was coming true and gleefully embedded it deep into his fort like a tick, and evicted his king out onto the open firing range of E5 under threat of checkmate.  

Black king is going to E-5

Once Doc's king was evicted from his fort on E-5, I had the option of threatening it with a castle to take the pawns on A5 and H7 at my leisure, and generally harassing the king with a check whenever I wanted.  I was quite willing.  This also meant that the white A2 pawn was the last pawn standing on the queen side, and would promote to queen if I protected it properly.  

Then Doc resigned.  He had to do a project with his wife, that he had forgotten about, and there is nothing less fun in chess than grinding for 30 moves to try to fix a very bad position.  Thus, games two and three of the championship were forfeited as well.  It is well known in chess that wives and the divided priorities they cause are part of the game.  World contender Levon Aronian once said that world champ Magnus Carlson would be unbeatable until he got a girlfriend.

As the new SSI champion, I can say we won't be talking about Bobby Fisher this month.  It will be a steady diet of nutty Youtube grandmasters Ben Finegold and Yasser Seirwan, and of course, my man Hikaru.  I'd like to commend Doc for the excellence and longevity of his nearly twenty year reign as SSI chess champion, but time and circumstance happen to every man.  

All of this is true and its meaning is certain.