Sorry, like leichtlöslich said I confused Surin as a 6D-KGS when he's an EGF 6d (no idea if there's a significant difference). Even if Alex Dinerchtein is not the pro he once was it still might show that weak pro's are beatable by strong amateurs and I don't think Surin is the best amateur in the world.
Again, let make a tournament where the champs of the known Western Go countries play out their world champ and let this guy play against any pro that is not considered "special" in a best of 7 and I bet it won't 0-4, more like 2-4 or 3-4.
But then I am just speculating for fun, maybe I am way off .
Pippen wrote:Again, let make a tournament where the champs of the known Western Go countries play out their world champ and let this guy play against any pro that is not considered "special" in a best of 7 and I bet it won't 0-4, more like 2-4 or 3-4.
I think this is a completely reasonable expectation. The very strongest amateurs are pro strength, if not 9P strength. The Venn diagram does intersect. But just a little. And the strongest amateurs aren't yet in the West. But we ARE getting closer.
- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders
One trick with the Korean professional tournaments that have open qualifiers is that many of the amateur competitors are actually yeonguseng (insei). So often you'll read that an amateur has qualified for the main tournament or upset some big name, only to find out that they've qualified as a professional six months later.
It's still impressive, but it's not much different from "1p qualifies for main tournament" or "1p upsets big name" for our purposes. It's just obvious that the best current professional trainees are going to be about as strong as new professionals. The interesting question is how amateur players who are not currently studying to go pro (or whose studies are somehow "non-traditional") might do.
leichtloeslich wrote:There's also the problem of "inactive pros". Afaik it's hard to lose your 9p rank, which doesn't make sense to me. (You should have to defend it regularly, otherwise it's meaningless as a measure of strength.)
It is because Dan rankings are honorary ones. They are not stating how strong you are, but how strong you were, and maybe still you are.
For strength measurements there are ELO points and other metric systems. Losing Dan ranking is common in amateur's world. In Pro world is very very rare and only occured in Japan when player from different than Tokyo branch were included to the latter.
hyperpape wrote:The interesting question is how amateur players who are not currently studying to go pro (or whose studies are somehow "non-traditional") might do.
The pros that can be beaten by amateurs are mostly those who received their pro rank as a honorary title or who are not actively competing anymore. The amateurs that can beat pros are mostly those who are trying or have tried to become professionals and are still very much involved in high level competitions, amateur, mixed or pro examn. This is where the world of pros touches the world of amateurs. In all other cases, i.e. an active professional against casual amateur, even the best among those amateurs don't stand a chance.
The group of amateurs in Korea and China that can beat pros may be surprisingly large because there is a fierce competition to become pro and the seats are greatly outnumbered by candidates. This makes for a yearly lot of frustrated, hypercompetitive, skilled top amateurs who can beat a freshman pro in 45% of the games. But very soon these amateurs need to find a living and resolve to internet play, where they can meet anyone, while the pros can study 9 to 5 (or more) and have plenty of good competition in professional circumstances. This skewed situation is bound to pay.
In the Western world, the likes of Antti Tormanen started Go too late and in too dire conditions to ever exploit their talent. Sure he has been competitive in Japan, but you can sense from his stories that he would never have made pro. Now that he's returned to Europe, he may be among the strongest here, while he is already losing the strength he built in Asia.
So, how would the best Westerner, active on KGS and playing the odd live tournament, fare against an anonymous pro who is active in competition without reaching the top? Well, with 2 stones, and prize money involved, I'll still bet on the pro. With 1 stone, not a chance.
Knotwilg, I think it is better to speak in rough probabilities. It's clear enough that the best western amateurs can beat ordinary active professionals in even games. But it does seem to be substantially less than 50-50.
Knotwilg wrote: In the Western world, the likes of Antti Tormanen started Go too late and in too dire conditions to ever exploit their talent. Sure he has been competitive in Japan, but you can sense from his stories that he would never have made pro. Now that he's returned to Europe, he may be among the strongest here, while he is already losing the strength he built in Asia.
Unlike players who stayed for a longer time and reached a peak (sometimes surprisingly low) and failed or don't qualified for the exams, Antti had just risen to the second league before he left without figuring out how far he could possibly go (and how much he may still learn while there). That's time limits for you. We would know more, if he had actually taken the exams, I hope he will try and see where he stands.
Pippen wrote:Just today (at KGS: "eurogotv3") D. Surin, a 6dKGS, did beat A.Dinerchtein, a 3p. It emphasizes that the best amateurs are on the same level with average pro's. Only the top pro's might be two full stones stronger. I am a 1d at KGS and I think that I could beat Lee Sedol with HC9, e.g. in 10 serious games I might win at least 1-2 games.
Sorry, I just have to point out the idiocy of this comment again. As others have noted, Surin is only 1 rank lower than Dinerchtein, so that's not unexpected. Dinerchtein is a very weak pro now anyways - he was never "good" and has fallen off over the years.
And if you were to play Lee Sedol at 9 stones handicap, I would bet on LSD 100 out of 100 times.
Now, the issue I see with this thread is that there's too much of a focus on American and European players. The gap in those regions between amateurs and pros are far larger than those of Asian countries; in places like Korea and China, there will be a decent overlapping of top amateurs and weak pros.
hyperpape wrote:Knotwilg, I think it is better to speak in rough probabilities. It's clear enough that the best western amateurs can beat ordinary active professionals in even games. But it does seem to be substantially less than 50-50.
I think this is getting to the crux of the matter, and I also think TMark's comparison to golf was quite an apt one. In both go and golf, what makes a pro player a pro player is not necessarily where the peak of their abilities lie, it's where there average abilities lie. In a tournament that has 10-20 amateurs entering, one or two of them will be having all the stars align. With a good night's rest, playing the opening they like, spotting the tesuji that usually they only see in problem books...all these can add up to give the amateur a professional quality game and win. The difference is that the professional will produce a game of that quality 85 out of 100 times and they will do it under a much wider ranger of conditions.
It's the same with just about any profession...Some days senior lawyers may come across a case that could easily be handled by a paralegal, or an IT professional might come across a problem that could be done by a CS sophomore. Being a professional isn't about performing on one day, it's about consistently performing at a high level.
Comparisons with other sports are kinda hard, since the definition of pro in go is a little different. Usually you just need to make money, but in go you need to be able to pass the test and beat out the other contenders. So go pros are all above a certain level 100% of the time(at least all active ones) and that can't be said for pros in other sports, where there is a potential of someone not being that good(relatively speaking) but still being able to get the title of pro.
paK0 wrote:Comparisons with other sports are kinda hard, since the definition of pro in go is a little different. Usually you just need to make money, but in go you need to be able to pass the test and beat out the other contenders. So go pros are all above a certain level 100% of the time(at least all active ones) and that can't be said for pros in other sports, where there is a potential of someone not being that good(relatively speaking) but still being able to get the title of pro.
Actually, golf operates virtually the same way. To becoming a touring pro you must go through a series of tournaments in order to enter a qualifying tournament. By winning in the qualifying tournament you can be a pro and compete on the tour. You will only remain a pro as long a you remain in the top 125 on the money list. One could argue the ability to lose pro status makes golf more competitive than go.
As I said before, professionals cover a fairly wide range of strength and it is clear to me that there is a class of amateur players whose members can perform consistently at a professional level, certainly competitve with 1p players and possibly with somewhat higher ranked pros. Some members of the class I mentioned could be winners of the WAGC and winners of the major country-wide amateur championships in Japan, China, and Korea. Granted there are not many such amateur players but there may be more of them than active 1p pros. It makes sense to me that go playing strength follows some distribution with a long right-hand tail and the pro players would mostly be in the far right-hand tail of the distribution but there wouldn't be an empty gap between the pros and the rest of the go-playing population.
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