The Reign of Ke Jie

[bugcat]

As someone who's spent time following pro chess, I don't think it's good to be too focused on rating. Does it really matter so much whether Ke Jie is ten GR points ahead of PJW or ten behind? The fact is that Ke Jie is the player who's been incorporating the AlphaGo style into his own and winning with it, Ke Jie that's putting himself at the forefront of human Go theory more than anyone else. PJW might become GR #1 but he can't become as interesting as Ke Jie, and I don't have much doubt that (in good form) Ke Jie's the stronger player. But it'll be interesting to see what happens if they meet in the Nongshim Cup.

[WindCaliber]

I don't think it's good or bad, ratings are just fun to follow (IMO). Obviously, if people take it to the extreme and/or are obsessive about it, then it's not good.

This is all just in good fun. Personally, I'm hoping Ke Jie figures out how he can successfully incorporate AlphaGo's ideas to become even stronger. Right now, it seems he hasn't hit the sweet spot yet.

[pookpooi]

Not only us, Sina also write a report on this as well. At that time of writing the gap between them is 10 elo and Sina label it as 'smallest gap value in their history'. Now the gap is only 2 elo, I bet Sina is going crazy right now. But they're not gonna write a new report yet, they're waiting for today's result first.

[jeromie]

Ke Jie's "slump" right now reminds me of Tiger Woods retooling his golf swing when he was already the clear number one in the world. It looks like he is trying to incorporate many of the ideas from AlphaGo's style into his own game, and it's caused a momentary dip in his tournament success. If all goes well, though, he'll come out stronger in the end.

I think it's a good lesson for those of us who are reluctant to make changes in our game that we know are necessary for improvement but will lead to taking a few losses before we can adapt to the new style. Ke Jie has a lot more on the line than an amateur player, but he's still striving to improve his game instead of resting on a style that has worked for him so far. Ke is not unique in this regard, of course: I think it is a common trait among those who really seek to push the boundaries of what they are capable. (Kitani comes to mind as a prime example.)

[Uberdude]

jeromie, a reasonable point about having a possibly temporary dip in performance as you incorporate new ideas, but with Ke Jie it's not so simple. I've not replayed all his games to double-check, but iirc he started doing AlphaGo-style early 3-3s and so on straight after the Wuzhen AlphaGo match and had great results with that 22-win streak in June/July. It's just the last month he has had bad results. So incorporating these new ideas initially had good results, but now bad. So I suggest a few explanations:
- He is going even more extreme AlphaGo style recently and can't yet make that successful, whereas a milder AlphaGo style he could use well.
- His AlphaGo-ness is similar, but his opponents are figuring out better how to counter it
- He is just having a patch of bad form

[tartaric]

Wow just saw that Park was only 2 points behind Ke On the other hand, Iyama Yuta is on fire and could also steal the place relatively soon.

But in the next 2 years, the real threat will probably be the younger one of the top 5 Shin Jinseo

[xiayun]

Ke Jie was ahead throughout the game against Jiang Weijie today, but went for the kill in the midgame and failed and ended up losing the game. Park Junghwan, on the other hand, was trailing Fan Yunruo early (by Sina's commentaries), but came back to win. So we will indeed have a new No. 1 tomorrow.

[Uberdude]

I'm surprised Park made that 4-4 plus 2 large knight's enclosure, which I thought was a textbook dubious shape as the 3-3 is not secure. I know textbooks are being rewritten recently, but that reason still seems valid and sure enough Fan soon invaded 3-3.

[pookpooi]

Clean win against Park Junghwan, hope this will make him back on track to his reign.

[macelee]

This game is from one of those blah blah mind game tournaments - there are several of them which are designed to confused even the most experienced Go fans like myself. This one appears to be the so-called IMSA Elite Mind Games.

Any way, by beating the direct competitor, Ke Jie will probably get his No. 1 position on goratings back.

<Admin>
I made a new thread for the Imsa event, with moved posts detailing the tournament format.
</Admin>

[pookpooi]

Today Jiang Mingjiu should not be the problem to Ke Jie. Oh, and congrats for being back to no.1 again

[pookpooi]

Just as expected Ke Jie won breezily, and also as expected, Sina report Ke Jie's top ranking, with one comment jokes that there would be less than half news reports if ranking didn't exist.

[Elom]

Is he referring to Chinese rankings?

[pookpooi]

Is he referring to Chinese rankings?

It's goratings http://sports.sina.com.cn/go/2017-12-11 ... 3588.shtml

[Elom]

Is he referring to Chinese rankings?

It's goratings http://sports.sina.com.cn/go/2017-12-11 ... 3588.shtml

Thanks!