Bad Films Usually Have a Lot of Trees

After humiliating myself in a chess tournament this afternoon (0.5 - 2.5), I flung myself on the couch and turned on the TV. Sunday Night Baseball was on, and while that would normally occupy my attention, I deemed it too intellectual for my fried brain. Instead, the movie "Meatballs", starring Bill Murray, was just starting.

What a mistake.

I watched the entire film, realizing about 15 minutes in that I had seen it a few years ago, and thought it was pretty bad then, but deciding to give it another chance. The only thing that I got out of it is that Bill Murray is a fine actor. And that 1979 has some pretty bad clothing fashion.

Is there a worse film ever made? I didn't laugh, nor did I crack a smile. I sat there stone-faced, wondering how such a load of crap could ever be made. Then, I realized that, there was a worse film, the horrible and tasteless "The Emerald Forest", my pick for the worst film ever.

Both films have a lot of trees in them. Are trees bad?

Bobby Fischer's last days

An interesting article about the disposition of Bobby Fischer's assets and his last days is here. Definitely worth reading.

An Early Thanksgiving Parade...

Thanksgiving is still months away, but that didn't stop these three turkeys from parading across the street and into someone's driveway this morning in Bloomfield, New Jersey, not 50 yards from our house. I stopped the car, and took this picture with my cell phone.

That, in combination with the bobcat I saw from our front window last week, peaks one's interest in urban ecology. Unfortunately, the bobcat disappeared before I could take a picture of it.

Was Jorge Sammour-Hasbun the USCL's rookie of the year?

A few days ago in this blog entry, using the USCL rating system I developed, whether Todd Andrews should have won the USCL's Most Improved Player award. Today, I examine whether Jorge Sammour-Hasbun of the Boston Blitz should have won the Rookie of the Year award.

Sammour-Hasbun had a fantastic year in the USCL. He won six and drew two, without a loss. (Indeed his results in other tournaments have been similarly great; he just repeated as champion of the Dos Hermanas tournament - which was an incredible feat, given the competition he knocked out on the way there.)

But was he really the USCL's rookie of the year? How should that even be defined?

Let's start with the USCL rating system. One measure of whether a player is the rookie of the year is comparing the player's initial assigned rating and the player's rating at the end of the year, on the final 2007 list, and looking for the greatest difference. Remember that initial ratings are assigned by the board on which the player first competed.

Given that criterion, the rookie of the year would be the New York Knights' Irina Zenyuk (also spelled Iryna - I don't know what she prefers). She gained 136 points from her initial rating, while Sammour-Hasbun gained 125. Zenyuk also had an excellent year, with four wins, three draws, and a single loss.

Here are the top five rookies of 2007. They must have played a minimum of three games in 2007 to be included on this list.

1. Irina Zenyuk 2386 (+136, started at 2250, board 4)
2. Jorge Sammour-Hasbun 2575 (+125, started at 2450, board 2)
3. Eric Rodriguez 2370 (+120, started at 2250, board 4)
4. Chris Williams 2363 (+113, started at 2250, board 4)
5. Francisco Guadalupe 2352 (+102, started at 2250, board 4)

What rookie will take the award this year?

Was Todd Andrews the USCL's most improved player?

Todd Andrews won the "Most Improved Player Award" in the United States Chess League last season. Using the USCL rating system I developed, one thing we can check is whether this award was justified.

The easiest measure of this is the greatest difference between the rating on the final 2006 list and the rating on the final 2007 list. We have to set a one criterion, however; the player must have played a minimum of three games in 2007 in order to be eligible for consideration, as well as at least three in 2006 or earlier. (Remember also that the USCL ratings are dependent to some degree on how the player's results contributed to the team's results.)

So, did Todd Andrews have the greatest difference between these two lists? No! That honor goes to Davorin Kuljasevic, who gained 106 points from 2006 to 2007. Andrews gained 101 points in the 2007 season.

Here are the top five most improved players from 2006 to 2007, according to the USCL rating list.

1. Davorin Kuljasevic +106 (2434 to 2540)
2. Todd Andrews +101 (2307 to 2408)
3. Mackensie Molner +74 (2266 to 2339)
4. Jonathan Schroer +55 (2338 to 2393)
5. Marcel Martinez +41 (2345 to 2386)

In an upcoming post, we'll try and figure out the rookie of the year award.

USCL Ratings End of 2005

The USCL Ratings have been calculated for the 2005 season.

As with the 2006 list and the 2007 list, the same conditions apply namely that (1) players must have played in the 2005 season, and (2) players must have played three lifetime USCL games to be published.

Final 2005 USCL Rating List

1	2597	Eugene Perelshteyn
2	2585	Pascal Charbonneau
3	2584	Vinay Bhat
4	2558	Larry Christiansen
5	2552	Alex Stripunsky
6	2552	Alejandro Ramirez
7	2543	Julio Becerra
8	2532	Marcin Kaminsky
9	2527	Vince McCambridge
10	2514	John Donaldson
11	2499	Irina Krush
12	2495	Gregory Braylovsky
13	2481	Magesh Panchanathan
14	2477	Jay Bonin
15	2475	Lev Milman
16	2472	Tegshsuren Enkhbat
17	2445	Peter Vavrak
18	2441	Marcel Martinez
19	2438	Larry Kaufman
20	2427	David Pruess
21	2427	Josh Friedel
22	2423	Norman Rogers
23	2421	Richard Costigan
24	2417	Paul MacIntyre
25	2415	Miguel Espino
26	2411	Dmitry Schneider
27	2405	Dmitry Zilberstein
28	2394	Matthew Bengtson
29	2372	Blas Lugo
30	2369	Elvin Wilson
31	2362	Andrei Zaremba
32	2356	Charles Riordan
33	2348	Carl Boor
34	2344	Katerina Rohonyan
35	2323	Ray Kaufman
36	2320	Tsagaan Battsetseg
37	2302	Matthew Hoekstra
38	2291	Boris Baczynskyj
39	2291	Mark Pinto
40	2288	Jennifer Shahade
41	2287	Bruci Lopez
42	2284	Evan Rosenberg
43	2281	William Kelleher
44	2274	Daniel Fernandez
45	2267	Andy Lee
46	2262	Nicholas Yap
47	2256	Ilya Krasik
48	2255	Andres Suarez
49	2244	John Fernandez
50	2238	Sam Copeland
51	2235	Jose Cabrera
52	2223	Lewis Eisen
53	2203	John Timmel
54	2192	David Pecora
55	2181	Eric Moskow
56	2175	Greg Samsa

USCL Expansion Team Logos

Back in December, I posted a review of all the team names and team logos in the United States Chess League. I gave "incomplete" grades to the Chicago Blaze and the Arizona Scorpions, because their logos had not been released yet. Here's what I said then...

• Arizona "Scorpions" - As I said above, I think there are scorpions in Arizona, and I certainly wouldn't want to encounter one, so this is the most "terrifying" team name. No chess reference, but that's ok. The name rolls off the tongue well. Also, while we'll all be calling them the "Scorps" if they win a lot, we can also call them the "Peons" if they lose. No logo yet. Grade: Incomplete, pending logo.

• Chicago "Blaze" - Again, I said above that there was a fire in Chicago a long time back, so I suppose this gets the nod for being relevant to the city. And, "blaze" also has a connotation of running rampant over your opponents, so that works. However, it sounds too much like "Blitz". You can't have that many Zs in team names and still stay sane. No logo yet. Grade: Incomplete, pending logo.

Well, the logos were recently released -- the Scorpions earlier today, actually. So, what about these new logos?

The Chicago Blaze logo has a nice echo of the famous water tower in Chicago, and dresses them up nicely as rooks. But the shield? Has a heraldic touch, but not all that relevant. What would have been really funny is if it was a chessboard instead, but the squares between rank 6 and 7 didn't line up properly, which mimics the strange street shift to the left about 50 feet that happens when you drive north in Chicago. Okay, maybe that's too obscure. Overall grade (name and logo): B



The Arizona Scorpions logo is over the top. Way over the top. Way too frightening. So totally not for children. The A-claws are clever. That's all good. What's not so good? The tail should curve the other way which would make the tail look like the top of an S; right now it looks like the top of a question mark. And what does the logo designer have against capital Ns? All the other letters are capitalized - why not the N? Still, it is a mean looking logo and a mean name and they complement one another well. Overall grade (name and logo): A-

Next year, for the 2009 season, I'll review the new team names and logos of the USCL.