Final Round Money Math

In the final round of the World Blitz Championships, GM Daniel Naroditsky, one of the most popular chess streamers, had worked his way up the table into contention for the prestigious Knockout phase of the event.

As you can see, his tiebreak is the worst among the 9 pointers, and there are a bunch of elite players on 8.5 points on his tail. Not much breathing space there. So comes the final round and he has to play Wesley So, not exactly someone you can beat on demand. So here's the prize list for the event

. So what we can more or less adduce is the worst case scenario for DN is if he loses, he will finish within the top 15, and take home $7000 (minus taxes), which is a decent payout for a chess event, better than most Open Classical Swisses.

So I was looking forward to seeing DN try to make the KO phase and show what he can do there, since he will finish in the money anyway whichever way the result goes. The big problem for him is, if  he fails to win while the other dudes in the mix were to draw their games to secure 9.5 points,  he will be out of the running since his tiebreak is the worst of the lot. As it transpired, in the final round, Daniel took a 3 move draw against Wesley and finished 9th (ouch), one place shy of the KO qualifiers.

He was just edged out of the elite Day 5 matches because everyone in the top bunch protected their spots with draws to make sure of their 9.5 points with superior tie-breaks and Duda managed to win on demand.

So essentially, with hindsight, had Daniel tried to win and lost, he would have finished 10th, and collected 9 grand. A win would give him extreme bragging rights on 10/13, ahead of the world's best and a minimum of $20000 and a maximum of $90000 (if he goes on to win the whole thing). Quite good odds, right? In Chinese, there is the term 马后炮 (ma hou pao), meaning 'the horse (knight) behind the cannon' - which means it is extremely easy to give advice in hindsight when everything has already happened. Beating Wesley with Black in a clutch game is of course going to be harder than those Titled Tuesday jaunts without all eyes on you. All he needed  if he drew was just one decisive result among the top boards and he would be in the Quarterfinals - otherwise catch a lucky break with his prior opponents winning their matches in the final round to boost his tiebreak heavily. Anyway, he still got to show street cred by tying for 1st in the World Blitz Swiss with the World's best players while collecting $11,000 so there you go.

A parallel incident happened in the recently concluded Caplin Hastings where GM Daniel Gormally playing on top board in the final round, has to decide to try and beat the rising Chinese star Xue Haowen (chasing his final GM norm) with White or not.  A win would make him clear champion as Xue was then the only tournament leader on 6.5/8 then. However, Daniel opted for a draw in move 14 from a position with a slight spatial edge.

Thus, Xue achieved his final GM norm and wins the 2500 pounds first prize with Daniel finishing in a tie for 2nd and collecting 783 pounds. Daniel explained that apart from having only 2 hours of sleep the night before, he had to think of the consequences of a possible loss, taking him out of  decent money chances. It's a hard call for sure for chess professionals. The risks of trying for glory comes with the possibility of ending a great event with a sour aftertaste and going back home skint. Surely not an easy decision to make.

I had a similar situation in the 1996 Cairnhill Open. Long story short, the top seed Dr IM Hsu Li Yang was unexpectedly hit by a surprise early round loss and both FM Mark Ong and I had to keep sprinting on with wins from Rounds 1 to 10 to avoid him catching up. So in the final round with both of us on 9.5/10,  I played Mark with White and we took a quick draw after 5 moves of a Pirc Defence and spent the next 3 hours watching with baited breath while Li Yang (on 9/10)  tried to grind a win out of Lau Keng Boon (former National Champ.. Fortunately for me and Mark, Keng Boon held firm despite being a pawn down, and both Mark and I were joint champs, dividing $2750. Actually, Mark and I were told to return next weekend to contest a playoff for the title but Mark waved it away, saying he doesn't care much about that. But I definitely would have been freaked out, if  we had to contend with Li Yang for the 3 way fight had he won the last round.

So in my case (or Li Yang/Mark), we were already starting our own careers as school teacher/doctor/banker so it really didn't matter that much about the actual standings or being undisputed champion or whatnot.  We celebrated with another Haagen Daz ice cream treat by me and Mark with other chess friends. But for professionals who make a living out of chess, it gets very tricky...to make sure money is in the bag or to go for broke and heck the consequences. Just think about it....in any strong Chess open, a huge number of IMs and GMs finish out of the prize list, and still have to account for airfare and accommodation costs. Not a very nice situation to be in, if you have responsibilities like mortgages or children to feed and educate, or family expenses.