User Profile: Phony Benoni

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Phony Benoni
Member since Feb-10-06 · Last seen Jun-11-22

Greetings, O Seeker After Knowledge! You have arrived in Dearborn, Michigan (whether you like it or not), and are reading words of wisdom from a player rated 2938--plus or minus 1000 points.
However, I've retired from serious play--not that I ever took playing chess all that seriously. You only have to look at my games to see that. These days I pursue the simple pleasures of finding games that are bizarre or just plain funny. I'd rather enjoy a game than analyze it.
For the record, my name is David Moody. This probably means nothing to you unless you're a longtime player from Michigan, though it's possible that if you attended any US Opens from 1975-1999 we might have crossed paths. Lucky you.
If you know me at all, you'll realize that most of my remarks are meant to be humorous. I do this deliberately, so that if my analysis stinks to High Heaven I can always say that I was just joking.
As you can undoubtedly tell from my sparkling wit, I'm a librarian in my spare time. Even worse, I'm a cataloger, which means I keep log books for cattle. Also, I'm not one of those extroverts who sit at the Reference Desk and help you with research. Instead, I spend all day staring at a computer screen updating and maintaining information in the library's catalog. The general public thinks Reference Librarians are dull. Reference Librarians think Catalogers are dull.
My greatest achievement in chess, other than tricking you into reading this, was probably mating with king, bishop and knight against king in a tournament game. I have to admit that this happened after an adjournment, and that I booked up like crazy before resuming. By the way, the fact I have had adjourned games shows you I've been around too long.
My funniest moment occurred when I finally got a chance to pull off a smothered mate in actual play. You know, 1.Nf7+ Kg8 2.Nh6+ Kh8 3.Qg8+ Rxg8 4.Nf7#. When I played the climactic queen check my opponent looked at the board in shocked disbelief and said, "But that's not mate! I can take the queen!"

Finally, I must confess that I once played a positional move, back around 1982. I'll try not to let that happen again.

>> Click here to see Phony Benoni's game collections.

   Phony Benoni has kibitzed 18634 times to chessgames [more...]

   Jun-11-22 M Blau vs Keres, 1959

Phony Benoni: Not a good recommendation for the DERLD. Out of 59 moves, White makes only three in Black's half of the board. And two of those conist of 3.Bb5 and 6.Bxc6.

   Jun-11-22 chessgames.com chessforum

Phony Benoni: Er, it's back. Karpov vs Timman, 1988

   Jun-10-22 Orlo Milo Rolo

Phony Benoni: Marco!

   Jun-10-22 Lilienthal vs Bondarevsky, 1947

Phony Benoni: Another one for you King Hunters. Black's monarch travels fron g8 to b8, then takes the Great Circle Route back to h3 before calling it a day.

   Jun-10-22 GrahamClayton chessforum

Phony Benoni: <GrahamClayton> I've posted a question for you at L T Magee vs J Holland, 1948

   Jun-10-22 L T Magee vs E L Holland, 1948

Phony Benoni: <GrahamClayton> The source you cite, <Chess Review, May 1948, p. 24>, gives Black's name as <E Holland> "Chess Life" (June 5, 1948, p. 1) has a table of results giving <E L Holland>. That form also appears in USCF rating supplements for a player fro ...

   Jun-09-22 Biographer Bistro

Phony Benoni: SkinnVer Here Among the Fold?

   Jun-09-22 Flohr vs Bondarevsky, 1947

Phony Benoni: Black's bishop makes me think of Godzilla emerging from the depths of the ocean to wreak havoc. However, in the end it's his Two Little Friends who steal the show. Well, maybe not so litt.

   Jun-06-22 W Ritson-Morry vs G T Crown, 1947

Phony Benoni: it was the last round. Rison-Morry was mired in last place. These things happen.

   Jun-06-22 W Adams vs M Kagan, 1947

Phony Benoni: Some more informztion. The game was published in <Chess Review>, March 1948, p. 23. Black's name is given as "M Kagan", and the location as "Massachusetts". There is no other game data, but I think we can now safely assume Black is <Milton Kagan>. Earlier in the ...

indicates a reply to the comment.

Living in the Past

< Earlier Kibitzing · PAGE 266 OF 914 · Later Kibitzing>
Sep-02-11		Phony Benoni: <perfidious> Shows how hard it is.

Sep-02-11		perfidious: <Phony Benoni> That '99 MVP vote was a measure of how difficult it is, given the obvious bias of some voters, and I agree-Verlander has a Sisyphean task, if Martinez couldn't quite manage in what's likely one of the all-time great seasons by any pitcher, given the context. His stats, relative to the league, were straight out of a freak show and up there with the likes of Grove in 1931 or Walter Johnson in 1913. Even in that 1988 season to which you allude, there was no-one special in the NL and Hershiser probably should have won.....maybe if he'd pitched 90 straight scoreless innings instead....

Sep-02-11		Jim Bartle: Four great seasons: 1978: Rice over Guidry. 1986: Clemens over Mattingly. Virtually the same situation, hitter picked once, pitcher picked once, Red Sox picked twice, Yankee picked zero times.

Sep-02-11		WannaBe: Yes, after winning 4 in a row, the Dodgers' chance of making the play-offs have gone from 0.3 to 0.4!! "Play-offs?! Play-offs!? You want to talk Play-offs?!" <NO> apologies to Coach Mora. =)

Sep-02-11		perfidious: <Jim> And you remember what James concluded in his article in the '87 Baseball Abstract on that..... Had I voted in those two races, I'd probably have gone with the winners, though it would have been close in my mind also. <WannaBe> Cha-CHING cha-CHING cha-CHING!!!

Sep-02-11		WannaBe: Wow, Texas is putting a world of hurt on Boston...

Sep-02-11		Phony Benoni: Justin Verlander goes to 21-5. 7.1 innings, one run, seven hits. Tigers win 8-1 and push the White Sox another game back.

Sep-02-11		perfidious: <Phony Benoni> No way Verlander doesn't win in a unanimous vote.

Sep-02-11		WannaBe: I don't know how many SoCal sports writer are eligible to vote for the MVP this year, but I can assure you, even if there is only one eligible voter, he/she will vote for Weaver.

Sep-02-11		Phony Benoni: <WannaBe> Two writers for each team in the league get votes, hence 28 voters in all.

Sep-03-11		WannaBe: Did anyone enjoy that wild 4th quarter in the TCU-Baylor game?! =)

Sep-03-11		perfidious: <perfidious: <Phony Benoni> No way Verlander doesn't win in a unanimous vote.> The correct word above was 'shouldn't' instead of 'doesn't'-either or both writers from the Anaheim chapter of the land of fruits and nuts could well vote for Weaver. Such an outcome would remind me of this blast from the past: http://www.baseball-reference.com/a... Thank you, Minnesota homer.

Sep-03-11		Phony Benoni: The real question is why the guy from Minnesota didn't vote for Killebrew.

Sep-03-11		perfidious: <Phony Benoni> Very good question indeed. When I saw Paul Blair's name pop up in the thick of the voting, my first assumption was that his 6.7 WAR had to be chiefly from his awesome defensive skills, but not so: he was 4.4 on offence, 2.3 on defence, which is good for someone who had the reputation of being strictly a glove man.

Sep-03-11		OhioChessFan: I think this year, a Boston writer didn't vote for Williams in the Top 10. http://www.baseball-reference.com/a... His excuse was that Williams didn't steal a base. Of course DiMaggio had a grand total of 3. I've never looked at the cybermetrics, but I have always thought Williams was way better than Dimaggio.

Sep-03-11		Phony Benoni: How in the world did Eddie Joost get two first place votes? There were a couple of pitchers in the balloting with better offensive numbers. <OCF> Williams clearly had better basic hitting numbers than DiMaggio. DiMaggio had some handicap from being a right-handed hitter in Yankee Stadium, but he also won votes on fielding and general demeanor. Plus the Yankees usually won, the Red Sox usually lost. And how did Joe Page get 7 first place votes?

Sep-03-11		Phony Benoni: Just ran into an interesting number. During his 56-game hitting streak in 1941, Joe DiMaggio hit .408. During the same period, Ted WIlliams hit .412.

Sep-03-11		Jim Bartle: I'll bet Williams got at least one walk in every game he went hitless over that period.

Sep-04-11		perfidious: <OCF> The Boston writer Dave Egan hated Williams, though it should be noted that The Splinter wasn't the easiest to get on with either. Bill James writes about this joke of an MVP award in one of his books; DiMaggio also got jobbed in the voting, though I don't recall specifics. <Phony Benoni> Don't know whether James ever mentioned Page and his seven firsts in '47, but suspect it's the old thing where Williams may have had the Triple Crown season, but his team finished well out of the race for first, whereas Page pitched for the pennant-winner. It's curious that any Athletics got serious consideration, though this period 1947-49 was the A's swan song in Philadelphia; they managed to finish 78-76 in '52, but didn't see the light of day again till they went to Oakland. As to Williams vs DiMaggio in '41, believe I'd read that somewhere, but of course the hitting streak cemented DiMaggio's MVP.

Sep-04-11		Phony Benoni: <Jim Bartle: I'll bet Williams got at least one walk in every game he went hitless over that period.> I took this as a joke, but had to check it anyway. Of course it wasn't quite true, but I did discover one interesting fact. DiMaggio began his streak on May 15. That same day, Williams began a 23-game hitting streak, which would be the longest of his career. http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/... http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/... Which just enforces JIm's point: since Williams walked so often, he would have fewer chances to extend a hitting streak in any particlar game. In 1941, he walked nearly twice as much as DiMaggio (147 to 76).

Sep-04-11		chancho: Hey Jim, Hope everything's going well for you.

Sep-05-11		Jim Bartle: Gracias, chanchito. Now in Cusco, dealing with distasteful business affairs. But what an incredibly beautiful city. PB: I actually did think Williams would have at least walked in every game over the period of DiMaggio's streak. I guess he missed a few games. By the way (and I apologize if I mentioned this before), though DiMaggio had a reputation as being aloof and uncommunicative, he was extremely nice to me during 45 minutes or so of casual conversation in 1966. Of course it helped that I didn't recognize him; I thought I was just talking to a handsome man in his 50s wearing a sharp gray suit.

Sep-06-11		perfidious: <Phony Benoni> Here's a fun stat from BR: http://www.baseball-reference.com/b... Those Braves teams of the 1990s really didn't hit much in the postseason and got shut down because they didn't score nearly enough for the most part. One would have expected rather more than one WS title with all that talent, and it's not as though they got to the Series every year, either. <Jim> When did you recognise DiMaggio, then? Interesting story; I wonder how he'd have reacted, had you discussed baseball with him.

Sep-06-11		OhioChessFan: The biggest problem they had was usually the closer. They had ongoing consistency problems and often lost games late.

Sep-06-11		Jim Bartle: This was at the US Open at the Olympic Country Club in 66, where DiMaggio and I formed the entire gallery for a lesser-known player (Mike Souchak) in a distant corner of the course. We chatted about the golf we were seeing casually (I asked him if he were a friend of Souchak's, because they were talking back and forth at times, he said yes), following the twosome for about three holes. Then we came back into sort of a hub with several tees and greens together, and lots of people. All sorts of people started running up for autographs, I figured it out, and just sort of said bye, and went on my way. If I'd asked him about baseball, I'm sure the conversations would have ended immediately. He probably wouldn't have been friendly at all if I'd treated him like Joe DiMaggio, even not talking baseball.

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