The Daily Show on US efforts to recruit Caruana

Every negative chess cliché you could imagine was packed into a funny but somewhat dismaying 5-minute clip on Jon Stewart’s hugely popular The Daily Show – chess players as nerds, chess as boring, chess as only “kind of” a sport and, of course, there was a chessboard with the king and queen set up wrongly! But why the sudden attention? It’s all about the switch of Wesley So and, potentially, Fabiano Caruana, to the US Chess Federation. We look at the details, including the revelation that Azerbaijan also tried to land Caruana.

Jon Stewart introduces a segment on the US recruiting chess players, or as he puts it, "nerds, nerd mercenaries, nerdcenaries" 

“The United States is buying up nerds”

First, the video. The segment with Jon Stewart and “Senior International Correspondent Mr. Trevor Noah” didn’t really do a lot for the image of chess:

When Deep Blue (“I’m pretty sure the parts came from China”) and Bobby Fischer (“but that was 40 years ago”) were mentioned as examples of native US chess talent, Hikaru Nakamura had every right to feel offended. It might interfere with the joke, but the fact that the US has the current world no. 3 merits a mention!

So why the sudden focus on chess? Well, the Daily Show producers had picked up on an article by Dylan Loeb McClain in the New York Times: Your Move, Grandmaster. (To the U.S., Please.)

The recent switch of Wesley So to the US has already made the US team formidable, but add in another of the world’s very best players, US-born Fabiano Caruana, and they suddenly become very realistic winners of the 2016 Olympiad in Baku. McClain talks up the overtures Rex Sinquefield is known to have made to Caruana, who currently represents Italy:

The most important contribution to remaking the team may be an endeavor that has the whiff of a Cold War-era plot: a private overture to a top foreign grandmaster, tens of thousands of dollars in payments to secure his eligibility, and a rich American benefactor intent on overtaking the Russians and the Chinese in the game he loves. Similar campaigns to obtain the national allegiance of top prospects are not uncommon in the Olympic movement and international soccer, but they are virtually unprecedented in the more cerebral world of top-level chess.

Let’s take the players one by one. First, the Philippine prodigy:

Wesley So

McClain describes Wesley So's switch to the US as an “unexpected boon”, and it’s hard to argue with that assessment. So, whose parents live in Canada and who was studying at Webster University in St. Louis, made the decision to switch federation on his own last summer, complaining of a lack of prospects:

In the Philippines, there is no serious training system. There are also very few strong tournaments in Asia. Besides, I am required to fly back from the U.S. during my school year to compete in events such as the South East Asian Games, which seriously conflict with my study at Webster University. I have to live with the fear that if I am unable to play, I may get deprived of financial support.

The Philippine Chess Federation at least initially refused to waive the €50,000 compensation fee they were due for the immediate transfer of a 2700+ rated player against their wishes, the US Chess Federation didn’t offer to pay and therefore Wesley So was left needing to wait two years and miss big international events like the 2014 Olympiad. According to McClain, that wait came to an end when So won the $100,000 first prize at the Millionaire Chess Challenge in September 2014:

Mr. So said he paid the transfer fee out of his own pocket and immediately became eligible to represent the United States.

This may "only" have been the €5,000 transfer fee and not the ten times higher compensation fee, since Wesley So stated in a press conference this January that the Philippine chess authorities hadn't ultimately demanded that amount.

Not quite $1 million but enough to cover any expenses connected to the transfer | photo: Millionaire Chess

Wesley has since gone from strength to strength, and although abandoning his studies to become a chess professional may have disappointed his mother and university it’s almost unquestionably in both his interests and those of chess (you wonder, for instance, if Le Quang Liem would be near the Top 10 now if he wasn’t drawn into the US education system).

Although McClain notes the US isn’t planning to send a top team to the World Team Championship next month, Wesley is now expected to play at the 2016 Olympiad, where the presence of two Top 10 players in the US team will make them dangerous opponents for any team. Hikaru Nakamura, who was briefly knocked off his US no. 1 spot by So in January, had mixed feelings about the new recruit when he spoke to Peter Doggers:

I have my own personal reservations in that I think on the one hand it's not so good. It's good for competition, it's bad for some of the rising players in America who aren't going to have a chance to get invitations. Some of the players, like the Shanklands or the Robsons, they aren't really going to have opportunities unless they pick up a lot of points.

While Wesley So’s move appears to have been almost exclusively a personal decision, it’s another player who has sparked talk of recruitment:

Fabiano Caruana

For a couple of weeks in autumn 2014 it looked as though we were seeing a seismic shift in the chess world. Magnus Carlsen’s long dominance was suddenly under threat, as he could only look on – and add to the statistics – as Fabiano Caruana went on a 7-game winning streak at the Sinquefield Cup that took him to within touching distance of Carlsen on the rating list. On that form Caruana was arguably the world’s best player, Sky Television in Italy began to broadcast his games live and everyone started to think in terms of a future World Championship match. 

Could Italy or the US learn to love the "magic of chess"?

Or at least learn how to set up the king and queen correctly?

It’s no surprise, then, that offers followed.

Fabiano was born in Miami, grew up in New York, and only switched to play for his mother’s country, Italy, in 2005, after moving to Europe to further his chess career. There would therefore be nothing unnatural about his representing the US, and the New York Times article notes:  

Mr. Caruana said he was approached and offered a large sum to switch federations.

The article heavily implies but doesn’t claim that the money was offered by Rex Sinquefield, but other sources have been less coy about the details – and note an offer didn’t only arrive from the US.

The Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera quotes Italian Chess Federation spokesman Adolivio Capece:

The Americans offered him €100,000 a year, Azerbaijan even €400,000. I’d like him to earn that much with chess, but clearly those proposals didn’t come to fruition, since in January Caruana once again signed a contract for €80,000 a year with the Italian Chess Federation and will remain with us until December.    

Stefano Bellincampi gives a slightly different account for the Italian chess website, Schacchierando.it:

Fabiano did actually receive two offers to change allegiance, one from Sinquefield and the other from the Azeris of SOCAR. According to leaked details the American offer arrived at the end of the supertournament in St. Louis and included a six-year contract at €200,000 a year, while the Azeris offered €400,000 for 2015.

The bid from Azerbaijan would presumably have been aimed at boosting that country’s chances in the 2016 Olympiad, which they host in Baku. Their team was severely hit by the tragic death of Vugar Gashimov, leaving Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Teimour Radjabov as their only World Class players. It may be worth noting that state oil company SOCAR was also thwarted when Caruana changed clubs to play for an Italian side in the European Club Cup that followed the Sinquefield Cup. 

Caruana (who beat Mamedyarov) and Nakamura (who lost to Topalov) played together for Obiettivo Risarcimento, but SOCAR won this match and the tournament | photo: Manu de Alba

Mair Mamedov, the CEO of SOCAR Georgia, stated:

Unfortunately our line-up doesn’t include Fabiano Caruana. He’s an extremely strong player who has worked on his game tirelessly together with a brilliant coach. In recent years he has, of course, made an enormous leap and moved to a completely new level. It was nice that he played in our team and I hope that we can keep cooperating with him in future. 

So whatever the precise details we can conclude that Fabiano was made some very tough offers to refuse, but did refuse them… at least until he has another decision to make in December 2015. The Italian Chess Federation have stated that although they of course want Fabiano to stay they wouldn’t stand in his way if he did choose to leave.

Here’s how Caruana himself reflected on the situation during an interview with Vlad Tkachiev:

Are you planning to return to the American rating list and play for the US team?

No, I’m not planning that at this moment in time. However, I don’t know what will happen in future. Such an option is always there since I’ve got dual citizenship: American and Italian.

If sometime you become World Champion will you consider yourself the second American Champion or the first Italian?

And why not both at once? I consider myself an American since I was born in the States and grew up there. I’m an Italian since my mother is Italian and my ancestors on my father’s side are also Italian.

An official US Chess Federation recruitment program?

So far the money on offer to Caruana has been from private sources, with Bellincampi pointing out that a reason for Caruana not to accept Sinquefield’s money is that it might suddenly disappear and that it also ties him down to following the tycoon’s wishes. An official program might change that, and Dylan McClain states in the New York Times article:

The United States Chess Federation recently created a player opportunity committee and a charitable fund to help recruit and pay the fees of foreign players interested in moving to the United States.

It’s not clear if Rex Sinquefield could channel his money through that “charity” to land a prize of Caruana’s calibre, or if instead the system is aimed at encouraging some of the strong but lower-rated players in the US college system to switch federations. USCF executive board member Randy Bauer talks about the motivation:

Certainly, if we have a team that wins a gold medal against Russia and China, that will help. The United States loves winners.

Sinquefield, of course, also has every reason to focus on Russia. As the man who bankrolled Garry Kasparov’s bid to become FIDE President he would no doubt dearly love to get the better of Russia, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov’s biggest ally in 2014.

Trevor Noah: "They have more World Champions than any other country."

Jon Stewart: "Who’s their current World Champion?

Trevor: "Well, officially Putin. You all remember that famous photo?"

Jon: "Oh, you know what’s weird? I always thought he was on a real horse. You don’t look because you just see the nipples."

It's unlikely The Daily Show realised how close it came to the truth when it joked:

But here’s my point. America has been trying to get back at Russia for stealing Crimea, warring with the Ukraine, supporting Assad. You’ve tried everything – sanctions, diplomacy, passive-aggressive subtweets. Nothing’s worked! So now you’re trying to take Russia’s place as the world’s chess superpower, because you know that would really hurt them where it hurts – right in the pawns! 

Update:

We asked Fabiano Caruana if he had any comment on the transfer story. He responded:

I have nothing to add except that much of what has been written is speculation. For now, it's best I don't stoke the flames.