Common defenses for bad openings

---

'[A bad opening] isn't bad; people just aren't playing it correctly.'

We have a database of OTB tournament results that show how good or bad each opening is; tournaments played by experts and masters who've put money, time and energy into said tournaments. To claim that said players choose to not play bad openings because they can't, 'unlock their full potential' is false.

But, if you still think that you have a secret that makes a bad opening good, prove it. Go to OTB tournaments and show us how poorly we've been playing your opening.

In 99.9% of cases where you think you've discovered a secret strategy, people have heard of it, people have tested it, and people have determined it to be inferior to other options.

---

'[A bad opening] isn't bad. I win a lot with it.'

I've mostly seen this written by people who're lower rated.

Every strategy in every game is good at a casual and/or weak level, therefore, it's not worth mentioning that it's good. If you're not talking about higher level, competitive play, then, 'is this strategy good?' isn't a discussion that's worth having.

You beating casual and/or weak players with bad openings is fine, but it doesn't mean anyhting when talking about higher level, competitive Chess, where players put tons of work into winning, and the difference of opening strength can put one at a decisive disadvantage.

Even if you've had higher-level, competitive success with bad openings, that doesn't evalidate OTB tournament results.

---

'If it's bad, how come [a professional player] won one game with it?'

There is this common misconception that if a strategy has ever won a game, it's competitively viable.

The Grob has won OTB games, that doesn't make it good.

What determines a strategies strength isn't if it won one game one time; it is if it consistently sees high-level, competitive success.

---

'If it's bad, then have Stockfish use it against you, and you'll see that it's the player, not the opening.'

Why would anyone play Stockfish to try and prove you wrong, when statistics have already proved you wrong?

SF is a machine that'd crush any human. Losing to it while playing a better opening than it mean nothing, and one player's result against a machine wouldn't make millions of OTB tournament games irrelevant.

Life isn't a film where the mechanic is all that matters and the tool is irrelevant.

---

Conclusion

If you like a bad opening, play it. You don't have to play good strategies, in any game. But the people who do care about playing good openings shouldn't be mislead by these arguments.

Everything has flaws, and the flaw of bad openings is that they aren't competitively viable. Which is fine; not every strategy in every game has to be good; but if it's bad, don't go in forums and pretend that it isn't bad, because that's misleading.

Bonus

I'll debunk two arguments that aren't the main point of this blog, because why not?

Bonus 1) 'There's no best opening; if there was, everyone would always play it.'

In every game, there is a best strategy. Again, we can look to statistics for help. We can see that against 1. e4, 1. c5 is the best reply.

Just because not everyone plays the Sicilian, doesn't mean that it's not the best. Win-draw-loss rates are what determine a strategies strength, not popularity.

There're plenty of reasons why someone might not play the best opening. For me, I prefer the French and Caro-Kann to the Sicilian. While I am a competitive player, I don't care about winning so much that I'll quit my favourite openings for a higher chance of winning.

Bonus 2) In response to, 'What opening should I play?' 'The opening you should play is the one that suits your style' is one I often see.

While having a style is fine, if you're trying to win, you sometimes have to make sacrifices, which might include playing strategies that don't suit your style.

In every game, there're good and bad strategies. 'What you prefer playing' and 'what gives you the highest chance of winning' are two different things, that aren't related.

You can't have everything: You can't play bad—or inferior—strategies and have the same chance of success as you would have had with a good—or optimal—strategy. If you don't care about optimising winning chances, that's fine. But don't come and claim that, 'it's about style,' when we can look at statistics to see how good each opening is.

Again, I play the Frecnh and CK, both of which are worse than the Sicilian. But I accept and admit that they're worse.

You don't have to play the best openings to have success; they'd just give you a higher chance of success.