Re: Chess World Championship
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If you know anything about the top players, isn't betting on this stuff almost impossible to lose? The ball doesn't take funny bounces in this game. I see nothing to randomize the outcome. Shouldn't the favorite win just about every single time?
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It's probably closer to that in chess than other championship sports.
But there is still the human factor.
When Fischer played Spassky in 1972 he made a bad error in game 2 that lost the game.
I believe it was in that match that he surprised everyone in a different game by opening with white with his queen's pawn when he had previously ALWAYS been a king's pawn player.
The Karpov-Kasparov match of 1984 is another example.
Karpov has a big lead and is on the verge of winning.
Kasparov battles his way back and closes it to 5 wins to 3 I believe (with about 9-zillion draws) before the chess federation president called it.
Simple things like the format of the match can favor one player over another (just like making hockey higher scoring can be to the benefit of one team more than another).
I don't follow chess at all anymore so I don't know about this particular match.
Just addressing the idea that handicapping this would be as straight-forward as some people might think.
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