Talk:William Lombardy

William Lombardy was a Sports and recreation good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There may be suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
September 5, 2013	Good article nominee	Not listed

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Chess High‑importance

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High	This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale.

old talk

This article mentions that William Lombardy was the only player with a perfect score 11-0. However, see article on Bobby Fisher, section Playing career before 1967 .. last line. That mentions the same thing as well. Not sure which one is correct?

Lombardy did it in the World Junior championship, Fischer did it in the regular US Championship. Bubba73 (talk), 04:54, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Collins section

The stuff about Collins is overblown, the long quote by Collins doesn't belong in bio article on Lombardy and seems straining to prove something. (Perhaps it belongs in the Collins article.) And did Lombardy have any direct conflict with Collins, or just with what others said about him later? (If the latter, then section name "Conflict with Collins" is inappropriate.) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 13:09, 13 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I agree on all points. It's WP:UNDUE here. The stuff about Collins and Fischer is wildly off topic in this article, so I'm going to remove that now. The section still needs more trimming. Quale (talk) 05:01, 14 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I also removed the off-hand game with Collins. Lombardy won the World Junior Championship with a perfect score, and that was the only game score in article??? That game was not significant in Lombardy's career. Quale (talk) 17:17, 14 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Good point. I am currently researching the Lombardy collection to find a game that the majority of chess players consider to be his "best" to place in the article, instead of the game with Collins. Thank you for your help and guidance. It is much appreciated. Sirmouse (talk) 20:06, 14 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I was able to speak to Lombardy directly. He seems to want the Collins game put in. He says it was played under tournament conditions, even though it was in Collins' home. I don't know if there's a way to upload the game to chestempo.com or chessgames.com, or if I should just put it back in the article. Any thoughts?.... Sirmouse (talk) 17:52, 18 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, it is inappropriate for a encyclopedic biography article on Lombardy. (Please see earlier comments.) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 18:12, 18 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

boards in the Olympiad

The boards Lombardy played in on the Olympic teams needs to be checked. Someone seems to have copy and pasted lines of the table, and not updated the link to the individual Olympiad and the team's place. Some of the boards are likely wrong. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 19:14, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the boards do correspond to the individual Olympiad articles. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 19:24, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also, the text says "In 1976, Lombardy lead the U.S. team to a Gold medal at the 22nd Chess Olympiad in Haifa". 22nd Chess Olympiad shows that he was the first reserve. "Lead" usually means that they played board 1. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 19:21, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please refer to: http://www.olimpbase.org/players/p9dxbr3n.html

Thank you for your work. I appreciate it.

Sirmouse Sirmouse

High importance?

I have a slight objection to this article being rated as of high importance. Compare it to Larry Evans, which is rated mid importance. Evans won the US championship five times; Lombardy never did. (Evans won the US Open four times, Lombardy three times - not much different.) Evans played in an Interzonal but finished poorly. Lombardy qualified one time but didn't play, so those are about even. Evans is much more famous as a writer than Lombardy. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 06:06, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps then, Larry Evans should also be rated as high importance, seeing as he helped Fischer with writing "My 60 Memorable Games" and performed very well at the top level for many years.

I can say that Lombardy being World Junior Champion 11-0 (1957 in Toronto), leading the U.S. Student team to gold in the 1960 Student Olympiad (where he beat Spassky in their individual game), and racking up a near-perfect score of 12/13 at 1st Board, should all qualify him for mid-importance only.

However, also winning the individual gold in the 1956 Student Team, winning the individual gold for best performance on his board in the 1970 Men's Olympiad, beating (at least once) almost every single leading grandmaster of his generation, including beating Reshevsky in the last round of Fischer's first U.S. Championship, thus securing 1st place for Fischer and cementing his name in the history books -- not to mention that he also coached Fischer and was his second at the 1972 World Chess Championship, and helped keep Fischer in the match, and also not to mention that he authored nine chess books and created "the Pawns Game" which almost every chess teacher I have known uses (i.e., 8 pawns against 8 pawns) -- all leads to "high importance" for his impact on the chess world, and for his performances at tournaments and one-on-one with the top players in the world. Sirmouse Sirmouse 14:57, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But when Lombardy won the gold medal in 1970, he was playing in the reserve position. I think US players of the era like Benko and Reshevsky are more important, and they are rated High. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 21:45, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree. I believe they, for one reason or another, are all high importance for chess. Certainly I would not put Lombardy at top importance, whereas Reshevsky I would put at top importance. Benko I would put at high importance. It is not just the results, but their impact on chess: literature, influence, variations, analysis, teachings, etc.

I have not read extensively on Reshevsky or Benko so I do not feel it is my place to raise or lower their importance. I believe there are others who are more qualified for that task. As for Lombardy, I have read most of his books and have spoken to him for well over a collective 100 hours, so I have an idea about where he stands as an individual, and hence why I raised him from mid-importance to high-importance.

I do not believe that he being of high importance in the chess community degrades any other chess figure. He is not "top importance", wherein one may conclude that there is no one more important. There can be degrees of import, but certainly Lombardy is not top importance, but he is certainly not mid importance, because of his accomplishments on and off the chess board. That does not mean that others do not deserve to also be placed in this category.

I welcome your thoughts or anyone else's on this matter. Thank you for sharing. It helps build a better wikipedia, I believe.

Sirmouse Sirmouse 22:24, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm thinking of his standing with comparable players of roughly the same era. Many of his successes were on the student team and the junior championship. These are very good, and the Junior championship win is very impressive. However, these are age-limited events. His success at this level did not really continue as an adult. Now I am fully aware that me mostly quit playing high-level chess while still at a young age, almost certainly meaning that he did not reach his potential. But his success as an adult player was quite limited.

For instance, compare him to Arthur Bisguier, also a mid-importance article. Bisguier won the US Junior championship twice, the US Open three times, the US Championship twice, and played in two Interzonals.

Finally, realize that Wikipedia is not just for the US - it is worldwide. If it were a US-only, then Lombardy would be relatively more important. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 03:24, 29 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Other US players of the era that have mid-importance articles but had more success than Lombardy: Robert Byrne and Walter Browne. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 04:16, 29 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Even though Lombardy did not reach his peak, he still beat almost every leading player of his era at least once.

But should his importance in chess be based solely on his performance in chess tournaments as an adult, or should it also encompass his achievements as a coach, chess author, analyst, and one-on-one competitor? This is the question when we define what it means to have import in chess.

I am open to any of your thoughts on any of these achievements. Thank you.

Sirmouse Sirmouse4:36, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Maybe we need to ask for a third opinion at the chess project. But I think that it is hard to make the case that Lombardy is in the same class as Benko & Reshevsky, and is a class above Bobert Byrne, Walter Browne, Larry Evans, & Bisguier (picking some prominent US players from about the same era). Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 05:38, 29 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I used to be troubled by the importance ratings for chess articles, but years ago I decided that worrying about it would drive me crazy and I stopped caring. According to the table on WP:WikiProject Chess/Assessment, the chess project has and 51 top importance articles and 168 high importance articles. Is Lombardy one of the top 219 most important chess pages overall, including non-biographical topics)? Absolutely not. But I think that some of our mid-importance articles should be high importance and that some low importance articles should be mid. Our article importance classification is too heavily weighted toward the bottom. Perhaps high importance is appropriate for Lombardy, but many other articles are classified too low. Quale (talk) 08:06, 29 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We don't want an equal division among the importance categories. In any group there are a few that are the leaders, so there are fewer at the top and more at the bottom. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 17:13, 29 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Quale has a point about some articles being too low on the importance scale. True, Bubba73, there are a "few that are the leaders" "in any group" and there are "fewer at the top and more at the bottom", but should that include those articles that are not top importance (which, as you, I believe, suggest would ascribe an assumed finite number within that group), but are rather mid or high importance? Should there be a finite number of top importance articles?

Certainly saying that an article is of "high importance" does not negate the "top importance" articles, because "top importance" can be defined as being at the very "top" whereas "high importance" may not be as clearly defined in terms of percentages and ratios to other "lesser important" articles. Something to consider.... Sirmouse Sirmouse 02:11, 30 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There is no specific number or percentage for any of the importance categories. But to be helpful, I think the importance scale should try to reflect the importance of the subject and try to be consistent with other articles. For what it is worth, Lombardy is not in the US hall of fame. I'm not saying that he doesn't belong there, but all of the other US players I mentioned are in the US hall of fame. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 02:17, 30 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lombardy refused entry into the U.S. Hall of Fame years ago due to his disenchantment with the handling of the American Chess Foundation.

I see no reason why grandmasters such as Reshevsky and Evans can't be moved up to "high importance".

I can't say much else without reiterating so I'll leave it at that. Sirmouse Sirmouse 07:22, 30 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The Reshevsky article is High importance and Evans is Mid. And that is probably right, considering their international influence. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 18:22, 30 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

He has moved to the Chicago area

I don't have an authoritative source - just Facebook posts I've seen - but Lombardy has recently moved in with a family in one of the Northwest suburbs of Chicago. Krakatoa (talk) 09:25, 1 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Reported death

It has been reported on Twitter that Lombardy has died. See [1]. Needs a reliable source, but that will probably be forthcoming soon. Carcharoth (talk) 22:15, 13 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Coaching Bobby Fischer

I am copying this comment from the Talk page for Bobby Fischer.

To the best of my knowledge, the earliest source for the claim that Lombardy "coached" or "mentored" Fischer when Fischer was very young is Lombardy's 2011 memoir. Other references, such as to Sloan & Aravena, postdate that and are probably simply copied from it. I do not know of any independent corroboration, such as a mention in Brady, or any public statement by Fischer.

I do not think that Lombardy's book is a reliable source for this question. I propose to delete that claim. The section would then be diminished or eliminated. Of course, we have reliable sources for the stories of Lombardy working with Fischer at Portoroz and Reykjavik, and I have no problem with citing these, but it may be appropriate to move that material to the following section, on the 1972 World Championship match. Bruce leverett (talk) 20:47, 1 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sloan & Aravena postdate Lombardy's memoir, but, having read those sections of their book, I can tell you that it is not copied from Lombardy's (which I have also read). In terms of something earlier than Lombardy's memoir, I am not sure about anything directly saying he was Fischer's coach. There have been people who have said it in corroboration after Lombardy's memoir came out, but not before, to my knowledge. Sirmouse (talk) 03:38, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

A record that "still stands today"

We are describing Lombardy's 11-0 score in the World Junior as a "record that 'still stands today'". There are two cited sources; one is the back-cover blurb of Lombardy's self-published autobiography, the other is the Lombardy profile in a website called worldchesschampions.com.

The page from worldchesschampions.com is gone (the whole worldchesschampions.com site times out when one tries to visit it) and I can't find it in the Wayback Machine. So I went looking for a reliable source for the "record", but found nothing. (chessgames.com mentions it, but this could have been copied from Wikipedia.)

One can verify from olimpbase.org that indeed no one has made a perfect score in the World Junior since Lombardy. However, it was 13 rounds for more than 40 years (though it has recently returned to 11 rounds), and besides, it is a much stronger tournament nowadays; Lombardy got the IM title for winning it in 1957, but nowadays the winner is invariably already a GM. So I do not think that we need to put any special emphasis on the "standing record", in the absence of a reliable source to indicate notability. I will remove it. Bruce leverett (talk) 22:55, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]