Otake Hideo 9p retires from Pro

[Knotwilg]

Is your problem of seeing sabaki as coping perhaps to do with not appreciating the nuances in English? Unlike, say, manage or sort out, for us it has a strong connotation of dealing (effectively, of course) with a difficult or stressful situation. The effective response therefore implicitly has connotations of skilfulness or expediency or compromise or partial sacrifice- not just a simple pay-attention kind of response. In other words sabaku = cope.

Maybe but I think not. I understand the difference between managing and coping with a situation. The latter assumes some kind of difficulty, while managing can also apply to a lead or an advantage.

In the first game I find a few moves where Black (Rin) does something I would label "skilfully coping with the situation". Game 2 was Otake's - I'll focus on the concept in the 2nd review.

[John Fairbairn]

The 3rd Meijin, Game 1

The first thing to say is that your game record seems faulty. You have omitted moves 127 to 132 in the lower left (193 moves were played), which puts at least one of your or katago's comments into doubt.

The second thing that seems worth commentiing on is the match as a whole, to sett he scene. The following is my summary from the GoGoD files.

This term saw the first application of the new rule that required a playoff if there was a tie for first place in the league. Otake and Kato both ended on 7-1 but it was Otake who became the challenger when he won the playoff by 3.5 points. This set up a repeat of the previous year's chikurin - Otake-Rin - final. This time, however, Otake came back refreshed - and lucky.

On the last occasion Rin was in good form going in to the final, Otake in bad form. Now it was a refreshed Otake who was making the running. But in Game 1 it was if his legs had turned to lead. Rin made a protracted battle of it through missing an opportunity to wrap it up sooner, but the result was never in doubt.

Even in Game 2 Otake allowed Rin to take the lead - almost a decisive lead - but Rin fell into time trouble and let Otake come back from behind after finding a game-confusing ko. Rin told a friend later that this was a loss he truly regretted. Apart from anything else, it allowed Otake to avoid the psychological trauma of his sixth consecutive defeat in Meijin title games. However illogical, there was a feeling that the wheel of fortune had turned.

For whatever reason, Otake found the resources to make Game 3 a conceptual masterpiece that evoked the admiration of other pros. Rin then self-destructed in Game 4 and suddenly faced the situation where he had to win just to stay in the match. To his credit, he showed his old tenacity in Game 5, but there was a feeling that he had not reversed the flow, and Otake duly sealed his victory in the next game, 4-2.

But comments after the match focused on reasons for loss rather than reasons for victory. A common refrain was Rin's tactical mistakes - notably the loss of a large group in Game 4 and misreading a semeai in Game 5. Otake himself said luck was the difference: Game 4 and winning after being outplayed in Game 2.

Third, the comments from the Kido Yearboo:k:

White's [Otake's] magari 40 was dubious. He had available 'a' [H11] in the centre or invasion at 'b' [H3].

The invasion at White 44 was bad, eliciting Black 45. (Later on, once White has pushed through with 92 and 94, it would have been better has this exchange not happened.)

Living with Black 79 to 85 is painful. If Black had played more forcibly with 79 at 'c' [M9], White would have been in trouble.

Were White to start a ko at179 [my 179 - your 173], it would be Black's turn to take, and if White were to lose the ko his eye-shape would be put at risk. White's attempt to capture Black was frightening but unreasonable. Black had too much territory in the lower right and so White resigned.

[John Fairbairn]

Dieter: I see from SL that you are still confused, and the source of the problem, it seems to me, is that you don't understand shinogi.

Shinogi is (emphasis with capitals mine, but taken from a Japanese dictionary): "SETTLING an attacked group WITHOUT LOSS or WITHOUT HARMING your own stones roundabout." Another dictionary gives a similar definition but says LIVES instead of SETTLES.

Shinogishoubu is the Japanese for what we call a one-weak-group strategy, in which you greedily take more territory than the opponent and leave one weak group to fend for itself, gambling that it will LIVE.

Sabaki has nothing directly to do with living. It is tiding over a difficult situation, and in the process you can accept some loss of stones or aji - but you still cope FOR THE TIME BEING. It is an EXPEDIENT. You are juggling, not catching.

[Knotwilg]

I have adapted the game analysis to John's additions

[John Fairbairn]

Otake.jpg (115.22 KiB) Viewed 14874 times

Since my main addition was that the game as shown was not the game as played, I'm not too sure that the adaptation stands. For a start, the real game shows two less empty triangles by Black

The game as given in Kido YB is as above, and is the same as in Go World, where the commentary is essentially by Rin Kaiho, though it does quote Otake once as saying W96 was the fatal mistake. But the longer commentary is interesting for its psychological insights. It says Rin at one point spent 75 minutes on one move because he was worried about taking a risk, which was based on giving White a lot of certain territory. That raises, in my mind, the possibility that Otake was playing the man as much as the board when he made the slow move 40.

I would also add that I have never actually encountered the Otakian aesthetic in Japanese in the same form it is expressed in English (i.e. an obsession with shape). I have seen that term, but the attributes differ. As I mentioned above, Otake used the term "beautiful" in his writing - we have to ask why, but clearly he was searching for something that could not in his view be expressed by katachi. In addition, when he writes about his own style, he likes to talk of rhythm, and again he often uses the English word (rizumu), and what is ugly is when the rhythm is broken. If I were forced to hazard a guess, I'd say he was vainly searching for the Korean word haengma but wanting to add something "beautiful" to it. But if that be close to the truth, I'd be tempted to add that criticism of empty triangles doesn't seem to feature much in Korean commentaries. They seem too utilitarian for that!

And since we are talking aesthetics, it would be nice if the original poster could edit the thread title to remove 9p, and tidy up the English. Motes in the eye, and all that?

[aeb]

The first thing to say is that your game record seems faulty.

Yes. I wonder where this 187-move version came from.

Now that the topic is Otake, earlier this evening I added seven Otake games not found in the usual collections. See https://homepages.cwi.nl/~aeb/go/games/ ... index.html.

Last month I sorted my Honinbo Shuwa games (but have not yet resolved discrepancies between various sources). There are 596 Shuwa games in or near https://homepages.cwi.nl/~aeb/go/games/ ... nbo_Shuwa/.

[Knotwilg]

Game 2 of the 1978 Meijin title, with my own unbiased comments, then amended with KG's insights

I'm of course curious again to know more about how the pros saw the game as being advantageous for Rin and where he lost the lead.
KataGo's evaluation is not so straightforward. Yes, Otake played two corner patterns which by today's standards aren't optimal, giving Rin huge influence to work with and turn into a moyo, giving an estimated lead of W+6

Next, the corner sacrifice/capture brings the game into balance again, where probably KataGo is more confident in reducing the moyo. At that stage, there's a double spike, because of the ponnuki granted but not taken.

Not surprisingly, Otake's reduction of the moyo is not KataGo's and Rin's lead goes up again. When he forges a ko in the upper right, White's up by 6 again. It looks like this is an instance of "lose a ko to win the game" but Rin at some point decides to finish the ko and let Otake live in his moyo, trading it for the corner. KataGo evaluates this as a mistake of about 15 points. Otake then doesn't capitalize as severely as KG sees opportunities, but he brings the upset to a safe victory.

[John Fairbairn]

Abbreviating the Kido YB comments:
B9 is better at F15.
B15 is better at 16.
B39 is maybe better at C9.
W60 : 88 is more severe.
B79: 81 is maybe better.
B95 ends up painful. He had the opportunity to march into 97.
W120: 123 instead would not seem to die.
W130: 142 is more solid.
W194: with 196 instead he would not have lost.

My comment:

giving Rin huge influence to work with and turn into a moyo

Thickness, not influence. There are good practical reasons for maintaining the distinction. E.g. everyone says "Stay away from thickness." I don't see anyone saying "stay away from influence."

Very abbreviated comments from Go Word:
W28-34: moyo strategy is unusual for Rin. Otake may have made him play it for psychological reasons (i.e. he do not play 17 at D8).
B39: much regretted by Otake (and others). W gets to strengthen his moyo.
B41: honte is L6 but B has to attack as W ignored 39.
44-52: standard settling moves.
W60: 88 is more severe.
B75: vital point.
W82: sacrifice. He gets ample compensation in the centre.
B97: as far s he can go.
B91: necessary.
B109: O17 is safer but not enough.
W118: he missed an easy way to live: N17. But several long sequences here missed by both players. Yamabe Toshiro revealed them. (Yamabe noted for excelling in analysing corner positions). But ko is adequate for W.
W130: greedy.
W156: regretted by Rin. He called it the losing move.
B163: the reason Rin regretted 156.
B170: big part of reason for dissolving the ko was that Rin was in time trouble.
B187: the last incident of the game. Careless. Should be 189.
205: careless; loses 2 points.
Overall the game could be split in two. Up to 102 Rin (W) was ahead. Thereafter he went to pieces, taking risks while in time trouble.

[Knotwilg]

Recompiled with John's findings and analyzing those pro comments with KataGo some more.
Seems like the Kido comments are 2 moves out of phase with Go World's and KataGo's.

Anyway, really interesting to compare and see that the pros on many occasions found the same deep variations as KataGo, sometimes there's a pro suggestion unconfirmed or vice versa.

[Knotwilg]

Game 3 of the 1978 Meijin final, analyzed with KataGo

Like in game 2, Otake reverses the game via a ko (actually three kos are involved). It's interesting to see that Rin outperforms Otake in the opening of all three games but Otake stages an upset in game 2 and in game 3 takes command in the middle game. Otake reveals himself as a "ko master" while I find myself sympathizing with Rin's supreme feeling in the opening.

[Knotwilg]

Game 4 in the final is a good example of why the shodan-AI combo can fall short of any meaningful analysis, unless AI is given enough time at every move to find the single path of failure. There are just too many occasions where feeding a game move to KataGo suddenly gives a whole different evaluation than the move candidate had before feeding.

There's a very complicated L&D fight going on at the rights side, which Otake launches in his favor at some point. Why note earlier? What was the defence against it and how did Rin spoil it? I have some suspicions but I'm really at a loss here.

[pajaro]

Otake Hideo is still included in the prelims of some tournaments.

https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/player/htm/ki000008.html

I could understand if he was active in an ongoing tournament. But he had a game in the first prelim of the 47 Kisei, which has just begun. On Jan 6th, he lost to Moro Arisa 2dan (by default?).

Maybe the pairings were already decided before he announced his retirement. Maybe he will actually play until he is out of every tournament.

Just curious.