Yasser Seirawan tells the story about how for a four-year period or so as he looked after his father's house, his neighbour was none other than the baseball legend Ken Griffey, Jnr. In the morning, as Yaz would set off to work at Inside Chess, there was always a large crowd of autograph hunters just outside his house. Baseball, like most things in America, equates big bucks. It all started in the 1920s when club officials at the New York Yankees chastised the legendary Babe Ruth that his new salary demand was greater than that of the U.S. president. And that's what it's like in America.
Baseball is bigger than anything.
And, much like the Seattle Chess Foundations support for the US Chess Championships, he didn't disappoint. He packed Dutch journalist Gert Ligterink and myself off to Safeco Field for the match up between the Seattle Mariners and the Texas Rangers, where the Mariners top pitchers Freddy Garcia and Kazuhiro Sasaki would be in action. The difficult thing, however, is to decide how and where to attack in the first place, and to build up the offensive without giving the opponent any real counter chances. White now has a chronic dark-square weakness. However, it was always going to be a very tough defence.