How Do You Evaluate a Position?
Most of the times evaluating a position is not that difficult. The position can be familiar as it comes from an opening we know or have analysed, it can be a known theoretically winning endgame, it can be visually clear what is happening and so on.
But what happens when something like this occurs on the board?
How do you evaluate a position like this one? (Taken from the online rapid game Shirov-Grigoryan from 2020.)
I can only assume what the others do, but I don't think it's very different from what I would do, especially as there's little else one can do!
After admitting to yourself that you have absolutely no clue what is happening here, the next step is simply to calculate. That's incredibly difficult too, with many options for both sides on each move. But the point of calculation is to give you one important understanding about the position, unless you have already figured it out. That is the understanding of which side has easier play.
In this position it is undoubtedly Black. His play is simple and it consists of pushing the pawn(s). What White should do is not clear at all.
This understanding of "easiness" is very important because it implies which side should undertake more urgent measures. In this case it's White - if he doesn't do something urgent Black will simply queen his pawn(s), sooner or later.
Once this understanding has been reached, then calculation becomes (a little bit) easier, as White will be seeking moves in the direction of creating something, while Black would seek to calm the position down and push his pawn(s).
This doesn't take away the hard work of "I go here, he goes there" but at least gives some direction. As for the actual evaluation of the position above, the latest version of Stockfish at the time of writing evaluates it at depth 48 to be, surprise, surprise, 0.00.
P.S. Speaking of easiness, this week’s video is about creating a repertoire based on positions that are easy to play. In this case, I’m talking about positions where one side (White) has a pawn majority. I was inspired for the video after revisiting the games of Bobby Fischer in the Ruy Lopez Exchange Variation and this led me to think in the direction of basing one’s openings on these types of positions. You can take a look at the proposed lines here. Perhaps you will be tempted to have these lines either as your main or backup repertoire. Either case, after proper study, hopefully easy times will lie ahead.