Comment by jasonfarnon
8 hours ago
naive question--does " He did this at the key opening and middle-game sections and never burnt through the full buffer of handicap points in the last two games. " imply in retrospect he could have won with a smaller handicap? or was having the rest of that buffer in reserve guiding strategy?
Traditionally, handicaps are usually given in the form of extra stones played on the board. This is a coarser resolution than points, with one extra stone in the opening having a strategic value of about 13 points. So he probably couldn't have won if his handicap were a full stone smaller, but he may have won if it were a few points smaller.