re: Is Chess a Sport?

He was the best player in the world, pretty much indisputably. Someone like Lasker, Capablance, or Alekhine were at least playing the strongest players of their day. Though there still was much lacking for the organization. There was just so little organization. He never played Staunton who was supposed to be the European Champion that he needed to beat. But he dominated all of the other great European players of the day. He was just on another level.

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His main competition, Anderssen, was a great player

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The game was just so undeveloped at the time. He was great for the context of the time. You could say that is kind of the nature of chess. It's something that is always building upward and understanding is growing with each generation, but people just didn't take it seriously at the time. People didn't study and train for it like they do today. It was just kind of a hobby that people did in their idle time.