I am not impressed with his KID suggestions contrary to TopNotch with whom i disagree also about the 7...Nbd7 line (i'll make a thread at the KID section about this). Also, i compared Ziegler's analysis with his Benoni coverage and although at present i like White (which means that i agree with Kaufman and disagree with Ziegler) i think that studying Ziegler's coverage of that Bf4 line will do more good for a WHite player than study Kaufman's artificial coverage. But i was impressed by his choice against the Blumenfeld. I have to check it more deeply but it seems that his recommendation is quite strong.

His choice to pair 1.e4 e5 as Black leading to the Breyer with the Grünfeld also surprised me. Still after some thought it makes sense to me if you read some of his white recommendations for the 1.d4 repertoire.

Let's check a couple of alternatives:
1. Semi-Slav: He considerers the Semi-Slav slightly problematic because of 5.Bg5 plus move-order issues incl. Slav Exchange. I guess this also puts him off the regular Slav.
2. Nimzo/Queen's Indian/Catalan: he doesn't state this explicitly, but I guess it's hard to get this on 100 pages plus it is difficult to combine with the repertoire vs. 1.Nf3 and 1.c4. In addition it's hard to find something in the Catalan at all where you can claim black preserves some winning chances.
3. King's Indian: He quite frankly states that he thinks it is a not completely sound opening. Of course that's debatable.
4. Queen's Gambit Declined: I think this is just too 'unsexy' to present plus you have the Catalan issue and general lack of winning chances. Sure, you could argue here (I play this myself as black, so dont accuse me  ).
 
In general he has the problem of showing a repertoire for Black and White, so there is bound to be a point where both sides meet, so to say. Here it is the Russian Variation of the Grünfeld, where he basically slighty prefers white but states that the position is sufficiently unbalanced to offer black chances as well. I think the Grünfeld is maybe the best opening to come up with such an overlap. For instance if he would have choosen the QGD Lasker or black side if the Catalan the end of the variation is either a stale complete draw or some pull for white, but never any 'imbalances'.

Antillian wrote on 02/07/12 at 19:41:06:


Yes, I think it's at least disingenuous; some would say it borders on deceptive practice given that it's referring to a completely different repertoire book written eight years ago. NIC aren't exactly making that distinction clear. But one has to admit, it's a marketing coup to emblazon that quote everywhere, given the amount of respect accorded to Watson in the chess community. 

Wonder if Gambit Publications is a tad annoyed...

JEH wrote on 02/07/12 at 17:07:48:

It may be artificial, but I think it's a real concern for many club players. That may well make them misguided - as I said, strong players tend to be less concerned about such things - but I don't quite see how it makes them lazy. Surely a lazy player would prefer low-theory lines, whether consistent or not? Anyway I suspect that a lot of people who liked The Chess Advantage will hesitate to buy this one, because they regard half of the recommended black repertoire as being alien to what they (no doubt wrongly) think of as their "style". 

But I agree that that would be their loss. Rather to my surprise, I'm finding that I quite like the Grunfeld!

Paddy wrote on 02/07/12 at 18:17:11:


Similarly there used to be several leading GM's who championed the Caro-Kann and the Semi-Slav as Black. 

On a lighter note, does anyone else see some mischievous humour in the John Watson quote being featured on the New In Chess website shown below...considering that John Watson is  about to release a repertoire book from Gambit Publications based on 1. d4 2. c4.!!

http://www.gambitbooks.com/books/strategic.html

Note  also that John Watson's quote is actually about the predecessor book "The Chess Advantage in Black and White" and not the new Kaufman book. It is actually a bit funny when you put all of that together. 

JEH wrote on 02/07/12 at 17:07:48:


The "lack of consistency" clearly does not bother the GMs who defend with 1 e4 e5 and the Gruenfeld, including (off the top of my head) Peter Svidler, top authors Boris Avrukh and Alexander Delchev, and CPub's own Victor Mikhalevski.

Straggler wrote on 01/28/12 at 00:15:02:


This is a valid concern for building a repertoire. In my opinion suggesting the Breyer goes well with the KID and not the Gruenfeld. The concept would be the strong point on e5.