2016 CJA Award Entries

Tracking the Chess Journalists of America (CJA) is one of the things I do with this blog to have a few fun, easy posts each year. Chess stories, chess history, chess art -- what's not to like? A couple of months ago I mentioned the 2016 CJA Awards Announcement (May 2016), and some time afterwards the group announced its 2016 CJA Awards : Entries Received.

This year the CJA has assembled the best collection of award nominations that I can remember seeing since I started paying attention in 2003 (or thereabouts). In addition to the usual nominations from the USCF's Chess Life, the megasite Chess.com has started nominating articles published on its own pages. The category 'Best Tournament Report', for example, has 14 entries, including two for the 2016 U.S. Championship.

'Best Chess Blog' gets the usual short shrift and the only entry is identified by a single underscore ('_'). Fortunately, the corresponding link works and it leads to 'Chess Book Reviews', which is on track to win for the Nth time in recent years. As for another of my favorite categories, 'Best Chess Art', I collected all of the entries and created the composite image shown below.

Top row (left to right):-
* 'The Chess Game', Yael Maimon
* 'GM Walter Browne', Scotty Phillips
* 'Going Deep', Frankie Butler
Bottom row:-
* 'Chess Christmas Tree', Ben Papernick
* 'Mate in 3 (Yes, but is it art?)', Gary Venn
* 'Leader of the Pack', Jim Hollingsworth

I know that I would have trouble selecting a favorite for the 2016 award, and I look forward to seeing which entry the judges will choose. I'll come back next month for a wrapup.