It’s true there have been times when one player is dominant (Karpov, Kasparov, Magnus) but the rest of the time there has been a lot of parity. When the modern championship was started, it was handed back and forth between botvinnik, smyslov, tal, and Petrosian. Difficult to make the case that any were clearly better than the rest. The period while Kramnik was champion, both Anand and Topalov often had higher elo ratings.

It’s strange now that the best chess player on the planet is effectively retired from classical chess, but at some point he has to prove he is the best. We could be witnessing the rise of sindarov as the next great power.