Weird games between So and Mamedyarov

I was looking at some Four Knights Italian lines and noticed a super GM playing a this well known dubious line as White.



I'm just speculating but maybe Mamedyarov took offense to this so he plays an even more dubious variation of the same opening against him a year later.



Black wons in both games.

Anyone knows if there's a story behind these games?

It's hard to speculate. Only the first game is on chessgames.com, but it looks like the second was from the Speed Chess Championship on the site that may not be named. Mamedyarov didn't do very well, and had apparently switched to some quite unorthodox openings - this was the second Four Knights Italian hybrid of the match. It's not a huge deal, though, as the time control was 1+1. The other game was from the St. Louis Rapid and Blitz, at a "rapid" time control, so I think So's play makes less sense. I doubt either remembered the earlier game during their bullet match, though.

Thanks for the details @iBishop I still think it's a bit odd since there's so few games in this variation at super GM level and two of those are between the same dudes but with different colours.

" I doubt either remembered the earlier game during their bullet match, though."

These guys remember all of the games they have played, especially against other top players. I think it's reasonable to assume that they have looked at their past games before the match.

@EdinburghCollective While it is not inconceivable that either player remembers all 31 games they have played on Chess.com, it seems rather unlikely that GM Wesley So remembers each of his 1550 games against other grandmasters on the website. Note that in the first 11 games displayed by chessgames as being played between So and Mamedyarov, there are 11 different openings. Just because So had once played a Four Knights hardly means Mamedyarov would expect it in a bullet match, or plan to play it himself. In fact, in the same match he played a Four Knights type game beginning with 1.a3. I expect neither player prepared for this, but that the two games are unrelated.
Of course, I have no way of knowing this. You may very well be right that Mamedyarov was attempting to josh or goad So in that one game. I think two games are not necessarily related because they have the same opening, though. Take www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1916241 and www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1916241, which were played only months apart. Sure, there could have been hidden meaning, but I don't think opening choice matters so much to these guys. Most of them play every (good) opening under the sun anyway. At least that's my opinion.

There is nothing fundamentally wrong with this opening. Especially at faster time controls it is playable.