ISU Congress- Decisions bring new rules

[Mathman]

The Olympics have always had 9 FS judges, with one a substitute.

Didn't it traditionally have 9 judges PLUS a substitute, whose score would be counted if one of the 9 got sick in the middle of the contest or something?

As I recall part of the Salt Lake City pairs controversy was that the substitute judge had voted for Sale and Pelletier, so if the French judge's scores had been throw out and the substituite judge's included, S&P would have won by a 5 to 4 majority. The ISU ruled instead to throw out the French judge's score and declare it to be a 4-4 tie, hence the duplicate gold medals.

IIRC at Torino there were 12 seated judges, with 3 scores discarded in the random draw.

As I read the proposal of the Russian federation (#134), their proposal is to eliminat the extra "dmmy" judges and the random draw that currently reduces the panel of 12 down to 9, before trimming. The proposal seems to be to seat 10 (or perhaps 9 for lesser events like Four Continents and Europeans), have a computerized "random draw" only to determine which of the the 10 will be designated the "substitute," then use the other 9 as the scoring judges (before trimming.)

I think this is a good proposal. It does not address the question of anonymous judging one way or the other. But it eliminates the need to have three "dummy judges" sitting at the table with their fingers up their noses pretending to be judging something, when if fact they are not. Plus, it will save the ISU a couple of bucks.

[Buttercup]

As I understand it, current judging rules also mean that actual results can change based on who the dummy judges are, i.e. which scores are dropped and which are not. While the proposed change won't make things any less subjective, and won't do away with the anonymity, it should at least address that issue.

[merrybari]

Clarification please.

Simply put do I understand correctly that the scores from all the seated judges will count - that none will be randomly dropped?

If true this goes a long way toward at least leveling the field IMO.

Also re: substitute judge. Score only used to replace the score of a "real" judge in the event that one gets sick or is otherwise unable to complete the job?

[Mathman]

Clarification please.

Simply put do I understand correctly that the scores from all the seated judges will count - that none will be randomly dropped?

Not exactly. As I understand the proposal, all ten judges will be seated, all ten will think they are scoring the event, but one will be selected by the computer with the designation "substitute." His or her scores will not be included, unless one of the other judges has to drop out.

So basically, the idea is to toss out only one judge's scores (out of 10) instead of three judges' scores (out of 12.)

The justification offereed by the Russian federation was: (a) to save money, and (b) to provide for a substitute judge within the current framework.

This was the propsal. I don't know whether it was passed or not.

[hockeyfan228]

As I recall part of the Salt Lake City pairs controversy was that the substitute judge had voted for Sale and Pelletier, so if the French judge's scores had been throw out and the substituite judge's included, S&P would have won by a 5 to 4 majority. The ISU ruled instead to throw out the French judge's score and declare it to be a 4-4 tie,

That is, the free skate. Then the ISU discounted the SP results altogether and awarded

the duplicate gold medals.

[Joesitz]

Clarification please.

Simply put do I understand correctly that the scores from all the seated judges will count - that none will be randomly dropped?

If true this goes a long way toward at least leveling the field IMO.

Also re: substitute judge. Score only used to replace the score of a "real" judge in the event that one gets sick or is otherwise unable to complete the job?

Is it for the Olys only? If not, I would think that 10 judges with one acting as substitute would make it easier to 'fix' the results. If judges are not going to be identified by name (and country) and only one score is 'dropped' so to speak, it's kind of obvious that hanky panky is a bit easier.

[merrybari]

Is it for the Olys only? If not, I would think that 10 judges with one acting as substitute would make it easier to 'fix' the results. If judges are not going to be identified by name (and country) and only one score is 'dropped' so to speak, it's kind of obvious that hanky panky is a bit easier.

Yet another reason to do away with anonymous judging. Making judges scores public knowledge is the most obvious way to do away with hanky-panky. By refusing to do so, the ISU leaves itself and the judges wide open to the accusations of "fixing." I thought elimimating fixing was supposed to have been the reason for the "new" judging system in the first place.

Has anyone seen the rationalization for keeping the judging anonymous?

[MissIzzy]

Yet another reason to do away with anonymous judging. Making judges scores public knowledge is the most obvious way to do away with hanky-panky. By refusing to do so, the ISU leaves itself and the judges wide open to the accusations of "fixing." I thought elimimating fixing was supposed to have been the reason for the "new" judging system in the first place.

Has anyone seen the rationalization for keeping the judging anonymous?

Actually I thought the fancy "fixing" that this new change would make easier was done by federations rather than individual judges, thus the anonymous judging preventing the federations from bullying their judges. The problem the random droppings created, on the other hand, was when judges from certain nationalities were just biased, because if the wrong judges were dropped their marks had more impact.

[Sylvia]

Has anyone seen the rationalization for keeping the judging anonymous?

IIRC, it's to "protect" the judges from pressure from within their own federations...

I'm all for larger judging panels and using ALL of the judges' marks.

[merrybari]

Thanks for the info. Really pitiful that the judges would need protection from their own federations.

ITA - ALL scores should count.

[chuckm]

IIRC at Torino there were 12 seated judges, with 3 scores discarded in the random draw.

As I read the proposal of the Russian federation (#134), their proposal is to eliminat the extra "dmmy" judges and the random draw that currently reduces the panel of 12 down to 9, before trimming. The proposal seems to be to seat 10 (or perhaps 9 for lesser events like Four Continents and Europeans), have a computerized "random draw" only to determine which of the the 10 will be designated the "substitute," then use the other 9 as the scoring judges (before trimming.)

I think this is a good proposal. It does not address the question of anonymous judging one way or the other. But it eliminates the need to have three "dummy judges" sitting at the table with their fingers up their noses pretending to be judging something, when if fact they are not. Plus, it will save the ISU a couple of bucks.

This proposal ensures that nearly all of the judges' votes will be counted. If the panel can be 'packed' with judges from one European region, so much the better for the federation controlling (or lending) those judges. And so much the better for pre-engineering the outcome.

[Tonichelle]

until they get rid of the subjective components (and therefore eliminating figure skating as we know it) there will always be a way for one 'bloc' (eastern, western, american, european, martian...) to win out over the others...

[antmanb]

The justification offereed by the Russian federation was: (a) to save money, and (b) to provide for a substitute judge within the current framework.

This was the propsal. I don't know whether it was passed or not.

The cynical justification may be (a) having three dummy judges makes it very difficult to rig the result if three of your bought judges are thrown out in the mix (b) knowing that only one judge's scores will not count makes it easier to see if you will have a certain majority on any panel to rig said event.

Ant

[Joesitz]

The cynical justification may be (a) having three dummy judges makes it very difficult to rig the result if three of your bought judges are thrown out in the mix (b) knowing that only one judge's scores will not count makes it easier to see if you will have a certain majority on any panel to rig said event.Ant

That's exactly what I was thinking when I brought this up. There is no more 12 judges with only 9 being used for scoring, A substitute could be one of the 3 being dropped. However, it didn't happen. They cut the 12 to 10 so it helps a Federation who is able to get assistance from like minded other Federations if his abettors are included in the 10.- less possible chance to be 'dropped'

This is all so silly. Just name the judges and their scores and let the media and fans make hay of it.

Joe

[merrybari]

Joe, ITA

This is all so silly. Just name the judges and their scores and let the media and fans make hay of it.

OK - that said, I have more questions from the uniformed.

How are the judges chosen for each event in the first place? Do federations "offer" to send them? Are they chosen - randomly - by the ISU? Who pays their expenses?

Every federation should always be represented on the judging panel, but I know that sometimes is not the case.

Another thought - have the judges be independent of/from the federations.

What a mess! Whatever happened to honesty, anyway?