Did the USFS Send the Right Mens Team to Worlds?

Mathman said:

I am dumbstruck by this exchange. Even grown-ups should care about fairness. (Crazy, I know.)

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Should an American follow your perception of the Rule of Fairness, and the other Feds do not have to. Does it make you feel better, personally?

wallow said:

Did you confuse Jeremy with Jeffrey Buttle?

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Of course not. I mentioned the possibilities of Buttle way back years ago. I did the same with Patrick when I first saw him. I am all for good skating from wherever. I was just speaking about the American system of selecting its World Team and I detected a bit of sarcasm by you in skipping the subject, and even now you inject a snarky remark of confusement. Stick to the topic. If you think the American system is the way to go, just say it.

Joesitz said:

Should an American follow your perception of the Rule of Fairness, and the other Feds do not have to. Does it make you feel better, personally?

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Well, I have to be candid. I don't really care what other federations do. They will do as they think best. We should, too.

What I can't get over is this view that we should not be fair in the way we choose U.S. representatives for world competitions. We should always be fair to our athletes. Always.

I just don't get how having a specified selection criterion that exists beyond solely using Nationals is unfair.

^ No, that is not unfair.

But the question posed on this thread was, should we choose the worlds team by the most fair method, or should "we" (unspecified who "we" are) intervene and choose the "best" team, without regard to fairness.

Joesitz said:

Should the USFS look into changing the regulation that the best choice is not necessarily the fairest choice?

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Now…having said that…

There is still a sense in which the winner-take-all nationals is the most fair to all U.S. skaters. At the beginning of the season every aspiring skater in the country who has tested into seniors has an equal opportunity to compete in their regional championships.. Top four advance to sectionals. Top four at sectionals advance to nationals. Winners at nationals make the worlds team.

“You’re Michelle Kwan? Good for you, I’m Suzie Smith – let’s get it on!” What could be fairer than that?

If the technical panel and judges at US Nationals called the skating similarly to how international competition panels do, I'd have no problem with using US Nationals as it's currently used--the linchpin of the "winners take all" system for berths to Worlds, 4CC, etc. But when US panels seem to markedly deviate from international panels in what they are seeing and judging, it troubles me.

What bigsisjiejie says.

If the U.S. judges say one thing and intenational judges say another, who is right?

Is there a clearly stated official goals of the US Nationals?

Somebody please find it for me.

Mathman said:

If the U.S. judges say one thing and intenational judges say another, who is right?

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When it comes out to handing placements and medals at international competitions, the international judges are right. Always. That's the reality of the situation.

Mathman said:

If the U.S. judges say one thing and intenational judges say another, who is right?

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They are all right, at their events, like monarchs in their own kingdoms. But is it about right or wrong? Judges rule on quality so it's really about the standard and whether or not the standards should be synchonized. If they should, then it's the national judges that need to adjust.

Tech Panels' calls, OTOH, should not vary.

Theorectically, they all go by the same ISU stipulations, i.e. the same standard.

bigsisjiejie said:

When it comes out to handing placements and medals at international competitions, the international judges are right. Always. That's the reality of the situation.

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Well, yes, and by the same token, the U.S. judges are always right in giving scores at U.S. Nationals. (?)

The question still remains, what is the fairest way to make assignments to the U.S. Worlds team? You are addressing instead the question, how can the U.S. get the most medals at Worlds?

But that is the whole question that this thread raises. Which of the two principles should be foremost?

ImaginaryPogue said:

I just don't get how having a specified selection criterion that exists beyond solely using Nationals is unfair.

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My thought exactly the same!

I don't get it. Why having Nationals as a sole method for selecting the world team is fair, while having Nationals along with international competition records together as a method for the same purpose would be not fair?

The international competitions are competitions. The team you are selecting is going to do an international competition similar to the competitions you'd be based on for the selecting. Do you mean the records that US skaters got at the GP series are not fair records? Only Nationals are fair? Look at the US Nationals which has just rewarded the most popular skater by ignoring his under rotations and low basic skating skills, using different favoritism, which has undermined the country's chances on the big international stage. Is that fair to the 176,000 members of USFSA? Is that fair to the country?

SkateFiguring said:

Is there a clearly stated official goals of the US Nationals?

Somebody please find it for me.

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I tried to find an "official" statement, but without success. I am pretty sure the official goal is to crown the United States Champions in the four disciplines.

As for the official selection rules, for some reason I am not able to link directly to the pdf file, but if you Google "2010 Official U.S. Figure Skating Rulebook" it pops up at the top. The rules for selecting the U.S. World team are on page 34 (Selection of Athletes).

According to the by-laws the U.S Champion automatically goes to worlds, and if their are additional places to fill then the International Committee is supposed to take into account U.S. Nationals placement, last years worlds, four continents, junior worlds and the grand prix final, with the most weight given to U.S. Nationals placement. In practice, the weighting has pretty much been, U.S. Nationals 100%, the rest 0%.

However, in the last couple of years the language has been tweaked in the direction of giving "The Committee" more leeway than has previously been customary in bringing international results into play. Whether or not this signals a sea change in the way the USFSA looks at the selection process is anybody's guess at this point.

Bluebonnet said:

I don't get it. Why having Nationals as a sole method for selecting the world team is fair, while having Nationals along with international competition records together as a method for the same purpose would be not fair?

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Because not every skater has an opportunity to skate in international competitions.

Look at the US Nationals which has just rewarded the most popular skater by ignoring his under rotations and low basic skating skills. That is not fair.

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Bad judging at U.S. Nationals is not fair. The USFSA should continue to do everything within its power to assure competent and unbiased judging.

I guess my problem is (to quote Dick Button) that I don't really give a rusty hoot about the ISU.

Totally fair. And honestly, since I rather do give a hoot about the ISU (as exists for the World Champions), more power to the US Federation. In the end, it benefits every other nation for the USA march to a different beat, so have at it!

Sorry for the quadruple post. Let me try one more time to get my thoughts clear on this issue.

There are two separate questions being debated at the same time. The question that I am interested in is this:

Question 1. Should we select the US worlds team (a) on the basis of fairness or (b) on the basis of winning as many medals as possible.

If the answer is (b), then, OK, I have nothing further to contribute..

If the answer is (a), then and only then is it time to move on to question 2.

Question 2. What is the fairest way to conduct the selection process? Nationals onl;y? Mixture of National and International results?

bigsisjiejie said:

If the technical panel and judges at US Nationals called the skating similarly to how international competition panels do, I'd have no problem with using US Nationals as it's currently used--the linchpin of the "winners take all" system for berths to Worlds, 4CC, etc. But when US panels seem to markedly deviate from international panels in what they are seeing and judging, it troubles me.

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But that's a whole different question. That's a question of whether U.S. judging is biased and political. There's no guarentee that putting the team decision is someone else's hands would be any different - or that they would come up with the right team.

For me, it would have to be based on very clear rules on how to take into account the other competitions. Otherwise, there would be politicking for sure and like I said zero guarantee that the real best team would be sent. The easiest way I can think of is to use 4cc as a runoff ... but maybe others have more interesting ideas.

It really has to do with Winning and Placing in the World Championsips since the set up of Figure Skating is based on a Country win and not by an individual win. This is very much supported by the Fans who love their country. I would conclude that the Feds must send their very best (even if it is only one) to represent their country.

If the point of the World Championship is to spread good will, then maybe Fairness is a factor, but I see it as combat where Fairness just doesn't fit into the picture, and neither does cheating.

Mathman said:

Sorry for the quadruple post. Let me try one more time to get my thoughts clear on this issue.

There are two separate questions being debated at the same time. The question that I am interested in is this:

Question 1. Should we select the US worlds team (a) on the basis of fairness or (b) on the basis of winning as many medals as possible.

If the answer is (b), then, OK, I have nothing further to contribute..

If the answer is (a), then and only then is it time to move on to question 2.

Question 2. What is the fairest way to conduct the selection process? Nationals onl;y? Mixture of National and International results?

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Well, if you are polling the peanut gallery here, I vote (b), I'm going with the Vince Lombardi School of Figure Skating. Go for medals (or highest likely placements). Life ain't fair. The USFS can accomplish all the internal Kumbaya stuff in other ways.

Wally, I'm not really sure about the Artur point. The Russians pretty much have a system where they send the top 3 at Nationals to Europeans, and then if there is underperforming at Euros, or it was close at Nationals, let Euros decide.

If a skater who is really good all season long but doesn't make Euros team by Nationals results, the Russians don't put said person on the Euros team. Case in point is I/M the Russian pairs team who was 4th at GPF, (and many thought should have been 3rd) Their personal best as way higher than G/E but the Russians sent G/E to Euros, although reports are there was some debate.

I do think the USFSA could make some changes but these changes need to be made in advance.

I think there are benefits to a system that allows young up and coming skaters to win spots easier. Skaters like Dornbush/Miner aren't going to get huge PCS internationally as unknowns but it can change if they improve.

This being said I think the biggest issue I have is the scoring at Nationals. Mathman do you think its fair for the USFSA to give a skater who (is not an up and coming skater who isn't well known internationall) but rather a skater who has been around for a long time, has poor basic skating skills, huge PCS? Is it fair to give said skater credit for jumps he did not rotate, that he wouldn't get credit for in international competition.

I'm sorry but its pretty darn telling that Dornbush/MIner even though they are rookies did better than Ryan here. Its because they are better skaters, but the results at Nationals didn't show that.

This being said I think it would have been difficult to earn 3 spots anyways. I don't think based on his skating this season Adam would have necessarily don't better than Ricky or Ross. I think Adam has some serious jump work today. Quads are back, and Adam doesn't even have a consistent 3 axel. I think that if you look at the jumps, I think Dornbush with his HUGE jumps is the most likely of the US men to master a quad, and unlike Bradley or Mroz has decent skating skills to back it up. (Although he still needs to work on them.)