Double standard? (Men's FS vs. Women's SP/Pairs FS)

zschultz1986 · Mar 29, 2013

Well, of course, I agree that Shizuka and Maria are not on the same level... However, saying that "Shizuka was the Maria of Japan" isn't commenting on the level of talent. For me, its commenting on the arc of their careers and the fact that the federation was already pushing Mao, just like Slutskaya was always being looked to ahead of Maria.

I'm taking away nothing from Shizuka's Olympic Win. She totally deserved that Oly title. It just wasn't as exciting, nor as technically demanding as Tara's, Sarah's, or Yu-Na's. She played it safe, and sure, that's really all she had to do... but it just didn't sit right with me. It wasn't even that she had bad first jumps in the combination, she wasn't even going after the triple-triple combos, which given that you've only seen Sasha's splatfest right before, and you don't know what Slutskaya is gonna do, seems like she wasn't grabbing the Gold. She was gonna play it safe, and let Slutskaya determine the champion, however she skated.

Also, I agree that Mao overemphasized the 3A. However, I don't even think a Mao with 3Ax2 and 3/3 could have beaten Yu-Na in that Olympics, that's how high Yu-Na was riding. (I don't know how I could have forgotten about Janet Lynn and Ito. I always forget about Ito... god that lady had springs for legs.)

pangtongfan · Mar 29, 2013

According to everyone I have talked to, and all reports I have read as well, Slutskaya was crashing and burning hard and heavy in practice. I was shocked at her performance given her performances the prior 15 months but friends of mine who were at the event reported to me they were surprised Slutskaya even skated as well in the LP as she did. Her illness also was strongly affected by altitude and Turin was at very high altitude. I Imagine if this is true Shizuka was aware of it to, and fully aware that Slutskaya wasnt landing anymore than 4 triples max even given how she was skating, and her performance was certain to do it at that point.

I do take the point though that Kim does all her technical content no matter what is needed and no matter the situation. That is one area she is superior to Shizuka for sure, but some could say there are qualites Shizuka has over Kim too.

zschultz1986 · Mar 29, 2013

pangtongfan said:
According to everyone I have talked to, and all reports I have read as well, Slutskaya was crashing and burning hard and heavy in practice. I was shocked at her performance given her performances the prior 15 months but friends of mine who were at the event reported to me they were surprised Slutskaya even skated as well in the LP as she did. Her illness also was strongly affected by altitude and Turin was at very high altitude. I Imagine if this is true Shizuka was aware of it to, and fully aware that Slutskaya wasnt landing anymore than 4 triples max even given how she was skating, and her performance was certain to do it at that point.

I do take the point though that Kim does all her technical content no matter what is needed and no matter the situation. That is one area she is superior to Shizuka for sure, but some could say there are qualites Shizuka has over Kim too.

I cede the point the Shizuka has some qualities that Kim could learn from. However, I never knew that Slutskaya's illness was affected by altitude... and as someone who was either a gymnast or a diver for most of his life, at a relatively high level (the diver part, not the gymnast part. I was a tons better diver than gymnast), that should have ZERO effect on what you plan to do. It just shouldn't.

CanadianSkaterGuy · Mar 29, 2013

FlattFan said:
Anyway, who out of the 3 was capable of 3x3 at the 2006 Olympics? Only Shizuka.
Slutskaya can only do 6 triples max at that point. No chance.

No. Slutskaya had landed 3-3's since 2000. Just 3 months before the Olympics at the 2005 Cup of Russia, Slutskaya landed 7 triples, including a 3S+3L+2T (the year before the Olympics at Worlds she executed 7 triples, including 3Z-3L.)

FlattFan · Mar 29, 2013

CanadianSkaterGuy said:
No. Slutskaya had landed 3-3's since 2000. Just 3 months before the Olympics at the 2005 Cup of Russia, Slutskaya landed 7 triples, including a 3S+3L+2T (the year before the Olympics at Worlds she executed 7 triples, including 3Z-3L.)

She couldn't do a single 3x3 on practice. Was not skating well at all. How will she pull out a 3x3 in the actual competition?
Shizuka at her best in 2006 would be unrivaled by anyone.

Just look at what happened. Shiz handily beat Cohen in TES for the same number of triples. If both get 2 more triples, the difference would be higher.
Shiz has speed, power, effortless, skills that Cohen was falling short of. And Shiz's line is just as impressive. Cohen had nothing on her, jumps are much weaker, spins are weaker (Shiz actually got level 4 on all of her spins in both Sp and LP where as Cohen got a few level 3), spiral is weaker, steps are weaker. So how on earth will Cohen beat her if both were at their best?

Slutskaya at that point was playing for bronze. She was no threat.

Really, if all 3 skated their best, Shiz would still beat them by 10 points.

CanadianSkaterGuy · Mar 31, 2013

FlattFan said:
She couldn't do a single 3x3 on practice. Was not skating well at all. How will she pull out a 3x3 in the actual competition?
Shizuka at her best in 2006 would be unrivaled by anyone.

Just look at what happened. Shiz handily beat Cohen in TES for the same number of triples. If both get 2 more triples, the difference would be higher.
Shiz has speed, power, effortless, skills that Cohen was falling short of. And Shiz's line is just as impressive. Cohen had nothing on her, jumps are much weaker, spins are weaker (Shiz actually got level 4 on all of her spins in both Sp and LP where as Cohen got a few level 3), spiral is weaker, steps are weaker. So how on earth will Cohen beat her if both were at their best?

Slutskaya at that point was playing for bronze. She was no threat.

Really, if all 3 skated their best, Shiz would still beat them by 10 points.

I realise you're a hardcore Shizuka fan and won't think otherwise, but Sasha's spiral is unmatched, even by Shizuka. As for the spins, Sasha's I-spin and layback are much better than Shizuka's. Although I suppose Shizuka's donut spin is better -- all FOUR of them. :biggrin:

And Slutskaya not landing 3-3 in practice is a negligible point if nobody attempted the 3-3 in the SP or FS. It's what you bring to the competition that matters. If you're saying Shizuka had such a cushion on Slutskaya, then why didn't she attempt the 3-3?

Maybe in 2006 - at the time of the Olympics - Shizuka was unbeatable because Cohen and Slutskaya weren't at their peak. But as far as whether Slutskaya or Cohen would beat Arakawa if all three skated their best, but BOTH of their personal bests (Slutskaya 198.06 and Cohen 197.60) are considerably better than Arakawa's personal best at the Olympics in 2006 (191.34).

pangtongfan · Mar 31, 2013

Slutskaya was skating awful in practice at the Games. She was not going to be skating a clean 6 triple program, never mind one with 3-3s. It is sad but she the combination of age and her illness finally caught up to her after 15 months of great skating.

Cohen does not have the best spirals in the World. The best spirals in the World overall were Michelle Kwan. Cohens spirals were overrated by people like Dick Button since people just look at the position, but the depth of the edge and flow of the spiral are far less impressive, and those count as well.

Looking at overall careers Slutskaya is the greatest of those three, but looking at just quality of skating Shizuka is the most complete of the three. Sasha even at her best has weak jumps, weak edges, and is slow. Her choreography was also weak until she hooked up with Tarasova in 2003. Slutskaya is one of my favorite skaters but even at her best she has alot of sloppiness and artistic deficits to her skating, her spins are excellent in some respects but travel badly, and her spirals were not on par with some of the top skaters of her era.

Mathman · Apr 3, 2013

Anyway, back to the original question...

Here is why fans' reactions to the scoring at worlds does not represent a double standard.

Ladies. Kim skated way better than everyone else and was proclaimed world figures skating champion for 2013.

Pairs. Volosozhaer and Trankov skated way better than anyone else and were crowned world pairs champions for 2013.

Ice Dance. Davis and White skated better than their rivals and were crowned ice dance champions for 2013.

Men. A controversial outcome where the winner did not skate well at all.

Which one of the four disciplines will attract the most negative feedback from fans?

CanadianSkaterGuy · Apr 3, 2013

Mathman said:
Anyway, back to the original question...

Here is why fans' reactions to the scoring at worlds does not represent a double standard.

Ladies. Kim skated way better than everyone else and was proclaimed world figures skating champion for 2013.
Pairs. Volosozhaer and Trankov skated way better than anyone else and were crowned world pairs champions for 2013.
Ice Dance. Davis and White skated better than their rivals and were crowned ice dance champions for 2013.
Men. A controversial outcome where the winner did not skate well at all.

Which one of the four disciplines will attract the most negative feedback from fans?

Obviously the men's because the WINNER had such a flawed FS performance and the runner-up had such clean performances. If V/T hadn't skated and if Kim hadn't skated, you would have the Germans winning with that horrendous FS over the clean Canadian pairs and Kostner winning with both a bad SP and LP (even if her FS was easier last year, at least it was clean).

Really, Ladies and Pairs were "saved" by Kim and V/T, otherwise you might be seeing similar backlash that Chan received for Kostner/Germans. Of course, Chan is more outspoken and has more critics than Kostner or the Germans, so he'd still get the brunt of it.

Kostner winning gold over Mao wouldn't be as bad since all of the women, save for Kim, in the top 10 skated really poorly over the SP & LP, so it's kind of a best-of-the-worst. But for the Germans to win over the Canadians, there would have been considerable backlash. I don't think D/R cared as much that they didn't win silver so much as they made the podium, but if the Russians weren't there, that would have really stung to have the Germans take gold from them.

FlattFan · Apr 3, 2013

CanadianSkaterGuy said:
I realise you're a hardcore Shizuka fan and won't think otherwise, but Sasha's spiral is unmatched, even by Shizuka. As for the spins, Sasha's I-spin and layback are much better than Shizuka's. Although I suppose Shizuka's donut spin is better -- all FOUR of them.

Sasha's spiral is pretty to look at from a distance. The edge and the speed is not even close to Shizuka's. I'm not a hardcore Shizuka fan. Shizuka got level 4 on all spins in both SP and LP, something Sasha and Irina didn't get. The rule was there, why didn't anyone else take advantage of it? If this girl did 4 donut spins to get level 4 and the rule allowed it, what's the matter?
To a lesser extent, why repeat 2 jumps in the same program? Should people start complaining that Sasha is doing TWO flips in the LP?

And Slutskaya not landing 3-3 in practice is a negligible point if nobody attempted the 3-3 in the SP or FS. It's what you bring to the competition that matters. If you're saying Shizuka had such a cushion on Slutskaya, then why didn't she attempt the 3-3?

At the 2006 Olympics, of the medalists, only one girl who could do 3x3 effortlessly. Actually, she was doing 3Lz-3Loop and 3Sal-3Toe all week. She chose to be safe, left the 3x3 out, and still scored less than a point behind the favorites. If all 3 skated their best in the SP, Shizuka would pull so far ahead with a 3x3 because the other two didn't have 3x3.

Maybe in 2006 - at the time of the Olympics - Shizuka was unbeatable because Cohen and Slutskaya weren't at their peak. But as far as whether Slutskaya or Cohen would beat Arakawa if all three skated their best, but BOTH of their personal bests (Slutskaya 198.06 and Cohen 197.60) are considerably better than Arakawa's personal best at the Olympics in 2006 (191.34).

Shizuka didn't score better than those two because she didn't even bother trying anything hard in both phases of the program. Had she done 3x3 in both programs and not popped the loop, she would hit over 200, possibly 210, something both Cohen and Slutskaya can't dream of reaching even at their peak.

How about this, have Cohen and Slutskaya ever gotten a 6.0 on Technical mark in the 6.0? Both competed more years in the 6.0 system. No. Shizuka did.
Just a superior skater to both, artistically and technically.

Irina is a better competitor and more consistent than Shizuka.

Mathman · Apr 3, 2013

^ Exactly.That is why there is no "double standard." If things had been different, we would be hollering about a different discipline.

mskater93 · Apr 3, 2013

Mathman said:
^ Exactly.That is why there is no "double standard." If things had been different, we would be hollering about a different discipline.

Or multiple disciplines.

CanadianSkaterGuy · Apr 3, 2013

pangtongfan said:
Cohen does not have the best spirals in the World. The best spirals in the World overall were Michelle Kwan. Cohens spirals were overrated by people like Dick Button since people just look at the position, but the depth of the edge and flow of the spiral are far less impressive, and those count as well.

Sasha had good flow and edge on her spirals and was one of the only skaters to make a RBO edge spiral with the leg in front look attractive. And her forward spiral had arguably the best extension of any (certainly much more than Kwan). Her Charlotte was also a full split (and forward and backward), unlike Kwan's. Sasha's was also far more difficult to maintain in a full split, and she even had that variation where she did a 3-turn from RBO to RFI edge with her leg still up which obviously requires flow and edge control.

If there's one thing Kwan did have over Cohen is that her spiral was an excellent highlight to her music. Michelle's overall artistry IMO was better than Sasha's so her spiral became a lovely climax in her programs. That deep starting inside edge was lovely but in competition she rarely maintained the changeover to the outside edge after to the same extent. And there are several skaters who perform more difficult variations with greater extension.

I'm not the biggest Cohen fan, but from a technical standpoint, her spirals are unmatched.

pangtongfan · Apr 3, 2013

Sasha's PB is also BS as it was achieved in the 2003 grand prix where the judges were not scoring COP the same way they did in 2004-2005 and 2005-2006. Her true PB is the 185 range score she posted at the 2005 Worlds with as clean to a clean competition as she is capable of, and even that is below Shizuka's Turin total, and it is much easier to see Shizuka skating much better than she did in Turin (based on her practices and 2004 Worlds skates) than Sasha skating much (or any) better than she did at the 2005 Worlds.

CanadianSkaterGuy · Apr 3, 2013

FlattFan said:
Sasha's spiral is pretty to look at from a distance. The edge and the speed is not even close to Shizuka's. I'm not a hardcore Shizuka fan. Shizuka got level 4 on all spins in both SP and LP, something Sasha and Irina didn't get. The rule was there, why didn't anyone else take advantage of it? If this girl did 4 donut spins to get level 4 and the rule allowed it, what's the matter?
To a lesser extent, why repeat 2 jumps in the same program? Should people start complaining that Sasha is doing TWO flips in the LP?

Are you honestly saying what's the matter with Shizuka doing four donut spins? (Let alone comparing it to a skater repeating a triple jump in a FS?) Those actually marred the freeskate a bit for me... it's like, okay, we get it - you can do a donut spin. Maybe she did it to reflect those ridiculous donut medals that they gave out. :laugh:

I think we're well aware that Shizuka was able to land 3-3 in practice, but as I said, she could be landing quads in practice and it wouldn't matter. Sotnikova was practically doing 3Z-3T-3L combos at Worlds this year, so should we assume she'll wipe the floor with everyone because she's able to hit that? Kostner has done 3-3-3 but never in competition. I don't care what you're capable of landing in practice, there are plenty of "practice skaters", Cohen/Sandhu being two examples, but you don't get medals for good practices.

Mathman · Apr 3, 2013

No, but two things that you can do in practice are intimidate your opponents and impress the judges. :yes:

CanadianSkaterGuy · Apr 3, 2013

Mathman said:
No, but two things that you can do in practice are intimidate your opponents and impress the judges. :yes:

Oh yeah, I realise the point of practice skates is to do just that. But if practice performances truly held weight (which it really shouldn't), then Cohen and Sandhu would have won way more often.

Intimidating opponents is another thing. Obviously practices help gauge competition. Shizuka knew Sasha had bombed and realised Slutskaya was way off-form in practices and not landing 3-3's. With her main competition out of the way, all she needed was a clean skate so she didn't bother putting in her content. Was she able to incorporate the 3-3? In practice, yes, but who knows if she would have been capable of that in competition (it's not like Shizuka landed nearly as many 3-3 up until that point compared to, say, Slutskaya). It was a smart thing to do and a lovely performance, but to say she totally could have wiped the floor with Cohen/Slutskaya but decided not to is as negligible as saying Slutskaya wasn't landing her 3-3 in practice but could have brought it out in competition at any moment. Neither did 3-3, so it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

FlattFan · Apr 3, 2013

CanadianSkaterGuy said:
It was a smart thing to do and a lovely performance, but to say she totally could have wiped the floor with Cohen/Slutskaya but decided not to is as negligible as saying Slutskaya wasn't landing her 3-3 in practice but could have brought it out in competition at any moment.

You are saying Shizuka's chance of landing 3x3 in the actual competition was as negligible as Slutskaya's. One is incapable and one is very capable. And they have the same negligible chance? Logic failed!

CanadianSkaterGuy · Apr 3, 2013

FlattFan said:
You are saying Shizuka's chance of landing 3x3 in the actual competition was as negligible as Slutskaya's. One is incapable and one is very capable. And they have the same negligible chance? Logic failed!

No, I'm saying that it's negligible that Slutskaya was at the time incapable of doing a 3-3 and Shizuka was capable of doing a 3-3; since neither attempted it in the SP or FS, then it doesn't matter if they're capable or incapable of it.

Plus there's no guarantee that Shizuka would have landed her 3-3 even if she had attempted it, just because she was landing them in practice, so it's a moot point. Was Shizuka landing 3-3's in her program run-throughs or just when trying the 3-3's separately? Was Shizuka landing 3-3 in the warmup of the SP or FS? (Again, doesn't matter because plenty of skaters have clean practice run-throughs but can't land the big elements or dilute their programs come competition.)

FlattFan · Apr 3, 2013

CanadianSkaterGuy said:
Are you honestly saying what's the matter with Shizuka doing four donut spins? (Let alone comparing it to a skater repeating a triple jump in a FS?) Those actually marred the freeskate a bit for me... it's like, okay, we get it - you can do a donut spin. Maybe she did it to reflect those ridiculous donut medals that they gave out.

I don't see the problem. She got level 4 on all spins. The aim is to get the highest level for everything. They competed under the same system and they chose to throw away points. Dumb and dumber much? By virtue of level and points, Shizuka is a better spinner than both girls. What's there to dispute?

Double standard? (Men's FS vs. Women's SP/Pairs FS)

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