What was the worst skating interview? | Golden Skate

What was the worst skating interview?

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SkateFan4Life

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What do you think were the worst televised figure skating interviews? My all-time worst commentary moment occurred at the 1988 Winter Olympics.
Canadian Brian Orser had just skated his long program and received his marks. He realized that he had finished second to American Brian Boitano - a heartbreaking defeat in his home country.

David Santee, commentating, shoved a microphone in Orser's face and said (to paraphrase) "Brian, I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is that you received a 6.0 for artistic impression. The bad news is that you finished second. How do you feel?"

UGH! How in heck to you think Brian felt, David? What an idiotic, insensitive question! (IMHO) Orser managed to be gentlemanlike and gave a polite response, but he probably felt like decking Santee. :mad:
 

Antilles

Medalist
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
The NBC interview with A&P after they won gold at the Olympics. The woman had a comment about how quiet (read: unimpressed), the crowd was during their program. Peizerat handled the question with class, but Anissina looked like she wanted to take a swing at the woman.
 

OwenEvans

Rinkside
Joined
Aug 10, 2004
ANY of the interviews conducted by Lisa Guerro (sp?) - whenever I watch my tape of last year's worlds I automatically press "fast forward" the moment she appears. I thought her comments vapid at best (and could she have found more ill-fitting jackets anywhere? Is Dolly Parton her role-model??)

Also, I thought the camera-work @ Dortmund (at least that for the ABC feed) was just terrible - just two of many examples of the producer's/cameramen's ineptitude, they botched Divakawa's Ina during her freeskate and then Sasha's during the ex. I just love a good Ina, and still feel ripped off... :)
 

PrincessLeppard

~ Evgeni's Sex Bomb ~
Final Flight
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Lisa Guerrero, last year's Worlds, with Sasha Cohen, who had just botched the long program. Lisa says something like, "Wow, that was really bad," and Sasha says something like, "Yeah, I hoped to do better," and Lisa says, "Back to you, Terry."

:rofl:
 

attyfan

Custom Title
Medalist
Joined
Mar 1, 2004
IMHO, the worst interviews are those where the press blames the skaters when they think that the results were wrong. I read that, after the Israeli dance team got the controversial bronze at Worlds in '02, a reporter asked Galit Chait "how much did you pay the judges", and similar comments were made to Michelle Kwan after SA in Oct of '01, when the press thought the gold should have gone to Sarah Hughes. I do not mean to start a re-hash on who should have gotten the ice dance bronze (or SA gold); I only wish to distinguish between "the results were wrong -- the skater must have done something to get that result" that Kwan and the Israeli team got as opposed to the "the results were wrong, but the skaters are innocent and it is the judges that f***** up" after the pairs mess in SLC>
 

Tonichelle

Idita-Rock-n-Roll
Record Breaker
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Jun 27, 2003
I think a lot of the interviews during SLC surrounding the pairs crap were in bad taste. I mean, they're all working for teh same network... do they HAVE to ask the same 3 questions? Jamie, David, Elena, and Anton were all so great about not losing their cool... but NBC took advantage of Elena and Anton... and *can't think of his name, he thinks he's Matt Lauer half the time* were quite rude...

Rosie O'Donnel never got her wish to speak with teh pair that was "screwed" out of the gold... and I think one of the main reasons was because the "Queen of Nice" (more like teh queen of CRUDE) said that she'd wished that the skate blade that had hit Elena had sidelined her longer (actually I think it was closer to she wished Elena wasn't around anymore) Jay Leno's "Cheaties" box with Elena and Anton box also was totally out of line
 

VIETgrlTerifa

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
OwenEvans said:
[
Also, I thought the camera-work @ Dortmund (at least that for the ABC feed) was just terrible - just two of many examples of the producer's/cameramen's ineptitude, they botched Divakawa's Ina during her freeskate and then Sasha's during the ex. I just love a good Ina, and still feel ripped off... :)

Acutally, I heard the feed was really bad everywhere, not just ABC. People who saw the live feeds from other countries kept commentating on the bad feed they got, and some even complained to Eurosport who replied that they were not the one responsible for the feed. So if we Americans had to be ripped off with bad camera-work, at least the rest of the world suffered with us, :p.
 

R.D.

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
PrincessLeppard said:
Lisa Guerrero, last year's Worlds, with Sasha Cohen, who had just botched the long program. Lisa says something like, "Wow, that was really bad," and Sasha says something like, "Yeah, I hoped to do better," and Lisa says, "Back to you, Terry."

:rofl:

eeeexactly. No, it really annoys me when sports reporters go up to athletes who may have had a disappointing performance, put a microphone in his/her face, and ask them stupid questions like "You placed second, and everyone was expecting you to win. How do you feel?"

I need not say any more. :p

P.S. I think that's how Lisa approached SC...I don't think she said to her "That was bad"...if she did, then WOW. Get her off immediately.
 

Fossi

Final Flight
Joined
Aug 23, 2003
I remember one year at COR? When Sarah and Sasha skated. Sarah did much better than Maria B, and I think Sasha did just as good as MB, and the interviewer was saying things to get them to say they weren't judged fairly. They handled it well, but it was an obvous set up.
 

IDLERACER

Medalist
Joined
Jul 28, 2003
In a way, this thread is a bit redundant, as for the life of me, I cannot recall a single GOOD post competition interview...simply because there's usually nothing to say. I find that most skaters just wind up rehashing what Dick & Peggy already commented on during their performance..."Well, I did well on my triple salchow, but my camel spin was a bit wobbly blah blah blah..." :boohoo:
 

brad640

On the Ice
Joined
Dec 8, 2004
OwenEvans said:
ANY of the interviews conducted by Lisa Guerro (sp?) - whenever I watch my tape of last year's worlds I automatically press "fast forward" the moment she appears. I thought her comments vapid at best (and could she have found more ill-fitting jackets anywhere? Is Dolly Parton her role-model??)

Yes, she is awful. Usually the interviews at skating events are terrible. Where do they find these people? I wish Dick Button would do more interviews. I loved Lesley Visser's interviews when she covered skating. She usually didn't know what she was talking about, but she was very high energy and hilarious and her hair was always out of control.
 

RealtorGal

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 27, 2003
Yes, it's just awful:

Interviewer: "Hey, you really bit the big one out there. What happened?"

Skater: "I fell on my a--, you dumb jerk! What do you THINK happened out there? Maybe if you think it's so easy, you should give it a try some time!" :p
 

Vash01

Medalist
Joined
Jul 31, 2003
At SLC 2002 after the pairs competition was over, NBC completely ignored the winning pair and interviewed only the second place finishers. The interviewer encouraged them (Jamie) to cry more and complain about the results, when the proper thing to do would have been to interview both pairs and be sensitive while asking questions.

Vash
 

Tony Wheeler

On the Ice
Joined
Jul 27, 2003
For those of you who don't like Guerrero (who IMO did a fine job), I have to let you know that the whole 2 second Cohen interview wasn't as it appeared. If any of you had watched the re-telecast on ESPN a week or whenever later, you would have seen that interview actually went on for over a minute. It was ABC who edited the interview on their telecast, and I agree, it was strange.. but it was nothing Lisa did!
 

Spirit

On the Ice
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Vash01 said:
At SLC 2002 after the pairs competition was over, NBC completely ignored the winning pair and interviewed only the second place finishers. The interviewer encouraged them (Jamie) to cry more and complain about the results, when the proper thing to do would have been to interview both pairs and be sensitive while asking questions.

Vash

This is the one I was going to mention. I don't remember her name -- a woman with shoulder-length black hair -- but she had a plastic smile and did all the rinkside interviews for NBC in SLC.

Immediately after the Pairs controversy, NBC showed a few seconds backstage before cutting to commercial. This woman, not realizing the camera was on her, was not smiling her plastic smile any more; she was impatiently telling Jamie Sale where to stand so they could get the best shot. She did not give a toss that Jamie was openly weeping and holding David at the time. I don't think Jamie even knew she was there.

The dream of a lifetime dashed? Get your butt in front of this camera, then you can weep. You're our drama tonight. Don't cry now, wait 'til we're rolling tape.

I didn't know she had encouraged Jamie to cry more, but it doesn't surprise me.

But then, all sideline media interviews are awful. I don't even know why they bother.

And yes, the media's treatment of B&S all around was atrocious.
 

JonnyCoop

Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 28, 2003
RealtorGal said:
Yes, it's just awful:

Interviewer: "Hey, you really bit the big one out there. What happened?"

Skater: "I fell on my a--, you dumb jerk! What do you THINK happened out there? Maybe if you think it's so easy, you should give it a try some time!" :p

This reminds me of what Kristy Sargent-Wirtz was quoted saying after her & Kris Wirtz made mistakes in the SP at the 01 Worlds. "Well, basically, I fell on my a--" (tho she didn't embellish it QUITE the same way" :biggrin: ) Plain talk -- very refreshing. And I liked how the Canadian papers printed it without even deleting any letters.
 
S

SkateFan4Life

Guest
OwenEvans said:
ANY of the interviews conducted by Lisa Guerro (sp?) - whenever I watch my tape of last year's worlds I automatically press "fast forward" the moment she appears. I thought her comments vapid at best (and could she have found more ill-fitting jackets anywhere? Is Dolly Parton her role-model??)


Actually, I liked Lisa Guerro's commentary and interviews. I think she's very attractive, articulate, charming, and she asks the kinds of questions that the average fan would want to ask the skater. I liked the fact that she asked Sasha Cohen, after her fantastic short program at US Nationals (to paraphrase) "What has been the biggest difference with your training this past month with your new coach, Robin Wagner?"

When Timothy Goebel skated a disastrous short program, Lisa was kind and sympathetic. She did not berate Goebel for his mistakes and wished him well. Clearly, she could have extended the interview, but seeing how upset Timothy was, she cut it short.

IMHO, Guerro has a lot of class. đź‘Ť
 
S

SkateFan4Life

Guest
At the 1996 World Championships, Jim McKay of ABC Sports "interviewed" Peggy Fleming's son's shoe. It was hilarious. :rofl: McKay isn't exactly a stand-up comic, but he came across like one on that occasion.
 

Pau-goodle76

Rinkside
Joined
May 11, 2004
One of the worse imo, is the interview done by that Beth chick with Todd Eldredge. The show was called The Golden Gala,or something like that, and it took place after the Nagano games were over. She all made him cry by asking something like, 'How did you feel to watch your young teammate and training partner go and win the gold medal and have the national anthem played for her?' I remember going, "WTF?!?!?" and then I felt really bad when he started crying and was trying to stop but couldn't stop and she was just sitting there waiting for her answer. That was just wrong!
 

Ladskater

~ Figure Skating Is My Passion ~
Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 28, 2003
SkateFan4Life said:
What do you think were the worst televised figure skating interviews? My all-time worst commentary moment occurred at the 1988 Winter Olympics.
Canadian Brian Orser had just skated his long program and received his marks. He realized that he had finished second to American Brian Boitano - a heartbreaking defeat in his home country.

David Santee, commentating, shoved a microphone in Orser's face and said (to paraphrase) "Brian, I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is that you received a 6.0 for artistic impression. The bad news is that you finished second. How do you feel?"

UGH! How in heck to you think Brian felt, David? What an idiotic, insensitive question! (IMHO) Orser managed to be gentlemanlike and gave a polite response, but he probably felt like decking Santee. :mad:


Yes, I recall that famous moment. Brian Orser was devastated after the results. It was really in poor tatste. Also, ABC did a piece on Brian Orser and kept referring to him as "Mr. Second Place." That really got my dander up!!!!


:sheesh:
 
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