Lysacek, Shibutani and Shibutani Withdraw from 2013 U.S. International Classic
- Thread starter gsk8
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Me too. Heck I don't even know if he can do what Sasha did and that is to compete at Nationals.
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As a reigning Olympic medalist, he gets a bye to Nationals, but IF he shows up will he be competitive?!
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- Feb 17, 2010
I was thinking the same thing. I suspect this whole "comeback" is just to keep his name out there for sponsorships. I don't think he wants to tarnish his brand with a poor performance at Skate America or US Nationals.
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His brand's shelf life is nearly expired to begin with. He knows that he needs to compete at the coming Nationals/Olympics. Without visibility his financial opportunities will fade. It doesn't matter if he doesn't do well at the Olympics, he'll always already be an "Olympic Champion" and have a base-line ability to throw that title around to make money. He wants more than just the base-line, though, and this is the only way he'll get it - competing. Almost nobody actually cares about him as a skater or individual. He needs the platform of the Olympics to simply present his name to a new audience.
Personally I think they should have went with it with anonymous sources or not report it rather than this weird middle-of-the road tease they ended up doing. If they had multiple sources (as they claimed in various responses on Facebook) confirming the withdraw then they should have reported it with the caveat that they couldn't provide attribution because the source isn't authorized to release it or whatever.
They could had went to USFSA and asked them, "Is Evan WDing?" Likely they would say "No comment." Fine. Guess what, USFSA looks like fools later when they release their news release. Why not go directly to Frank Carroll and ask him. He's been on TSL before, I'm sure he would be willing to at least confirm on background. He doesn't strike me as someone who would walk the USFSA PR line ( I mean....just look at his past comments...).
Basically, if the USFSA isn't going to be your friend (give you credentials), then you might as well scoop them and force them to work with you. Scooping them would be a bigger "up yours" then getting all your fans to write mindless letters.
Instead, you had all this, "Is it Max?" "Is it Josh?" "Who is it?!" It actually created more questions than answers.
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I am aware that Lysacek is not Mr. Popularity, but the assessment above strikes me as overly harsh. Although I do not have strong feelings in Lysacek's favor, I believe that he deserves my respect for winning the Olympics and for other accomplishments.
Just last month, Sasha Cohen singled him out for praise in her reddit AMA:
Q. Who are your favorite current skaters?
A. I'd have to say Evan Lysacek is probably my favorite skater. I've known him since I was 12 years old. His determination and work ethic really show you that it isn't always the most talented person, but the person most willing to take it home.
http://np.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comment...2x_olympian_3x_world_figure/cbnlwpv?context=3
A. I'd have to say Evan Lysacek is probably my favorite skater. I've known him since I was 12 years old. His determination and work ethic really show you that it isn't always the most talented person, but the person most willing to take it home.
http://np.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comment...2x_olympian_3x_world_figure/cbnlwpv?context=3
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They did confirm very early on that it wasn't Max (mostly because they got a flood of people on their FB page saying "I hope it's not Max!"). But the way they bandied it about as shocking and surprising, when only a week or two ago they were saying that Lysacek withdrawing would NOT be surprising, made a lot of people worry that it was Stephen or Joshua, and when Stephen was confirmed training, then that left only Joshua, who has had enough injuries already to last an entire career. I'm sure it freaked a few people out. And then it was Lysacek. Which was NOT shocking or surprising at all.
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- Jan 15, 2010
I was reading the Lysacek #TheseAreMoments post by the USFSA (or was it the injury post?) on Facebook, and it seemed like people were divided on Lysacek. So people were "over him" and the other half were genuinely concerned for his well-being. While I am no Evan Lysacek fan, I would never be so excited about him getting an injury--the fact that people are almost giddy kind of disturbs me.
Anyway, like many others have said, it's really not surprising that Lysacek got an actual injury--that guy has never learned how to ease up on the training. He's not as young as he used to be. Not everyone can be immortal like Plushenko.
Judging by the handful of (negative) responses to the way TSL "handled things," clearly, one should never play Guess Who? in terms of skating ("I'm disappointed that you'd do something that was so beneath you," etc). I guess it should just stay in the entertainment business.
I guess I was never freaked out like other people were--I mean, it wasn't as if they were dangling a gigantic carrot in front of us and we would never, ever be able to reach it. Another factor would be that I wasn't as emotionally invested in any of the three skaters as others were.
I do wish both Alex and Evan have speedy recoveries though. I really do. I like watching the Shibutani siblings and I'm actually quite curious as to what Evan's programs look like.
My criticism is strictly constructive. I don't have any personal issues with the folks at TSL nor do I find them vile or anything like that. So the whole dangling carrot thing didn't really bother me that much, I'm just responding from a strictly academic perspective, since I write/report for a living (granted, it's on a much more local scale, but the same rules apply).
They have continued to dangle the "One 2013 World team member is going to change coaches soon..." carrot for a week or two now....and by dangling the carrot they got somebody (who may or may not be reliable) claiming that it's Gracie leaving to go to Frank Carroll.
Again, if they have reliable sources at Toyota that confirms the information, they should simply put it out there, or not say anything until they have the sources (be it anon or otherwise) to say something. If you look at most sports journalists, that's how they roll. They don't go "Oh, we have a source that told us that a certain NBA player is being traded off!" No, they hold off until they can say "We have multiple sources that state that LeBron James is heading to Miami next season..." (obviously just an example).
I sympathize with TSL and the fact that they don't want to burn their sources or have it come back to those sources...but that's the thing with scoops...You either scoop with the risk that it hasn't gone through official channels...or you wait until you feel pretty confident about releasing all the information, front and center. You don't do the carrot dangling game.
And what was confusing to me was the whole, "It's shocking because he was actually injured" thing...
Again, this affirms why it's important to either release the information or you don't say anything at all. They actually had enough on the record, even with out the "source," to state that it was likely Evan that would be WD-ing. Instead of a speculative tweet that can get all kinds of misinterpretion (just look at the TSL FB thread and you can see that in action), they could have posted a blog post stating that....1.) That Evan is likely to WD from SLC based on multiple sources. Earlier reports indicated that Evan was highly injured during Champs Camp, blah blah.....context/background helps too.
It's also OK to state what you don't know/haven't confirmed also, i.e. USFSA wouldn't comment, Evan was still listed on the ISP for SLC as of X date, etc.
That's the thing journalists do. They curate pieces of information to help readers explain the situation at hand. And that curation is ongoing. They don't cause further speculation that may lead to inaccurate information.
For example, Sylvia (of SylviaUnseen Twitter fame) is really great at this. She is really good about stating what she knows or doesn't know and promises to add to that information as she gets updates. She never plays the speculation game and she is very respectful of her sources and readers. I actually used her in a presentation on how you curate information/build readership via social media.
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I agree with Sasha's statement 100%.
As far as Evan's popularity, you can't gauge it just by just looking at skating sites like FSU, Great Skate, and ONTD. I know many Evan fans, and 95% of them do not access the skating forums because they view the posters as too catty, mean spirited and cruel.
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- Feb 27, 2012
IMO, when a person gets giddy over another person's misfortune, it says a lot about their character.... or lack thereof.
Luckily for Alex, it sounds like a minor injury and he should be fully healed for Skate America.
I enjoyed Evan's Black Swan program that he debuted at Sun Valley. Hopefully he will be healed in time for Skate America.
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I want to give Evan the benefit. But several times du ring this quad (one where he has yet to show a quad though talks about it lol) we hear the princess boy in Vera Wang is coming back only to be like Lucy to Charlie Brown the football is snatched from us. He has an injury but still somehow most are not surprised. We'll see if he skates the GP. I am kind of against that silly US rule that olympic medallists automatically earn their way to Nationasl 4 years later. EVan is a competitor though so you never know.
Aww poor Evan. I wish I loved his skating because I like the guy. I just don’t see Evan gaining as much momentum as he thinks competing this time around. Sarah competing immediately after the Olympics didn’t help her any either. Well maybe it will bring a few endorsements. He did get that one endorsement recently.
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That's an excellent point about him getting injured w/o competing. I suspect he isn't going to show. There's no upside to this comeback. He's not a dominant technician (no reliable quad....ever) and he's lucky to finish top 5 in Sochi.
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