The Judging Controversy Thread

[drivingmissdaisy]

What do you think about this theory that the user (Andy) from ISU forum came up with--under COP, unlike 6.0 system, 2 judges are enough to severely impact the outcomes of any event?

Five judges scored Adelina over 151, and all of those within a range of about 5 points. There were not two judges who scored her unusually high.

You friend Andy used an example: SS: 7,7,7,7,7,7,7,9,9

That is not what happened here. Adelina's lowest SS was 8.5 and she had 6 9.0+. She got all 9.0+ on PE, eight 9.0+ on CH and IN. The judges absolutely loved the program. To argue that two judges caused the result here is, frankly, stupid and ignores anything gleaned from a basic review of the protocols.

Please don't take my word for it: http://www.isuresults.com/results/owg2014/owg14_Ladies_FS_Scores.pdf

I don't understand how we are arguing whether two judges tilted this event when Adelina's third highest score was higher than all of Yuna's.

 

[usethis2]

What do you think about this theory that the user (Andy) from ISU forum came up with--under COP, unlike 6.0 system, 2 judges are enough to severely impact the outcomes of any event?

http://forums.isu.org/viewtopic.php?t=2084&start=200&sid=12e78a6ef9cd39efab7a1e33f703b26a

This doesn't even factor into all the calls made by the possibly biased tech panel.

The math looks sound, but s/he did not consider that the top/bottom scores are discarded. I do think even one judge who are counted can alter the standings, in a situation like this.

Edit: Oh, wait. It isn't about scores but about investigation. Then maybe the method is sound.

 

[starrynight]

I'd say it's likely all the 151+ Adelina scores she won, as I doubt a judge would score both Yuna and Adelina within a point at 151. Adelina's two 145 scores are higher than 6 of Yuna's scores, so she probably won at least one of those. The two judges that absolutely hated Adelina, 141 and 143, probably preferred Yuna.

Stop speculating with "doubt," and "probably" but try all.

 

[Icey]

Yuna was crying after the competition...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxPp5n4irkA

She was probably crying for several reasons, one of which would be release from all of the built up pressure.


Could someone write a summary of this thread in thirty words or less?

 

[drivingmissdaisy]

Stop speculating with "doubt," and "probably" but try all.

Statistically it is nearly impossible. If you generated random pairs you would maybe get 1 out of 100 where Yuna wins 5. Practically, I cannot see a judge scoring Adelina 151 and not having that be the high score from that judge.

 

[yuki90]

http://m.voices.yahoo.com/scandal-fraud-death-figure-skating-12547557.html?cat=9

Scandal, Fraud, and Death of Figure Skating

It was the Russian mob politics that robbed Yuna Kim of South Korea of her rightful gold medal in front of the global TV audience. It was the ISU's premeditated device, since they began promoting the 15 year old Julia Lipnitskaia, that turned upside down the COP system as well as the integrity of figure skating.

If judged correctly, Sotnikova should have scored 65 or less in short and 135 in free, which gives her less than 200.

Facts remain facts. Frauds are frauds.Who wants to invest their time and sweat and life to this fraudulent work of travesty? Who will tell those young dreamers to become a figure skater if your glory depends on politics not sportmanship?Who will compete in that sport where corruption is your crown and fraud is the name of your medal?

 

[drivingmissdaisy]

http://m.voices.yahoo.com/scandal-fraud-death-figure-skating-12547557.html?cat=9

It was the Russian mob politics that robbed Yuna Kim of South Korea of her rightful gold medal in front of the global TV audience. It was the ISU's premeditated device, since they began promoting the 15 year old Julia Lipnitskaia, that turned upside down the COP system as well as the integrity of figure skating.

Facts remain facts. Frauds are frauds.Who wants to invest their time and sweat and life to this fraudulent work of travesty? Who will tell those young dreamers to become a figure skater if your glory depends on politics not sportmanship?Who will compete in that sport where corruption is your crown and fraud is the name of your medal?

The Yahoo Contributor Network authors are not real journalists. They might get paid $10 to write an article.

Edit: A completely biased fan wrote the article: http://voices.yahoo.com/ladies-event-sochi-there-will-yuna-kim-nothing-12539409.html?cat=14

 

[yuki90]

The Yahoo Contributor Network authors are not real journalists. They might get paid $10 to write an article.

Edit: A complete *******: http://voices.yahoo.com/ladies-event-sochi-there-will-yuna-kim-nothing-12539409.html?cat=14

Have you been watching figure skating? Really? Seriously?

Jesse Helms is prominent journalst and columist in figure skating for a long time.
Wayyyyyyyyyyyy better than you.

 

[drivingmissdaisy]

Have you been watching figure skating? Really? Seriously?

Jesse Helms is prominent journalst and columist in figure skating for a long time.
Wayyyyyyyyyyyy better than you.

The articles haven't even been proofread. However, I agree he is one of the more credible voices on the Yuna side of the debate. I'm glad we agree on something.

 

[vfvh]

http://m.voices.yahoo.com/scandal-fraud-death-figure-skating-12547557.html?cat=9

It was the Russian mob politics that robbed Yuna Kim of South Korea of her rightful gold medal in front of the global TV audience. It was the ISU's premeditated device, since they began promoting the 15 year old Julia Lipnitskaia, that turned upside down the COP system as well as the integrity of figure skating.

Facts remain facts. Frauds are frauds.Who wants to invest their time and sweat and life to this fraudulent work of travesty? Who will tell those young dreamers to become a figure skater if your glory depends on politics not sportmanship?Who will compete in that sport where corruption is your crown and fraud is the name of your medal?

Aah...I feel bad for Yuna...
However, The world will remember Yuna as a two time olympic champion like Katarina Witt or might be better than her
She deserves it.

 

[yuki90]

The articles haven't even been proofread. However, I agree he is one of the more credible voices on the Yuna side of the debate. I'm glad we agree on something.

OK. CAN YOU PLEASE BLOCK ME? ^^

 

[Andre Smith]

Have you been watching figure skating? Really? Seriously?

Jesse Helms is prominent journalst and columist in figure skating for a long time.
Wayyyyyyyyyyyy better than you.

The Russian and her friend judges are not less knowledgeable than the Yahoo contributor, but they are equal crooks not listening to their inner conscience.

 

[drivingmissdaisy]

The Russian and her friend judges are not less knowledgeable than the Yahoo contributor, but they are equal crooks not listening to their inner conscience.

Four of her friends thought it was the best LP of all time.

 

[yuki90]

The articles haven't even been proofread. However, I agree he is one of the more credible voices on the Yuna side of the debate. I'm glad we agree on something.

wow. You mean legendary skaters, prominent journalist in figure skating and

major journals form France, Germany, Austrailia, US are not credible. hahahahahahaha

Did you watch FRANCE channel 2 and Rai Sports from Italy??? They all said YuNa should have won the gold.

 

[sk8in]

The articles haven't even been proofread. However, I agree he is one of the more credible voices on the Yuna side of the debate. I'm glad we agree on something.

Unlike Katarina Witt and Brian Boitano?
*Also 2 of the judges (aside from the cheater, and wife) were from Russian satellite nations. So I don't think the 5 high scores exactly negates the conspiracy theory.

 

[Y Zygmunt]

See Just 1 amazing judged score against same 3Lz performance (She seemed to having trouble with 3Lz, and not yet fixed)
3Lz+3Lo in 2013 Grand Prix -1 -1 -1 -1 +1 0 0 -1 +1 (wrong edge)
3Lz in 2014 Euro Championship -3 -3 -2 -2 -3 -2 -3 -2 -2 (wrong edge)
3Lz+3T in 2014 Sochi Olympics +2 +2 -1 +1 +2 +2 +3 0 +1 (???? - we saw it was absolutely wrong edged)

 

[jehan215]

I thought we agreed that ISU should get rid of anonymous judging and implement transparecy to the current IJS?

Both sides of Yuna and Adelina have compelling reason to believe their skater one. HOWEVER, the current circumstances or facts that were made known to the public about the ex-banned judges, wife of the Russian Federation president, and a Russian technical controller is putting weight towards the concerns that Yuna's fans are expressing. In that case, it would be better for the head of ISU to do a full-blown investigation. It's inevitably questionable as to why such a judge who caused so much trouble in the past (I'm referring to Yuri Balkov) would be allowed back on the panel? Even if he did judge fairly this time - which I doubt - questions may be raised against his credibility because of his past, like the old tale of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf". Yes, some people may say "Well, why bring that up now?" and that is also a reasonable argument. But the same logic can be brought from the 2008 Financial Crisis - we can only find out about things in hindsight. Still, it doesn't make the fact any less arguable and punishable. The same logic applies to the Russian Federation president's wife. Surely there must have been other fully competent judges out there. Why was her name in the ballot in the first place? Shouldn't there have been a disclosure of conflict of interest? There are other speculations that Adelina's ex-coach (Olga Baranova) was on the panel - this one needs a bit more researching. In addition, there have been many cases of "foot-tapping" and collusion amongst judges (2002 SLC and 1998 Nagano). The veil provided by ISU is, as blatant this may sound, abused by the judges. We may never know what happens behind that veil. If the ISU stands by what the judges delievered last week, then they should not be afraid to hide anything from the public. Without looking fairly deep into it and defending themselves with not much supporting evidence, the public may rather develop stronger suspicion.

A mere statement from Cinquanta saying that he would rather have a good judge with a possibility of conflict of interest just doesn't cut it. It just proves how much little integrity he has for this sport in making the playing field transparent and level as possible - going against not only the Olympic spirit but also sportsmanship. Since figure skating is a subjective sport, there will never be a perfect scoring system. Some people don't even count it as a sport - those are ones who only watch it once in four years. Therefore for this sport to be recognized, for it to gain more attraction from the public, the ISU can't just sit back and say "This is your score. Deal with it. We'd rather have competent but fishy judges." Every skater puts sweat and blood to perform as they do on the ice. I think the ISU owes it to them to at least initiate a constructive discussion and work their a** off too, to award skaters with what they genuinely deserve - without any non-performance related influences.

 

[evangeline]

LMAO. That "Jesse Helms" person is even less objective and credible than the Yu-Na fan that runs the Fever Skating website. At least the Fever Skating person actually looked at how the skaters skated at the Olympics.

On the other hand, The "Scandal, Fraud, and Death of Figure Skating" article offers zero analysis of actual skating, only histrionic comments on some "premeditated device" and/or "devious plot" by the ISU, sprinkled with some rants about Putin and North Korea (????).

Look at what "Helms" (which I doubt is his real name as he does not write like a native English speaker) says in his article about Lipnitskaya:

It had been set up already long before the game began. Last year throughout the Grand Prix, Julia Lipnitskaia caused a storm winning every competition with her consistency but questionable qualities and super inflated scores.

As I indicated in the earlier articles, that presaged this storm.

This is not an anomaly in which those pro Russian judges and the mad Russian mob raped and butchered the sport in live TV. It was the ISU that conceived it all several months ago.

Firstly, Lipnitskaya's Cup of Russia win was controversial, but did anyone actually think her Skate Canada win was controversial or super-inflated? Not that I recall.

Secondly, she did not win every competition on the Grand Prix, Mao Asada beat her at the GPF.

Thirdly, using words like "pro Russian judges and the mad Russian mob raped and butchered the sport in live TV" absolutely demolishes any shred of credibility "Helms" may have possessed. Talk about outrageously OTT language.

More importantly, nowhere does "Helms" offer any proof of whatever ISU plot he thinks exists. All he says are completely false statements like:

In the 2013 Worlds Adelina Sotnikova's perfect short program which is an almost exact replica of hers in Sochi earned barely 60. Now nearly 75? Are you kidding?

To start, Adelina didn't skate an "almost exact replica" of her Sochi program at 2013 Worlds. Adelina skated to her Capriccio Espagnol SP in Canada, while she skated to Carmen in Sochi, which is a completely different program.

Secondly, Adelina did not skate perfectly at 2013 Worlds. She clearly UR-ed her 3T-3T in Canada and received a <. However, her 3T-3T in Sochi was huge and clearly rotated. It was one of the best 3T-3Ts I've ever seen her do, much better than the one she landed in Canada.

Thirdly, Adelina received a Level 2 spin in Canada (I need to re-watch her 2013 Worlds SP again, but IIRC, she made a mistake and didn't hold one of her positions long enough). In Sochi, Adelina received all level 4s on her spins.

Fourthly, Adelina skated far better in terms of PCS in Sochi then she did in Canada--much more speed, attack, energy, etc.

Given that Adelina skated better in Sochi than in Canada, is it a surprise that Adelina scored higher in Sochi?

Also:

The truth is that a skater like Adelina Sotnikova or Julia Lipnitskaia needs at least five years of hard training and a bit of luck to reach the kind of level of skating of these trio veterans.

Adelina and Julia are definitely weaker than skaters like Yu-Na, Mao and Carolina in many areas of their skating. On the other hand, they match or exceed the "trio veterans" in other areas of skating. Adelina and Julia have better spins, for instance, and they have more transitions in their current programs than at least 2 of the 3 members of the "trio veterans." But my biggest question is, why five years of hard training? Is there an arbitrary five year limit in the ISU handbook that prevents up-and-coming skaters from scoring as high as the veterans?

And finally, I don't even know what to make of this hysterical ranting about Putin and North Korea:

No matter how North Korea tries to convince the world that their people live in paradise, millions are still starving to death. Putin and his chauvinistic crowd cheer for Adelina's skating and her scores, but it cannot make her skating worthy of gold, not even surpass Kostner.

Russian's logics and the ISU's denial shall continue but it's out there for everybody to see. North Korea's mythic leader may be a god riding the cloud to those dying North Korean, but to the world they are simply brainwashed people in a pathetic condition.

I don't get it. Is "Helms" somehow linking "Russian's logics" and the ISU to North Korea in this "devious plot" he is protesting against? Did North Korea somehow contribute to the scoring of the Sochi ladies' event?

 

[ngfriend]

lolol

http://www.change.org/ru/петиции/korean-netizens-apologize-to-adelina-sotnikova

all those "Koreans" out there better apologize to Adelina right now.

LMFAO -Apology to Adelina.... Wat da hell for!! You stole gold!!

 

[tetana]

LMFAO -Apology to Adelina.... Wat da hell for!! You stole gold!!

I think before they do, ISU should apology to the World about the corruption. Especially to all figure skaters and relating publics.

Anyhow, Russia federation and ISU caused this happening.