Look, you may not like this rule. But it exists and as such it must be applied - equally to all skaters.
Under the exact rules of ISU at that time, yes. But that's not the purpose of the thread. I am asking people to judge for themselves. When we study history, we see things in a different perspective than many people did during the given time period. Just because a black person was sent to prison for deciding to sit on a different part of the bus in 1955, that doesn't mean we still look at that act as a crime now in the future. Nothing can change what happened there, just as nothing can change Takahashi losing the 2008 World Figure Skating Bronze Medal because of a very poorly written rule. But, by using our own judgment rather than simply agreeing with the status quo of the time, we uncover truths.
As Hsuhs wrote, Daisuke Takahashi is perfectly capable of winning based on his skating. But to do so he needs to do well in both parts of the competition. And he did not do well in the 2007 SP and the 2008 LP. That's not Brian Joubert's fault.
Takahashi certainly did well in the 2007 SP. Not as well as Joubert but, then, Joubert didn't do as well as Takahashi in the LP. And that certainly is Joubert's fault. The extent to which Takahashi was better in the LP exceeds the extent to which Joubert was better in the SP, imo. Which means that Takahashi deserved Gold. This certainly shouldn't be confusing; how many times have we seen someone win the Gold Medal after not being the leader in the Short Program?
Also, let's make sure we understand something correctly - you don't need to do anything specifically (such as "skating well in both the SP and LP") to win a certain medal. You win a medal by doing better overall than the people below you when considering both phases of the competition. It is my judgment that Takahashi deserved 1st place in 2007 and 3rd place in 2008 when you consider what he accomplished in the SP + LP in comparison to his competitors. I can provide scoring details if that would help to illuminate my rankings.
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