State of the U.S. Men's Figure Skating for 2014-15

[karne]

I haven't seen Max's skate yet but I wouldn't be surprised if he lost a big chunk of support from the USFSA. Chances are he was dumped for Jason, the new golden boy.

Yawn. You and centrept would clearly get along well.

Just watched Max it's improved tremendously from last time. I think it's the choreo, especially in the middle part that's doing him disservice: it needs to have more in it; whereas Jason's SP (CoR performance I haven't watched yet) there's too much going on (though he'll have mastered it by Nats probably).

I think the part just after the camel spin needs a bit of rechoreo. He needs to really explode into the chorus, not kind of bounce around and then set off on some crossovers.

Something I don't understand about why his curls at SLC this year and at Skate Canada got some thumbs down:
IIRC, Adam Rippon's curls back in the day were not so different from Max's. And I thought that everyone loved Adam's curls, and that many were upset when he left them behind.

To me, Max's curls have an inherent "aura" of energy. Their positive vibe is esp. welcome when he is looking intense and not smiling.
His hair in 2012-13 suited Tron and West Side Story, but it was rather "safe." The changes last season and this season have been fine by me -- and I like that in both cases, they show more personality. :yes:

The curls grew on me. I thought they needed to be a little shorter because they seemed in his eyes sometimes. But this hair is giving me some Lysacek vibes.

I don't understand why Max continues to do the quad in combination; he invariably turns the triple toe into a double. Is the problem that he can't do preceeding steps into a quad jump, or is he just being stubborn about going for a 4/3? Surely, the 3lz3t would be quite easy for him.

Because he CAN land the 4S-3T. We've seen him do it before. He can do it again.

 

[aromaticchicken]

Because he CAN land the 4S-3T. We've seen him do it before. He can do it again.

Yeah but saying we've seen him land the 4S-3T when we haven't seen him do it in a while is a little silly.... I mean, we've seen Mirai land 3Lz-3T before too and Michelle Kwan used to be able to do a 3-3... I think it's a little frustrating seeing a skater whose main strength is his jumps performing a layout that is throwing away points. I get that he probably plans it 4-3, but given his success rate there (his 4S is often shaky to begin with, so the GOE isn't going to be the strongest anyway) it honestly makes much more sense for him to tack it onto the Lutz, especially in the short program. I just don't understand.

 

[karne]

I think the more important areas where he's leaving points on the table are his spins and steps. He's not leaving that many points on the table with the 4-2 compared to what he's losing on those.

 

[Wo|flax]

I think the part just after the camel spin needs a bit of rechoreo. He needs to really explode into the chorus, not kind of bounce around and then set off on some crossovers.

The curls grew on me. I thought they needed to be a little shorter because they seemed in his eyes sometimes. But this hair is giving me some Lysacek vibes.

:yes: that's the part that was most glaring;
I love the curls they were so bouncy at SC and he looks so cute with them. I wish he wouldn't slick it back and now that you've said Lysacek I can't unseen it :shocked: why

 

[CanadianSkaterGuy]

I think the more important areas where he's leaving points on the table are his spins and steps. He's not leaving that many points on the table with the 4-2 compared to what he's losing on those.

Not true. He leaves about 2.7 points on the table with the 2T instead of the 4T on the quad and that's at least 3 points if you factor in GoE. Even if he had maximum levels on his spins/footwork, he wouldn't get that much extra.

I agree that this 4-2 seems to be a perpetual issue with him. I just don't think he's one of those skaters who can effortlessly tack on a 3T to any landing.

 

[Mrs. P]

Well folks, I've updated the scores on the front page to account for Cup of China and Rostelecom Cup.

Richard Dornbush had a solid, if not perfect, effort at Cup of China to get the bronze. He did well considering the circumstances in the FS.

Jason Brown had his worst SP score as a senior at this competition, but pulled a new personal best to get his overall score on the top 5 list. Despite scoring higher overall than SA, the level of competition at RC was such that Jason could not place higher than 5th. His score would have beat himself for silver at Skate America, Max Aaron for the bronze at SC and Richard Dornbush for the bronze at COC, but that is the breaks as they say.

Max Aaron had a poor FS. Skate Canada was his better showing. He had a decent SP, but missed two quads. I do feel the judges really tanked him in PCS -- he did not even break 70 for the FS.

Stephen Carriere also fared worse here than he did at Skate Canada, which is too bad.

That said, field is still wide open.

COMING UP:
TEB: Richard Dornbush, Adam Rippon and Douglas Razzano
NHK: Jeremy Abbott, Ross Miner and Joshua Farris (which would be his season debut)

You can see all the score lists in the OP, but here's the summary:

OVERALL
Max Aaron 240.22* (U.S. International Classic, 1st)
Richard Dornbush 237.28* (Lombardia Trophy, 1st)
Jason Brown 237.17 (Nebelhorn Trophy, 1st)
Jason Brown 235.56 (Rostelecom Cup, 5th) + 9
Jason Brown 234.17 (Skate America, 2nd) -2
—
Max Aaron 231.77 (Skate Canada, 3rd) -7
Stephen Carriere 231.67 (Skate Canada 4th)
Ross Miner 227.26 (Skate Canada Autumn Classic, 1st)

SP

Jason Brown 83.59 (Nebelhorn Trophy)
Jeremy Abbott 82.81 (Skate America)
Stephen Carriere 80.33* (Skate Canada)
Ross Miner 80.24 (Skate Canada Autumn Classic)
Jason Brown 79.75 (Skate America)
——
Richard Dornbush 79.36 (Lombardia Trophy)
Max Aaron 78.96* (U.S. International Figure Skating Classic)
Richard Dornbush 77.23 (Cup of China)

FS

Max Aaron 161.26 (U.S. International Figure Skating Classic)
Jason Brown 159.24* (Rostelecom Cup) +13
Richard Dornbush 157.92* (Lombardia Trophy) -2
Max Aaron 155.27 (Skate Canada) -2
Jason Brown 154.42 (Skate America) -2
—
Jason Brown 153.58 -2 (Nebelhorn Trophy) -7
Stephen Carriere 151.34*
Adam Rippon 152.22 (Finlandia Trophy)

I'll add Douglas Razzano's scores from Graz when they become available.

 

[Tavi...]

Mrs. P - what do the plus and minus numbers mean? If you've already explain it somewhere else, just point me to the post - thanks!

 

[StitchMonkey]

Jason Brown had his worst SP score as a senior at this competition, but pulled a new personal best to get his overall score on the top 5 list. Despite scoring higher overall than SA, the level of competition at RC was such that Jason could not place higher than 5th. His score would have beat himself for silver at Skate America, Max Aaron for the bronze at SC and Richard Dornbush for the bronze at COC, but that is the breaks as they say.

Worth noting he actually would have bee the second highest FS at SC and highest at COC, but that comparisons is just. . . well I am just going to pretend that never happened and the winners just decided to draw straws. But like you said. What happens happens.

 

[Mrs. P]

Mrs. P - what do the plus and minus numbers mean? If you've already explain it somewhere else, just point me to the post - thanks!

They are part of my score tracker. Basically I give 15-13-11-9-7 to the Top 5 in Overall, SP, FS and the TES/PCS in the SP and FS segements, so a total of 7 different categories. Basically the +XX points mean they gained points after a recent competition and those who went farther down the list due to that point game is what the - points are.

For the record, here's the current scoring. Not claiming my system is the best, but just my way to track where the men stand:

Jason Brown — 161
Max Aaron — 74
Richard Dornbush — 46
Jeremy Abbott - 37
Stephen Carriere — 31
Ross Miner — 18
Adam Rippon — 11
Nathan Chen — 7

Jason has a super high score due to having multiple listings in the Overall score (3), the SP PCS score (3), the FS overall (2) and FS PCS (3).

He also makes a show in the remaining categories: SP overall (he still has the highest score from Nebelhorn), SP TES, and FS TES.

I'm hoping to see Dornbush or Abbott to balance things out by doing well at their events. Or Miner or Josh to surprise at NHK!

Other potential additions could come from Douglas Razzano at TEB and Grant Hochstein, who looks like will be sent to the Golden Spin Senior B in Croatia.

Jason's, Max's and Stephen's scores are pretty much solidified since they are done with their Senior B/GP events.

 

[centerpt1]

I anticipate (and hope) Dornbush will do well. Abbott tweeted he had the flu....so that may (or may not)affect NHK.

 

[IcyEdges]

I anticipate (and hope) Dornbush will do well. Abbott tweeted he had the flu....so that may (or may not)affect NHK.

Jeremy had the flu a week ago. It's 2 more weeks until NHK. If he isn't okay by then there's a big problem.

 

[Tavi...]

Thank you, Mrs P!

 

[Mrs. P]

In the interest of providing as much statistical information to you find U.S. men watchers and look for variances in data, such as highs and averages, I made two more calculations beyond the score tracker (whose weakness is that someone who does a lot of events well gets a more weighed score than someone that does fewer events).

First is the scoretracker based only season's best scores. Again I used 15-13-11-9-7 points and here's what I got.


Jason Brown -93 (#3 Overall, #1 SP Overall, #2 SP TES, #2 SP PCS, #2 FS Overall, #2 FS TES, #1 FS PCS)
Max Aaron - 72 (#1 Overall, #5 SP TES, #3 SP PCS, #1 FS Overall, #1 FS TES, #4 FS PCS)
Richard Dornbush- 69 (#2 Overall, #5 SP Overall, #3 SP TES, #5 SP PCS, #3 FS Overall, #5 FS TES, #2 FS PCS)
Stephen Carriere -51 (#4 Overall, #3 SP Overall, #1 SP TES, #5 FS Overall, #4 FS TES)
Ross Miner -41 (#5 Overall, #4 SP Overall, #4 SP TES, #4 SP PCS, #5 FS PCS)
Jeremy Abbott -39 (#2 SP Overall, #1 SP PCS, #3 FS PCS)
Adam Rippon -20 (#4 FS Overall, #3 FS TES)

Of course the obvious weakness of SB is that it only accounts for the BEST performance and does not note overall performance over the season.

So the third method of calculation was look at average of every category used in the score tracker. I simply ranked all the U.S. skaters then averaged their rankings over the 7 categories. The number below is the average ranking

#1 Jason Brown 2.14 (#1 Overall, FS, FS PCS; #2 SP, SP PCS; #3 FS TES; #5 SP TES)
#1 Richard Dornbush 2.14 (#1 SP TES, #2, Overall, FS, FS TES, FS PCS; #3 SP, SP PCS)
#3 Max Aaron 3.14 (#1 FS TES, #2 SP TES, #3 Overall and FS, #4 SP and FS PCS, #5 SP PCS)
#4 Jeremy Abbott 4.71 ( #1 SP, SP PCS, #3 FS PCS, #4 SP TES, #5 Overall, #7 FS, #12 FS TES)
#5 Ross Miner 5.71 (#4 SP PCS, #5 FS, FS PCS; #6 Overall, SP,#7 SP TES, FS TES)
#6 Stephen Carriere 5.86 (#4 Overall, #5 SP, FS TES; #6 SP TES, FS, FS PCS; #9 SP PCS)
#7 Adam Rippon 7.86 (#4 FS, #4 TES; #7 Overall, SP PCS, #8 FS PCS, #11 SP, #14 SP TES)

( I can how the rest of the skaters averages average and the actual averages, on request).

So all roads, as RIGHT NOW (knowing that Dornbush, Abbott and Rippon all have opportunities to improve their scores and averages in their second GP events):

1.) Despite Jason's struggles (#5 average SP TES) this season, he is still scoring relatively consistent relative to the other U.S. men. However, the averages show that Dornbush is RIGHT there with him (He is #2 in FS and Overall scores by just a few points). Dornbush has been relatively consistent on the quad this season, but has made silly mistakes that cost him points (see Cup of China FS).
2.) Max Aaron is not far behind and I'd argue still part of the trio to watch come January He continues to show strong TES scores, but as we saw today in Moscow, he is also prone to making costly mistakes. And I know Max is trying to improve in the PCS area, but the judges are not having it.
3.) Abbott only has competed once, so the averages obviously is just the ranking for one competition. The #12 ranking in FS TES is a bit concerning, but I think he can improve on that at NHK. His PCS is very solid, however, and rightfully so.
4.) Our Boston boys, Ross Miner and Stephen Carriere look relatively good, though they are lagging a bit the top 4. Miner has a chance to up his average at NHK.
5.) Disappointing season for Adam, especially compared to this time last season. However, he too, has a chance to improve at his next GP.

Okay that's about all the math I can do right now.

ETA: When I have a chance, I'd like to calculate the average for all the men. I'd like to see where the U.S. men rank relative to others. That's a project, of course.

 

[karne]

It's almost like the more Max tries to improve the PCS, the more the judges hate it.

 

[katmari]

Thanks so much Mrs. P!

 

[karne]

GASP! I have just realised the answer. It's the Lysacek hair! Lysacek could never land a quad, so of course Max loses his quadly powers when he has the Lysacek hair! Quick, someone rescue him!!!!!!!!!!!!

(This is my brain's in-denial reaction to the fact that I went to sleep and when I woke up the men's FS had actually happened.)

 

[StitchMonkey]

GASP! I have just realised the answer. It's the Lysacek hair! Lysacek could never land a quad, so of course Max loses his quadly powers when he has the Lysacek hair! Quick, someone rescue him!!!!!!!!!!!!

(This is my brain's in-denial reaction to the fact that I went to sleep and when I woke up the men's FS had actually happened.)

So the longer the hair the more issue with a quad. Works for Jason. And Dornbush is sporting a shorter cut and doing better. Ok which US man would look best bald?

 

[karne]

So the longer the hair the more issue with a quad. Works for Jason. And Dornbush is sporting a shorter cut and doing better. Ok which US man would look best bald?

It's not the length, it's the style. Max adopted the greasy slimy Lysacek look and suddenly the quad deserted him. Coincidence?!

 

[noskates]

Aww Karne, I knew you'd wake up to disappointment!!! The FS had taken place and the results were the same.

I don't know about oily, greasy, slicked back hair ruining quad - asthenics but I think it's pretty yucky to look at. Makes me think of a Quentin Tarantino movie! But if your theory is valid, there are going to be a lot of bald male figure skaters. I'll miss Javi's curls and Jason's ponytail!

 

[LRK]

It's not the length, it's the style. Max adopted the greasy slimy Lysacek look and suddenly the quad deserted him. Coincidence?!

So what's the cure - the Magic Mullet?