Reputational judging in figure skating

[Magill]

Applauding a skater for competing while injured and with a head injury - I can’t even with that. His choice of course but it was dangerous and sends the wrong message competing with a likely concussion - a way worse message than you can fall 5 times and get 84 PCS if your popularity is sound enough.

It was the system and its rules that left the decision to the skater and skater only, no matter the state he was in, no matter how blurred his mind was and how well he understood his medical condition. And it was the system that has been broadly criticized by many Japanese athletes from other sports for making skaters take this decision right after an accident, including by Yuzuru himself. And no, not the scoring, lol, scoring was the least important in this mess and TBH I find it surprising that anyone feels an urge to go back to discuss it 10 years later. It was the revealed lack of medical safety and emergency regulations at the rink which was way more important. Criticizing an athlete for taking a decision demanded from him by the system is something new to me. So both the athlete and judges had to operate in the horrid circumstances they found themselves under, the best they could at the moment, and whatever they did was responding in a shock to an emergency. I for one applauded the score, and would not feel anything else right under the circumstances.
And what is more worrying AFAIK, the ISU rules on accidents have not been been changed in this aspect since, despite the pile of international criticism that followed, and many other amendments being introduced. It's not about sending messages, it's about having the rules. As Yuzu and other sports' Japanese OGMs pointed commenting on this, an athlete will want to compete, and especially if he's young and his mind is somewhat blurred, he will not have a good judgement of the medical situation, so this decision in such severe medical circumstances should not have been left in his hands as that is irresponsible. The way it was, criticizing him for it is somewhat petty to me.
I can only repeat - you may like it or not but this was not a case of reputational scoring, so you're barking a wrong tree.

Personally I thought then and think now that cancelling the free skate after such a horrible accident and just keeping placements from SP would have been much wiser, safer and more fair solution from the organizers.

 

[Isk]

And we need to stop this fallacy that PCS (I assume you meant that not GOE) is supposed to be independent of jumping/elements.

PCS is program component scores - jumps/elements are part of the program. If somebody falls on every jumping pass, bails every lift, trips out of each spin, and stumbles in their footwork, you shouldn’t be able to award them 9’s because they stayed on their feet and had really really nice skating during the inbetweens.

Watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHooKLsQvkU
Every jump messed up, but mesmerizing skating and commitment in presentation to the end. I guess music helped, doing this to an uplifting music would be much harder. Protocols are archived. He probably didn't get 9s, I wonder if he deserved some. I wish his coaches wouldn't have allowed him to skate so soon after an injury and go through this experience, but you never know, he placed 2nd in 4CC with almost a clean skate later in the season. And then retired. The last classical US skater with technique, lines, SS, presentation and understanding of music, there is no one like this in the US now. Lukas Broussard is trying but I don't think he'll get there, because ISU wind is blowing in the other direction.

 

[CanadianSkaterGuy]

Watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHooKLsQvkU
Every jump messed up, but mesmerizing skating and commitment in presentation to the end. I guess music helped, doing this to an uplifting music would be much harder. Protocols are archived. He probably didn't get 9s, I wonder if he deserved some. I wish his coaches wouldn't have allowed him to skate so soon after an injury and go through this experience, but you never know, he placed 2nd in 4CC with almost a clean skate later in the season. And then retired. The last classical US skater with technique, lines, SS, presentation and understanding of music, there is no one like this in the US now. Lukas Broussard is trying but has some way to go.

Here's the protocols: https://www.isuresults.com/results/gpjpn2014/gpjpn2014_Men_FS_Scores.pdf

I'd say the judges for the most part correctly marked him down. But if he were an established skater (he was not, at the time and had his breakthrough at 4CC as you said) - his PCS would have been way higher. Josh Farris is a lovely skater (arguably the best/most effortless/best postured 3A when he nailed it) but yeah, if you have 2 falls and 4 pops, and an error on EVERY jumping pass... the scores should reflect that.

The judging for Hanyu in that protocol is ridiculous too .... like Murakami skates basically flawless and gets sub-80..... but Hanyu doubles the 4S, triples and falls on the 4T, and singles a 3A.... and gets a PCS of 82. In the SP Hanyu had a UR fall and no successful combo (2 major errors on 3 jumping passes) and still got 42.11, including a 9.00 and several 8.75s - meanwhile Jeremy Abbott goes clean (no quad but still 3A/3Z/3F+3T) and gets 40.89. https://www.isuresults.com/results/gpjpn2014/gpjpn2014_Men_SP_Scores.pdf

 

[Skater Boy]

^ To me, that assessment is overly harsh. Since this is a thread about "reputation" my bottom-line takeaway is that in this completion Petrosian neither enhanced nor diminished hers. She goes away as she came in -- not the button on Fortune's cap, nor the soles of her feet.

IMO the judges felt the same way. On the one hand, she won the competition and it's better to win than to lose. Conversely, she did nothing to distance herself from other aspirants. Looking at the protocols, the top three were evenly matched, with a big gap between that trio and the rest of the field, as expected. The only thing that seems to show any judges' favoritism to Petrosian is that she got a lot of +3s on elements that deserved only a +2. LOL.

As for opportunities for nitrpicking and wuzrobbing, this event provided thin gruel. We will have to wait until later in the season before making our Olympic predictions.

First reputational judging has always been an issue in figure skating. Even GOE's has the opportunity for judges to give their biases or predetermined placements etc. GOE's, pcs - the former artistic marks all have lots of room for "human" biases. I think here the real issue was not AIN but Loena - she could have been buried in the short. Petrosian reputational or otherwise really does not look to play much of a factor come the podium at least without quads. Now I don't know does she have a 3A for the sp and can she do the quads cleanly and fully rotated for the free. That would make her competitive for sure but not dominate like the Russian ladies of 2022 where the arsenal of quads if skated reasonably well unlike Valieva who was still forth before being disqualified. I don't think we saw much "reputational judging" with Petrosian. Maybe Loena. And I do think I would have had Davide a bit higher score wise but he isn't Jason Brown with a reputation. This is a judged sport with so much room for human interpretation. There will always be debates abotu judging.

 

[Isk]

Here's the protocols: https://www.isuresults.com/results/gpjpn2014/gpjpn2014_Men_FS_Scores.pdf

I'd say the judges for the most part correctly marked him down. But if he were an established skater (he was not, at the time and had his breakthrough at 4CC as you said) - his PCS would have been way higher. Josh Farris is a lovely skater (arguably the best/most effortless/best postured 3A when he nailed it) but yeah, if you have 2 falls and 4 pops, and an error on EVERY jumping pass... the scores should reflect that.

The judging for Hanyu in that protocol is ridiculous too .... like Murakami skates basically flawless and gets sub-80..... but Hanyu doubles the 4S, triples and falls on the 4T, and singles a 3A.... and gets a PCS of 82. In the SP Hanyu had a UR fall and no successful combo (2 major errors on 3 jumping passes) and still got 42.11, including a 9.00 and several 8.75s - meanwhile Jeremy Abbott goes clean (no quad but still 3A/3Z/3F+3T) and gets 40.89. https://www.isuresults.com/results/gpjpn2014/gpjpn2014_Men_SP_Scores.pdf

He sort of had a reputation. He was very strong in juniors, won junior worlds in 2013 and had a quad, albeit inconsistent, but it was normal in those days. Such guys didn't go unnoticed. Here is his SP from 2012 junior worlds where he placed 2nd: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfYvCmzCSlo, mark the 3A and flow throughout the program. Senior debut was not easy: Oly-season, 4T was still inconsistent, 2 spots and a few competitors, and injuries. In the end he had a short senior career because of injuries, tried to come back but it didn't work out. Thank you for the protocol and your assessment, the same program at 4CC earned 8s on average, with some 7s and some 9s: http://www.isuresults.com/results/fc2015/fc2015_Men_FS_Scores.pdf (wow, I can find them too, hooray )

 

[Mathman]

What she is, is Russian, and the score is inflated because of it.

Let’s be clear - a 9.0 being given to you by a judge swayed by politics doesn’t mean you skate really really well - it is a score that SHOULD be awarded to if you skate really really well, regardless of where you hail from.

I think we are conflating two issues here that are largely unrelated. "Russia, Russia, Russia" is a separate topic from reputation judging.

Hanyu fell five times at cup of China and still got good PCSs. He isn't Russian.

Patrick Chan fell twice at 2013 Worlds and still got 9's in skating skills. I would like to think that this was because he displayed superior blade-to-ice skills despite the falls. Possibly it was because he had a big reputation going in as, "the one. the only, PATRICK CHAN, master of the blade and reigning world champion." One thing for sure, though -- he did not receive any sort of skating-while-Russian bonus.

I think that in any judged sport, the following mind set does play a role. The champion became champion by knocking out the old champion. If you, the new kid on the block, want to become champion, you also have to knock out the reigning champ. If you just pussy-foot around scoring a half-point here and a half-point there, no, you didn't do enough to take his crown. A tie will almost always go to the "Winner and still Heavyweight Champion of the World!!!!!"

 

[Ziotic]

I think we are conflating two issues here that are largely unrelated. "Russia, Russia, Russia" is a separate topic from reputation judging.

Hanyu fell five times at cup of Chiuna and still got good PCSs. He isn't Russian.

Patrick Chan fell twice at 2013 Worlds and still got 9's in skating skills. I would like to think that this was because he displayed superior blade-to-ice skills despite the falls. Possibly it was because he had a big reputation going in as, "the one. the only, PATRICK CHAN, master of the blade and reigning world champion." One thing for sure, though -- he did not receive any sort of skating-while-Russian bonus.

I think that in any judged sport, the following mind set does play a role. The champion became champion by knocking out the old champion. If you, the new kid on the block, want to become champion, you also have to knock out the reigning champ. If you just pussy-foot around scoring a half-point here and a half-point there, no, you didn't do enough to take his crown. A tie will almost always go to the "Winner and still Heavyweight Champion of the World!!!!!"

Falling on a jump doesn’t mean your step sequence isn’t the master class example of blade work.

So I understand separating them, but these skates are before the mandatory limits on PCS for programs with a fall.

 

[gkelly]

I figure there are three general categories of what we call reputational judging:

1) The judge knows exactly who the skater is, what they've done in the past, and what kind of scores they've received in the past, and they consciously have a mindset of what range of scores they expect to give in this performance, in a relatively narrow range. So if it's a bad performance by a known star, the judge may award scores on the lower end of their expected range, but it won't occur to them to go even lower. Or similarly for an excellent performance from a skater who has never lived up to their potential in the past (to the judge's knowledge) so even if they do so now the judge is not prepared to score above the upper end of their expected range for this skater, even if this performance was much better than the judge could have imaged from this skater.

2) The judge knows who the skater is, what they've done and how they scored in the past, or they know something about them (like their nationality and national ranking, what jumps they are capable of, etc.), which sets certain mental expectations in the judge's mind. They're not consciously trying to apply that outside knowledge, they just want to judge the performance as they see it, but, being human, they can't help being somewhat influenced, subconsciously, by this knowledge. Skate order can also play a similar subconscious role in applying scoring ranges.

3) The judge really is doing a very good job of scoring the present performance according to the guidelines and that judge's mental standards for what scores go with what kind of performance. Which will include overlaps between stronger skaters having a bad day and weaker skaters having a good day.

A weaker skater on the best day will have skill-based limits on the highest scores they're capable of earning, and a skater who is much better technically will start from a higher base before any point loss for errors or other problems in that particular performance. A senior world medalist especially one who is particularly strong even by world medalist standards on Skating Skills or Composition, for example, will likely still have more/stronger strengths than, say, an intermediate-level skater on their very best day. This drastic a difference should be evident even to casual fans. But the difference between a skater who typically deserves 9s (good day) vs. 8s (bad day) may be less clear than one whose range is usually 7s (good) to 6s or high 5s (bad day).

Especially if we're watching on video only and can't see and hear the qualitative differences in skating skills, or see the ice coverage and program layout as well as judges with their front row seats.

So we may be inclined to award higher scores to a performance with fewer errors or better projection and musicality, for example, while not being in a position to appreciate the areas where the stronger skater was still stronger even with errors.

And then, of course, any two fans or any two judges might have different priorities over which criteria to give most weight to or somewhat different scales of how to award specific numbers to specific qualities. If you and I watch the same performance in the same conditions, we might give different scores without our difference of opinion representing "reputation judging." (Or maybe it does.) Similarly if two judges on the same panel give significantly different scores. So if we disagree with any/all judges on the panel, it can be an honest difference of opinion.

It's also possible that we ourselves were subconsciously influenced by skaters' reputation as in 2) above.

 

[gsk8]

Well, it does prove my point. They don't understand what they are watching if Adelia was just 66 PCS.

That didn't take long. The whole reason you created this thread was to rant about the injustice of Petrosian's PCS (like you did when you and others helped derail the entire Skate to Milano competition thread).

That won't happen during the Olympics

 

[CanadianSkaterGuy]

I think we are conflating two issues here that are largely unrelated. "Russia, Russia, Russia" is a separate topic from reputation judging.

Hanyu fell five times at cup of Chiuna and still got good PCSs. He isn't Russian.

Patrick Chan fell twice at 2013 Worlds and still got 9's in skating skills. I would like to think that this was because he displayed superior blade-to-ice skills despite the falls. Possibly it was because he had a big reputation going in as, "the one. the only, PATRICK CHAN, master of the blade and reigning world champion." One thing for sure, though -- he did not receive any sort of skating-while-Russian bonus.

I think that in any judged sport, the following mind set does play a role. The champion became champion by knocking out the old champion. If you, the new kid on the block, want to become champion, you also have to knock out the reigning champ. If you just pussy-foot around scoring a half-point here and a half-point there, no, you didn't do enough to take his crown. A tie will almost always go to the "Winner and still Heavyweight Champion of the World!!!!!"

I thought this thread was about reputational judging... so if we're talking about national reputation, in the context of the big nations... Japan in singles/pairs, China in pairs, and Russia/Canada/US in basically every event are all prone to having higher PCS for their fave skaters (with some exceptions, like Skate Canada doing little to back Schizas who gets meh PCS even when she's improved and skates clean). In Skate To Milano, Safonova from Belarus and Brain from Monaco were good examples of skaters who skated well but would never be given the PCS/GOE boost for belonging to one of the major nations.

Patrick didn't receive a skating while Russian bonus but he's had a reputation bonus, and competitions/segments where he skated poorly and was held up (2013 Worlds being a prime example). Another example is the Olympic team event when he had 2 falls in the SP and still got 45 PCS which is all kinds of ridiculous (https://www.isuresults.com/results/season1718/owg2018/OWG2018_TeamMen_SP_M_Scores.pdf). If he wasn't an established skater (3-time world champ), and was from another country even with his sublime skating, he would have been buried. Chen (who was still a relative newcomer but was backed hard by the US fed) also got a "nation reputation" bonus with 43.88 in spite of errors on all 3 passes: turning a 4-3 into a 4-2, doubling his solo quad, and falling on his triple axel. Bychenko (Israel) and Cha (South Korea) skated clean but their PCS were 40.60 and 36.99.

Yes, you have exceptions like Javier Fernandez or Loena Hendrickx who come from less prominent countries who break through. But they had to grind to get to where they were. Obviously they improved but they weren't given the PCS bonus off the bat that several skaters from the "major" nations get.

 

[Mathman]

Falling on a jump doesn’t mean your step sequence isn’t the master class example of blade work.

I think that even that a (step sequence that shows mastery of blade work) is tricky. If your step sequence is masterful, you get big positive GOE on that (non-jump) element. bot tp mention levels. But PCSs are supposed to reward the"whole program" aspects of skating. If you get big GOE on the element and on top of that big PCSs for the same thing, is that double-dipping?

Similarly the tendency to automatically give +3 to a quad that deserves a +1 but. hey, quad is hard and so to deserves a little more. The little more is already rewarded in the base value.

 

[Mathman]

I thought this thread was about reputational judging... so if we're talking about national reputation, in the context of the big nations... in basically every event are all prone to having higher PCS for their fave skaters

Thank you for that explanation. I see now whatvthe problem is. We are using different definitions of what "reputational judging" means. To me, I thought the term referred to "the rich get richer" tendency to dole out extra rewards in the present because of what the recipient achieved in the past. like if a judge gave Scott Hamilton special consideration at the 1984 Olympics for having won the previous 4 world championships. This human tendency has nothing to do with where you come from or how big your federation is.

(I looked up the term, but did not find anything relevant, only methods of "evaluating something's reputation," like questionnaires designed to see if consumers have a favorable or unfavorable view of a particular product -- what is the product.s "reputation" among stakeholders.)

I think that @gkelly gave the best analysis in post #48, especially point #1.

 

[Skating91]

That didn't take long. The whole reason you created this thread was to rant about the injustice of Petrosian's PCS (like you did when you and others helped derail the entire Skate to Milano competition thread).

That won't happen during the Olympics

I think that's a little unfair (Petrosian was lowballed Ted and Mark were absolutely gushing about every element and then scores barely ahead of a error riddled Hendrickx program that lacked confidence and energy), but I won't complain too much this skating community is more fair than any other. Grateful for this community.

Anyway, Petrosian only had two weeks preparation before the Olympic event because of injury. If she's injury free the next 5 months she returns her ultra-c and she will take the decision out of the judges hands.

I will be careful to not antagonise those

 

[frompolandwithlove]

I think that even that a (step sequence that shows mastery of blade work) is tricky. If your step sequence is masterful, you get big positive GOE on that (non-jump) element. bot tp mention levels. But PCSs are supposed to reward the"whole program" aspects of skating. If you get big GOE on the element and on top of that big PCSs for the same thing, is that double-dipping?

That would be double-dipping if PCS were based only on the quality of step sequence. But - surprisingly enough - skaters do have to show mastery of blade work outside of step sequence as well. In fact, I would even say that this should be the most important goal of every program - to highlight their actual skills in skating, you know, the thing they do when they are not jumping or spinning. Program full of falls and pops can still be very difficult skating-wise, skater can still generate speed with ease, have excellent flow, travel on one foot across the whole ice rink - and those skills deserve recognition just as much as quads do. Just like it is the other way around - skater who skates poorly, but has massive jumps, gets GOE for the jump itself and not for the skating before and after said jump.

As for reputation in judging - well, I feel this is the problem of unclear judging criteria. Many vague points that allow judges to stretch their objectivity (like "effortlessness" - how do you measure it? "Good take off" also gives too much room for interpretation etc.). So either we come up with very very specific written criteria for every move skaters could perform on the ice, or we accept human aspect of judging with all its flaws. (Don't get me wrong, I also hate bonus-for-being-russian/backed-up-by-big-fed/artificialy-hyped, but I don't really have any reasonable ideas how to get rid of it. Maybe we should be able to randomly ask judges to justify their notes? But then again, who would decide if their justification is sufficient enough? Another potenatially biased organ? Sorry, now i'm just thinking out loud

 

[TallyT]

Ted and Mark were absolutely gushing about every element...

Ummm this is Ted and Mark mate, they wax lyrical about everything that is anywhere above adequate. It's why they are so good with the juniors (quite a few of whom they have praised higher than they did Petrosian)

 

[Mathematician]

Another "boring" thread by Skating91 racking up pages of engagement.

What would we do without you?

 

[Arigato]

Injustice of PCS. Is that right. Well, then . . . everyone in this thread who knows what a perfectionist Daniil is, raise your hand. For those of you who don't know which one he is, he is the unhappiest one of all in the middle with the light-colored jacket on. I must say, he holds no expressions back.

 

[gsk8]

That didn't take long. The whole reason you created this thread was to rant about the injustice of Petrosian's PCS (like you did when you and others helped derail the entire Skate to Milano competition thread).

That won't happen during the Olympics

I think that's a little unfair (Petrosian was lowballed Ted and Mark were absolutely gushing about every element and then scores barely ahead of a error riddled Hendrickx program that lacked confidence and energy), but I won't complain too much this skating community is more fair than any other. Grateful for this community.

Anyway, Petrosian only had two weeks preparation before the Olympic event because of injury. If she's injury free the next 5 months she returns her ultra-c and she will take the decision out of the judges hands.

I will be careful to not antagonise those

You are entitled to your opinion, however, conspiracy theories, judging rants, etc. derail competition threads. Please see the guidelines and take note of the forum thread banner(s). Thank you for understanding moving forward.

 

[Mathman]

Injustice of PCS. Is that right. Well, then . . . everyone in this thread who knows what a perfectionist Daniil is, raise your hand. For those of you who don't know which one he is, he is the unhappiest one of all in the middle with the light-colored jacket on. I must say, he holds no expressions back.

Oh my goodness. Is this video real? Is Mr. Gleickhengauz appalled at his own choreography or at the performer's execution of it?

 

[Isk]

I thought this thread was about reputational judging... so if we're talking about national reputation, in the context of the big nations... Japan in singles/pairs, China in pairs, and Russia/Canada/US in basically every event are all prone to having higher PCS for their fave skaters (with some exceptions, like Skate Canada doing little to back Schizas who gets meh PCS even when she's improved and skates clean). In Skate To Milano, Safonova from Belarus and Brain from Monaco were good examples of skaters who skated well but would never be given the PCS/GOE boost for belonging to one of the major nations.

Patrick didn't receive a skating while Russian bonus but he's had a reputation bonus, and competitions/segments where he skated poorly and was held up (2013 Worlds being a prime example). Another example is the Olympic team event when he had 2 falls in the SP and still got 45 PCS which is all kinds of ridiculous (https://www.isuresults.com/results/season1718/owg2018/OWG2018_TeamMen_SP_M_Scores.pdf). If he wasn't an established skater (3-time world champ), and was from another country even with his sublime skating, he would have been buried. Chen (who was still a relative newcomer but was backed hard by the US fed) also got a "nation reputation" bonus with 43.88 in spite of errors on all 3 passes: turning a 4-3 into a 4-2, doubling his solo quad, and falling on his triple axel. Bychenko (Israel) and Cha (South Korea) skated clean but their PCS were 40.60 and 36.99.

Yes, you have exceptions like Javier Fernandez or Loena Hendrickx who come from less prominent countries who break through. But they had to grind to get to where they were. Obviously they improved but they weren't given the PCS bonus off the bat that several skaters from the "major" nations get.

Patrick may have received a bit of "London, ON" bonus in 2013. Compositionally Patrick's program wasn't very strong, I think he should have ended it with Muzetta's waltz. He never slowed down in the middle section, which should have affected interpretation. So I think 9.50 from some judges was too much for these components. SS-wise Partick was above the competition, and I wouldn't say his presentation was bad, albeit a bit sloppy with these falls. Perhaps they should have given the win to Denis. He kinda stalked the jumps in the beginning and seemed to run out of steam a little bit towards the end, but it was mostly a clean skate. I think it would be nice to see some arguments why he shouldn't have won and who should have.

Patrick didn't get high PCS off the bat, he got 6s at his first worlds in 2008, about the same as Kevin van der Perren.

I think, Safonova's PCS are about right, clean skate or not. Also Davide is a good skater, but just good, not fanstastic, somewhere in the 7-8 range. I am not sure why Petr got high 7s and low 8s for PCS. His program was empty, choreo was shooting, reading and posing, his skating was tentative, and his music generic. Maybe it is good posture, charisma, good looks and 5 quads bonus, maybe it is something else. I think if empty programs got nothing for composition, we'd see fewer quads and fewer such programs, but it is what it is.