US Men's Olympic Team | Page 4 | Golden Skate

US Men's Olympic Team

I think we are underestimating how unpridictable nationals can become. There is agood chance that two thirds of the world team wont make the olympics. I can definitely see Johnny and Adam knocking Mroz and Abbott of the podium. I believe Evan can finish as low as 4th and still be named to the team.For the next two spots it will be a dog fight.
 
I am not saying that Evan will be left out the World team if he finishes 4th or lower at the Nationals. I am just struggling to figure out how USFSA explain the dicision of not giving Johnny a chance last season but give Evan a chance this season?
 
I am just struggling to figure out how USFSA explain the dicision of not giving Johnny a chance last season but give Evan a chance this season?
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it is olympics - not worlds and it is the world champion-not the bronze medalist.:p
Evan must be messing his competitions big time until olympics to leave him out and still I think they wont.
 
jennylovskt said:
I am not saying that Evan will be left out the World team if he finishes 4th or lower at the Nationals. I am just struggling to figure out how USFSA explain the dicision of not giving Johnny a chance last season but give Evan a chance this season?
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For me that's not such a stretch.

Going into the Olympics Evan is the world champion and has shown that he improves steadily throughout the season. Johnny has not done that. In fact, as is being discussed in another thread, he tends to start strong and fade.

That's sound reasoning to give the nod to Evan should he place off the podium at next Nationals imo. However, that's not likely, so to me it's a moot point.
 
jennylovskt said:
I am not saying that Evan will be left out the World team if he finishes 4th or lower at the Nationals. I am just struggling to figure out how USFSA explain the dicision of not giving Johnny a chance last season but give Evan a chance this season?
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Why are you struggling with something that hasn't happened yet?
Who knows what US Skating will do if Evan comes in 4th at Natls?
For that matter what will Russia do if Plushy has an off night at Russian Natls?
Will they send him home? At the worst they would send him to Euro Championships for another chance. He is the reigning Olympic champion and will be treated with the respect that comes with that title.
Evan is the World Champion and will be treated with respect he earned on the ice.
All Johnny has to do is make the podium at US Natls and he will be on the US Team. In fairness, it has been a long time since Weir won the US title. His recorld in WC's and Olympics (one bronze medal in six competitions) is not exactly the stuff of legends. At this stage in his career he has to earn whatever he gets as he is not owed any big favors by US Skating.
As to last season - he left US Skating little choice. He could have done the smart thing and withdrawn due to illness. Johnny, or Galina, Victor, or whovever was advising him made a BAD decision allowing him to skate when he was not well.
I think US Skating would have given Johnny a ticket to Worlds and named Mroz as an alternate if he had withdrawn. But that is not what happened. Once Johnny skated his fate depended on his performance. His fate was probably sealed when after getting sick he still went off to Korea and came back sicker.
It is not for me to judge Johnny but don't you think US Skating monitors their skaters. Looks at their decisions, priorities, their training habits, etc.
For the future, Mroz got valuable experience last season. He may very well be a factor in Intl events for the next 4-6 seasons. Johnny will probably turn pro after this year.
US Skating most likely made the right and fair decision last season.
 
janetfan said:
Why are you struggling with something that hasn't happened yet?Who knows what US Skating will do if Evan comes in 4th at Natls?
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Because it's boring off season.:laugh: Actually, realistically, I think the chance of Evan finishing off podium is so slim, almost next to none. The judges could use their power to keep Evan on the podium, and they are willing to do that. Unless Evan skates a disastrous SP and LP at the Nationals which I don't see it could be the case. Johnny needs more works. The judges won't do much to hold him up. He has to skate his way up to the podium. This is the year, and the reason that Johnny stayed in competitive skating for 4 more years. If he doesn't give out all he gets, what will he be waiting for? I believe Johnny will retire after this season no matter what out come will be. So he must have redemptions in his mind to go into the season.

janetfan said:
For that matter what will Russia do if Plushy has an off night at Russian Natls?
Will they send him home? At the worst they would send him to Euro Championships for another chance. He is the reigning Olympic champion and will be treated with the respect that comes with that title.
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For my understanding, Russian uses different method to select their World and Olympic teams. The result from Russian Nationals is not much of a factor in the process of selecting.

janetfan said:
For the future, Mroz got valuable experience last season. He may very well be a factor in Intl events for the next 4-6 seasons.
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Agree. Wish him good luck in the future.
 
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jennylovskt said:
In fact, I think USFSA should have realized that how stupid it was to not let Johnny go to the World this year.
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In spite of Weir´s absence, USA still has 3 slots for the Olympics and Worlds. If those slots would not have been gotten, then and only then it would have been stupid.
 
:unsure:these pants look like they escaped from the Cirque Hawaii ...
somehow feathers and sequins look ok now:cool:
 
snowflake said:
Isn't this what all pre-season posts are struggling with?

Enjoy reading them though :)
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Yes, of course you are right. Pre-season, post-season, off-season.......it lasts too long so many of us enjoy raising questions and offerering explanations and solutions. And one should never undervalue the entertainment factor of a good conspiracy theory whether it involves judging or federation infighting and favoritism.
My favorite so far is that US Skating is out to get Johnny. That it will show favoritism and put Evan on Team USA no matter how he does at Natls.
When this was brought up about Plushy - all we heard was that "they pick team differently in Russia." :p
What does that mean? US Skating must be perfect and fair and that Russian Federation can just do whatever they want? :cool:
Skating rocks and hearing all these different views from fans around the world is interesting to say the least. It is funny to think US Skating is now or has ever been totally fair. But atleast we make an effort to have a competitive and fair selection process. So I do wonder - if Russian Natls don't really matter in the selection of the Russian Olympic team - how do they pick their team?
 
I think they would pick their team more or less by results,didnt they send Borodulin Lutai and Voronov in euros this year?
In the past they sent yag even if he didnt competed because yag was the world champion etc, so it was usually Plush in RN, Abt, klimkin and the rest were going for a walk. It is the plushy come back now that messes it up in men. Now how much plushy needs to mess to be third after Lutai and Voronov or threatened by Griazev, Dobrin and the Uspenski brothers?
 
seniorita said:
I think they would pick their team more or less by results,didnt they send Borodulin Lutai and Voronov in euros this year?
In the past they sent yag even if he didnt competed because yag was the world champion etc, so it was usually Plush in RN, Abt, klimkin and the rest were going for a walk. It is the plushy come back now that messes it up in men. Now how much plushy needs to mess to be third after Lutai and Voronov or threatened by Griazev, Dobrin and the Uspenski brothers?
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Thanks for that explanation. I wasn't being so serious, just pointing to the irony of Johnny's Russian fans complaining that US skating is giving Evan special treatment and that we are out to get Johnny.
It sounds exactly the way Yag was treated and how I am sure Plushy will be treated. Skating is different and the same everywhere. Favors and politics :)
 
Historically different national federations have selected their Olympic and Worlds teams differently. Russia is an example where the federation (read Valentin Piseev) simply decides who they like best and that's who they send. Alexei Yagudin never won Russian nationals. For some reason the Russian federation always favored Irina Slutskaya over Maria Butyrskaya.

Many European federations use Europeans as the decider in case they have more good skaters than slots to fill. In contrast, outside of Europe, national federations never paid any attention to Four Continents -- most often they could not talk any of their top skaters into even doing this event.

There was a big back-and-forth whoop-de-do in France between Contesti and Dambier which eventually involed law suits on both sides as to whether the French federation was violating its own rules. I don't remember all the details, but as I recall the issue wasn't settled until Dambier won the battle in the local courts of his home town. Contesti now skates for Italy (after the French federation wouldn't allow him to skate for Monaco.) France is another place where the federation (Didier) pretty much just does as it pleases, with no particular rules.

The United States always prided itself in having a straightforward selection procedure. Top placement at nationals, period. If anything, the USFSA took a holier-than-thou attitude toward those wicked federations that decided such things by secret deals in smoke-filled back rooms. With the new rules this year has come speculation about whether the selection process will be less aboveboard in the future as it was in the past.

In Japan, there was a movement toward more openness in the selection procedure and they came up with a point system. So many points for winning this or that competition, whoever acquires the most points over a two-year period makes the team. This procedure fell into disrepute in 2006 when they were accused of manipulating the results of Japanese nationals to make sure that Miki Ando made the Olympic team ahead of Yukari Nakano, who had a much better 2005-06 season. The charge was that Ando's commercial sponsors leaned on the Japanese federation to do what they had to do to make it come out that way. (As a separate issue the president of the Japanese federation resigned in disgrace amid financial scandals.)

In response the Japanese federation came up with a new point system that put heavier weight on more recent results than on older ones.

Many smaller (in terms of their profile in international figure skating) nations have Olympic qualifying events to decide whether they want to send anyone at all. Sometimes slots go unfilled because even the national champion is deemed not to be competitive at the Olympic level. Either for reasons of national pride or to save money that they can spend on athletes in other sports, the national Olympic committee doesn't want to send an unqualified representative.
 
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seniorita said:
In the past they sent yag even if he didnt competed because yag was the world champion etc, so it was usually Plush in RN, Abt, klimkin and the rest were going for a walk.?
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You have mentioned that before - but I just have to say that during his entire senior career Yagudin missed Nationals just once, and that was before the Olympics 2002. He placed second the previous four Nationals.
 
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