Also, I don't agree that removing the anonymity and holding judges accountable for their scores would "make the politics ten times worse." The unspoken assumption you are making is that the amount of politicking/deal-making is significantly lower now, but is that indeed the case? I don't know, but I don't think you can assume it is. The point is with anonymous judging we never will know.
If you don't know which judge gave which scores than you have no guarantee that any deal you will make has actually been completed. So let's say that federation A and federation B meet and agree that each will mark the other federation's skaters very highly. The event is over and... you have no idea whether the other side has actually did what promised.
Judges need to be protected from threats as well.
I will give you an example (I can talk about it, because it's been printed in a newspaper):
Evgeni Platov (I think it was him, might have been another Russian skater) once stumbled slightly in their CD. The Polish judge placed them second.
After the competition, the Russian team leader went to the Polish judge and told her: 'Forget about your team ever placing well again.'
And guess what, they never placed well again. Of course that team's future placements could also be the result of their skating not being good enough and what was said could have been done because of temper flaring up and possibly didn't really mean anything. But still.
Another example is what was happening when Chait/Sakhnovski were competing. I'm not going to publicly accuse anyone of anything but let's just say that there were a lot of tensions backstage.
As Moon said:
Don't be fooled into thinking there is not as much behind door deals as there always has been. The judges need anonymity to protect them from having to prove that they did someone a "favor". The bad side to that is we do not know which judges are playing with the skaters marks. I guess we can not have it both ways.
I don't see why punishing skaters twice is so bad in itself. You have to look at whether the proposed deductions for major mistakes are going to be more accurate in reflecting what the skater produced over what we have now.
Think about the consequences of a decision like this.
Everybody would start skating conservative simple programs because taking risks would be too costly. You would be trying to make sure you never fall.
I don't want skating to be safe and conservative. I want it to take risks and excite.
I just it's funny that some are so nonchalant about big falls in a routine (and multiple falls) and can live with a performance that is mired in them winning a competition, but once you talk about underrotation and fluting or lipping, then it's the end of figure skating.
That's because if a skater falls on a fully rotated jump, then at least they went for it and they completed it other than for the landing part. If a skater underrotates, flutzes or lips, then they aren't completing a jump. They are completing some kind of bastardised version of it.
I mean, is anyone complaining that transitions are basically being rewarded twice (in jump GOE and in a separate category in PCS)?
TES and PCS will always overlap to some extent. But if a skater falls yet still presents their program well I don't see any reason to deduct on the PCS.
He just believes people are fooled by his 'knowlege'. LOL. Insanity.
Those kind of personal comments are really unnecessary. If you disagree with me on anything, you are very welcome to show me why I am wrong.
I love Canada!
How pathetic!
