Quantifying titles

Old Cat Lady said:

I'm sure all the titles are meaningful to the skaters. The ranking is more just a matter of "what would you rather have". I'm surprised that you consider Euros less prestigious than 4CC. I never really thought of Euros as a practice before but I can see it. I figured people would be more sentimental about Euros because of the tradition.

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I think at this point, I would consider Euros less prestigious, because there is very little competition.

In 4CCs, this year in men's you saw Boyang and Shoma.

Last year, you found the entire top 6 from worlds, apart from Javier Fernandez.

But it also varies discipline to discipline.

Old Cat Lady said:

With our undying adoration This is meant to evaluate purely on a competitive achievement aspect. Artistic achievement or any other more subjective achievement is a whole separate thing.



Why do anything? We're hanging out on a FS message board - nothing we're doing here is all that worth doing Just another angle to look at things - not going to change anyone's mind on anything just like every other argument on here.




I'm sure all the titles are meaningful to the skaters. The ranking is more just a matter of "what would you rather have". I'm surprised that you consider Euros less prestigious than 4CC. I never really thought of Euros as a practice before but I can see it. I figured people would be more sentimental about Euros because of the tradition.

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Yeah...I don't think Euros is less prestigious...it's the other way round really. But I don't want to downgrade 4CC...to which the best Americans and Canadians don't go in an Olympic year, while European competitors do go to Euros. It's more to do with the timing than whether it's prestiguous or not.

Old Cat Lady said:

I agree that 4 Continents is a weaker competition than Europeans but I feel like awarding 4 Continents less is penalizing skaters for not being from Europe. I think it's only fair to either give them equal points or don't include either of them at all.

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I don't agree that 4 continents is a weaker competition than europeans. Sure, there is more withdrawals, but there are more deep fields generally. In singles for example the field is usually better than europeans were every men are inconsistent and Javier can win even when he bombs, and in ladies there is only Russians + Kostner who can score greatly in other competitions (+ Loena this season).
And usually there is more 4CC skaters in top10 of worlds and olympics.

So i don't see why 4CC should worth less. It's fair to give equal points like you said.

i think the ISU has a pretty accurate system already.... a competition is quantified by the depth of its field. I am not sure why there seems to be so many people here giving more value to GPF over 4CC and Euros... a field of 6 skaters, sometimes not even the top 6 skaters in the world depending on injuries, withdrawals, luck of the draw... where the lowest you can finish is 6th? where a skater has 1/2 chance of making the podium to me isn't as valuable as euros or 4cc...

fine, I suppose I would agree to give a bit more value to Olympics simply because it happens once every 4 years and has therefore a special cachet but I wouldn't chance other values from ISU.

For instance, I could suggest 1600 for O G, 1400 for O S and 1200 for O B....

IN this system O B would equal World's Gold... and I think it makes sense. I can see how skaters would have a hard time answering :would you prefer Olympic Bronze or Worlds Gold?

I would leave all other competitions the same....

I haven't done the math for any skaters... but i saw quickly some calculations here... again, I find the ISU has a good system when it comes to championship events... only one of the two (or 3 in Olympic years) will be counted.... I think it's fair that way, especially for skaters not having a chance to make a world team but able to do well at Euros or 4CC for instance... and of course, why penalize an olympic hopeful for skipping 4cc two weeks before their olympic event?

One thing I may change : a skater can only count their total best of either GP series OR Challengers.... not both concurrently. Reasoning, skaters in Europe are much more advantaged when it comes to Challengers and some countries send their skaters to MANY event, whether or not they have GP assignments.

However, I wouldn't cancel points for those events, as some skaters do not have GP assignments... I would just calculate the total for each skater, from GP and then from Challengers, and assign them their highest total... So a skater winning two challengers would still get 600 points which may help them in the standings compared to a skater with lesser impressive results on the GP circuit... However, we wouldn't see a skater with 800 for GPF, 400 for second GP and then 600 for winning two challengers... I find it ridiculous when adding all these points together = 1800... which is pretty much winning more than Olympic Gold under my system or winning gold + 600 points under the current worlds points.

echeveria said:

I may be in the minority here, but I don't think that Olympic medals should be so much higher in point value than other medals, except for the grand prix series (excluding GPF). The only thing that really makes an Olympic medal more valuable is that there are more people watching, but it's still the same competitors, so maybe difference shouldn't be quite so big. Actually, I think there shouldn't really be a difference between Olys and Worlds at all, even though this year a lot of skaters opted out from Worlds.

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I think you would be in the minority, especially to the athletes. It's not just this post Olympic Worlds the athletes opted out of. It's nearly every post Olympics Worlds because the athletes trains hard, continues on until the Olympics because it's their goal. It's extremely important to them because it's the peak of their athletic achievement and because it happens only once every 4 years, it's a dream that doesn't happen for most.

I think for the scale, Oly gold, silver and bronze should outweigh any other medals.

World is next obviously.

I also got a sense that GPF is a bigger deal, but it's up to ISU to invite people so it seems arbitrary. For that reason, I think Euros and 4CC still should outweigh GP series. Just because Europe is weak on the Men side and 4CC is weak on the Ice Dance and Pairs side (other than Chinese) now days doesn't mean medaling in those events doesn't mean a lot to the athletes. Hell I think Javi is staying in competition solely for Euros and Worlds.

I know as a Yuzu fan, I want his 4 consecutive GPF championship to outweigh Euro/4CC, but I'm trying to be more fair about it.

how is 4cc weak in ice dance??? USA have been dominating Ice Dance for quite a while + Tessa and Scott and Weapo... I mean you have 4 North American teams in top 6 at worlds...

and that with Shibs and VM skipping

4everchan said:

how is 4cc weak in ice dance??? USA have been dominating Ice Dance for quite a while + Tessa and Scott and Weapo... I mean you have 4 North American teams in top 6 at worlds...

and that with Shibs and VM skipping

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I think 4CC is stronger in 3/4 disciplines compared to euros. And with the Japanese and Korean ladies picking up, I think 4CC might become stronger than Euros in all four.

russianfan said:

I can tell you how. If your fave has won Olympics - Olympics is most important competition ever. If your fave has won Worlds - Worlds is the most important competition ever.
This is how it works.

I think O4G will confirm

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ICYMI, Osmond won both an Olympic gold and a World gold this year.

CanadianSkaterGuy said:

ICYMI, Osmond won both an Olympic gold and a World gold this year.

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but nobody is talking about team event right now...

P.S. so which one is more important?

Well, I like that this topic has come up again.

Everyone else: Bets on how many pages over the bogus Osmond vs Zagitova "debate" to this thread?

russianfan said:

but nobody is talking about team event right now...

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I disagree. The team event is still a title and Osmond is an Olympic champion. Not in the individual event, but an Olympic champion nevertheless. Same with all the Russian team from Sochi - unless you think that event was meaningless and Lipnitskaia/Bobrova/Soloviev/Stolbova/Klimov's Olympic golds are negligible?

Fact remains that Osmond won an Olympic gold and a World gold this year. So someone with a screenname like "Osmond4Gold" would have been very pleased with the results of either the Olympics or Worlds.

Just as I'm sure someone with a screenname like yours would have also been very pleased with the results of either the Olympics or Wor-.... well, okay, maybe just the Olympics.

chopinskate said:

Well, I like that this topic has come up again.

Everyone else: Bets on how many pages over the bogus Osmond vs Zagitova "debate" to this topic?

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:thumbsup: i'm out

Old Cat Lady said:

Have all medals in other competitions be worth the same as each other but less than any Olympic medal?

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I would, yes. Simply from a prestige point of view, taking into account the exposure an (individual) Olympic Podium gets, I would rank that far above the rest of the medals. Since the exposure for the non-olympic podiums comes with far less exposure, I would tie them at second.

Of course, that's not taking into account how athletes favour medals, and how they work towards them. In that case, I would say Worlds>GPF>4CC>Euros. Again, Olympics is far out of league here, since I would say athletes wouldn't mind not getting golds in all these events while they're working on peaking towards the Olympics towards the end of the quad.

Old Cat Lady said:

If one were to evaluate a career statistically, how would you value each international title?

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If I wanted to evaluate a career statistically, I wouldn't value titles at all. If the best in the world are all competing against each other at the Ondrej Nepela Trophy, there is no reason to abstractly value this competition more than then Olympics unless skaters are timing themselves for a peak later in the season.

So if I really wanted to evaluate skaters "statistically" I would probably design a multiplayer variation on the Elo rating system by approximating each event as a pairwise competition between each competitor. There are also variations which include "momentum" into the rating system that would probably be relevant for skating. Like I said, there is no statistical reason we should value an Olympic win more than a Nepela Memorial Trophy win if all the same competitors are there - except if a skater is intending to peak at the Olympics, in which case Elo deals with that by updating the scores based on current relative scores (meaning if you are under-scoring because you haven’t peaked yet, you’ll get a much bigger point boost from winning than someone who has dominated all season). The main issues would be determining the correct "K-Factor", a flexible one might work best for skating.

But I actually think this is all pointless. It's easy enough anyway. Few fans really thinks Sarah Hughes or Adelina Sotnikova are comparable to Yuna Kim or Mao Asada. I mean, an Elo rating could tell the difference between those two groupings - but we're all smart enough to reason it out. There will always be close competitors that make it hard to say, but in that case, ratings systems don't help either since there is no statistical system that will be precise enough for some competitors.

schizoanalyst said:

So if I really wanted to evaluate skaters "statistically" I would probably design a multiplayer variation on the Elo rating system by approximating each event as a pairwise competition between each competitor. There are also variations which include "momentum" into the rating system that would probably be relevant for skating. Like I said, there is no statistical reason we should value an Olympic win more than a Nepela Memorial Trophy win if all the same competitors are there - except if a skater is intending to peak at the Olympics, in which case Elo deals with that by updating the scores based on current relative scores (meaning if you are under-scoring because you haven’t peaked yet, you’ll get a much bigger point boost from winning than someone who has dominated all season). The main issues would be determining the correct "K-Factor", a flexible one might work best for skating.

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Can we, though, please? More gaming stats in FS, please. More gaming music, too.

But I actually think this is all pointless. It's easy enough anyway. Few fans really thinks Sarah Hughes or Adelina Sotnikova are comparable to Yuna Kim or Mao Asada. I mean, an Elo rating could tell the difference between those two groupings - but we're all smart enough to reason it out. There will always be close competitors that make it hard to say, but in that case, ratings systems don't help either since there is no statistical system that will be precise enough for some competitors.

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Yeah, but not everyone agrees to reason it out, so coolness trumps?

The most important is the Olympic Team Gold, the Olympic Bronze and World Gold medal for 2017-2018 season. That's a lot of hardware in a matter of a month or so. I can’t mention her name bout it begins with an O....

russianfan said:

I can tell you how. If your fave has won Olympics - Olympics is most important competition ever. If your fave has won Worlds - Worlds is the most important competition ever.

This is how it works.

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My fave won five world championships but did not win an Olympic gold medal.

I would give points on an increasing scale to many victories over a long career.

Olympic gold medal -- 1000 points

Second Olympic gold medal -- 2000 points. (Sp now you have 3000 in total.)

First world championship -- 100 points

Second world championship -- 200 points (Total = 300 for someone who wins worlds twice.)

Third world championship -- 400 points (Now you have 700.)

Fourth world championship -- 800 points (Cumulative total =1500.)

Fifth world championship -- 1600 points. (Grand total = 3100. )

millie said:

The most important is the Olympic Team Gold, the Olympic Bronze and World Gold medal for 2017-2018 season. That's a lot of hardware in a matter of a month or so. I can’t mention her name bout it begins with an O....

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May her big jib draw!

Mathman said:

My fave won five world championships but did not win an Olympic gold medal.

I would give points on an increasing scale to many victories over a long career.

Olympic gold medal -- 1000 points

Second Olympic gold medal -- 2000 points. (Sp now you have 3000 in total.)

First world championship -- 100 points

Second world championship -- 200 points (Total = 300 for someone who wins worlds twice.)

Third world championship -- 400 points (Now you have 700.)

Fourth world championship -- 800 points (Cumulative total =1500.)

Fifth world championship -- 1600 points. (Grand total = 3100. )

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If you're doing it like this... Title defence needs to be accounted for, I'd say.

chopinskate said:

If you're doing it like this... Title defence needs to be accounted for, I'd say.

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That's an interesting point. Is it better to win a championship and then successfully defend it the next year? Or is it better to come back and regain the championship after some time has passed? I think maybe the latter is more difficult and more rare. (?)