I'm pretty irritated with Hersh on this article. The focus is supposed to be on Jason and to a lesser extent Boyang, but all anyone cares about at this point is a selectively chosen quote, placed
so conveniently at the end of the article so that's all ppl remember.
I admire Yuzuru, but he gets a ton of press coverage already, and I'm a bit tired in seeing how journalists likes turning the story to be about him. Let others shine and be the focus for once.
My personal take is that Phil Hersh is a terrible jounalist and I wouldn't be so quick to trust anything in that article aside from the quotes. (Even Phil is not bad enough to misquote, but we just have to be content with not knowing what specific question prompted that quote.) Whatever comparison between Fernandez and Hanyu is in Hersh's words, not Orser's so I'm taking it with a mountain of salt. If judging from the BOrser quote alone, he "didn't really ask [Hanyu] for permission". Which makes sense, considering Hanyu is Orser's client, not his boss, so asking for "permission" would be weird. But he did tell Hanyu directly about the move, even came to his apartment for it, so I would assume they had a conversation. Between then (late Apr?) and when the news dropped there's a month in between, if Hanyu has things he wants to say, I certainly hope he would have said it already. Sure, he might not be able to veto the coaching change entirely, but he can request for adjustment of training time and his coaching team if he wants. If he kept it to himself and worst come to worst this whole thing implodes, it's everyone's fault, not Brian's alone.
TBH, I'd be way more worried if Brian dropped the news in TCC's dressing room or something. The fact that there was a house visit kind of guarantees a conversation longer than three sentences did occur
THIS so much. Coaches are actually not obligated to ask "permission" from their student to accept another. I'm always confused as to why no one ever questions if RA or Eteri ever asks for "permission" from their students. Unless the original arrangement was for Orser to be the sole coach etc., which we all know it's not the case, then he is not obliged to do so. Top coaches, especially an experienced one like Orser, should also be quite well aware of their workload and capabilities so I'm not worried. I mean Orser was self aware enough to be quite upfront with Jason that he could only train him in if he agrees to be coached in a team arrangement. He also did not say yes to Evgeni a right away until he made sure him and team had the capacity to work it in. Orser seems like some one who is very upfront about things, and as long as you tell him, he will try to accommodate.
However, no obligation aside, a good coach will check with his students to give them a heads up, and see if they have any input or concerns and work from there. In fact, Orser was actually quite courteous to give Yuzuru a heads up and to see if he has any response, which we don't even know is a courtesy extended to his other students. Yuzuru is not Orser's only commitment.
Like Danny said, this wasn't some random, casual encounter in the hallway or something. Orser took did this in a private setting and at the comfort of Yuzuru's place, soI highly doubt the conversation ended then and there. Plus, Yuzuru had at least a month, maybe even two, to discuss further if needed. People always demand Orser to be sensitive to the Asian politeness and their cultural nuances, but forget that communication is a two way street, and Yuzuru needs to also be adaptive to the Western tendency to speak up when he has issues.
And it sounds to me like Orser knows that. Also by bringing Javi into his explanation, Orser seems to imply: see, Javi had to put up with you joining the team years ago, now it is your turn to put up with Boyang's arrival. Not even too subtle
There is no indication that Orser mentioned Javi to Yuzu at all. That entire paragraph was Hersh's own concoction, don't fall into his trap. I just love how Hersh wrote that in to remind everyone that Orser once checked with Javi, then immediately place a very selective quote about "oh Orser didn't ask for 'permission' this time" . The whole Javi permission thing was always weird to me anyways, like I highly doubt Orser would actually turn Yuzuru down if Javi had said no. It's more like Javi's opinions were considered and they'd likely work things around if Javi objected.
Yup, we don't know all the details but from that article it all sounds really worrisome to me. And not to me only.
)
