Sasha discouraged by judges not giving her major title due to jump errors?

[temperboy28]

Sasha discouraged by judges not giving her major title due to jump errors?

Does anything ever think that Sasha might be not sure about continuing to compete now since she is discouraged by how she has been hit hard by judges for any 1 or 2 mistakes she makes in competition, and not recognized with a major title like Worlds or Olympics, or a U.S title where Michelle Kwan was there? It must be frusterating for her to see herself taken out of gold medals anytime she makes 1 or 2 mistakes, and the judges not ever giving credit for the other excellent parts of her skating enough to compensate for just 1 or 2 mistakes on jumps.

It seems alot of fans are not high on her either. Even my bofyriend does not like her much and thinks she is very held up, and seems to overlook how the rest of her skating makes up for her jump mistakes, or should more then it does in judges eyes.

 

[R.D.]

you know, when I read the thread title I thought you meant that SHE said that. I was then gonna say, Huh? :scratch:

This thread is calling for speculation and rumor, and I don't think that's gonna get us very far.

I think the only way she would get discouraged is that she's just plain not able to deliver when all the chips are on the table. It's not the judges, it's her. Hello folks?

I think she's a thing of the past. But if she happens to come back, let's wait until she actually can deliver when it counts and then gets marked low for it before we cry foul.

 

[Spun Silver]

I don't think that would be a reason for not continuing. There are so many other factors:

* She's getting older and the new talent is so great.
* The grind may be getting to her after so many years.
* She seems to want to see if she has other options for her future since figure skating doesn't offer much in the way of career longevity.
* She seems to suffer from bad competition nerves as a result of the constant pressure to get the two clean back-to-back programs.

I think she's a perfectionist who judges herself harshly for every error. How could she not know she is gold-medal material when she's been hearing that her whole skating life? But I don't get the impression from anything she's said that she blames the judges for her results. After her Olympic free skate she changed her clothes because she was sure she was off the podium. That doesn't bespeak an attitude of entitlement. She called her silver medal a gift - when actually (as Mathman just pointed out elsewhere) she earned it fair and square under COP which actually does credit the non-jump elements where she is so strong.

But I still hope she WILL continue after this break. I was pleased that Uncle Dick recently declared that he certainly hopes she'll be in Vancouver in 2010 because she is "a glorious skater." (This was some fluff in the Cup of China broadcast, I think.) I hope she could hear him over the voices of skating fans pronouncing her already retired.

 

[attyfan]

Skating is all about comparatives -- who is the best, second best, etc., so I don't think that Sasha can expect to win when she makes major jump errors, when she is competing against other skaters who also can do high level spins and spirals, and land the jumps as well.

In her case, though, I don't think the judges could discourage her as much as the harm to her back that skating may have already done (and/or may do in the future, especially if she continues)

 

[temperboy28]

Lets look at her career as I remember it:

2002 U.S Nationals-she skates a wonderful short program and still only takes 1 first place vote over Kwan. At the very least it semed closer then that. Then in the long she touches down on her last jump and finished 2nd with no 1st place votes and 2 3rd place votes. It is obvious she was not going to come even close to winning without that mistake. At the Olympics she skates a wonderful short program and finishes 3rd behind Kwan and Slutskaya, but takes 3 2nd place votes. In the long she has a fall and the judges dump her to 4th place. This was wrong. She landed 6 triples cleanly, and the jump she fell on was the back end of the extremely hard triple lutz-triple toe, she finished with 2 triple lutzes, a triple flip, triple loop, triple sal, and triple toe so all triples clean except 1. Kwan landed only 5 triples clean, falling on the easier triple flip giving her 1 of the most important triples not completed. Her program was like the worst choreographed I ever saw from her. Her techinical and presentation marks should have been both below Cohen, yet she scored slightly higher technicaly and much higher artisticaly, held up marks for the sentimental favorite vs the new kid. Slutskaya did not fall, which is one plus on Kwan and Cohen. She only attempted 6 triples though, already less then all of Hughes, Cohen, and Kwan. She 2-footed her triple lutz, swung herself wildly in a leg kicking roll on her triple flip attempt. So only 4 clean triples for her. Her marks were even more of an inflation of her performance, alot of them were even higher then Hughes and it looked like she might win, but thankfully some sane 5.6s from judges who had her 4th pulled her down to 2nd overall. My boyfriend is a big Slutskaya fan and has tried to defend her silver medal in Salt Lake to me but I thought it was a joke. Cohen should have beaten both Kwan and Slutskaya here, her one fall was used as an excuse to keep them on the podium over her, even though they had bigger mistakes, landed fewer clean triples, and were slow as snails.

2002 Worlds-In qualifying Sasha had 2 mistakes but landed 5 triples including a triple-triple while Slutskaya only landed 5 triples and no triple-triple. Sasha should have won the qualifying over Slutskaya. Sasha stepped out of her double axel and was hammered and put 5th in the short program. Even with that mistake she should have been 3rd or 4th. Slutskaya deserved to win the short, Suguri deserved 2nd. Kwan had a similar kind of mistake as Cohen, stepping out her triple lutz combo, but received much higher scores then Cohen anyway and was put in 3rd. Onda who was 4th should have been below Cohen for sure, her style and grace is miles behind Cohen. Then in the long Cohen had 2 falls as her only mistakes and received scores as low as 5.2-5.5 for technical merit, much too low. Suguri landed only 5 triples since she popped one, Cohen 4, the rest of Cohen's skating is much better then Suguri's-spins, footwork, beautiful positions, elegance, edge quality. She should have beaten Suguri in the long, that combined with winning qualifying round over Slutskaya, and 3rd or 4th(either one would do)in the short gives her bronze over Suguri.

2003 U.S Nationals-Kwan and Hughes had clean performances and Cohen had only 1 fall. The qualify of Cohen's skating should have made up for that fall to give her gold but the judges used it as an excuse to put her 3rd.

2003 Worlds-Cohen skated a clean qualifying round performance but was put below Kwan and Sokolova anyway. Kwan landed the same jumps as Cohen, so Cohen should have come ahead, only a skater with beautiful artistry and much harder jumps then Cohen should beat her by now skating cleanly. Sokolova landed harder triple-triples but her artistry was dull and unpolished compared to Kwan and Cohen. Discouraged Cohen fell in the short and the judges used that as an excuse to put her down to 5th rather then 3rd in the short behind Kwan and Sokolova where she should have been. In the free skate she landed a triple lutz-triple toe, and only fell twice on a jump and spin. Since Sokolova only landed 1 triple-triple I would have put Cohen 2nd in the free skate behind Kwan. The judges placed her 3rd in free skate behind Kwan and Sokolova which put her 4th overall. That combined with 1st in qualifying instead of 3rd, and a 3rd in short instead of 5th, would have given her the silver overall behind Kwan and ahead of Sokolova, instead of 4th overall behind Suguri which was not fair.

2004 Nationals-She had only 1 fall, and then 1 two-foot landing, not enough to put her below Kwan's clean performance with a musical interpretation to Tosca not as good as Slutskaya's interpretation of the music in 2002. Ripped off of gold again.

2004 Worlds-She deserved to be 2nd in the long behind Arakawa, the judges put her 3rd behind Arakawa and Kwan. She and Kwan both had 1 mistake, Kwan's was on a more important jump then Cohen's. Nobody should beat Cohen with the same amount of mistakes and same difficultly in jumps. In the short program Arakawa was overscored and should have been 4th behind Cohen, Ando, and Kwan. Her costume was very ugly and her positions and refined positions were not as good as her long, and her spins were not as good as her long either, which is why I put her 4th instead of 2nd in the short. So overall Cohen should have won gold, not Arakawa.

2005 U.S Nationals-this was the worst of all. Atleast in 2003 and 2004 she made a mistake or two and Kwan did not giving the judges an excuse to put Kwan first. Here they both do clean shorts, both miss 1 jump in the long and land 5 triples each and Kwan wins easily with 5 6.0s for artistry with that Bolero program which was her worst program ever, along with her 2002 Olympic long.
Terrable, but it was the year was going to tie the record so the judges were going to give it to her no matter what I guess.

2005 Worlds-At Worlds Slutskaya made a mess of her short program with two big errors and should have been 5 points behind Cohen going into the long. On the surface her long might look 5 points better but 1 of her triples was not even counted since she repeated it 3 times. That gives Slutskaya only 6 triples, with no added credit for combining a triple lutz and triple loop under COP particularly with her 3rd triple loop discredited. Cohen got credit for 7 triples, even if 2 were not clean they still received most credit. Cohen had 2 triple lutzes, Slutskaya had 2 triple loops. Cohen actually had more jump difficulty once you lose Slutskaya's discounted triple loop, but the small mistakes makes the jump area even. Cohen had better spins, choreography, music, more elegant positions, daintier more ladylike movements. It was her gold, another ripoff, a gold given for the Russian crowd.

2006 Olympics-Arakawa did not skate spectacularly enough to beat Cohen with 2 falls but an otherwise sensational performance. Arakawa also doubled a jump, a big mistake, and landed 5 triples cleanly, the same number as Cohen in fact. Arakawa had a pretty program I guess, with good quality 5 triples, but she was slow and boring. Her footwork, spirals, and spins are not even in Cohen's league. Also what was up with Arakawa, Slutskaya, and Cohen all coming in almost tied in the short? Arakawa, Slutskaya, and Cohen skated cleanly in the short with the same jumps. You always give Cohen a clear lead when she and somebody else skates cleanly with the same jumps, horrable, she should have had a 4 or 5 point lead because they all skated cleanly with the same jumps and she has such quality to her skating. Not recognized.

2006 Worlds-Ok I did not like her Worlds free skate, she 2 footed her triple lutz in the short so was maybe a bit high scored here even, and her qualifying was not so good for her. So 3rd place here was ok. Finally an event she was not ripped off in.

So placements:

2002 Olympics-finished 4th, should have finished 2nd
2002 Worlds-finished 4th, should have finished 3rd
2003 U.S Nationals-finished 3rd, should have finished 1st
2003 Worlds-finished 4th, should have finished 2nd
2004 U.S Nationals-finished 2nd, should have finished 1st
2004 Worlds-finished 2nd, should have finished 1st
2005 U.S Nationals-finished 2nd, should have finished 1st
2005 Worlds-finished 2nd, should have finished 1st
2006 Olympics-finished 2nd, should have finished 1st
2006 Worlds-finished 3rd, should have finished 3rd

 

[Mathman]

On the contrary, I think the International judges love the talent that Sasha brings to the sport and have done everything in their power to encourage her and to reward her for her strengths.

But the judges have to play by the rules. Under the CoP, certain scores are dictated by the scoring system. If you look at her Olympic LP, for instance:

The judges "gave" her 6.0-3.0 points for her triple Lutz with a fall. This is mandated by the rules.

They "gave" her 5.5-2.86 for a near fall on her triple flip, as the rules provide.

They gave her 7.5 points for her 3F+2T, just like it says in the rule book.

They gave her 7.5-1.14 for her flawed 3T+3S sequence.

They gave her 3.6 for her double Axel.

They gave her 5.0+0.57 for a pretty good triple Salchow.

For her spins, spirals and footwork (one level 2, one level 3 and four level 4s) the judges gave her 17.4 (as the rule book dictates) plus a whopping 4.15 in GOE (the only thing so far that is at the judges' discretion).

Finally, they gave her a huge (and well-deserved, IMHO) 62.41 in PCS, despite several bad mistakes. Only Arakawa with 63.00 ranked higher, by a whisker.

So, no, I don't think Sasha feels discouraged by anything the judges have said or done.

My own personal feeling (based on nothing but a wild hunch) is that Sasha is simpy ready to move on.

 

[dancindiva03]

Huh? In EVERY instance where Sasha did not win, she was simply out-skated by other skaters. She may have made "just one or two errors on jumps", but her basic skating is very weak compared to other top skaters. With poor stroking, weak edges and a lack of speed, especially in her first few years as a senior level skater, she NEEDED to land all the jumps cleanly in order to overcome her other problems.

 

[R.D.]

Huh? In EVERY instance where Sasha did not win, she was simply out-skated by other skaters.

:agree: Exactly.

And FIRST in the Olympics? With 2 falls? You've got to be kidding me! Shiz deserved that win by a mile. Everyone else sucked...simple and blunt. (Maybe the only exception would be Suguri).

 

[temperboy28]

On the contrary, I think the International judges love the talent that Sasha brings to the sport and have done everything in their power to encourage her and to reward her for her strengths.

But the judges have to play by the rules. Under the CoP, certain scores are dictated by the scoring system. If you look at her Olympic LP, for instance:

The judges "gave" her 6.0-3.0 points for her triple Lutz with a fall. This is mandated by the rules.

They "gave" her 5.5-2.86 for a near fall on her triple flip, as the rules provide.

They gave her 7.5 points for her 3F+2T, just like it says in the rule book.

They gave her 7.5-1.14 for her flawed 3T+3S sequence.

They gave her 3.6 for her double Axel.

They gave her 5.0+0.57 for a pretty good triple Salchow.

For her spins, spirals and footwork (one level 2, one level 3 and four level 4s) the judges gave her 17.4 (as the rule book dictates) plus a whopping 4.15 in GOE (the only thing so far that is at the judges' discretion).

Finally, they gave her a huge (and well-deserved, IMHO) 62.41 in PCS, despite several bad mistakes. Only Arakawa with 63.00 ranked higher, by a whisker.

So, no, I don't think Sasha feels discouraged by anything the judges have said or done.

My own personal feeling (based on nothing but a wild hunch) is that Sasha is simpy ready to move on.

Arakawa had the highest scores on spins in the long program though, Sasha was 2nd. How good Arakawa get the highest scores on spins, she has average spins really, not as good or Cohen, Slutskaya on a good day(although the Olympics was not a good day for her), or Suguri. Also wasnt Arakawa's program so boring? I mean it was nice but it was so boring and such high PCS for such a boring program.

Also what about Arakawa and Cohen and Slutskaya all almost tieing in the short. Like I said all 3 skated cleanly in the short with the same jumps. Sasha is such an unbelievably exquiste skater with such beautiful refined positions and such elegant movement that no skater should be almost tied with her with both skating cleanly and the same jumps.

Also what about the events in 2002, 2003, and 2004 I talked about under the old system where the judges discretion was how to decide what to do themselves with mistakes and they still did not give her her due at events.

 

[Mathman]

As far as Sasha's run of second place finishes at U.S. Nationals is concerned, her problem was not with the judges, but with unfortunate timing.

Sasha came along before Michelle was done. Sasha has many admirable qualities, but Michelle Kwan stood on a plateau that other U.S. skaters could only espy in the distance.

 

[temperboy28]

:agree: Exactly.

And FIRST in the Olympics? With 2 falls? You've got to be kidding me! Shiz deserved that win by a mile. Everyone else sucked...simple and blunt. (Maybe the only exception would be Suguri).

Sasha landed the same number of triples as Arakawa. Arakawa had only 6 planned once she decided not to do any triple-triples. Cohen had 7 planned once she decided to do a triple-triple sequence. Arakawa landed 5 and Cohen 5, same number. Arakawa was boring and dull in her performance, although it was beautiful. Sasha was also beautiful but was firey and captivating in her performance. Yet Arakawa's performance was somehow da bomb and Cohen's "sucked". Still I agree Arakawa deserved to win the long but not by 8 points, more like 3 or something. Cohen should have won the short program by about 4 points so she deserved overall gold probably, or atleast it should have been very close.

 

[Mathman]

TB, I think where you are going wrong is looking at Sasha above the ankle. Yes, she is very pretty. She can strike exquisite positions of the upper body.

But skating is about where the blade meets the ice. That's where Sasha's problems lie.

 

[temperboy28]

As far as Sasha's run of second place finishes at U.S. Nationals is concerned, her problem was not with the judges, but with unfortunate timing.

Sasha came along before Michelle was done. Sasha has many admirable qualities, but Michelle Kwan stood on a plateau that other U.S. skaters could only espy in the distance.

Michelle is a great champion, but when Sasha came on the scene it only took her a couple years of development in her skating to acquire all the skills to better or match anything Michelle had. The only thing Michelle had over Sasha by 2003, or maybe even 2002, was reputation, and consistency in competition. Sasha could do everything else Michelle had as good or better. The quality of Sasha's skating should have won her more U.S titles, but 1 or 2 mistakes was enough of an excuse for judges to give to the tired and true favorite Kwan.

Look at how Michelle would get so many 6.0s just for any good performance at U.S Nationals. The only time she deserved all of them was 1998 for her historicaly wonderous programs which still are remembered to this day. Her other 6.0s at Nationals were unlegit and just a sign of a lovefest as if she was some goddess. It really became to the point they had no credability. Somebody was going to have to blow her away to beat her at Nationals, and the judges would always look for the smallest excuse to give it to Michelle over any rival.

 

[Mathman]

Look at the blade, TB.

 

[temperboy28]

TB, I think where you are going wrong is looking at Sasha above the ankle. Yes, she is very pretty. She can strike exquisite positions of the upper body.

But skating is about where the blade meets the ice. That's where Sasha's problems lie.

If her edges, stroking, speed and ice coverage are a problem why are her skating skills scores in line with all her other categories in the PC marks? That suggests to me they arent.

 

[temperboy28]

Look at the blade, TB.

Like I said if that area of her skating is a problem why are her skating skill scores in the same range as her other scores? That suggest to me the "below the ankles" area of her skating, the "blade to ice" areas of her skating are just as strong as the others.

Also why does Dick Button or Peggy Fleming never point them out? They say except for inconsistency Sasha has no weakness. They say that many times. Why dont they point out what you say she is lacking in then?

 

[R.D.]

Yet Arakawa's performance was somehow da bomb

I wouldn't exactly say that Shiz's performance was "da bomb", but it was surely leagues better than the what the other skaters could muster. She was the only one left standing. She was the best of a not-so-stellar lot. I wish Kwan was there to shake things up a little.

About Nats- MK was brilliant in her 03 Free and the last minute of her 04 Free. I don't blame the judges for 6.0's there. What was ludicrous, IIRC was Cohen getting a 6.0 in 04 when she FELL. WTH was up with that? What do you have to say about that?

But Kwan certainly didn't deserve 6.0s or 5.9s for her 05 Bolero performance. It was very underwhelming but still good enough to win. I thought Cohen was rather boring and lacked spark, but that was JMO.

MK has earned all of her golds- at least since I've been following along. The others just couldn't match her. Yes, I hated that she kept winning but she really did deserve those wins.

I think a lot of this is subjective. Presentation alone does not win competitions. You have to bring the Tech too and if you're weak in that you can have all the Talent in the world and never make it to the top. The best you can muster would be 4th place- and lucky for Cohen she's good enough in Tech to consistently place on the podium. But she keeps falling and/or stumbling on jumps. The only time she would deserve to win is if everyone else did WORSE than her. But that hasn't been the case.

 

[dancindiva03]

If her edges, stroking, speed and ice coverage are a problem why are her skating skills scores in line with all her other categories in the PC marks? That suggests to me they arent.

It suggest to me that the new judging system does not make it any harder to "prop up" certain skaters (i.e. SASHA) that in was in the old system. Judging is still subjective, and contrary to what you seem to think, its pretty clear to me that the judges have been trying to put Sasha on top, but she is the one that can't pull it off. And like the others said, look at the blade. That's where half of her problems are. The other half are in her head.

 

[hockeyfan228]

It might also have helped if she didn't have such a pronounced flutz, which, according to CoP, deserves a specific and consistently applied deduction, which was rarely taken.

 

[Spun Silver]

Temperboy, I have to applaud your nerve in putting forward such a strong revisionist pro-Sasha history. It's interesting and I'd like to think it's true, or even partly true. When I can I'll rewatch some of those matchups to test it.

Maybe Sasha does have some resentment toward the judges - who knows. But her public story now is that she wants to do better and achieve what she's capable of. I hope she means it. That's a healthier, more impressive attitude than resenting what you can't change.

Your reasoning about the 06 Olympic scores is compelling and I agree about Arakawa's boring free skate. But even if Sasha had won the SP by 5 points, she still would have lost to Arakawa - the final gap was almost 8 points. Anyway, she's taken enough heat just for getting the silver. A gold for her, with the falls, would have been a tainted medal and an international controversy.

OK, so PC scores aren't fairly awarded, but aren't you underrating the athletic side of the sport a bit? Sasha can do the jumps fine (ignoring the flutz issue). She doesn't need to be propped up on PCS. She just needs to land them in competition.