The Politics of Figure Skating

[Mathman]

Hi, Rgirl. For the Olympics, Worlds, GP Final, Euros, etc., there are 12 judges, 3 eliminated in the random draw, one high and one low thrown out, leaving seven actual scores to determine the winner.

Does all of this help or hurt potential cheaters? It's the luck of the draw. A conspiracy of five (out of 12) might all get eliminated, or they might all survive to dominate a panel of seven. Sometimes they will be successful in their nefarious schemes, sometimes not.

I do not understand the obsession with debating whether cheaters have a statistically better chance under the old or the new judging systems. The NJS is what we've got. It is possible to cheat, but assuming that there are only a few cheaters among many honest folk, we have every reason to be optimistic. (My sister Pollyanna thinks so, too.)

To me, a more important consideration is that the judges are appointed by their cronies and superiors in the national federations. Naturally they must please their bosses or they're out of a job.

MM

 

[Mathman]

About creeping inflation in the program component scores, maybe the ISU brain trust gets together periodically to raise or lower them, to keep up the fans' interest. Like major league baseball, although the rules state what is a ball or a strike, every year the umpires meet to decide how big a strike zone to call that year, depending on whether they think the fans want to see more home runs or not.

Maybe leading up to the Olympics, team Speedy wants more home runs.

MM

 

[chuckm]

The damage that can be done by a group of colluders under CoP is far greater than it was under 6.0. Under 6.0, the judges could use ordinals to place skaters where they wanted them, but it wasn't that secure because they often had no idea where the other judges were going to place some of the skaters. But where the ordinals placed the skater was good for that segment only. A first or second place in the SP did not ensure that a skater would win the competition.

Under CoP, using PCS and GOE, a group of colluders can pad one skater's score in the SP to such an extent (as much as 5-6 points) that the skater can go into the FS with a comfortable cushion against a fall or disruption in the program. And the PCS score in a less-than-stellar FS can be padded as well to make up for technical points unscored or lost to deductions.

We've already seen that can happen without collusion. Jeff Buttle skated well in the SP at Skate Canada, but had a disastrous FS, yet he received PCS scores in the FS higher than any of the other men, including the FS winner Emanuel Sandhu who had a great FS. Jeff lost the competition by just 0.66 (Sandhu's SP was as disastrous as Buttle's FS).

 

[Joesitz (RIP)]

Does all of this help or hurt potential cheaters? It's the luck of the draw. A conspiracy of five (out of 12) might all get eliminated, or they might all survive to dominate a panel of seven. Sometimes they will be successful in their nefarious schemes, sometimes not.

To me, a more important consideration is that the judges are appointed by their cronies and superiors in the national federations. Naturally they must please their bosses or they're out of a job. MM

I don't believe you are grasping the curiosity of the serious fan of figure skating. There are fans who have a favorite and noting that their favorite after a brilliant skate did not get the scores anticipated can not help but wonder who those judges are in that mix of Tech and PCS scores escpecially if another skater who was perceived to not have a good skate received better scores.

The curiosity extends to fans of figure skating in general also. Fans love the Sport and want to be able to discuss at all levels including what to expect from certain judges. You yourself pointed out that the Italian judge will more than likely give good scores to Sasha but you mentioned this based on the 6.0 system where judges were not secretive.

The notion that removing 3 judges' scores from a panel of 12 alleviates any kind of hanky panky from the system. to a degree I see that but not totally when 9 are still left. There are judges who are completely on the up and up and their scores are subjected to being thrown out as well.

I'm against secret judging If there is Open Scoring and a scandal (which is unlikely in Torino) happens, I think the fans are entitled to know what's going on.

Chuckm's post is well taken. The questions of 'holding up' top ten skaters doesn't do much for lesser skaters and why not?

Joe

 

[chuckm]

About creeping inflation in the program component scores, maybe the ISU brain trust gets together periodically to raise or lower them, to keep up the fans' interest. Like major league baseball, although the rules state what is a ball or a strike, every year the umpires meet to decide how big a strike zone to call that year, depending on whether they think the fans want to see more home runs or not.

Maybe leading up to the Olympics, team Speedy wants more home runs.

MM

That would be fine if the scores went up proportionally for the other skaters as well. But they don't.

 

[Mathman]

For me, it's hard to draw any conclusions at this point. I am not alarmed that Irina's program component scores went up from 61 at Cup of Russia last year to 63 at Cup of China this year.

Irina is skating better and better; none of the other ladies is keeping pace.

MM

 

[gezando]

I think the serious death threat against MK when she was 14 going on 15 had influenced her view about competing outside of US. During the 95-96 season, she was going everywhere.

It's the escalation of the scores that grabs the attention. We didn't see 8s in Irina's averaged scores until Worlds last year, but we are now starting off the season with 8s. I expect the scores will go up again at CoR and the GPF. If she stays healthy, we may well see 9s for Euros and Torino

I kind of agree, but so far Irina has outskated her competitors, so I have no argument about her placement. I do think Arakawa should be rewarded more for her skating skills relative to what the judges gave Irina.

 

[mzheng]

I kind of agree, but so far Irina has outskated her competitors, so I have no argument about her placement. I do think Arakawa should be rewarded more for her skating skills relative to what the judges gave Irina.

Yes. I always think Arakawa was the one underated by Judges, especially her SS score, it was soooooooooo obviously under marked. During 2003/2004 season, it was against SC. Last season it was against IS.

 

[Rgirl]

Of course it takes more than just making a phone call. You'd have to convince the person on the other end to vote the way you want. Which probably means offering them something in exchange, such as a higher placement for the skater/team from their country, either in the same event or in a different discipline. Or just cold hard cash....

No, in the old (pre-1998) majority system, a majority is a majority of all the judges, and if there are 9 judges, than 3 first places does not give you a majority of firsts. Firsts from 5 of 9 judges in a given program would guarantee you first place in that program, but firsts from 3 or 4 judges would not guarantee anything even if no one else had that many. You'd have to look for who had the best majority of second-place ordinals, or in some cases even thirds, which might not be same person who had the most firsts.

Take a look at the pairs' long program from 1996 Worlds. I don't have the actualy scores ordinals available, but as I recall Shishkova & Naumov had four 1sts (the most of any of the teams) and either five 4ths or four 4ths and one 2nd or 3rd.

The other five 1sts were split among the three teams who ultimately finished on the podium.

Eltsova & Bushkov won with a majority of 2nds and possibly additional tiebreakers. Shishkova & Naumov ended up 4th, despite having more 1st-place ordinals than any other team.

Thanks, Gkelly. Although I understood the "I'll scratch your back if you'll scratch mine" of 6.0 judging fixes (heck, who doesn't get that lesson on the playground in kindergarten, lol), I was definitely off re "the majority of 1st place votes." Your explanation sounds familiar, so maybe I knew it in another life. Thanks for correcting me and taking the time to give an excellent example. I know a lot of people are probably still wondering how Eltsova & Bushkov ever got to be World Champs--no diss to them personally, but as pairs skaters...not exactly holding up "the great Russian tradition."

Given that scenario, ie, no clear winner, do you think the "right" skater or team was more likely to be chosen using the OBO system (forgetting the interim system for argument's sake) or under the NJS as it stands now?

Rgirl

 

[Rgirl]

I think what has us Michelle fans down in the dumps is that the New Judging System does not seem to have a mechanism for rewarding the best qualities in Michelle's skating, but it does provide ample opportunity to pile points on her chief rivals.

Dispite the famous language discussed on the other thread, the language about radiant energy that transports the audience to Nirvana, etc., etc., there just does not seem to be a category in the CoP for "Kwanliness."

Well, figure skating without Kwanliness is Orange juice wthout the big O. (And if you don't know what range juice is, think road apples.) No, I mean a day without a sunshine.

And Kwan without Kwanliness is just 4.0 points for a triple toe and 1.3 points for a level 2 layback. Others can top it, pointwise, but phooey on that.

I realize that "skating that results in an invisible bond with the audience" as being 1/5th of the Performance/Execution component has been discussed and 1/5th of one component score would never satisfy the fans of any skater they feel brings "a day full of sunshine" to the ice.

But do Michelle's fans really want, say, a 3-point "special qualities" bonus to be included in the COP? Think long and hard. That would probably have meant that in '98, for example, Kwan would have received that bonus at Nationals (she made all the judges--all American--cry), which just would have meant she would have won Nats over Tara by a bigger margin. But at the Olympics, even by some her biggest fans' accounts, "Lyra" was skated "tentatively" and "just didn't sing," so Michelle would not have received the "SQ" bonus; Tara probably would have; and, just to play devil's advocate, perhaps Lu Chen would have received the SQ bonus and won the silver, leaving Michelle with the bronze.

Also, the fact is, what Doggygirl (I think it was her) said is true. Nobody has any idea how Michelle stands in terms of the COP except for her one NJS event, '05 Worlds. Michelle could have done the GPS in '04 to get familiarize herself with the COP rather than wait until the Olympic season. I posted this some place else, I can't recall where, so I apologize for repetition, but it's almost as if Michelle's strategy for the '06 Olympics is the same as it was for '02: Wait until just before the Olympic season and then make a great big change. I'm sure that's not what Michelle was thinking, but it has been the result with the first really serious injury of her career. I'm not trying to dump on a skater while she's down, and as you know, I've been a fan of Michelle's skating since '03. In fact, I was most looking forward to seeing what a skater like Michelle would do with the COP. Now, it's all up in the air.

So that's my case. MM, what do you or any other Kwan fans feel should be added to or subtracted from the COP to make the things you love about Michelle part of what is judged and why?

Rgirl

 

[Rgirl]

The damage that can be done by a group of colluders under CoP is far greater than it was under 6.0. Under 6.0, the judges could use ordinals to place skaters where they wanted them, but it wasn't that secure because they often had no idea where the other judges were going to place some of the skaters. But where the ordinals placed the skater was good for that segment only. A first or second place in the SP did not ensure that a skater would win the competition.

Under CoP, using PCS and GOE, a group of colluders can pad one skater's score in the SP to such an extent (as much as 5-6 points) that the skater can go into the FS with a comfortable cushion against a fall or disruption in the program. And the PCS score in a less-than-stellar FS can be padded as well to make up for technical points unscored or lost to deductions.

We've already seen that can happen without collusion. Jeff Buttle skated well in the SP at Skate Canada, but had a disastrous FS, yet he received PCS scores in the FS higher than any of the other men, including the FS winner Emanuel Sandhu who had a great FS. Jeff lost the competition by just 0.66 (Sandhu's SP was as disastrous as Buttle's FS).

But Chuck, we've just seen Sandhu come from 6th place after the SP at COC to win after the leaders tanked their LPs. If the judges were in collusion for an Eman win, that's sure a funny way of doing it.

I'm not saying judges won't try to cheat. People will always try to cheat. But, as has been said many times before, with now 3 random scores being thrown out, plus the high and low, how do you know if you're going to be colluding with anybody? All your colluders may have been thrown out in the random draw and high score.

Also, thanks for the breakdown of all Irina's scores from '04/05. It would bother me more if there were a 1:1 correlation between skating at each successive event and PCS scores. Different panels of judges should be giving skaters different PCS scores, up to a point. The point Irina received for her SP at COC is within my understanding of human nature, statistics, and chance. So is the way her PCS scores went last season.

Lest we forget, vasculitis and pericarditis are not versions of the flu that you come down with and recover from. They are chronic inflammatory diseases and can flare at any time.

But even if Irina didn't have this "extra variable" I'd still be fine with her scores. They are very, very much within one standard deviation--just eyeballing it, Mathman. But thanks again for taking the time to post them so I could see for myself. For some reason I thought it was last season Irina missed the GPS.

Rgirl--Still Annoying

 

[Rgirl]

Hockeyfan, you're my hero! We should invent a "fantasy league" game where we can play all this out.

My hero, too. Seriously, anybody want to get serious about how the COP works vs the OBO? Too bad it's the holidays or I'd recommend this for the GPF. Anyway, pick any significant ISU event except Nationals prior to the Olympics. Have one of the mods, or even better, Paula, randomly choose 21 judges from the regular GS ranks. One group of 12 will judge the predetermined event under NJS; the remaining 9 will judge it under OBO. Then let's see how our NJS panel compares with the ISU panel's outcome as well as how our OBO panel's outcome compares to both the GS and ISU NJS panels' outcomes.

Anybody care to drive themselves crazy doing this?

Rgirl

 

[Mathman]

But at the Olympics, even by some her biggest fans' accounts, "Lyra" was skated "tentatively" and "just didn't sing," so Michelle would not have received the "SQ" bonus; Tara probably would have;

I think Tara did receive Kwanliness points for her eye-popping energy in the Olympic long program. I think that's what won it for her (along with her triple loop / triple loop).

I also think that's why it is not of much value endlessly to review tapes of events trying to nitpick who was robbed. The tapes don't capture the moment.

MM, what do you or any other Kwan fans feel should be added to or subtracted from the COP to make the things you love about Michelle part of what is judged and why?

I think it's about right as it is. When a skater really brings it, like Irina's short program at Cup of China, she gets straight and indiscriminately high marks across the board in program components.

I do not see any difference between this convention and that of giving a string of 5.9s in Presentation under ordinal judging. This is the judges' opportunity to thumb their noses at the CoP and simply say, you rock, girl!

MM

 

[Mathman]

But, as has been said many times before, with now 3 random scores being thrown out, plus the high and low, how do you know if you're going to be colluding with anybody? All your colluders may have been thrown out in the random draw and high score.

This has indeed been said many times before. But IMHO what is not said often enough in response (although I am doing my best to keep up the ratio, LOL) is this: The randomness factor is equally likely to strengthen or to weaken the supposed conspirators' hand, vis-a-vis the rest of the panel.

MM

 

[chuckm]

The point I was trying to make about Jeff almost beating Sandhu with a poor FS was not that those judges were colluding, but that it is possible to give a skater enough of a cushion in the SP (Jeff did win the SP at SC) to make winning possible even if the FS has problems. The Buttle-Sandhu scenario shows that it would be possible for the skater winning the SP to win it all with a little help from a select group of judges.

I'm sure the judges are well aware that such an outcome is possible.

 

[Mathman]

Given that scenario, ie, no clear winner, do you think the "right" skater or team was more likely to be chosen using the OBO system (forgetting the interim system for argument's sake) or under the NJS as it stands now?

I'll be interested in GKelly's take on this question, too.

But for what it's worth, here's what I think. I do not believe that there is such a thing as the "right" skater. In a judged sport, excepting dishonesty or incompetence on the part of the judges, the "right" skater is the one that captures the votes of the judges.

Under ordinal judging, in a close contest with no one winning a majority of first place ordinals, this aspect of the sport is rubbed in our faces somewhat uncomfortably.

Under point total judging, it is a little bit more hidden to the casual fan. Someone gets 152 points and wins, someone else gets 151 points and finishes second. A close contest, but winning is winning. It is only when we look closely at the differences in scores given by different judges that the subjective nature of the judging process is uncovered.

MM

 

[Joesitz (RIP)]

Under point total judging, it is a little bit more hidden to the casual fan. Someone gets 152 points and wins, someone else gets 151 points and finishes second. A close contest, but winning is winning. It is only when we look closely at the differences in scores given by different judges that the subjective nature of the judging process is uncovered.

MM

And when we see this subjectivity what conclusions should we make? We are powerless to change the scores so we have a choice of sucking up the results and continue to believe in the sanctity of the system or compain about them in a forum.

I have no idea that any such subjectivity would be taken up by the ISU.

Joe

 

[hockeyfan228]

The point I was trying to make about Jeff almost beating Sandhu with a poor FS was not that those judges were colluding, but that it is possible to give a skater enough of a cushion in the SP (Jeff did win the SP at SC) to make winning possible even if the FS has problems. The Buttle-Sandhu scenario shows that it would be possible for the skater winning the SP to win it all with a little help from a select group of judges.

Except that Sandhu had a horrible SP, and no one else who did well in the SP to stay in contention skated well enough in the LP. With a decent skate, Weir would have won easily, and Buttle wouldn't even have been on the podium if Honda had skated to his capabilities. A more relevant example is Slutskaya's lead over Arakawa and Asada, where it would have taken a complete meltdown for anyone to have come from behind to wind, or even her collective lead over Cohen at Worlds. With a perfect skate Cohen wouldn't have had the base difficulty to overcome the points deficit from the quali and SP.

 

[Mathman]

And when we see this subjectivity what conclusions should we make? We are powerless to change the scores so we have a choice of sucking up the results and continue to believe in the sanctity of the system or compain about them in a forum.

I think the only conclusion we can draw is that, yes, figure skating is a subjective sport. When performances are judged on the basis of "interpreting the character of the music" and "individuality of style and personality" (to quote from the ISU rule book), there is no escaping subjectivity, IMHO.

I thought Emanuel Sandhu's LP at Cup of China was outstanding in these two respects. Someone else might think it was just weird and incoherent. Who's right and who's wrong?

MM

 

[gkelly]

even her collective lead over Cohen at Worlds. With a perfect skate Cohen wouldn't have had the base difficulty to overcome the points deficit from the quali and SP.

Heading into the long program at Worlds last year, Slutskaya had a lead of 2.86 points over Cohen.

With a perfect skate in the LP, Cohen could easily have earned at least that much more than the score she actually earned for a pretty-good skate with a few errors.

Of course it wouldn't have been enough to catch the actual near-perfect LP that Slutskaya put down in Moscow, but even Cohen's slightly flawed performance would have been plenty to catch a more seriously flawed performance by Slutskaya (e.g., her Europeans LP).

If Cohen had beaten Slutskaya in the long in Moscow, she was easily within reach to beat her overall. However, if both have great LPs, it appears that Slutskaya would come out ahead there as well as overall.