- Joined
- Mar 28, 2005
He would not have.
She would not have.
He might have.
He would have.
He would have.
In 4 of the 5 I pretty much do know for sure. :agree:
Turin 2006 - The Best May Not be Allowed to Skate (non-spoiler)
- Thread starter Frau Muller
- Start date
He would not have.
She would not have.
He might have.
He would have.
He would have.
In 4 of the 5 I pretty much do know for sure. :agree:
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- Mar 28, 2005
SkateFan4Life said:
Definitely not. The judges would never have allowed them to beat Rodnina
/Zaitsev.
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- Jun 21, 2003
But even so, I bet Tai kicks Randy in the behind every time she sees him for coming up with such an ill-timed injury.slutskayafan21 said:
About pacing, it is intriguing to me that Irina, the oldest lady in the running and the one whose health concerns ought to make her the most cautious, is the one who has thrown caution to the winds and is competing full out in every event she can squeeze into her schedule.
MM
Mathman said:About pacing, it is intriguing to me that Irina, the oldest lady in the running and the one whose health concerns ought to make her the most cautious, is the one who has thrown caution to the winds and is competing full out in every event she can squeeze into her schedule.
MM
ITA
to Irina. If you look at the Japanese skaters, they may not have a choice but to skate a max of 2 GP events, because there are so many talented skaters who are worthy to have GP assignment. In order to make room for Mao, e.g. Arakawa might be able to only skate in 2 events instead of 3. Then for whatever reason the Japanese federation is allowing 3 of their stars to skate GPevents back to back, Arakawa, and Mao at COC, and TEB, Ando at COR, and NHK. It must be a harsh schedule for Shiz and Mao to skate back to back away from home. at least Miki has one of the 2 events at home
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- Dec 18, 2003
gezando said:ITA
events back to back, Arakawa, and Mao at COC, and TEB, Ando at COR, and NHK. It must be a harsh schedule for Shiz and Mao to skate back to back away from home. at least Miki has one of the 2 events at home
Weren't the skaters limited to only 2 GP assignments this year (no non-scoring events for anyone). At least that was my understanding.
DG
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- Jul 11, 2003
Isn't Liashenko the oldest female skater in the eligible category? and Corwin? and Sebastyen?
Joe
Joe
slutskayafan21 said:
You may "pretty much know" to your own satisfaction, but neither you, nor anyone else, really does know. Everyone involved in each of those situations, including the skater named, the other competitors, the judges, coaches, etc., acted and reacted based on what actually did happen. Unless you have a time machine handy and can go back and change the situation and then put all the folks involved back into that now-changed situation, you'll never know what would have happened "if.".
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- Mar 28, 2005
mememe said:
Ummm no. They are all pretty obvious. Kadavy was in 6th place going into the long program in Calgary, with 50% of the scoring done, before withdrawing. So one is saying she would have won the long program in order to pass Thomas for the bronze? Keep in mind the judges only placed her where she was despite skating well in figures and the short so. It is pretty obvious she was out of it.
Kulik skated perfectly and did a quad at the 98 Olympics. Unless Stojko was going to get all 6.0s for technical merit, Kulik would have won out on the second mark, Stojko might have taken 2 or 3 judges, but that is it.
Browning beat Petrenko at the 1990 and 1991 Worlds, and those were close and split decisions, but Petrenko skated MUCH better than he did in the 1992 Olympics long program.
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chuckm said:
I am not trying to, but all the sitations are pretty obvious, it does not take a genius to see Kadavy was never in medal contention in Calgary by the time she withdrew, Stojko would not have beaten Kulik that night in Nagano given his artistic shortcomings and Kulik' skate, Orser would have won in Sarajevo without the figures since he easily won the other two programs, and that Browning who was such an incredable competitor would have had no problem beating a subpar Petrenko if he was healthy. Explain one of them that I am not obviously right on and you have a point.
slutskayafan21 said:
Well, let's take 1984. We've been through this all before. You are saying that Orser would have won without figures because he won the long and the short. But -- please tell me WHEN figures were going to be taken out of the equation? After the competition was already skated? The day before the competition began? The year before? Two years before? Because you simply can't apply "today's" rules to "yesterday's" competition. It doesn't work.
It's unlikely that figures would have been taken out of the equation after the competition was skated, or the day before. When figures were removed from the equation in 1990, it was known two years before (at the ISU meetings in the spring of 1988) that figures would not be competed beginning in 1990. And the skaters prepared accordingly.
So, if Scott Hamilton, Brian Orser and the rest had known in 1982 that figures would not be contested in 1984 (which is highly unlikely -- a major change in rules is seldom instituted in an Olympic year -- CoP was used at Worlds in 2005, not used for the first time internationally this season; figures were eliminated two years before the 1992 Olympics), then you have to figure in what may have happened in those two years. In 1982, Scott Hamilton would have known he couldn't rely on figures to get a lead, and that good figures skaters couldn't "beat" him by out-scoring him in figures. Brian Orser would have known figures couldn't hold him back anymore. Brian Boitano, Robert Wagenhoffer and some other U.S. skaters who were outjumping Hamilton by then, would have known that they wouldn't be held back by figures anymore; Alexandre Fadeev and Josef Sabovcik, who were trying quads, etc., by then, would have known that figures couldn't help (Fadeev) or hurt (Sabovcik) by Olympic time. And JUDGES will know that they can't "place skaters" or make sure the people whose "turn" it is will be among the top heading into the short programs.
So, three hours of practice a day that most of those guys were putting in on figures goes out the window in 1982 -- Hamilton knows he can probably hold off all the up-and-comers in 1983 with his figures as they are, so he'll want to start working on upping his jump content. The "figures" experts know 1983 is likely their last hurrah, so who knows what they work on or if they just out and out retire then, leaving it open for the "jumpers" to be close enough in figures in 1983 to perhaps get on the medal stand, and thus help their reputations. The jumping beans will not care about figures for one more year, since in the "most important year," figures won't be there. Everyone goes gung-ho in practicing bigger and more impressive jumps.
Now, can you figure out who would have gotten injured, who would have improved their jump content, who would have retired by 1984? Can you figure out whether the judges in the U.S. would have figured they'd have a better chance at a medal stand finish if they rewarded the guy with the triple axel (Boitano) rather than the defending world champion who didn't have a triple axel (Hamilton?). Would Hamilton have a triple axel by then? Would he (or Orser or Boitano or Sabvocik or Fadeev or anyone else) have gotten injured trying to do more and more jumps to try to get on the medal stand?
Can you decide whether Orser would have been a serious contender for the gold medal by 1984, rather than someone who was expected to possibly medal, but have no real chance of unseating the three-time world champion? If he was considered a favorite for the gold, can you tell me whether the nerves that afflicted him in 1985 and 1986 (when he was the reigning Olympic silver medalist, with a much better "international" rep than either Fadeev or Boitano and expected to win out through the 1988 Olympics, a la Hamilton) would have affected him at the 1984 Olympics?
I am not at all convinced that Orser would have been the gold medalist at the 1984 Olympics without figures -- and unless you can give me logical, back-up-able answers to all the above questions, I can't see how you can be even "pretty sure." he would have been.
As for Browning -- well, the Olympics were, as he said, "never my thing." In 1994, when he was in an absolutely perfect situation in the short program to put himself in position to win gold -- defending world champion, last up in the short program, the other two 'big name" favorites (Boitano and Petrenko) already way down in the standings, his triple axel combination out of the way ... he fell on the flip and then didn't even manage to hang on to his concentration enough to do a double axel at the end of the program, and fell way down to 12th place. So, you can assure me that without the injury (that wasn't enough to keep him from competing), he would have absolutely, positively, no-doubt have held it all together to win gold in 1992. (Hey -- if that is the case, then I can say I'm "pretty sure" that Boitano would be a three-time Olympic gold medalist, if only the rules had allowed him to compete in 1992 and if he hadn't had a knee injury in 1994. After all, he held it together in 1988 -- beating both Petrenko and Browning in that competition -- so of course he would have been able to beat a sloppy Petrenko and an injured Browning in 1992, and would have easily beaten a bunch of no-names (at the time) in 1994, since both Browning and Petrenko had taken themselves out of the medal competition after the SP).
I'm with SkateFan4Life on this -- "what if" can drive you crazy. But that's all it is -- what if? There is no way to know what would have happened if the situation was different, because it wasn't different.
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mememe said:
I am sorry but parts of that are funny. You mention Boitano beating Petrenko and Browning in 1988, regardless how you would compare the 3 later in their careers, how they compare that year being of any relevance is ridiculous, since both were just developing skaters at that point, especialy Browning. Neither were serious threats to Boitano at that point obviously, and Browning was not even a medal contender at that point, in fact Petrenko's medal was a huge surprise, and courtesy of a meltdown by Fadeev.
Boitano's knee injury held him back from winning in 1994? The Olympics was the only competition he fell in the short program, yet he had that same knee injury all year, I doubt the fall in the short program had anything to do with his knee injury. Anyway he had already lost twice that year-to Petrenko at Skate America, and even to Scott Davis at the U.S nationals, Boitano as an amateur skater at that point was very beatable, Americans were too presumptous on how he would do based on his dominance in pro events which are completely different.
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mememe said:
There is every reason to believe all the aforementioned skaters were working as hard as they could at both figures and free skating, which were both imperative then. The free skaters like Orser, Boitano, Sabovcik, spoke about how hard they worked at their figures even though they were known more for free skating; and Rudi Cerne and Jean-Christophe worked hard on their free skating and openly spoke about it, though they were better known for figures. I dont see what would have changed for any of them, had there been no figures, as far as their free skating performance. Even without figures Hamilton would have dominated the 81-83 seasons since the triple axel guys were too new, not polished enough, and not consistent enough in 82-83 to have beaten him. Orser would have probably finished on the podium at both the 82 and 83 Worlds but behind Hamilton, and would still have not gone into the 84 Olympics with anywhere near the pressure of 1988. I dont see any reason to believe either would have skated differently, Hamilton's performances were affected by pressure and Orser's were free attacking performances by somebody without the pressure. Are you saying Hamilton would not have gone in as the clear favorite in 84 even without figures in the leading to Sarajevo?
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slutskayafan21 said:
And I see every reason to believe that either one or both and possibly everyone else in the competition would have skated differently had figures been eliminated a couple of years earlier..
Yes, skaters were working hard on all aspects of their skating, but there's only so many hours a day you can practice (and three hours a day of figures practice tended to keep guys from overdoing the jump practices -- which may have been a factor in keeping injuries down). And everyone had a tendancy to work on the things that will help them the most. Orser also said that he didn't concentrate that much on his figures early on, figuring he wasn't going to get noticed unless he did something spectacular in the jumping department -- and indeed, the triple axel got him noticed. He figured there was no way he was going to get up far enough in figures early in his career with all the "figures" skaters around, so figures weren't on his list of things he had to really concentrate on until he found himself beating Hamilton in the SP and LP. Then, it was time to work on figures a bit more -- it was "his" time. (Skaters tended to have a very fatalistic view of the "turn" system when figures were being contested -- they knew they'd have to wait their "turn" before they could expect to really win -- that mindset went by the wayside with the elimination of figures .)
Hamilton, on the other hand, has admitted in his book that he didn't make that extra effort to get a triple axel when it just wasn't coming, but was causing some aches and pains. rather, he concentrated on getting his figures good enough to beat the "figures" skaters, confident that he could hold off the "jumpers" up through 1984 even without a triple axel or triple loop as long as his figures were good enough to get a lead and then do what he did have very well. And he was only interested in getting through 1984 -- he had no plans to continue past that.
So, competitive guy that he was, would he have worked harder on the triple axel if he hadn't had figures to rely on? I think so (but of course, can't know) -- he hated to lose. Would he have gotten injured trying to get it, or would he have simply been unable to get it and thus retired or not been a factor anymore because the U.S. judges decided to go with the guys with the big jumps? Possibly yes, to all three of those scenarios. Remember, Scott only won the 1981 world championship narrowly over countryman David Santee, who was younger and had some bigger jumps. David went on to be injured for several years and never quite got back to that level again, although it was HIS finish in figures at 1982 U.S. Nationals that kept Boitano (who beat him in the free skate) off the 1982 world team. It's certainly possible that Boitano would have had at least one year more on the world scene had figures not been being contested that year (or if judges had known they wouldn't be contested in the coming years and had wanted someone with a triple axel to go up against all the other guys with triple axels).
And I can't say who would have been the favorite going into the 1984 Olympics if figures had been eliminated in 1982 (or earlier). Yes, Orser was "not polished" in 1983 or 84, but he did beat Hamilton in SP and LP at the Olympics. So, you're saying the judges that were willing to put Orser ahead of Hamilton at the Olympics wouldn't have been willing to put Orser, Boitano, Sabovcik, Fadeev, or someone else with big jumps ahead of him at, say, 1982 or 1983 worlds? Boitano became the first skater to land all six types of triples in the same program at 1983 worlds -- with no figures, would the judges have been willing to do the same thing for him that they did for Orser the next year at the Olympics, especially knowing that figures were not ever going to figure into the scoring again? I don't think you, or anyone else, can know whether they would have or not. Would Wagenhoffer (who did beat Hamilton in an SP at U.S. Nationals once) or Boitano or one of the other "jumpers" have beaten Hamilton at U.S. nationals even before 1982, had the judges known that figures would not be able to help Hamilton over the next four years? Again, how can YOU know that when even the people who were judging back then couldn't know what they'd have done had the situation been different.
You are certainly welcome to "pretty much know" that this or that or the other "would have happened if..." Hopefully, it makes you happy. Me, I prefer to see things as they DID happen and go from there.
slutskayafan21 said:
Uh -- it was all meant to be ridiculous -- because I think the "logic" your using to say that this or that pretty much for sure would have happened if ... is along the same lines, and therefore, ridiculous.
I would never presume to say that Boitano would have won either of those two competitions, because the FACT is, he wasn't in the 1992 Games because rules prohibited him from trying to earn his way there, and, while he did earn a spot at the 1994 Games, he didn't even come close to winning. Knowing the history behind his knee injury and what he could and couldn't do because of it could lead to a long line of speculatioin. But injury or not, he figured he was healthy enough to compete, he did so, and he finished sixth. What "woulda, shoulda, coulda" happened had he not had the knee injury is of no consequence, and it's totally unfair to the others who were in the competition (and also ridiculous) to try to re-do what did happen with "but if..."
You say Browning would have won had he not been injured, because he'd beaten other people before, etc., etc. Well, based on that line of reasoning, Boitano would have won had HE not been injured (or had he been in the competition -- gee, he was skating so well in 1992 -- and he'd never lost to any of the people he'd have gone up against!)
Nowhere have I run across anyplace where Browning claims that the back injury caused his problems in both programs at the 1992 Olympics. He simply didn't manage to hit stuff he had been hitting before (hit the lutzes, which he had just put back into his programs after several years of not doing them, but missed on jumps he had hit before in big competitions.) Whether that was because of Olympic pressure, back injury, difference in preparation because of back injury, or whatever, the fact is he DID miss those elements, and finished totally off the medal podium (behind someone who didn't even had a triple axel). To me, to presume that he "pretty much for sure" would have won had he not had an injury is an insult to those who did win. (Hey, Petrenko was having horrible boot problems in 1989 -- had he had the right boots and been able to practice properly all fall long, I'm "pretty much sure" he would have won the world championship that year, and who knows what would have happened in that battle after that?)
I guess ridiculous is in the eye of the beholder.
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