Who is second best male skater after Plushenko?

[lane85]

I agree with whoever said Yagudin was the best skater ever...I second. Plush is alright but he never grabbed me the same way Alexei did and never well. IMO.

 

[amber68]

You forgot the most overmarked skater too!!

Ant

You forgot to add that actually he does not win because he is overmarked!

 

[antmanb]

You forgot to add that actually he does not win because he is overmarked!

I didn't need to since that wasn't the point i was making

Ant

 

[antmanb]

Well I like that he gets credit for what he does particularly well, but not that areas he is not that exceptional in he is marked as if he is. Nobody who watches him skate can honestly say he is a master of spins, choreography, transitions, or even interpretation. Yet the judges score as if he is. Even his footwork, while excellent I find overrated to an extent, only in that the greatest foowork guys of the last 5-6 years like Yagudin, Browning, even Stojko did their footwork all as a unit, while Plushenko's is broken down into different segments for each part of the body, not working in any kind of cohesion I find.

That pretty much sums up why i think his footwork is completely overated. I would bet a lot of money that if he had to do the footwork at half the pace and actually hit some edges and hold some positions in his footwork he would fail and he would fall. He cannot hold his balance on twizzels and he even struggles to execute clean three turns - he nearly always skids or jumps them.

Ant

 

[dreamingofskating]

yay!

hear ye hear ye! I couldn't agree with you more, Ant. :agree:

 

[amber68]

That pretty much sums up why i think his footwork is completely overated. I would bet a lot of money that if he had to do the footwork at half the pace and actually hit some edges and hold some positions in his footwork he would fail and he would fall. He cannot hold his balance on twizzels and he even struggles to execute clean three turns - he nearly always skids or jumps them.

Ant

Bet taken. I can provide a vid from Oly warm up where he does the footwork nice and slowly. And it is beautiful!
Please let me know how to share this vid and let's discuss afterwards abot Plushenko's twizzles, edges etc.
Also, please check his programs from 1998-2002.

 

[Mathman]

IMHO there are two things about Plushenko's skating that, when he was at his prime, put him head and shoulders above his rivals. The obvious thing is the jumps. When someone else comes out with two secure quads, one in a 4T/3T/2Lo combination, and two triple Axels, one in combination -- and does this time after time after time -- then we can talk.

The second thing is his command and presence on the ice. This is not so obvious on TV, but when you see him compete in person, he is a man among boys.

 

[amber68]

The vid I was talking about is here (lots of thanks to the person who made it):

http://www.savefile.com/files/104258

Plenty of twizzles and three-turns (after 2:00 min. mark) and he neither falls nor looses balance ( I especially like the way he changes foot between twizzles).

 

[antmanb]

IMHO there are two things about Plushenko's skating that, when he was at his prime, put him head and shoulders above his rivals. The obvious thing is the jumps. When someone else comes out with two secure quads, one in a 4T/3T/2Lo combination, and two triple Axels, one in combination -- and does this time after time after time -- then we can talk.

The second thing is his command and presence on the ice. This is not so obvious on TV, but when you see him compete in person, he is a man among boys.

Don't forget the triple axel/half loop/triple flip he also did the season before CoP effectively penalised the use of sequences bygiving the 0.8 multiplier. That was pretty impressive!

Ant (who's just downloading the vid posted in an earlier post)

 

[antmanb]

The vid I was talking about is here (lots of thanks to the person who made it):

http://www.savefile.com/files/104258

Plenty of twizzles and three-turns (after 2:00 min. mark) and he neither falls nor looses balance ( I especially like the way he changes foot between twizzles).

Well in that tape there was mostly the three turns going into his jumps. The others in the tape are a prime example of what i describe has him not fully extending his free leg, pointing his toe or executing a clean turn - he wide steps out of all of them rather than pushing onto clean edges.

The Back twizzles he does first a couple of LBI twizzles followed by RBO twizzles which were well executed. The rest of thetwizzles he does later on in the tape are the jump warm up ones that are all on the RBO edge.

He doesn't execute any of the steps from either foot work sequence which was what i was meaning (and i think stated) when i said i'd bet any sum of money if he had to do his footwork sequences at a much slower pace i don't think he could do the twizzles or three turns since he falls out of them when he does it fast.

Believe me when i say i think he is a phenomenal skater and competitor - the best jumper in the history of the sport. But people claim his footwork is the best, for me, it s case of the emperor's new clothes - he can't do it and covers it up by manking everytnig fast and frenetic and distracts from his feet by doing much more "armwork" than footwork.

Again, all only my opinion and i appreciate that a lot of people disagree with me

Ant

 

[amber68]

Took me some time to search through my files but I uploaded a much better example (again, thanks to the person who made the vid)
http://www.savefile.com/files/104692

The footwork is slow, right on the beat of the music, executed on one foot, lovely deep edges, controlled twizzles (it's after 2: 30 min. mark).

 

[antmanb]

Took me some time to search through my files but I uploaded a much better example (again, thanks to the person who made the vid)
http://www.savefile.com/files/104692

The footwork is slow, right on the beat of the music, executed on one foot, lovely deep edges, controlled twizzles (it's after 2: 30 min. mark).

I get a message saying "http server is not alive" but is quite an amusing warnign message i'd never seen before - who knew that servers are alive and dead!!!

In all seriousness though i can't get the link to download.

Ant

 

[amber68]

I get a message saying "http server is not alive" but is quite an amusing warnign message i'd never seen before - who knew that servers are alive and dead!!!

In all seriousness though i can't get the link to download.

Ant

Checked the link and it works fine for me. Maybe the server was just sleeping

 

[antmanb]

Checked the link and it works fine for me. Maybe the server was just sleeping

Just downloaded it and its just an audio file with windows visual effect stuff going on while it plays...

Ant

 

[amber68]

Just downloaded it and its just an audio file with windows visual effect stuff going on while it plays...

Ant

I don’t know why the vid is not working for you; maybe you need a different codec.It doesn’t matter much and we will both keep our opinions.
But , of course, I would have loved to win the bet.

 

[Vodka Shot]

I actually think Plushenko is one of the worst skaters on that list. I feel this way b/c there was absolutely no attempt at choreography in his Torino showings. It was jump...wave arms....jump....wave arms....jump ...for a second I thought he was tring to flag down a helicopter or something, "look I'm down here, look!" This is figure skating; not Ice jumping! I'd have to say on that list: Weir, Sandhu, Buttle -top 3.

 

[Wren]

I picked other, Stephane Lambiel by for in my books!

 

[jennylovskt]

It got to be Stephane Lambiel.

 

[1795]

weir?!
people like him?
such a horrible attitude...but i have to say he can do one of the best triple axels