rockstaryuzu

Aww! See? Everyone can grow! This makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.

This is going to sound terrible, but what I remember about Kwan is that she was the girl who came second to Tara Lipinski at the Olympics. Like seriously, I just looked her up on Wikipedia and I had no idea she had five World titles, Olympic silver and Olympic bronze. Yet I wouldn't think of her as a GOAT, even though she ticks most of the boxes. Guess I've just proved to myself that having Olympic gold is a requirement for becoming the GOAT.

There's something to that. Tennis and gymnastics both have a much longer tradition of accepting and celebrating female excellence alongside and equally with male athletes. I'll talk about swimming again because it's the sport I know best, and in swimming, while there are a lot of great women athletes, the G.O.A.T. title just doesn't even start to get mentioned unless you're talking about people who've dominated an event for multiple Olympics ( like Janet Evans) or are heroic, history-making long-distance swimmers, like the first woman to swim the English Channel and so forth ( and even among them, there's a G.O.A.T. of G.O.A.Ts now, since there are a couple of women who've swim nearly every major long-distance crossing you could do). My point being, women athletes have to be uber-extraordinary before the GOAT thing enters the conversation. Most female skaters simply don't stick around the sport long enough to get there. Edited to add: I'm not sure how to move this post to the GOAT thread ...help?

Can't say I blame him. It must be embarrassing for him that scalpers are trying to profit off something his hometown is doing to honour him.

I think that depends on whether you're old enough to have watched her in her competitive years , or not. I'd also put Midori Ito in contention because of her 3A, but I'd never consider Michelle Kwan - I remember nothing about Kwan's competitive performances even though I know I watched them. The G.O.A.T. designation can be highly subjective. That being said, I think that one of the main requirements for being the G.O.A.T. is probably that a decent majority of people agree that you are.

Tbh, l think it's still not that common for people to think of female athletes in those terms. For whatever reason, there just aren't that many female athletes that stand out to people on that way. But I'd certainly give it to Witt, at least for now. In my opinion, Medvedeva has very strong potential to become the G.O.A.T., especially now that she's decided to go for longevity in her career. A lot depends on the choices she makes in the next year or so.

Yeah, when I saw that I had to chuckle. Granted, it's filtered through Google Translate, but still. Layers of meaning are packed into that sentence.

I would. God only knows what might show up.

Google Translate tells me the title is " the reason why Hanyu is the greatest and most respected men's figure skater" and the first line talks about the joy he brings to others. It's basically a praise-filled summary of his talents as an athletes and an artist, and talks about his intention to go for the 4A. It quotes Tara Lipinski saying that the joy he brings to fans, and his charisma and presence on the ice, are like nobody else's. And the writer starts off by saying ' Hanyu Yuzuru is the greatest male figure skater. Any American with some knowledge of figure skating knows it is safe to say that.' - LOL

I think he's dead? He won his medals before WW2. So he can't actually congratulate any winners who match his feat...

I don't know. maybe?

My thoughts on this are as follows: the feats and achievements help establish G.O.A.T. status, but by themselves they are not what makes a G.O.A.T. It's the whole person, the whole package, the background story, everything. It's the longevity in a sport but it's also the passionate engagement in it. It's the ability to take the sport somewhere it's never gone before. It's about being better than everyone else but by doing something new and innovative. I think Yuzu ticks all these boxes. To dredge up an example from another sport, compare Mark Spitz and Michael Phelps. Before Phelps, people would have said Spitz was the G.O.A.T. of swimming - he won seven medals at one Olympics and it took years, decades, for people to beat his records and surpass him. But Phelps swam and competed at the top level for nearly two decades, attending 5 Olympics and medalling at 4 of them- a nearly unprecedented run (most swimmers last about 3 or 4 years at the elite level, BTW). Along the way he had some serious ups and downs in life (arrested for smoking weed, come on!). but came back stronger and emerged victorious after each one. IMO that's what makes a G.O.A.T. - someone who wins at sport and in life, no matter what crap life throws at them. That's why Yuzu is now, and might always be, the G.O.A.T. It's everything about him, not just the skating, that earns him the title. Anyway, about high-risk jumps: if Uncle Voronov can challenge the 4Lo at 31, and succeed, then obviously there are many good ways to mitigate the risk and I'm sure Yuzu will use them.

But it would make him so sad to not achieve it, it's one of his life-long dreams.

I'm wondering if we could just use a crowdfunding site to collect all the donations in one place and then give them in a lump to the charity of choice, saying they're from Planet Hanyu in honour of Yuzu.

I just checked it out quickly. Looks good to me.

I don't know which to pick so I haven't voted - will give a donation to whichever one wins the vote though

"Human cognitive sciences" or something like that? I'm still not sure what that is, but I get the impression it's kind of on the intersection of biology and tech.

Waseda is a pretty elite school and hard to get into, as I understand it. If they offer academic accomodation to athletes, it's probably only things like being allowed to study part-time or by correspondence.

8 years? If it's an undergrad, then he must be part-time.

I'm not sure. I thought I saw it mentioned last spring but can't recall where.

I thought he graduated last year?

Exactly. Yuzu's strategy has always been to be so good that judges are compelled to give him good scores no matter what. Instead of talking about scoring, he makes his statement by going out and delivering so much excellence that he's challenging the judges to dare to give him poor scores.

I think it's a case of them having to say something that sounds reasonably logical to explain his rise.

Well on that front, I agree that they could do more, but I also feel that they're in a position where their options are limited. The best thing they can do is highlight all the times ISU gets it right and the scoring is fair, while pointedly withholding comment when the scoring is not fair.

I watch CBC all the time and I have not noticed any increase in praise for Nathan beyond the fact the he did win World's. And since he has won World's twice, it would be weird if they didn't talk about him.