General Skating Chat

[Veveco]

23 minutes ago, shanshani said:

Wait what, most judges can't tell the difference between a flip and a lutz? what, that better not be true. 

 

She might have meant at the lower levels only (at least I'm hoping so!), and it was only her own observation to be fair, but it was still troubling to hear. I hope it was merely a hyperbole 

[memae]

2 hours ago, Veveco said:

 

She stated her opinion publicly, in response to a discussion pointing out at the inconsistency of the panels, so obviously people are going to react. She chose to get involved in the discussion and she essentially gave ammunition to the people complaining about the system in the first place. I wish some fans were more subtle in their answer, but unfortunately social media is rarely the best place for a nuanced debate (particularly Twitter).

 

 

See, the way I interpreted it wasn't that she was giving an opinion at all. To me, it was as though she was merely pointing out that that's just how it is. The way judging works now, you can't really compare panel to panel, competition to competition, because there's such obvious lack of consistency and standardisation (in practice). Like, ideally, you would be able to because all of the judges would be rigorous in consistently applying the criteria to their judging and there'd be less room for subjectivity to cause big disparities between the scoring of similar standard jumps/falls/spins/etc. It's like it ought to be apples to apples but it just isn't (and there isn't enough scrutiny and reprimand coming from the right places to demand that it becomes consistent enough to allow for comparison). It sure didn't sound like she is okay with this. I think a lot of people just took her comment to be more shallow than (I think) it is. I think she was being quite critical of the lack of consistency and the inability to truly compare across panels. 

[shanshani]

10 minutes ago, Veveco said:

 

She might have meant at the lower levels only (at least I'm hoping so!), and it was only her own observation to be fair, but it was still troubling to hear. I hope it was merely a hyperbole 

hope so too, but even then, it's not that hard to learn. if you really dedicated an hour or two to it, you could get it pretty easily.

 

1 minute ago, memae said:

 

See, the way I interpreted it wasn't that she was giving an opinion at all. To me, it was as though she was merely pointing out that that's just how it is. The way judging works now, you can't really compare panel to panel, competition to competition, because there's such obvious lack of consistency and standardisation (in practice). Like, ideally, you would be able to because all of the judges would be rigorous in consistently applying the criteria to their judging and there'd be less room for subjectivity to cause big disparities between the scoring of similar standard jumps/falls/spins/etc. It's like it ought to be apples to apples but it just isn't (and there isn't enough scrutiny and reprimand coming from the right places to demand that it becomes consistent enough to allow for comparison). It sure didn't sound like she is okay with this. I think a lot of people just took her comment to be more shallow than (I think) it is. I think she was being quite critical of the lack of consistency and the inability to truly compare across panels. 

yeah, I think people are getting a little too harsh towards her. you could argue her comments are implicitly defending the status quo (“that's just how it is”) but I think the negativity is a little over the top. It seems that there's actually substantial agreement on the substance of what she and her critics are saying (that the judging is inconsistent, and that's unfortunate) but the blow-up is over how it's framed. but as it is now, I feel that the discussion is generating more heat than light

[memae]

Yeah, she's pretty blunt and Twitter isn't the greatest platform for being careful with nuance of meaning. I found the way she said it to be a very matter-of-fact statement rather than an opinion. I mean, you could take it as an opinion and go ahead and compare panels but you're just going to come to the same conclusion that underscores her statement that panels can't be compared: they're too inconsistent. 

 

Personally, I think she is going to be a great tech controller because she knows skating inside out and she seems to want the inconsistency to be minimised as much as it can. 

[monchan]

Abel's music is quite popular in FS. But has anyone skated to this particular piece yet? It's beautifullllll 

 

[WinForPooh]

11 hours ago, memae said:

Yeah, she's pretty blunt and Twitter isn't the greatest platform for being careful with nuance of meaning. I found the way she said it to be a very matter-of-fact statement rather than an opinion. I mean, you could take it as an opinion and go ahead and compare panels but you're just going to come to the same conclusion that underscores her statement that panels can't be compared: they're too inconsistent. 

 

Personally, I think she is going to be a great tech controller because she knows skating inside out and she seems to want the inconsistency to be minimised as much as it can. 

 

I don't know about this, because she also said that competitions can't be compared because each technical panel sets a different standard, and that people within technical panels often don't even agree on levels. She seems to be saying all of this as fact but she's actually given no indication that she wants it to be minimised. I haven't seen her make any reference to the things that tech panels would find difficult - rules about what they can slo-mo, what they can review, camera angle, quality of feed, things like that. Just that tech panels are all different and each tech panel has different people in it. If she's saying 'Well, people are different, they see different things' as opposed to 'people on these panels work under severe limitations, the limitations cause mistakes', that does kinda change the implication of what she's saying.

 

 

[WinForPooh]

@shanshani I was kind of under the impression that tech panels can only check for UR on elements that judges mark for review. Is it the TP that decides whether to mark something for review? Maybe I got it mixed up.

[WinForPooh]

Annnyway, Raf is also talking about quints from Nathan now.

[shanshani]

42 minutes ago, WinForPooh said:

@shanshani I was kind of under the impression that tech panels can only check for UR on elements that judges mark for review. Is it the TP that decides whether to mark something for review? Maybe I got it mixed up.

it's the TP that marks for review

[WinForPooh]

1 minute ago, shanshani said:

it's the TP that marks for review

Ah, thank you.

 

I wonder if they have an unofficial recommended limit on number of things to mark for review to save time.

[shanshani]

17 minutes ago, WinForPooh said:

Ah, thank you.

 

I wonder if they have an unofficial recommended limit on number of things to mark for review to save time.

Pretty sure I've seen events where they reviewed like, every element. But usually at lower level events where the skaters are weaker and they also don't have to deal with broadcasters whinging.

 

Tbh I'd be happy to pay the ISU directly for a subscription to streamed events if it would allow them to actually take time to review/buy a second tech camera/whatever. 

[Salior]

On 11/4/2019 at 8:58 AM, Veveco said:

I don't know if you guys have noticed this exchange on Twitter but Meagan Duhamel responded about Nathan's "fall" not being counted as a fall as simply "you can't compare one panel to the next". The following response to her comment has been, shall we say, less than positive. (I'm not posting all the angry answers here, but you can imagine, or check for yourself....) People are not impressed by her opinion. 

 

 

Obviously, comparisons between competitions matter. Be it for GP, world records, or PB/SB used for various selections. That panels don't apply rules the same way is precisely what people are complaining so much about so... I'm confused about her stating this so calmly? Technically, in the current state of things, she isn't wrong, but that is an observation, not a justification that anyone should be happy about. Does she not realize that she's just poking the beehive? And it obviously echoes Eric's infamous comment of "GOE and PCS are subjective" (iirc). I know they have both been on the good side of this "subjectivity" but how can they be so deaf to the general mood on sns? They could just... not say such things like it is 100% reasonable? Keep it to themselves? It's not surprising but disappointing that it keeps happening. 

 

 

 

22 hours ago, memae said:

 

She has probably been burned by this lack of consistency more than anyone griping about her comment. She's just calling it as she has come to see it through her years of experience with panels and judging - I think the athletes themselves have to get to a point that they can be calm about it or it's just going to burn them up and distract from what they truly need to focus on (their skating). I'd say she wasted a lot of energy being angry about it early in her career and then grew to realise she can't change it so she just has to make sure she skates as well as she can. I think the 'unfortunately' tagged on the end of her comment indicates that she's not impressed by it, but that it's just how it is. It's crap of course, because the athletes should be able to rely on judging being accurate and consistent, but they also shouldn't have to be trying to fight the system when they have their training and skating to worry about. We have just seen this with Yuzu - he was not pleased with the tech calls and judging at ACI and, while he has spoken out a bit about it, his real response to it was his performance at SC. He didn't give them any room for shady grey areas because he skated so well. 

 

It's one thing for fans to be getting outraged on behalf of athletes, but calling out the athletes themselves (even retired ones) for their nonchalant/jaded/whatever attitudes to inconsistent judging feels like a bit of a low blow because none of us have been in their shoes when it comes to dealing with and working around it. Like, if they're just resigned to be disappointed with it instead of angry and outraged, let them. They've put in the work. Fans, federations, gambling, and sponsors bring money to the sport. That's where the push has to come from.

 

14 hours ago, memae said:

Yeah, she's pretty blunt and Twitter isn't the greatest platform for being careful with nuance of meaning. I found the way she said it to be a very matter-of-fact statement rather than an opinion. I mean, you could take it as an opinion and go ahead and compare panels but you're just going to come to the same conclusion that underscores her statement that panels can't be compared: they're too inconsistent. 

 

Personally, I think she is going to be a great tech controller because she knows skating inside out and she seems to want the inconsistency to be minimised as much as it can. 

 

There's also these responses 

 

here's the rulebook if anyone's interested 

 

 

More impact of wrong calls 

Spoiler

 

 

 

As you can see from her other tweets, from her tone, the problem isn't that she's just stating the facts, and being resigned to it. People wouldn't be so angry, if they could feel that she thinks this isn't right but could do nothing about it. 

 

The problem, is that she sees herself as the expert, thinks that the "discretion of the panel" resulting in wrong edge or level calls is completely ok, not thinking the negative effects are important, and being unapologetic about it. That's like politicians responding to corruption complaints saying "You'll have to bribe us before you can get the contract, unfortunately. It's just how it is, the President gets 1b from it and we should get at least 100m too". Do you see the outrage from the people if the politicians say this on twitter? The term "unfortunately" says nothing about them being sad about the issue. 

 

This video explains the difference in mindset very well. 

 

 

There's already AI to help tech calls in gymnastics too. Same with baseball and tennis. Modifying AI isn't that difficult, granted we need more angles but again it is not impossible, if ISU has the will to look into it rather than making awards. 

 

 

[memae]

On 11/6/2019 at 5:03 AM, WinForPooh said:

Annnyway, Raf is also talking about quints from Nathan now.

 

Didn't he also say something recently about a 4A? When in the WC19 press conference Nathan himself was like nope,nope,nope let's leave that one for Yuzu. I think a lot of what Raf says is done strategically. 

[Old Cat Lady]

12 minutes ago, memae said:

 

Didn't he also say something recently about a 4A? When in the WC19 press conference Nathan himself was like nope,nope,nope let's leave that one for Yuzu. I think a lot of what Raf says is done strategically. 

 

I agree.  Though his latest statements are so obviously ridiculous that I think it's actually poor strategy because it makes you question everything he says.  But then again, I do wonder if some fans are more informed about skating culture that a lot of the judges so maybe the judges do fall for it.

 

That being said, I think a quint is more likely for Nathan than a 4axel - as in, no way in hell are either happening but he could probably do a quint on a harness eventually. The 4axel BS has been around for years but the quint talk is clearly in response to the buzz around Yuzu.

[WinForPooh]

Yes but at this point I think Raf is trolling because he's obviously saying the exact opposite of everything Nathan is saying. And he's not a stupid man, right? So this must be some kind of social experiment trolling thing to see how far he can push US media. It must be.