U.S. Men 2012-13 news, updates & general discussion

[luenatic]

That being said, I was at the rink, and Aaron's free skate was electric in person.

I totally understand this. I remember watching Jourbert and Elvis live at several Worlds, they were so exciting to watch! I guess that's the 'energy' I was experiencing. That should be counted towards the PE mark (but not the SS, TR mark)...

[Vagabond]

I went to the numbers to try to prove you wrong, but I couldn't.

Aaron's components for the short averaged 6.728 (factored comp score 33.64), while for the LP, they averaged 7.948 (factored comp score 79.48). So if he had been scored the same for the LP as he was for the SP, his score would be 12 points lower....

So, stripping away the across-the-board inflation, Aaron gained about 6 points. The numbers show that you are correct; he would not have won without that extra boost.

Told ya.

[toddlj]

My husband , who knows very little about figure skating, watched the men's long with me. He loved Max!! He said that it was about time that we have a men's champion who actually skates like a man. My 27 yr. old son agrees!

I have to be honest that I avoid comments like "skates like a man" because it implies men are better than women... or that there is weakness or frailty in being a woman, and I know plenty of women who are tough as nails. (I hate the phrase "throws like a girl" too. Some girls could knock you to the ground with their throw.) That being said, I did love how aggressive and confident Max was, and how safe and secure his jumps were. I don't want to lump that in with "manly" behavior, though, as I always bristle at the potential homophobia or gender bias in statements like that. Just sayin.

[pinky166]

His basic skating is clearly inferior to that of Miner, Abbott, and Farris, not to mention several who finished off the podium (Johnson and Brown, for example). His choreography and transitions, such as they were, started about 48 seconds into the Free Skate when he went from his quadruple salchow into his first spin. The marks for each of his Program Components went up by more than a point between his (clean) Short Program and his (clean) Free Skate for no apparent reason other than factors that are not supposed to be considered in the marks.

If the judges had given Aaron PCS in the Free Skate commensurate with what they gave him in the Short Program, he would not have won and might not even have made the Worlds team.

I never said his basics were better than Miner, Abbott, or Farris, because I agree with you that they aren't, but those guys all have very good basics skating, so just because Max isn't quite on par in that regard, doesn't make him automatically bad. He won because he landed 3 clean quads in the event and had a backloaded program, while Miner landed 1 clean and 1 under-rotated quad and popped open an intended 3a and had a pretty front loaded program, Abbott under-rotated and fell on his only quad attempt, doubled two jumps, and didn't do a 3-jump combo, and Farris fell on his one quad attempt, lost a level on a spin and step sequence, and got two edge calls on his flips. In his FS he actually edged Farris out on components anyways, but Ross and Jeremy were way ahead in PCS so even the judges don't consider Max's presentation to be on par with those two, even when he had a clean skate and they made mistakes.

Basically, I feel like Max isn't getting the credit he deserves. No, he's not a lyrical artsy skater like Jeremy, nor does he have the "nice normal guy" charm of Ross, or the lines, looks, and endearing boyishness of Farris, but, that's okay. Yes, he used to play Hockey. Yes, he's short and compact, his legs especially. Yes, his programs are jump centric instead of pieces of art, and, yes, his looks might not appeal to everyone (I personally find him very cute though), but the technical side of figure skating is more important than ever in the men's even and Max has that in spades. Plus he's young and hardworking and driven. I think he's a great choice for Worlds and really do think he'll make the top 10 comfortably if he can skate like he usually does, just on the basis of his technical abilities. And his PCS won't be awful, they won't be as high as at Nationals but he'll get high 6s or low 7s most likely, which is what the likes of Dornbush, Farris, and Rippon usually get at international events so if you're arguing one of them should be going to Worlds instead, the PCS buffer would likely be slim to nonexistant for any of them, so it once again comes down to TES, and Max beats every guy in the US on the basis of TES so there you go.

[kwanlysacek]

Here is another topic. Who is the biggest threat to upset Lysacek for the Olympic Gold next? I am not sure if it is Chan or Takahashi or Hanyu. It is obviously Evan's to lose but who has the best chance to beat him with a clean skate if he makes 2 or 3 uncharacteristic mistakes, or perhaps taking into account who of those others is most likely to skate cleanly.

[rayhaneh]

Here is another topic. Who is the biggest threat to upset Lysacek for the Olympic Gold next? I am not sure if it is Chan or Takahashi or Hanyu. It is obviously Evan's to lose but who has the best chance to beat him with a clean skate if he makes 2 or 3 uncharacteristic mistakes, or perhaps taking into account who of those others is most likely to skate cleanly.

That's the funniest thing I have read all day - thank you for that

[euterpe]

I have no doubt that a multiple-quad Aaron will end up doing well at worlds. In the past, plenty of somewhat-unknown men with questionable artistry but solid jumps have done better than expected at worlds. (Agreed that Bradley was a bust... but Aaron is not Bradley. Remember that Bradley didn't land clean quads in his FS at US nats.)

Bradley was slow and he was not a good spinner. While he sometimes achieved L4 on spins, he rarely earned GOE of more than +1 and his sluggish footwork was rarely more than L2. Many of his jumps were just eked out; at 2011 Worlds, Bradley didn't earn high GOE on any of his jumps and he got -GOE on half of them.

Aaron is fast, his jumps are big and his landings rock-steady. Although his transitions are lacking, his spins and footwork fulfill requirements for L3/L4. But he should do well at Worlds. He obviously won't get the PCS scores he got from US judges, but with clean skates his TES should be very high. A clean SP should score 75-79 and a clean FS 165-170. Even the lower range would have placed him top 6 at 2012 Worlds.

[pinky166]

Miner & Farris

Farris needs more consistency on his quad to make a better pick than Max. I tend to think if he had landed the quad in the FS the judges might have given him 2nd. I think the quad, or lack thereof, also played a factor in Jeremy's scoring and placement. Ross came out and landed the 4s in both his programs, it was UR in the SP, but he did land it in both. Max showed how consistent his 4s is by landing it 3 times, twice in combination. I agree that Farris with a consistent quad would have odds to do better than Max due to his having more international reputation and better spins, lines, and artistry, but at this point, while we know Josh is capable of landing the 4t in competition and seems to be able to rotate the jump fine, he's renting the quad at this point while Max owns the quad. Max and Ross have the most consistent quads of the US men so they are going to Worlds. Or well, arguably Dornbush's 4t is more consistent than Ross's 4s, but not by much, and Dornbush is nowhere near as consistent as Miner and usually makes other mistakes that negate his having a quad anyways. If Josh can get his quad consistent by Nationals next year, I think for sure he would be a great choice for the Olympic team, even if it only has two spots, provided he delivers, and I think he can get that quad consistent, he just needs a little more time and maybe some more strength or speed to make it more of a sure thing. He managed to do that with his 3a it seems, just last season he often struggled to land it in the 2nd half of his FS, and now 3a-3t is a great combo for him and the 3a is one of his best, arguably even his "money", jump. So who knows.

[Sylvia]

I've re-posted kwanlysacek's post in the Lysacek thread in GSD: http://www.fsuniverse.net/forum/show...=1#post3821544
Can we keep discussing the U.S. men here please? Thanks.

[AliasJohnDoe]

Here is another topic. Who is the biggest threat to upset Lysacek for the Olympic Gold next? I am not sure if it is Chan or Takahashi or Hanyu. It is obviously Evan's to lose but who has the best chance to beat him with a clean skate if he makes 2 or 3 uncharacteristic mistakes, or perhaps taking into account who of those others is most likely to skate cleanly.

I don't understand how you can say "it is obviously Evan's to lose" when he hasn't competed in years.

Evan has to make it out of nationals in 2014 first. Which he might have a tough time doing.

[pinky166]

Bottom line: quads are a big deal and can enable a skater who would otherwise be 2nd or 3rd tier internationally to do very well.

Examples: KVDP, Joubert, Nan Song, Javier Fernandez

Some guys have the quads and everything else (Chan, Hanyu, Takahashi), but the four I mentioned above I don't think really fall into that category. I mean, if it wasn't important, how else do you explain KVDP being a European medalist, Joubert being a World champion and multiple time World medalist, Song winning two GP medals, and Fernandez going from scoring around or under 200 points for a given competition to scoring 240s-260s over the course of two seasons?

[Skittl1321]

To be fair, Fernandez is also a very good performer.

[PrincessLeppard]

With his placement at Nationals, does anyone think Alex Johnson will get some international assignments next season?

[Sylvia]

Before 2013 Nationals:

Quad stats for Max Aaron this season:
Broadmoor SP Only (June): 4S fall (in Jumps comp. he landed a 4S+2T+2Lo & a 4T)
Liberty (July): 4S fall in SP; landed 4S (-1 GOE) in FS
Glacier Falls (Aug.): 2S+1T in SP; 4S< fall in FS
Salt Lake Senior B (Sept.): 4S+2T in SP, 4S in FS
Cup of Nice (Oct.): 4S fall in SP; 2S in FS
Midwestern Sectionals (Nov.): 4S fall in SP; 4S+3T in FS (+1.75 GOE, 16.35 points!)

Ross Miner:
Liberty (July): 4T< fall in SP; 4S fall in FS
Cranberry Open SP only (Aug.): 4S fall
(In a Champs Camp article in late Aug., he mentioned landing a 4S in at least one of his programs before officials there.)
Salt Lake Sr B (Sept.): 4S< fall in SP; 2S in FS
Skate Canada (late Oct.): 4S fell out/hand down (-3 GOE, 7.50 points); 2S in FS, followed by 7 of 8 planned triples landed
NHK Trophy (Nov.): 2S in SP; 4S landed in FS, 7 triples landed total

Richard Dornbush:
LA Open (July): It was posted that he missed both 4T attempts in his FS, don't know if he tried it in SP (no detailed protocols available to check)
Glacier Falls (Aug.): 4T (+1.50 GOE, 11.80 points) in SP; 4T (-1.25/9.05 points), 4T+SEQ fall in FS
Golden West (Sept.): 4T fall in SP; fell on both his 4T attempts in FS
Finlandia (Oct.): 3T in SP; landed 4T+2T, fell on 2nd 4T, then landed 7 of 7 planned triples in FS
Rostelecom Cup (Nov.): 4T (+1.29 GOE, 11.59 points) in SP; fell on 4T in FS, followed by 7 of 8 triples landed
NHK (Nov.): 4T fall in SP; 2T, 4T fall in FS, then landed all 7 planned triples afterwards

Keegan Messing:
Liberty (July): no quad attempt in SP (he won) or FS
Glacier Falls (Aug.): 4T<<+2T (-1.40 GOE, 4.00 points); 4T< fall in FS
Nebelhorn (Sept.): did not attempt quad in SP; landed a flawed 4T (-2.14 GOE, 8.16 points out of BV of 10.30) in FS
Cup of Nice (Oct.): clean SP with no quad attempt (80 points); 4T< fall in FS
Pacific Sectionals (Nov.): 4T (-1 GOE) in SP (80 points); landed a flawed 4T (-2.75 GOE, 7.55 points) in FS

Armin Mahbanoozadeh:
Vail (July): landed 4T in both SP & FS, according to reports
Salt Lake Sr B (Sept): landed 4T (-1 GOE, 9.30 points) in SP; 4T fall in FS
Skate America (Oct.): 4T fall in SP; 4T< fall in FS
Ice Challenge (Nov.): did not attempt 4T in SP; opened FS with 2T

Douglas Razzano:
Golden West (Sept.): 2T in SP; opened FS with 3T
Skate America (Oct.): 4T< fall in SP; landed 4T in FS
Ice Challenge (Nov.): clean SP with no quad attempt; opened FS with 3T

Joshua Farris:
JGP Lake Placid (late Aug./early Sept.): landed 4T (+1 GOE) in FS
JGP Slovenia (late Sept.): after opening 3A fall in FS, landed 3T
JGP Final (early Dec.): 4T fall in FS

Brandon Mroz:
Broadmoor SP Only (June): 4Lo fall
Liberty (July): 4Lo< fall (5.4 points out of BV of 8.4) in SP; landed a flawed 4Lo (-2 GOE, 10 points out of BV of 12) in FS
Glacier Falls (Aug.): 1Lo in SP; 4Lo<< fall in FS
Midwestern Sectionals (Nov.): 4T< fall in SP; landed a flawed 4T (-2 GOE, 8.30 points) in FS

Jeremy Abbott:
Skate America (Oct.): 4T< fall in both SP and FS
TEB (Nov.): clean SP with no quad attempt (81 points); 4T<< (-1.9 GOE, 2.2 points) in FS

Quads attempted/landed at 2013 Nationals:

In both SP & FS: Aaron, Miner, Dornbush, Mroz, Messing
Total quads attempted in both SP & FS: 17 by 10 men
Quads called fully rotated & landed with 0 or higher GOE: 7 (3 by Aaron, 2 by Mroz, 1 by Miner, 1 by Messing; 8 if Dornbush's SP quad is counted)

Aaron: 4S+3T (14.60 BV, 15.74 points) in SP; 4S+2T (11.80 BV, 13.94 points) and 4S (10.50 BV, 12.93 points) in FS

Miner: 4S< in SP (7.40 BV, 6.26 points); 4S (10.50 BV, 12.64 points) in FS

Abbott 4T< (7.20 BV, 4.20 points -1 for fall) in FS

Farris 4T (10.30 BV, 7.30 points -1 for fall) in FS

Dornbush 4T (10.30 BV, 10.01 points) in SP; 4T (10.30 BV, 7.87 points), 4T+SEQ (8.24 BV, 5.67 -1 for fall)

Carriere: 4T<< (4.10 BV, 2.10 points)

Mroz 4T (10.30 BV, 10.30 points) in SP; 4T (10.30 BV, 11.01 points)

Razzano 4T (10.30 BV, 8.30 points)

Messing 4T< (7.20 BV, 4.20 points -1 for fall) in SP; 4T (10.30 BV, 11.87 points)

Mahbanoozadeh 4T<< (4.10 BV, 2.00 points -1 for fall) in SP

[gkelly]

The US judges are rewarding a newbie like Aaron for clean, technically dynamic skates and passing over the seriously gifted Abbott who didn't melt down, but they are probably finally moving on, feeling that they've given Abbott enough opportunities already.

Well, yes, but at the time they awarded Aaron his LP scores, they didn't know what Abbott was going to do. So Max's scores were rewards for what Max did and had nothing to do with what they wanted to do about Jeremy.

Abbott's PCS might have been the result of a thought process along the lines of "That wasn't very convincing. We're not going to hold you up over that cleaner more exciting program with harder jumps we saw a few minutes ago." But his PCS were still about 10 points higher than Aaron's, so the judges didn't go too far out of their way to pass him over on purpose. The jump content did that.

Are the judges for the short program the same people as the long program?

Yes. Same order, too. US judging is not anonymous. You can see who they were if you scroll down the results page for each competition phase:
http://www.usfigureskating.org/leade...0/results.html

I totally understand this. I remember watching Jourbert and Elvis live at several Worlds, they were so exciting to watch! I guess that's the 'energy' I was experiencing. That should be counted towards the PE mark (but not the SS, TR mark)...

Speed is a big part of the SS mark.

[Sylvia]

With his placement at Nationals, does anyone think Alex Johnson will get some international assignments next season?

Yes, as I posted earlier today: http://www.fsuniverse.net/forum/show...=1#post3821474

[pinky166]

To be fair, Fernandez is also a very good performer.

But this was true back in 2010 and 2011 when he was getting 6s for PCS. His PCS didn't jump into the 8s until he started landing loads of quads. Javi is a good performer, but he's not on the level of Chan, Takahashi, or Hanyu even though he is capable of scoring as high as them.

[Skittl1321]

Yes. Same order, too.

Okay- well then that doesn't do anything to explain the difference between the two days

I do think what you said here

Well, yes, but at the time they awarded Aaron his LP scores, they didn't know what Abbott was going to do.

says something. If it was a super generous score day, chances are, they planned to place the next skaters even higher, but then those skaters didn't earn it.

[olympic]

I beg to differ. Bradley skates so slowly. He's like the male version of JSlow. Max is better IMHO.

No. I didn't mean they have the same skill weaknesses. I meant that Aaron, similarly to Bradley, might have problems in the PCS department at Worlds.

I disagree again. Alexander Johnson is probably one of the most artistic male skaters in the U.S. right now. He got the job done. Two 3-Axel and 3Lz+1Lo+3F. Only one -1 GOE (not even warranted) in the FS. His Spiral is GORGEOUS! He should be getting 9s in the PE, CH, IN marks. I cannot think of any male skaters in the past 4 years that are as artistic and technically sound as Alexander. He pays so much attention in details while skating in lightning speed, it's astonishing. For crying out loud, he actually extends and points his toe doing back XO. Did I mention he points his fingers like a ballet dancer? His basic skating skill reminds me of Katia Gordeeva and Ilia Kulik. Too bad he was judged so harshly in the SP. I'm going to start a campaign to promote Alexander Johnson! He is such a joy to watch. He is one of the reasons why I watch figure skating.

No. I was referring to Abbott and to some extent, Rippon. And when I say 'getting the job done', I meant placing well enough at Worlds to medal or secure 3 spots for the next one.

[AliasJohnDoe]

But this was true back in 2010 and 2011 when he was getting 6s for PCS. His PCS didn't jump into the 8s until he started landing loads of quads. Javi is a good performer, but he's not on the level of Chan, Takahashi, or Hanyu even though he is capable of scoring as high as them.

I consider Chan and Takahashi close to perfection when it comes to PCS. But Fernandez has improved a lot and is at least on par, if not better than, Hanyu at PCS....IMO of course.

ETA: Just noticed off topic again. This is US Mens thread. Sorry about that.