What skaters have left the biggest legacy?

DSQ · Jan 22, 2019

So from what I understand Lycasek‘s legacy is that all that really matters is what happens on the day.

This is why I find it fascinating to look at a skaters legacy a few years after retirement. Even an Olympic gold isn’t enough to capture the imagination forever.

chopinskate · Jan 22, 2019

Mathman said:
Well, obviously you can't expect any of the men at the 2010 Olympics to aspire to the standard set by Yuna Kim.

I regularly expect no man to be on her level

you know what I really meant there, though. Her actual, tangible technical quality was better for what I mentioned, not just the judge GOEs.

My takeaway from the men's competition was, it's not who is the best skater, it's who skates the best. 2010 Plushenko was not 2006 Plushenko. It should have been between Takahashi and Lambiel (with sweet-edges Kozuka also to be considered). But Lysacek brought his all and squeezed out every tenth of a CoP point that he had in him.

The competition ushered in the next chapter in the continuing debate, "are quads valued too highly or not highly enough."

The ISU likes promoting a winner for the Olympics who goes "clean". I suppose it's to make it a clear cut process for the viewers, and to simultaneously say "hey! Landed all their jumps! Good technician!" Of course, not always, especially with men and >3 quads, but Lysacek and co latched onto this.

Of course, at the end of the day, OGMs do have a legacy. It's just a matter of distinction of whether it's positive or negative. The reputation he had that fetched him his PCS, the backloading that undeservedly fetched him too high GOEs, the low technical and artistic quality along with the absence of quads, and the pasted on transitions and interpretation in his programs that led to several disowning him as the correct winner, imo, speaks for itself.

skylark said:
Besides his well-deserved Olympic Gold Medal

This is, of course, debatable. Quality matters, not just quantity. You mention Lysacek got higher GOE -- well, his quality was extremely lacking and he shouldn't have had that GOE. His PCS were overscored too -- an easy example of course is him somehow getting higher SS mark than Kozuka in the LP.

I rescored Vancouver, and had:

1. Takahashi
2. Kozuka
3. Plushenko
4. Weir
5. Lycasek
6. Lambiel

The rest of your post reads like emotional appeal. I can debunk that by making an equivalent emotional appeal. Mind you, I do think he has a legacy. Just not a positive one.

yume · Jan 22, 2019

Well, all this talk shows that an OGM doesn't necessary bring love of people or make you appear as a legend.....

And i have the impression that some of you think that Yuna Kim should have won men OGM too :laugh:

1904sk8 · Jan 22, 2019

Not sure if it was said already but the true legends are Gordeeva and Grinkov. No pairs team has come close or will be remembered as long. They truly set the bar.

chopinskate · Jan 22, 2019

yume said:
And i have the impression that some of you think that Yuna Kim should have won men OGM too

I might have had her in third :biggrin:

Mathman · Jan 22, 2019

skylark said:
Evan's rivalry with Johnny Weir has been turned on its head, I don't know why. ...

Johnny Weir has always cultivated an over-the-top "look at me" presence. He's still doing it as a commentator and celebrity. People either love johnny or think he's a clown, whereas self-contained Evan stirs no emotions one way or the other.

My favorite memory of Evan is from the Marshall's cheesefest held in December, 2004, in Detroit. An unknown just up from juniors, Evan held off Weir and Brian Joubert to finish second behind Plushenko.

On the ladies side, Irina Slutskaya landed 7 triples to get first ahead of Michelle Kwan, Sasha Cohen, Jenny Kirk and two other Americans. Irina said afterward, "I felt like I just won my first U.S. National Championship." :laugh:

yume · Jan 22, 2019

chopinskate said:
I might have had her in third

Third, not bad :laugh:

Though she's the ultimate example of CoP rewarding quality over difficulty, being first would have been difficult.

skylark · Jan 22, 2019

chopinskate said:
This is, of course, debatable.

But I'm neither debating nor making an argument. Just stating my point of view. The poster Rissa said their perspective on that time was limited, and I gave my perspective.

chopinskate · Jan 22, 2019

yume said:
Though she's the ultimate example of CoP rearding quality over difficulty, being first would have been difficult.

Yeah, Daisuke and Takahiko had great things to offer in their performances themselves, and of course had harder technical content. I would place Plushy over her for harder content, but at that point he had deteriorated spins, skating skills, and even his jumps were off along with the SP being bad, so he really only had his quads/3As and the performance quality in the LP (so it's a toss where Yuna with good quality jumps, spins, and better programs would win with a slight margin, probably. Or lose by a slight margin.).

I legitimately just replied to this to express confusion about why this particular result wasn't considered as scandalous as say Lipinski vs Kwan. I wouldn't say Sochi because that was reigning OGM+WC losing controversially, but Vancouver men's result is pretty awful on its own. Perhaps if Lysacek weren't reigning WC and it hadn't been Plushy's comeback season, it would have caught more people's eyes, because it's just an entire podium gone wrong. I guess Lysacek vs Plushy quad debate was controversial enough, and maybe that detracted, too, and maybe people were already delighted enough for Daisuke being the first Japanese man to medal.

yume · Jan 22, 2019

chopinskate said:
Yeah, Daisuke and Takahiko had great things to offer in their performances themselves, and of course had harder technical content. I would place Plushy over her for harder content, but at that point he had deteriorated spins, skating skills, and even his jumps were off along with the SP being bad, so he really only had his quads and the performance quality in the LP (so it's a toss).

I legitimately just replied to this to express confusion about why this particular result wasn't considered as scandalous as say Lipinski vs Kwan. I wouldn't say Sochi because that was reigning OGM+WC losing controversially, but Vancouver men's result is pretty awful on its own. Perhaps if Lysacek weren't reigning WC and it hadn't been Plushy's comeback season, it would have caught more people's eyes.

Well, it's a great if. I love the idea of her being on podium and Takahashi winning. But imo no one in men would have come close of those TES with the same quality jumps, spins and steps. There are things that look great and are well scored in ladies, but not so great and well scored in men.
Anyway, she's a great ladies OGM...who does some things better than the men OGM.

chopinskate · Jan 22, 2019

yume said:
Well, it's a great if. I love the idea of her being on podium and Takahashi winning. But imo no one in men would have come close of those TES with the same quality jumps, spins and steps. There are things that look great and are well scored in ladies, but not so great and well scored in men.
Anyway, she's a great ladies OGM...who does some things better than the men OGM.

Yeah I got carried away. woops. But I think the bold part is a good point. :agree:

Mathman · Jan 22, 2019

yume said:
Third, not bad

Though she's the ultimate example of CoP rewarding quality over difficulty, being first would have been difficult.

Not difficult at all. Just math.

Take the LP, for instance. If you give Yuna's PCS the men's factoring instead of the ladies', her total PCS is 89.70. This is almost 7 points ahead of Lysacek and Plushenko.

This by itself gives gives total scores of

Kim 168.06
Lysacek 167.37
Plushenko 165.51

Not to mention that she could have picked up a couple of extra points on the tech side by doing 8 jumping passes instead of 7. She was Zayaked out with no loop, but even an extra 2Lz would have put her total free skate score over 170. :yes:

TallyT · Jan 22, 2019

Rissa said:
Hanyu won Sochi with 2 falls but the math checked out so (almost) nobody considers it a slap in the face of FS.

Actually from the archives and reports at the time, both here and elsewhere, some people DID see it pretty much like that and some (ignoring both the rules and the brilliant SP) even said no one should have been given the gold... though it was all quickly forgotten in light of the way bigger uproar over the ladies.

Then he promptly went and won worlds.

I get the feeling the difference between his win and Evan's is that most don't dispute Yuzuru's skill and his program being in themselves good enough for the gold. Just not on that day... or at least not on that day had not everyone else's been even less good enough. On that day.

yume said:
I guess that the fact that basically almost everyone else bombed the FS and that he skated an epic SP is why most of people don't considers it as a slap in the face, and a more memorable win. Not mentioning that Hanyu himself is an inspiring skater. Way more inspiring than Lysacek.

It also didn't hurt that Yuzuru himself was among the open critics of his freeskate at Sochi (though never anyone else's) and as always promised to work harder and do better, and then did just that. Which always tends to disarm people....

yume · Jan 22, 2019

Mathman said:
Not difficult at all. Just math.

Take the LP, for instance. If you give Yuna's PCS the men's factoring instead of the ladies', her total PCS is 89.70. This is almost 7 points ahead of Lysacek and Plushenko.

This by itself gives gives total scores of

Kim 168.06
Lysacek 167.37
Plushenko 165.51

Not to mention that she could have picked up a couple of extra points on the tech side by doing 8 jumping passes instead of 7. She was Zayaked out with no loop, but even an extra 2Lz would have put her total free skate score over 170. :yes:

Would she have get the highest total score?

With the same marks yes her FS would have scored higher (which i find crazy and weird). But actually, i don't think she would have get those marks in men.

Mathman · Jan 22, 2019

1904sk8 said:
Not sure if it was said already but the true legends are Gordeeva and Grinkov. No pairs team has come close or will be remembered as long. They truly set the bar.

Although .. Belousova and Protopopov are the original "two skating as one" pair. Like Gordeeva and Grinkov they won two Olympic championships and four world championships. As for legacy, they skated professionally in competitions and shows for 50 years, delighting audiences and wowing skaters young enough to be their grandchildren well into their seventies. :love:

chopinskate · Jan 22, 2019

TallyT said:
Actually from the archives and reports at the time, both here and elsewhere, some people DID see it pretty much like that and some (ignoring both the rules and the brilliant SP) even said no one should have been given the gold... though it was all quickly forgotten in light of the way bigger uproar over the ladies.

I don't see it as a slap in the face, but I do think "no one should have been given a medal" was justifiable. Both Hanyu and Chan had pretty awful long programs, even when executed cleanly they were simply bad. A lot of people who see the Olympics as a representation of the best of skating talent to the casual, every four year fans would have been justifiably embarrassed, and then they didn't even skate cleanly!

vs Lysacek, I mean, Hanyu was simply more talented, and had shown great technical skill that season, at least. That's more than what can be said for Lycasek.

Mathman · Jan 22, 2019

chopinskate said:
I legitimately just replied to this to express confusion about why this particular result wasn't considered as scandalous as say Lipinski vs Kwan. ...

I think it was just as controversial.

First, I wouldn't say that Kwan versus Lipinski in 1998 was "scandalous." Tara skated very well, including her famous triple loop / triple loop combination, plus a triple-triple sequence. Presentationwise, she made up for youthful lack of polish with youthful exuberance.

I think the difference is that in 1998 the fans of both skaters acknowledged that the other girl did great. Plus they were both from the same country, so nationalistic feelings didn't muddy the waters.

In 2010 I think that skating fans in Europe were pretty irate about the result, although there was also a certain amount of fatalism based on the expectation of North American homeboy judging.

chopinskate · Jan 22, 2019

We're now slipping into different types of legacies, but still within topic I guess!

Mathman said:
I think it was just as controversial.

First, I wouldn't say that Kwan versus Lipinski in 1998 was "scandalous." Tara skated very well, including her famous triple loop / triple loop combination, plus a triple-triple sequence. Presentationwise, she made up for youthful lack of polish with youthful exuberance.

I think the difference is that in 1998 the fans of both skaters acknowledged that the other girl did great. Plus they were both from the same country, so nationalistic feelings didn't muddy the waters.

In 2010 I think that skating fans in Europe were pretty irate about the result, although there was also a certain amount of fatalism based on the expectation of North American homeboy judging.

I actually personally don't think there was a controversy with who won Nagano. But I do think it was considered controversial/scandalous by a lot of people.

I know there was the Lycasek v Plushenko. But legitimately wondering why there wasn't more controversy surrounding whether the way the others were judged and placed was right or not. Were people at that point already used to seeing nonsensical PCS judging (again, re: SS mark for Lysacek v Kozuka)? Perhaps as a relic of the already weird Artistic Mark in 6.0?

Did no one think that both Kozuka and Takahashi had perhaps done enough despite their falls to inch ahead of Lysacek and Plushenko? Was this now a relic of the CoP starting to already make the programs "too technical" and making people focus more on under-rotations and "transitions" as justifiable red herrings even if the PCS should have been by far ahead (the gap between Takahashi and Lysacek was laughable)?

It's actually another thing re: Matt Savoie being placed off the podium (especially behind -- you guessed it! -- Lysacek) in 2006. Wonder what kind of clout exactly a skater needs to have for people to scream about scandals.

plushyfan · Jan 23, 2019

asiacheetah said:
Poor maligned Evan. I wasn't rooting for him, but that Olympic Men LP was pretty disaster filled. Sure Plushenko landed one quad, but he is just not an elegant skater and made mistakes. Evan's LP was just smartly choreographed capitalizing on backloading bonus (same approach as Zagitova recent win). Current rules wouldn't allow Evan to have won based off of backloading.

Anyway, I don't think anyone is saying Evan had (positive) legacy for the sport. But seriously, he is not worst I don't believe.

Plushenko is an elegant skater not as Urmanov but he is. You can see it in every move, his posture. That came from his ballet basic.

" At the age of 16, Plushenko became the youngest male skater to ever receive a perfect score of 6.0. He received a total of seventy five 6.0's before the new Code of Points judging system was introduced" He had more 6.0s as Kwan's. I know that is not the same but an unelegant skater can't receive perfect scores for his presentations.

skylark said:
Evan's rivalry with Johnny Weir has been turned on its head, I don't know why. Johnny was always making snide remarks and innuendo about Evan. Evan chose not to respond. The one time he did, his temper flared because Johnny had publicly questioned Evan's sexuality. Afterward, Evan apologized for his remark and went on to say (I'm paraphrasing) that he (meaning "I, Evan") should never respond that way, even when provoked.

For the record, Evan won over Plushenko on the strength of his technical mark in the free skate. That included marks for higher quality: his higher GOE marks. I remember Sandra Bezic looking at the judges' scores and saying, about Evan: "GOE, GOE, GOE." After the event, she also noted that Evan and Evgeni got identical component scores, but she said, "I don't see how that can be." Meaning she believed Evan's should have been higher.

Besides his well-deserved Olympic Gold Medal, which he won fair and square according to the rules in 2010 (much like Alina Zagitova did in 2018) .... Evan's great legacy is that in the sht-storm that followed his winning, when people all over the world were maligning him and his skating, his response was always positive to his fellow competitors. Several US television interviewers asked Evan why he thought Evgeni Plushenko did such un-sportsmanlike things such as (1)stalking out of the K&C and (2)(most horribly, IMHO) when he came out to get the silver medal, he leaped up to the top, gold medal position. Just for a second, but it was clear what Evgeni intended. Evan's response was invariably to explain graciously that Plushenko had specifically come out of retirement and re-trained to win another gold medal, so his performance carried that extra emotional weight. Whereas Evan himself only had wished and hoped and worked to skate as well as he possibly could at the Olympics.

Evan was a Great competitor. If you look at his record from 2005-2010, that's clear. AND being a Great Competitor means also, IMHO, that an athlete is able to respect all their competitors enough to be gracious in victory or defeat.

That is Evan Lysacek's true legacy.

We all know a competition has two part. You are talking about the FS only. Evan was highly overscored in SP. According to the judges his IP and P were higher as Takahashi and Plush. What is a joke. He received 90.30 without quad it happened only in Chan and Jason's cases sometimes.:yes:

Plush 90.85 / PCS 39.75

Evan 90.30 PCS 42

Dai. 90.25 / PCS 41.35

chopinskate said:
I rescored Vancouver, and had:

1. Takahashi
2. Kozuka
3. Plushenko

1. Takahashi - he was 5th in LP 156.98 TES 73.48!!

2. Kozuka- he was 8th in LP 151.60 TES 78.40 ( 8th in short TES 42.14!!!)

3. Plushenko- he was 2nd in LP 165.51 TES 82.71 (SP TES 51.10!!)

I'm really curious how they could have been ahead of Plushenko? :rolleye:

Metis · Jan 23, 2019

asiacheetah said:
Poor maligned Evan. I wasn't rooting for him, but that Olympic Men LP was pretty disaster filled. Sure Plushenko landed one quad, but he is just not an elegant skater and made mistakes. Evan's LP was just smartly choreographed capitalizing on backloading bonus (same approach as Zagitova recent win). Current rules wouldn't allow Evan to have won based off of backloading.

Anyway, I don't think anyone is saying Evan had (positive) legacy for the sport. But seriously, he is not worst I don't believe.

It wasn’t just the backloading: the BV difference between a 4T and the 3A isn’t what it was post-2010 SoV (including now). The reward for the quad wasn’t quite there, which is how we wound up with the 4Lz being valued at 13.6 and all the chaos that came from the realization that a fall on a related quad Lutz was worth more than a 3A with neutral GOE even when you stapled the mandatory -1.0 deduction for a fall to the score for a -3 GOE 4Lz.

Lysacek wasn’t especially brilliant in terms of backloading his programme so much as Plushenko just didn’t seem to really live and breathe CoP. It was 3/5 versus 5/3 in terms of backloading, and that, along with Plushenko missing a few levels, is what gave Lysacek the win.

What skaters have left the biggest legacy?

DSQ

chopinskate

yume

🍉

1904sk8

chopinskate

Mathman

yume

🍉

skylark

Gazing at a Glorious Great Lakes sunset

chopinskate

yume

🍉

chopinskate

Mathman

TallyT

yume

🍉

Mathman

chopinskate

Mathman

chopinskate

plushyfan

Metis

Shepherdess of the Teal Deer

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