Name your top five underrated skaters, past or present. | Page 5 | Golden Skate

Name your top five underrated skaters, past or present.

Jeanie19

Record Breaker
Joined
Oct 20, 2017
Country
United-States
Satoko Miyahara
Mai Mihara
Kevin Aymoz
Yuhana Yokoi
Andrew Torgashev

I think both Yuhana and Andrew will turn senior next season. Yuhana's jumps have such wonderful flow, and I particularly adore her POTO free skate at the Bratislava JGP. If Andrew is able to get his jumps together, I think he could become a real threat on the senior level.

Great first post. Post often.
 

lady_bee

Medalist
Joined
Nov 3, 2013
Nobuo Sato, maybe:biggrin:
I have never seen him skating in competition, though, some people say "if he was not from small federation (at that time)...."
 

skateluvr

Record Breaker
Joined
Oct 23, 2011
Huh, I'd say it's pretty en vogue to criticize all of their skating amongst figure skating fans...

I like Evgenia now that she is older. Honestly I was a stick too at her age but I did say her legs bothered me.i think she has a mature style now that is nicer to watch than the frenetic Alina. I honestly think Peyong podium should be reversed. Osmond had the best program and PCS by far. Backloading it seems got Alina her medals. I just don’t enjoy what she does out there. She could skate beautifully and show off lines and edges. Ladies skating is awful because of the whacko scoring system. Several skaters are far more special. Every second a sloppy fast move. Anyway I think Mariah Bell was great at worlds. The scoring seemed to be an Eteri festival. Not a fan. Sorry not sorry.

Anyway Meghan Duhamel is a great athlete. No she was never gonna be Katia or Savchenko. But it is sport over art these days by far. Carolina Kostner in 2014 was to die for. 2018 she was overscored. Only she and Chan could bomb and still get huge PCS. The scoring system keeps changing. But I understand. I was happy to see the little Kazakh finally show her athletic prowess but she was Overscored. Hey I have never seen her smile before. Her career has finally paid off.



I guess the question is IS -is Eteri overrated and does she have some secret pull with the judges and the federations? Her secret is accept nothing but all out execution of the programs and drill the jumps till these tiny girls drop. I am not a fan of her choreographers. So I think it is fine to say who is underrated and overrated. It is opinion but if you get enough responses certain skaters stand out. So maybe we can be objective. I agree with much I have read here. I am just beginning to see that Vincent can be more than a quadster. He has potential artistically but his quads are what puts him on the scene. His worlds was the best I have seen him skate and kudos to him. He seems so serious. He will never be Hanyu or Shoma or even Nathan for me but he has made great strides. He is much improved just from beginning to end of last season.
 

skateluvr

Record Breaker
Joined
Oct 23, 2011
Can I just add:
Jeffrey buttle- While known more as a choreographer he was quite the skater. This performance received a standing ovation and got him a world title and it was just gorgeous. This is his 2008 worlds freeskate to Ararat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypNSQb9heLA

I agree. I always loved his skating. Interesting he has the Oly bronze I think and the World title and called it a day. Same medals as the lovely and amazing Kate Osmond. Canada has given us so many great skaters. Sadly most of the great ones never had the big pro career of the 90’s. And the money that crew of skaters made. None of them have to work like all the skaters nowadays. But at least those who skate elite lay really do it for love as the money isn’t there except maybe in Japan, Korea and perhaps Russia?
 

Mishaminion

Record Breaker
Joined
Feb 12, 2014
Kristi Yamaguchi.

I don't think she gets anywhere near as much credit as other past American ladies champions.
She was doing 3lz-3t in 1992, which although "standard" today for top ladies, was much more impressive back then.
 

Sabrina

Record Breaker
Joined
Feb 13, 2013
Current skaters:

Gilles/Poirer
Kevin Aymoz
Nam Nguyen
Jin Boyang
Roman Sadovsky
Sergei Voronov (is he still skating?)
Anna Pogorilaya (is she still skating?)

Retired skaters

Probiazko/Vanagas (spelling?)
Laurent Tobel
Lucinda Ruh
Denise Bielman
Emanuel Sandhu
Kaetlyn Osmong except the last 2 years.
 

SarahSynchro

Record Breaker
Joined
Mar 7, 2014
Country
Canada
I agree. I always loved his skating. Interesting he has the Oly bronze I think and the World title and called it a day. Same medals as the lovely and amazing Kate Osmond. Canada has given us so many great skaters. Sadly most of the great ones never had the big pro career of the 90’s. And the money that crew of skaters made. None of them have to work like all the skaters nowadays. But at least those who skate elite lay really do it for love as the money isn’t there except maybe in Japan, Korea and perhaps Russia?

I also remember being especially confused about Jeffery’s retirement in 2008, because his home and native land was hosting the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. I always thought competing in your home country’s Olympics was a dream come true for any athlete, though I suppose I should generalize like that. Jeffery made the choice that was best for him; assumingely pleased with and proud of the many accomplishments achieved in his skating career. Like Kaetlyn, he chose to “go out on top.”

As an aside: I believe 2008 was also the first season that P Chiddy won Canadian Nationals ahead of Jeffrey, the veteran front runner.
 

anonymoose_au

Insert weird opinion here
Record Breaker
Joined
Feb 22, 2014
Country
Australia
Definitely Anastasia Tarankova, what the heck were those scores at last year's Russian Nats? They had no relation to reality at all. I'm looking forward to her programs this year!

And due to my personal bias I often feel like Tarasova/Morozov don't get enough respect. I really want them to be World or Olympic gold medallists some day!

Also Sofia S.! I've seen posters bagging out her jumps, they look solid to me and the type of consistency she has doesn't come by often.

And from way back, Artur Gachinsky was so underated by the Russian Fed when he retired the only thing the President of it had to say was "Don't let the door hit you on the way out." I can't tell you what my response to that was because it'd just be censored. :p

Current skaters:
Jin Boyang

The judges certainly seem to give Boyang no respect.

Sergei Voronov (is he still skating?)

Yes, Sergei is still with us and had 2 GPs this year! :biggrin:

But yes, so underrated! If I'm honest, he probably should have gone to Sochi after Maxim K's epic Euros fail, but as far as I know the Rus Fed didn't even consider it!
 

acronycal0730

Rinkside
Joined
Nov 23, 2014
Anastasia Gubanova and Anastasia Tarakanova. To me they definitely deserve Senior GP spots than some other skaters on the list......
 

yume

🍉
Record Breaker
Joined
Mar 11, 2016
Gubanova and Tarakanova are unfortunately from a fed who rarely reward talent and superior skating. They should move in another country. I don't think their fed will ever care about them.
 

nussnacker

one and only
Record Breaker
Joined
Mar 16, 2019
Ma boy Jin Boyang has certainly been very underrated and wronged by the judges a lot of times :(
He’s actually trying to improve a lot in terms of PCS, you can see a lot of work being done there. Whereas some other male „jumping beans“ who haven’t improved in terms of PCS got very big bumps in those scores from being Form the right fed...

Elizabet Tursynbayeva, I feel like people have been sleeping on her for ages, she’s improved a lot last season, but I feel like people still don’t consider her a top skater, which to me she totally is. Very beautiful all around.
 

Jetta

Rinkside
Joined
Sep 13, 2018
My current top 3 underrated skaters:
Satoko Miyahara
Sergei Voronov
Sofia Samodurova

Satoko’s PCS should absolutely be higher. All three skaters just never seem to get the credit they deserve.

Top 3 overrated:
Alina Zagitova
Evgenia Medvedeva
Vincent Zhou

I will say I did enjoy Evgenia’s programs a lot more this season than in any past season. Alina and Vincent can jump and spin, sure, but I don’t enjoy anything else about their skating.
 

rlopen

On the Ice
Joined
Jul 4, 2016
Gubanova (how.....has she not skated at JW and a GP is just baffling), Pogorilaya, Nikodinov, Hendrickx, Yamashita, Mihara, Natasha McKay, Vanessa Gusmeroli, Elizaveta Nugumanova, and Miyahara, her PCS is criminally underrated when you compare it to what other skaters get.
 

meem

On the Ice
Joined
Nov 24, 2006
Kristi Yamaguchi. In 1992, after she won gold at the Olympics and then gold at Worlds, there sure was no hoopla for her.
Weaver/Poje just announced they won't be competing this coming season and figuring out what they want to do. I don't blame them. Most underrated ice dancers ever, IMO.
 

Ryan O

Final Flight
Joined
Mar 5, 2004
Country
Canada
These are my personal views

Top 5 underrated skaters:

1. Alexander Abt. Beautiful skater, creative both in (mostly his own) choreography and music choices, his own Federation hardly supported him, got no more then Medals at Euros (a bronze and a silver), never at Worlds or Olympics. But just outstanding.

I liked Alexander Abt, and he had a great style the way he could glide around the ice with such sweeping strides. He was a very strong skater.

I think one of the challenges for Abt was that he got overshadowed in the battle between Yagudin & Plushenko. They had such a huge rivalry which got so much attention in the media that Abt got a bit lost in the mix. If Abt had been skating in a different era in which he didn't have to go against two giants like Yagudin & Plushenko, he might have been able to go farther.
 
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