I am thinking
1 Shoma
2 Jin
3 Chen
I just don't feel very confident in Nathan at the moment.
I'm so bored with all the quietness. Normally we would have tons of news, updates and interviews around this time? Is the world already fed up with figure skating after olympics? Or maybe it's normal and I'm expecting a lot?
I am thinking
1 Shoma
2 Jin
3 Chen
I just don't feel very confident in Nathan at the moment.
I am not dismissing Nathan, just you all are overhyping him. Yuzuru was Worlds bronze medalist at 17, Boyang Jin bronze at 18, Shoma silver at 19 and Olympic silver at 20. They were not hyped as the next great thing even after they were Worlds medalist
Majors as far as many sports are concerned is : Worlds and Olympics for Olympic sports. Non Olympic sport depending, for us Asians, its Asian Games cos its every 4 yrs.
GPF is not majors across different sports. Athletes are remembered as World medalist or Olympic medalist. Everything else is a footnote.
My countryman, a very accomplished badmintan player, has never won any of these 3 majors in 15 yrs. He has 3 Olympic silvers, multiple world silvers, Asian Games silvers. He has won LOTS of GPF tournaments. BUT because he has never won the majors he is dubbed as mr 2nd place, no big match mentality.
Thus far, Nathan has crumbled at WC 2017 and 2018 OG Team and Individual SP. Let the kid medal first, give him space
Hanyu was hyped from the beginning as a teenage quad king and future star. And by hyped, I mean singled out for his talent--not given undeserved praise. And the same has been true of Nathan.
Not to the extend of the Olympic gold medal being Nathan's to lose by the media, US media. Someone posted that article in the Olympics thread. Nathan was still named to win the OG gold by Jackie Wong even after he bombed at Team SP
Yuzuru at 17, his Worlds debut, was a bronze medalist. Before he went to train with Orser.
He still had to proof himself, broke SP World Records before Sochi, starting with the 95 pts one, then 99 pts.
At Sochi, it was Patrick Chan and Yuzuru but Patrick was still the main contender. Yuzuru was seen as the young inexperienced kid. Young inexperienced kids was not regarded as fully able to withstand the OG pressure to win.
Not to the extend of the Olympic gold medal being Nathan's to lose by the media, US media. Someone posted that article in the Olympics thread. Nathan was still named to win the OG gold by Jackie Wong even after he bombed at Team SP
The OGM was Nathan's to lose. His LP score proved that. Yuzuru is, overall, a much better skater but he simply can't make up the points with GOE and PCS without mistakes from Nathan.
The OGM was Nathan's to lose. His LP score proved that. Yuzuru is, overall, a much better skater but he simply can't make up the points with GOE and PCS without mistakes from Nathan.
IDK. If you extrapolate based on previous performance, and included very mild Olympic inflation (I think it would've been more than I've allotted), a clean Chen (with 4Lz/4F instead as he should've been doing all along) at Olympics would've probably put up around 106-107 in the SP and then 215 in LP. That's 321-322 points. That would've easily won. And Hanyu's only done that 3 times. If instead his LP was clean - with the benefit of being in the late group - he probably would've put up around 221-223. That's 327-330. Hanyu had done that precisely once, and hadn't come close since 2015. I'm also being somewhat conservative on the likely PCS and GOE inflation.
So, yeah, Hanyu would've had a lot of trouble if Nathan would've been clean (we can debate if these scores are fair, but it is what it is). And probably would've lost no matter what he did since Olympic judges like to award technical skates generically.
The OGM was Nathan's to lose. His LP score proved that. Yuzuru is, overall, a much better skater but he simply can't make up the points with GOE and PCS without mistakes from Nathan.
Hanyu won the Olympics just 2 years after his World's debut. He was beating Japan's number 1 (Takahashi) by the next year. Everyone knew that he was the favorite for gold in Sochi (especially after the team event).Patrick's stock had gone down by then. I remember when he first came on the scene--a 16 year old doing quads! He was definitely hyped (again, not meaning in a negative way) as the next big star.
ETA: This was Nathan's second Worlds, by the way, and the third he qualified for (he was injured shortly after Nationals the first time). He is hardly a newbie and has also had to prove himself. And he did last season by beating Hanyu at Four Continents. He had a bad Worlds but came back this past season stronger than ever, winning everything (beating Hanyu again) up until the Olympics. He had a solid record to stand on, just like Hanyu did.
That depends which media you following. As I recall, in Japan, Daisuke Takahashi was still the main man. Yuzuru was regarded as no 2, the successor after Daisuke retires. The many fan shouts at Sochi during practice were for Daisuke, understandably so.
Western media was promoting Patrick Chan as the main contender. I remember the many references to Patrick's 3 WC. Yuzuru was challenger, he hadnt won any Worlds yet back then.
Anyways, no matter you look at it, no media outlet(not NBC, not CBC,not Eurosport),certainly not Japanese, was saying the Yuzuru for sure will win OG gold or OG gold was his to lose.
No such thing.Even the Eurosport commentators, though being Yuzuru fans has said "He has looked brittle... "
Nathan's hype, on the other hand, made him look like a skating God. While discounting the current World champion, former World champion, silver medalist and 2X bronze medalist. Quite hilarious all the superlatives the US media used.
Casual viewers would think Yuzuru, Javier, Shoma & Boyang didnt exist, lol.
Not by a long shot. Quite a number of us saw from many miles/km away that Nathan will have mental strength issues at 2018 Olympics. Which looked more and more so in the run up to Olympics with all the distractions added.