2018-19 U.S. Men’s figure skating

Tavi... said:

I actually enjoyed both of Vincent’s programs. It’s too bad about the < calls, but the way I look at it, he has two choices:

- if his jumps are really fully rotated and the TP was in error, he should tweak the placement of his jumps in the program - and refine it during the official practice - so that they can clearly see this.

- if his jumps are actually < due to competition nerves or something else, he can work on fixing the problem.

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He has another option. Since his 3Lz scored more points than his UR 4Lz it might make sense to simply ditch the quads entirely. It certainly appears that the risk/reward ratio for quads has so dramatically shifted that even skaters who can consistently do them might score higher by doing only triples.

VegMom said:

He has another option. Since his 3Lz scored more points than his UR 4Lz it might make sense to simply ditch the quads entirely. It certainly appears that the risk/reward ratio for quads has so dramatically shifted that even skaters who can consistently do them might score higher by doing only triples.

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True! I was just thinking of quads and < calls.

I actually think, though, that for a skater who can consistently do fully rotated quads without falling, the risk atill seems to be worth it. Hanyu, Shoma, and Nathan are already getting high GOE and PCS in addition to landing multiple quads. It’s tough for anyone not attempting a quad to beat them.

Mrs. P said:

I mentioned this regarding Satoko elsewhere, but I also think it applies to Vincent -- I think Vincent's jump technique is such that there is probably not consensus on how to determine whether his jumps are rotated. I mean how do you go from no URs in his Junior Worlds 2017 FS. Or from the olympics with just one UR to competitions where he has multiple URs.

In other words, Vincent's fate may be down to whoever the tech panel is, which is frustrating

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This is everything.

Yep, Nathan's hair is winning me over now lol. It just... adds to Caravan somehow (Land of All not so much).

VegMom said:

He has another option. Since his 3Lz scored more points than his UR 4Lz it might make sense to simply ditch the quads entirely. It certainly appears that the risk/reward ratio for quads has so dramatically shifted that even skaters who can consistently do them might score higher by doing only triples.

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I don't see Vincent going that route. He's been one to go for the big money jumps. I know he's saying he's not focusing solely on quads (and it's clear he's working on the non-jump elements), but the fact he's still attempting two of them in the SP and four of them (lutz, flip, toe) in the FS says those jumps are still important.

To think, even with all his UR calls Vincent might have gotten bronze (and 11 points) if not for that TIME DEDUCTION It's like when Danielian's necklace flew off during Yerevan... WHY

Noxchild said:

To think, even with all his UR calls Vincent might have gotten bronze (and 11 points) if not for that TIME DEDUCTION It's like when Danielian's necklace flew off during Yerevan... WHY

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Ugh, I'm still not over that And it took Vincent 33 seconds to get to starting position Why indeed

Vincent needs to go down to one quad in the SP and 2 in the LP, and really focus on those rotations.

Now that he's labeled as being a UR guy, he's always going to be under scrutiny when other guys will get the benefit of the doubt when they have an occasional UR. He needs to shake off the label asap or it will follow him for the rest of his career.

I am just shocked . I wonder if that technical panel should be at juniors competitions nowadays. If Zhou's quads are not quads, what about some girls? They should be honest and judge everyone the same. Rules are rules. They should be that strict everywhere. And they let some of them to have quads with pre rotations and others cannot. Whats the point?

Varlesca said:

I am just shocked . I wonder if that technical panel should be at juniors competitions nowadays. If Zhou's quads are not quads, what about some girls? They should be honest and judge everyone the same. Rules are rules. They should be that strict everywhere. And they let some of them to have quads with pre rotations and others cannot. Whats the point?

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Tech panels don't care about pre-rotations. Period.

Will be interesting to see if the rest of the GP series has such strict tech panels.

Mrs. P said:

I mentioned this regarding Satoko elsewhere, but I also think it applies to Vincent -- I think Vincent's jump technique is such that there is probably not consensus on how to determine whether his jumps are rotated. I mean how do you go from no URs in his Junior Worlds 2017 FS. Or from the olympics with just one UR to competitions where he has multiple URs.

In other words, Vincent's fate may be down to whoever the tech panel is, which is frustrating

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Arguably, every skater’s fate is down to whoever the tech panel is. Vincent was one of 7 men in this competition who was called for under rotated or downgraded jumps.

As to Vincent, since I had a bit of extra time, I took a look at his competitive history since 2015. I didn’t look at club competitions but I did consider senior Nats and his junior and senior international results. And what I see is that he’s been consistently called for < and << (for these purposes I didn’t differentiate) during that time. That to me suggests it’s not a matter of who the tech panel is. Whether he’s actually < the jumps or he’s actually rotating them fully and the tech panel just isn’t seeing it, his team has had several seasons to figure it out. Sadly, I think they’ve failed him.

Details:

- In 15 of 17 competitions, at least one of his jumps was called < or <<.
- In 2/17 competitions (JWC 2017 and US Nats 2017) all of his jumps were called clean in both programs.
- In more than half of his short programs (9/17), at least 1 jump was called <.
- In 14/17 of his free skates, at least 1 jump was called <. Of those, multiple (2+) < were called 10 times.
- On average during the period, he was called for 2+ < per free skate.
- In 2018 (Nats, Olys, Worlds, US Classic, SA) his jumps have been called < in the SP 4/5 times. In the FS, his jumps have been called < 5/5 times, with an average of 3+ < called per FS.

andromache said:

Tech panels don't care about pre-rotations. Period.

Will be interesting to see if the rest of the GP series has such strict tech panels.

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The point is some of his jumps were not UR, they were pre rotated . The jump dont fullfill 3,75 minimum revolutions to be called a quad(in the air). So they called them UR, because pre rotation is UR

Varlesca said:

The point is some of his jumps were not UR, they were pre rotated . The jump dont fullfill 3,75 minimum revolutions to be called a quad(in the air). So they called them UR, because pre rotation is UR

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I was under the impression that Vincent's jumps were UR due to "regular" URing on the landing, not pre-rotation. Sorry if I was mistaken.

andromache said:

I was under the impression that Vincent's jumps were UR due to "regular" URing on the landing, not pre-rotation. Sorry if I was mistaken.

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To my eye, they were short on landing... as you say, a "regular" UR.

But, I'm actually kind of hopeful that, if they were called because of pre-rotation, that is a standard that is consistently upheld.

Because another podium contender... well, I'll just leave it at that.

I was told by an international level technical specialist that take off does not matter, only the landing does. That was about 3 years ago but I assume that still applies.

FWIW. I cannot tell the difference between the different jumps and also how they are landed. I always have to ask the person beside me what was tried and how it was rotated. But I can tell if they are pretty and timed with the music.

Tom Z is popping off on Facebook about Vincent’s UR calls I can’t figure out how to share here but if you search his name on Facebook you’ll be able to find his profile easily

evasorange said:

Tom Z is popping off on Facebook about Vincent’s UR calls ���� I can’t figure out how to share here but if you search his name on Facebook you’ll be able to find his profile easily

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I do not agree that Tom Z is "popping off."

My more neutral wording would be: On Facebook, Tom Z has commented at length on the tech calls for Vincent's jumps.

This excerpt is from near the top of his post:


Tom of course is an advocate for Vincent.
But I do not find the tone of Tom's Facebook post to be hot-headed.

I hope that others will read the entirety of Tom's post and judge for themselves.

Lol popping off is just silly internet talk, nothing more nothing less. But whether I think he’s right or wrong I love to see coaches taking a stand to judges/callers. Actually I was wondering this the other night while watching, can official appeals/complaints be made against the judging? I know they can in gymnastics but I can’t recall ever hearing about that happening in skating

Tom Z is calling for higher quality video and more angles. Well buddy let me tell you that's only going to backfire on Vincent because all that will happen then is the tech panel will see more URs from him.

Also the whinge about 0.63 meaning the URs cost Vincent a podium is hilarious since it was actually Vincent's fault, given he didn't get to position in time in the short.

Mrs. P said:

I mentioned this regarding Satoko elsewhere, but I also think it applies to Vincent -- I think Vincent's jump technique is such that there is probably not consensus on how to determine whether his jumps are rotated. I mean how do you go from no URs in his Junior Worlds 2017 FS. Or from the olympics with just one UR to competitions where he has multiple URs.

In other words, Vincent's fate may be down to whoever the tech panel is, which is frustrating

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I don’t think that’s the problem, frankly. Nor do I think it’s actually a “problem” — everyone is at the mercy of the tech panel. (Ask Boyang about WC17 and the calls in the men’s short.) I’d say the actual issue is that Vincent gives the tech panel a lot of material to work with, and his coaches are doing him a disservice by not preparing him for a massive TES drop in the time between his final pose and the announcement of his scores. It’s arguably not worth comparing UR calls from the junior level to senior or even doing a comparison with just one set of competitions, because tech panels can be notably lenient or strict, leading to the no UR calls at JWC versus now; watching the JGP, it also seems like the Juniors don’t get nearly as many UR calls, at least this season, even in cases where a downgrade would be more than justified. And the UR rules have tightened, so that’s another factour (I’d expect Vincent to get more UR calls from a non-asleep panel this season than in prior ones).

Satoko and Vincent have different issues. I don’t care for Satoko’s jumps, but I think she hides her UR issues better than most, despite being notorious for them. While Satoko isn’t my personal favourite, even I would never deny her skating skills and attention to choreography, which makes her jump issues less “distracting,” especially given her frankly ridiculous rotation speed. When Satoko URs, it doesn’t break up the programme or cause the performance to falter, as her jumps aren’t the highlight and nobody watches Satoko for a jump clinic. Vincent ... noticeably tenses up around the jumps, has scratchy landings, and really doesn’t have the skating skills or performance chops to sell the programme when the jumps aren’t there — and if we’re being honest, the jumps have rarely been there. He’s had times when he’s been somewhat improved but he’s never been known for having exceptional jumps (except in terms of BV).

If you want to make an argument about URs being too costly under the updated scoring system, I’d probably agree — I’ve never been in love with the idea that you can lose half your BV on a fall, and the BV reduction for URs is a much steeper penalty now that BV is lower. As soon as we started getting details on the system, I said TES was going to be volatile, and we’re seeing skaters lose 7 points after they leave the ice. Which has its pros and cons, but if you’re planning a programme for Vincent, it’s arguably worth rethinking whether or not to go for the 4Lz and 4F, solo and in combination, if you think there’s a >=50% chance that it’s going to tagged as UR (especially with Vincent’s flip edge issues). If you crunch the numbers, it’s the 3Lz that received the biggest change in terms of max score — and the 3Lz was Vincent’s best scoring element at Skate America.

I think Vincent’s main issue, beyond the URs, is the lack of positive features overall in his elements. His URs lead to scratchy landings, which eliminates potential for a positive feature/positive GOE bullet, and even on his better jumps, I’d argue it’s impossible to get to more than +3, more likely +2. Vincent lives in a GOE range that’s mostly negative and caps at the low end for positives; with BV being lowered and tied to GOE, that’s a lot of points he’s not able to pick up and has the potential to lose, and he can’t make them up with the BV of the 4Lz and the 4F any longer.

Being brutally honest: I don’t think Vincent was ever all that good, but having the 4Lz and 4F gave him enough technical firepower to score well and be a stable pick for “the US guy who isn’t Nathan Chen” for scoring purposes. (Of course, see WC17.) But that’s not the same as actually being a complete skater, and the men’s field has been so thin that a guy with the two hardest quads (even if UR’d) was good enough when the US was struggling to field a competitive team. With Alex K. now in Seniors, however, I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest to see Vincent drop to the third wheel of the US Men’s team, as Alex has... far fewer issues overall, stronger fundamentals (skating skills), and better positive scoring potential. And I have more faith in some of the US Junior men than Vincent, largely due to Vincent’s non-jump issues and propensity for headcasing. He has time to make improvements, but not that much time, and he has a lot to improve beyond just the jump issues. Even if he were getting 0 to +1/2 GOE on all his jumps, he’d still be bleeding points in his spins, StSq, choreographer sequence, and PCS.