Olympic Gold Medalist: Evan Lysacek
February 20th, 2010
Now wait a minute, just hear me out
I have read many comments saying Plushenko should be the Olympic champion. Here is my two cents, and wish both sides to listen with an open mind to the point I am making. Forget about the current judging system and if you like it or not. Forget if you think the sport is moving forwards or backwards because of it. Forget if the current judging system affects the popularity of our sport or not. Consider these scenarios:
Tennis:
Plushenko and Lysacek are playing against each other at the Olympics. Plushenko has a devastating forehand swing. Lysacek has superior endurance. If Lysacek plays to Plushenko’s backhand the entire time, drags out the match as long as possible to weaken Plushenko and wins, he is a smart strategist and wins the gold. Nobody says he is not the true champion because he played smart.
Karate:
Plushenko and Lysacek are in the final match against each other at the Olympics. Plushenko has devastating kicks and wins most of his matches because of them. Lysacek has better punches and endurance. Lysacek, using a smart strategy, stays close enough to Plushenko to render his kicks useless while punching and prolonging the match to play to his superior endurance and wins the gold. Nobody claims he is not the true champion for not giving Plushenko the opportunity to kick him the entire match.
When Plushenko decided to come back, he accepted to compete under the current judging system. Did he take the time watch all the videos of the top competitors and ask, “if they skate perfect, what will their maximum points be? Can I map out my program,” by not front end loading it, “to increase my overall points?”
If you want to complain that the current system is not awarding enough points for a quad, or it promotes “not taking risks” etc., then fine. Make your points for what you want and how it will better the sport. If it truly does, most people will agree with you. But when you say Lysacek is not the rightful champion because he did not attempt a quad, or just because he had a superior strategy in the current system to gain more points is insulting to Evan Lysacek, who in my opinion IS the rightful and well deserved Olympic Champion.
My dad always says, “Show me your rules, and I’ll be happy to beat you at your own game.” Evan won by playing by the rules. If you don’t like the rules, don’t play the game and complain that you lost because of them.
33 Responses
Amen. Evan has been an incredibly gracious winner. Up until this point, I really admired Plushenko as well, but in the past week I have lost a lot of respect for him.
Get a clue, Plushenko. You may have landed a quad, but it was a shaky landing. Last time I checked, skating has always been about elements done well, not just elements done. Evan Lysacek did everything well and with grace. It was obviously a tough decision for the judges because it was close. Dear Lord how I cannot stand sore losers …
The analogies you used in this article are the best ones I have seen in this debate. You are absolutely correct and Evan very much deserves his gold medal.
Dan – I don’t care what everyone says about u, ur all right;-) Very good analogies, well said – simple and clear.
A Karate analogy Dan, you and I are gonna have to talk… Karate? Karate? Dan?
If we go with that… you would also have to add in that Evan would score more for his punches after the halfway mark, and Plushy perfect combination kick that was cleanly landed into Evan’s head in the opening of the fight was not given it’s due because he wasn’t allowed to hit full contact to kill his opponent from the get go.
So if I was watching this Karate match of yours… and Plushy’s kick combo was held back from full contact… I would still challenge the true winner. You know I love you, Dan… you are the man… but as my dad says, “Show me your rules, then when your ready to stop hiding behind them, let’s fight to the death. No rules, no “
AMEN!! For every post that thinks the Russian should have won, there are at least twice the number of people who recognize that Evan is the legitimate winner. Good analogies. I lost all respect for the Russian skater and have even greater respect for the gracios Olympic Champion, Evan Lysacek!!!
Evan won the gold fair and square. His WAS the better program. One quad does NOT automatically give Plushenko the gold. Evan was technically and artistically much better than Plunshenko. Evan is the gold medal winner – period! Plushenko just needs to get over it.
you are 100% right. Plushenko was quite awkward while landing the quads and figure skating isn’t all about the jumps, the footwork is impotant too! I think the judges made the right choice in making Evan Lysacek the gold medalist. Your analogies were very clear and really helps with the debate. The best article on this debate i’ve seen yet
Great analogies. Plushenko’s team didn’t strategize and just assumed that a program similar to Torino would still guarantee a win. If anything, the current COP is better than COP of 4 years ago since it brought skating back to skating.
I loved you analogies. They were very good and got the point across about how Lysacek won- strategy. Even I, not knowing the judging system completely, realized that Lysacek won by playing to Plushenko’s weaknesses. Plushenko has strong jumps, but his footwork isn’t as good, and that, in my opinion, is how Lysacek won- by having superior footwork and cleaner skating.
I believe that Evan has done a good job because his grace and elements were simply beautiful and powerful.
Thank you for writing this!! I am so sick of hearing Plushenko crying about what Evan and what Evan did or did not put on the ice. And the end of the day it comes down to what PLUSHENDO DID AND DID NOT DO ON THE ICE.
Had he not front loaded his program he would now be the champion. Had he added more transitions, he would be the champion. Had he read the rules, he would be the champion. A little bit of accountability is missing here from all of his interviews thus far. Rather than blaming the judges and his competitors, he needs to blame himself and his coach for not choreographing a program that would have gotten him the most points under this system.
WONDERFUL!!!! Thanks so much for this…Evan IS the rightful champion!
Well said. I agree 100%. Plushenko is being very childish about the whole thing. You’re right, he should have researched the point system before competing under it. I only hope someday he can look back and see how wrong he is and how much he has embarrassed himself. I am so proud of you Evan!
Thanks for this well written and reasoned perspective. Evan is the rightful Olympic Gold Medalist. If Plushenko wanted to win he and his coach should have tried to maximize his scores under the rules the same way Evan and his coach did to great effect.
Yes- I completely agree. Plushenko was arrogant to think one element would win under the IJS system. Evan’s IJS experience showed with a well rounded, masterful program. Plushenko had to eat humble pie and it was very bitter….
Thank you, Dan, right on! Evan’s grace before, during and after is inspiring. His hard work and dedication to the TOTAL aspects of the sport reflected in the prize.
It’s a shame Dan, that you and many others are focused on a much more trivial matter: that being the debate over whethetr Plushenko or Lysacek should have won. While Americans are slapping each other on the back rejoicing in Evan’s victory, figure skating is slipping further into being a sport that will go the way of the do-do bird and other various prehistoric extinctions. The deliberate dismissing of Johnny Weir and his undermarking is the big travesity at these games and continues to leave zero faith in the new system, the ISU or any figure skating body. I know I won’t get much support from a skater that may be considered “part of the system” or many of your readers, but Evan’s victory is a shallow one. Evan won because he had a good skate, but even moreso, because he knows how to play the political game. That is critical in figure skating, despite the head in the sand attitude of many. If you ever have children one day Dan, do them a favour. Only let them take up figure skating if they plan to do it recreationally. If they have talent and can compete at an elete level, remind them that what they do on the ice will never necessasarily translate into good (or poor) marks. One example is Patrick Chan who is uber in favour with Skate Canada and the ISU. He finished higher than Weir for that reason, and that reason alone. I have tuned out skating long ago, and many others have as well. And rightfully so……..the product is inferior….the skating is mechanical and points driven……and artistry is neither rewarded, evaluated or encouraged. The sport is near dead, and for someone who used to follow it for years, it has been like watching a strong, wonderful friend, fade into a skeleton of waste. It’s a shame, that no one cares to speak out, especially former skaters. Weir’s marks, not Lysacek or Plushenko’s victory, should be the topic for anyone who cares at all about figure skating any more. Maybe when people speak up, skating will get back some of the viewers and supporters, who have left the sport – and left in droves.
Dear Galileocan:
Thank you for your post. However, I’m afraid you have missed the point. In my opinion it is not trivial to defend Evan’s title against those who are upset with the IJS and how it has shaped skating today. They are two different issues.
Yes, I believe Weir should have placed higher. But again, that was not the point of this post. It is unfortunate that you misinterpreted my post and include me as someone who is “part of the system,” or I may be someone with a “head in the sand attitude.” You state: “Maybe when people speak up, skating will get back some of the viewers and supporters, who have left the sport!” and “It’s a shame no one cares to speak out, especially former skaters.”
Maybe you weren’t around in 2003 when a group called the World Skating Federation, WSF, was formed. Change within an organization can be hard, and this organization tried to over throw the ISU as the international governing body of figure skating. The list of people were:
“Ron Pfenning, Sonia Bianchetti Garbato, Kathy Casey, Ted Clarke, Judit Furst-Tombor, Jane Garden, Jon Jackson, Lorrie Kim, Britta Lindgren, Sandra Loosemore, Donald McKnight, John Nicks, J. Misha Petkevich, Barbara and Howard Silby, Sally-Anne Stapleford and Paul Wylie. Supporting athletes include Brian Boitano, Kurt Browning, Dick Button, Frances Dafoe, Drobiazko and Vanagas, Todd Eldredge, Scott Hamilton, Salé and Pelletier, Katarina Witt and Kristi Yamaguchi.”
(http://icesk8.com/olympics.htm)
That is a list of pretty influential people in the world of skating. The coup d’état was unsuccessful.
Almost every commentator has made some sort of remark criticizing the current system. People are talking, so to claim that they are not is false.
You say the reason I should not support my children to compete in skating is because they may skate a winning program, yet not place first. Do you honestly think that was better in the 6.0 system? It was not, and there are many examples to back up that statement. Skate Japan I had roughly 5.6s for a clean short that included triple lutz and triple axel – db loop combo. Ilia Kulik completely missed an element, requiring a .5 deduction. So he could not possibly get higher than a 5.5. He received 5.8, 5.9s! That would never happen in this new system.
We all get it. Many are not happy, and we all do what we can to make a positive change. Please do your research before pointing your finger at myself and other skaters for not speaking out. Many have, and many are, but that does not mean things will change either.
Perfectly put! I couldn’t agree more….The IJS scoring has been in place for many years….Pleshenko needed to get with the scoring program and get “up to date” We are not skating in the past any longer! It’s about all the elements not just a one trick pony show……Evan is the deserved winner for sure!!!
Now that’s an insightful response to the situation. Thanks, Dan. It’s nice to see someone examining the event as it was, a snapshot of competition, and not the be all, end all moment for the sport. Excellent analysis, whatever your views for the future.
There was no passion in Pleshenko’s performance. Very cut and dried so to speak. Obviously a good skater but not up to Evan’s standard. Evan put his heart and soul into his performance and it came through beautifully.
Thanks Dan.
I have to say that going into this competition, I was rooting for Plushenko or one of the other Europeans. While I can’t say that I’ve totally lost respect for him — as I heard Scott Hamilton say during the performance, Plushenko really IS a special guy — I totally agree with you and you’ve done a fantastic job of presenting the reasons why Evan won. It really should be true that “may the best man win” and I think he was the best at this Olympics. Good job Evan!
I completely agree with you. I hope Plushenko is already back in Russia. One thing I haven’t heard anyone say – they showed how hard Evan has trained the last 4 years for this moment. I doubt Plushenko did half – and it showed. Forget the quad. Everything about Evan’s performance was so much superior!
The way I saw it Plushenko was a poor looser. And yes, I say looser because even though he won the silver, he did not appreciate it. I knew when I saw the clean footwork of Lysacek and I saw the non-footwork of Plushenko that Lysacek had won the gold. He wanted it, he fought for it, he earned it. Plushenko slid into 2nd place by his reputation only. Especially when you consider the landings that were so bad that he did. When you look at a reply of the expression on Plushenko’s face while the National Anthem was playing you know one thing…..the cold war is not over, it has only changed faces!
So many have noted the superior skating by Evan–I cannot believe that anyone can support Plushenko for the gold. I have watched Olympic figure skating since Scott Hamilton won gold some 25 years or so ago. I remember vividly Brian Boitano’s skate and his win of Olympic gold. I actually liked Plushenko when he first appeared on the international circuit. The Plushenko who skated in this Olympics was a far cry from the skater he used to be. He seemed to think that because he had won gold before, he was somehow ‘entitled’ to it again. Big mistake–you’ve got to want it, to win it and he simply did not have respect for the competitors he was to face in this Olympics! And to you, Dan, thanks for the great analogies and for your clear thinking on the results of the skate for gold!!!
Dan,
You lay out a very solid legal case about playing by the rules. Sure, that’s the ideal. Don’t like it, find another game. But that’s like saying, “Don’t like America (or whatever country) go find yourself another one.” But it’s not so easy, is it? What other choice do skaters have if they don’t like the rules? I don’t mean Plushenko. You can well argue that he should have designed a better program. But the more artistic skaters who prefer to skate with abandon and not do math every second of the program … what choice do THEY have? I’m talking about someone like Johnny Weir. What choice does he have if he doesn’t like the system? Not to compete? He did, he skated the best program of the night at the Olympics, and what happened to him? He got buried in 6th place. Others who fell all over the place got better placements.
Sure there was corruption up to all our eyeballs with the 6.0 system as well. No doubt about it. But at least (1) everyone saw the marks and could see what happened and which judge cheated, instead of hiding under the cloak of secrecy and anonymity, and (2) there was no hypocrisy about it that it’s all scientific and mathematical and absolute. Those component marks are a joke. As Ed Swift recently said, they now have five artistic marks to monkey with instead of one.
As I said in my blog (http://savefigureskating.blogspot.com/) imagine that Weir had skated that program under the 6.0 system and gotten 5.2′s for artistic. Can you imagine the reaction from the crowd? Whoa! You’d have had pandemonium. But now he got something like a global score of 153. Gulp. Whatever that means. People looked around stunned and the competition went on.
The new system DOES matter. It changes the skating itself, not just the way it’s judged. And it protects criminal judging under total secrecy. It’s wrong. And no one has a choice whether to compete under the system or not. It’s not like they can pick which one they want, can they?
Okay, lets play tennis.
Plushenko is a tennis player with the special ability to hit aces. He is a talented player, but sometimes he rests on his aces too much. He had to go through several injuries, had to fight hard. Nobody thought he would come back, but he did and there are a lot of people who don’t like this.
On the other hand, there is a mediocre player, Lysacek, without any special abilities. He isn’t talented, but a hard worker and he has the will to win.
In the last years the officials decided, that a match with aces is boring, therefore they established a new rule, that a player has to hit 4 aces to get only one point.
Nevertheless it was unlikely, that Lysacek could win. Therefore somebody (let’s call him Mr. Inman) went to the referee to urge him to watch carefully at Plushenkos serving technique, in his opinion it’s weak.
When the match began, Plushenko hits his famous aces, but we hear “footfault” again and again. Because of a media campagne, the crowd is against him and When a point is close, the decision goes to Lysacek.
The match is really close, after several matchpoints for Plushenko, there is the first matchpoint for Lysacek. We hear footfault twice and Lysacek had won.
That’s the match I’ve seen,
I don’t come from the US, nor Russia. I’ve nothing to do with this countries, I’m just a figure skating fan. I like skaters from all over the world. But I don’t like the way figure skating is going.
Dear Tessa:
I agree that there are a lot of consequences with the current judging system, some that are not positive. As a show skater, when popularity goes downhill, so do our job opportunities. Can we relate some of this to the IJS? Probably, but there are too many factors to discuss here.
I must disagree with you, Evan is not mediocre. He can do the same jumps as Plushenko, including a quad.
The IJS is suppose to use the component score as an evaluation of the skater by their own skate, not in comparison of other skaters. In the old system, if a skater was awarded a 5.9 and the following skater was better, the judge was forced to give a 6.0, even though it might not be considered a “perfect” performance.
You relate biased foot fault calls in tennis as if Mr. Inman’s email caused the judges to be biased on Plushenko’s component marks. The DVD tutorial was created as a learning tool by the ISU. The Russian Federation asked that Plushenko be removed from the DVD because of the comments stating he was over marked on certain components. (have not seen it, not exactly sure what the specifics were).
Inman’s email, although I have not read it and only have seen the articles on, remarked on Plushenko’s statements:
“If the judges want someone to place high, they can arrange it,” Plushenko was quoted as saying last month. “Like (at the European championships) in Tallinn, (France’s) Brian Joubert got more points for his transitions than me, although we did exactly the same transitions on the ice. In fact, we don’t have any transitions because we focus on our jumps.”
(usatoday)
If I was a judge reading what Plushenko said, I take that comment to mean I as a judge am not judging what I see in front of me, but what I WANT the outcome to be. In my opinion that was what Inman’s email was about, stick with the system and mark what you see.
Therefore, going with your analogy, you appear to be blaming Inman for causing biased marks on the component score. The simple fact is that the component scores were tied 82.80. With that result, I find it difficult to argue that Inman, the ISU DVD, or Plushenko’s remarks affected the judges mark. I personally think Plushenko should have had a lower component score than Evan. Evan won with the technical mark by skating cleaner, having better spins, and gaining more points with elements near the end.
However, in the end, we can both agree that we are concerned over the future of skating.
Another great article to read (NBC Olympics)
Dan very well said.
Many individuals seem to be either for Plushenko or for Lysacek. Some of those individuals should turn off the volume on their TVs and truly watch the performance. It really does give you a picture of how they actually skated without the interference of media and their opinion on the system or the skaters, and the actions/reaction of the individuals involved. From watching it in person, regardless of what other people think, I agree on the final outcome. Everyone played by the rules. Just how one interprets those rules and uses them is a different story.
Figure skating will always be a sport of opinion. It’s likely that this will never change.
A champion is a champion and a loser a champion. They both skated to their best and one has to win the GOLD. BUT to see what Plushenko did before accepting the SILVER was uncalled for. That was just being a sore loser and Evan was greatful and had nothing but nice to say. So Plushenko you can go down is the books as being very disgraceful of your opponent and it’s all on camera. You did your country proud until that moment. GET OVER IT
What a thought provoking article. It makes total sense. I was already in agreement that Evan was the clear winner, but you put the reason why in words that make it so simple to me. Of course there will always be Plushenko fans who will never be satisfied, but if they can sit down and watch both prgrams with an open mind, they will see what you are talking about.
It’s easy to live in USA and to think,that everybody is satisfied with the outcome of the men final. I can assure, it!s not like this here, in Europe. The majority of figure skating fans thought, it was unfair. And I’m not from Russia neither, but I also think, that Plushenko must have won this Olympics. Not in the free program. It’s hard to argue, that he was not at his best. And I agree, that the choreography was pretty empty. But he should have been ahead of Evan by miles after the short! And as far as I understand, that is what Evgeni was saying. In the short program, the elements count, there is not much space for any transitions. You surely know, that some judges put Plushenko to 21-22 place by component score in the short. Do you really think, that was fair?! No, and you know it yourself.
It’s so disgusting to read hear “sore looser”. Please, you are speaking about Olympic Champion and twice Olympic silver medalist… I’d like to be such a looser!
The “cold war” is over, though some of your readers think it in different way.
In fact I like Evan Lysacek, and he was really good in his “Shaherezada”, but it still seems to be very strange, that he has won this Olympic title. And one more very strange placement: Weir. It’s a joke, that Patrick Chan is in front of him.