Skating federation to investigate controversial Olympic judging. I told you they were ROBBED! But I am only going on the small clips I saw last night because, silly me, I fell asleep on the couch before I started up the Tivo! I missed the finals! I am so bummed. Anyone know where I can find them online? [via Robyn]
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Ha! Take That!
10 replies on “Ha! Take That!”
Back to the future — whoa! 😉 I’m not sure if you’ll be able to find clips online b/c of all the legal rules — but I’d definitely watch the games tonight. I’m sure they’ll replay it. NBC Nightly News just showed the Russian’s bad landing clip again.
Kymberlie suggested looking on Kazaa. It’s always amazing what people upload there!
It is not always about one bad landing… other parts of the Russian program might have out-weighed the Canadians (i.e. better overall movements, musical interpretation, etc.)For the Canadians to cry “we were robbed” is just being a sore loser. Anyone who ever figure skated knows it is about interpretation, not just about perfect landings etc. I myself figure skated for 15 years and understood from the beggining that scores are a judgement call and you just do your best. I hate that this is a controversy and I hate sore losers.
Actually, I was just saying all of those things myself earlier today in a discussion at work about it. It’s a subjective sport, and the judges can score as they want to. Some like one style, some like another. I didn’t get to see the whole thing, just the clip of the fall, and I thought the Russians had a better short program. I will say, I did admire Sale’s comment in both the article that I linked to and on TV last night. She has seemed very graceful about all of this and said “We have no control over this. It’s not the [Russian] skaters fault, either. We do our job, and the judges do their job, and they are human, too.” But since it is an “Internal investigation” that seems to imply that the federation itself is questioning the practice, not Sale and Pelletier.
ilopan, I think the biggest controversy from last night was that the announcers and the crowd both thought the Canadians won. The female announcer (former skater) even went so far to say she was ashamed of her sport when the placing votes were shown — and Scott Hamilton was in complete shock as the crowd boo’ed.
I did hear that one thing that really hurt the Canadians was that they had skated the exact same program for over two years now — so even though it was flawless, it was old, and one the judges had seen before. But technically the judging is supposed to be based on *that evening’s* performance and not past ones. Judges are human however…
It will be interesting to see how this unfolds. NBC Nightly News even had taped telephone calls from recent world competitions between judges “bargaining” for votes between the countries. It’s not a “one event only” kind of deal — especailly with the recent ice dancing scandals as well.
The announcers and the crowd are not the judges though. It is as simple as that. You know the way it is going into the sport. And it is a shame for announcers/reporters who are not supposed to be biased to even have an opinion on this.
I’m not disagreeing with you ilopan — and I get the impression you think I am. I’m saying public opinion (and the outrage that followed) has been egged on from the start by the announcers — not that they were justified in doing/saying what they did — just saying that most people tend to let others do the thinking for them.
I *do* believe the Canadians did a wonderful job last night, but life doesn’t always work out the way you want it. Still, I don’t think the Canadians are the ones that started the controversy. They have been very gracious about the whole thing. However, they are disappointed! Who wouldn’t be??!…
Bigger thing – after hearing it on the news just now, this “investigation” was NOT something that Sale and Pelletier requested. It was a decision made by the committee itself. They are not being sore losers. They didn’t huff & puff and ask that it be reviewed – it was the judges themselves that made that call this morning after meeting for a meeting that was previously scheduled. I still say that other then one quote I have read that Pelletier supposedly said earlier today about “things like this make you want to hang up your skates”, they have been TRULY graceful losers in all of this. Sure, if someone interviews you are going to say “what a bummer that we lost” but they haven’t been judge or competition bashing, at least not in anything I came across so far. (It might be out there though … I just haven’t read it.)
interesting site