The Big Little Skating Show, 2009 Edition

You know, some people were a little disappointed with NBC Sports this year for doing things like not showing Alissa Czisny’s long program on air but merely making it a video clip available on their Universal Sports Web site. After all, as they correctly pointed out, not everybody has broadband — and not everybody even has the Internet. So is it really fair for a network to skip over the performance by its home country’s national champion — even if it’s not possible to show it live?

I don’t think so, to be honest with you. But I can tell you that by poking around on that Universal Sports Web site enough, you can find video you never even knew existed. Take me (please). I went on there last night, poking around looking for Czisny’s long program, and what did I find?

Amazingly enough, I found a video by two guys NBC Sports so happens to now have on its payroll, together: that old favorite SportsCenter team, Dan Patrick and Keith Olbermann. Doing a Worlds wrapup!

What can I say? Perhaps NBC Sports figured that now that they finally have Dan and Keith back together again covering football on Sunday nights, they might as well get a little more work out of them. Perhaps it’s part of Dan’s training in preparation for being on the Vancouver Olympics coverage team next winter (he signed with NBC too late to go to Beijing last year, but he’ll be part of the crew this go-’round). Maybe they figured they were paying Olbermann a fat enough salary to pontificate on MSNBC that the least he owed them is a little cleanup on the figure skating coverage. Who knows? I mean, if they can get Costas to do it…

I was so excited that I immediately whipped out a paper and pen and took down everything they said, lest I come back to the Web site later on and find out it the video clip had mysteriously…disappeared. And it’s a lucky thing I did, because sure enough, the next time I went, this morning, it was…not there! Could not find it for love or money.

What can I say? At least we have the transcript…

DP: Hello, skating fans, and welcome to the Big Little Skating Show, a bonus wrapup of the 2009 Figure Skating Championships from Los Angeles. Beside Keith Olbermann, The Man Who Is Saving Democracy, I am merely Dan Patrick.

KO: Which is more than enough.

DP: There was a lot of activity this past week in Los Angeles featuring women in short skirts that didn’t cover much, and amazingly enough, this time around none of it had to do with Britney Spears.

KO: Thank God.

DP: Let’s start with the pairs –

KO: Did I mention I lived in Los Angeles for ten years?

DP: Yes, you did. Thank you very much. Now –

KO: I just wanted to make sure. Because at the time, you know, I was voted both the best local sportscaster and the worst local sportscaster.

DP: Thank you, Keith. Now, in news that’s not about Keith, the pairs featured some interesting programs from many of the competitors. Here, for example, are Russia’s Kavaguti & Smirnov –

KO: On the rocks –

DP: — performing a lovely routine to “The Swan.”

KO: A fresh pack of Luckies and a song by Saint-Saens.

DP: As for the favorites, Germany’s Savchenko & Szolkowy, they were going to make sure they got noticed, in these shiny purple and pink costumes, skating to music from Lost in Space –

KO: Happily, they skated well, so there was no need to sit in the kiss ‘n’ cry moaning “Ohh, the pain, the shame!”

DP: But their long program was the kind of feat that might have had you shouting “Danger, Will Robinson! ” Watch how they end this on a throw for the win!

KO: And, Robin Szolkowy shows his aim is far superior to that of Chuck Knoblauch, who probably would have thrown Aliona Savchenko directly at my mother’s head, had she been sitting in the audience.

DP: You could be right. Anyway, they won, because you know, the Germans make good stuff.

KO: That they do.

On to the men, and talk about “does not compute”! Brian Joubert of France skates a salute to bland techno music and choppy footwork, and just look at those component scores!

KO: In the meantime, Patrick Chan of Canada performs, and while both The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan watching in the stands seem pretty happy with this, it doesn’t get the points Joubert’s short program does.

DP: But that was the story for Joubert and his choctaws…that’s a skating term. But Evan Lysacek of the USA didn’t seem to worry, because he was en fuego all week. Take a look at this performance from the long program. Nothing but the bottom of the blade!

KO: He lands every jump, spins every spin and they’re not…gonna…get…him.

DP: So Joubert is…gone. And an American man wins worlds for the first time since, well, since we were on SportsCenter together and covered it then.

KO: And you know that means a long time ago.

DP: On to the dance. Now as many of you know, the USA’s Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto had to sit out this year’s nationals because of –

KO: Say it. Say it.

DP: A bulging DISSSSSSSSC in his back.

KO: Damn. You were so careful.

DP: Well, of course I was. I didn’t want to end up like Steve Levy on the night I had off, that he was doing SportsCenter with you –

KO: — and he’s talking about a player on the IR with a bulging disc in his neck, only he doesn’t pronounce the S –

DP: –and I come home and turn on the TV and see you with your glasses off crying to beat the band and wiping your eyes, and I think “What’s the matter with Olbermann? He’s finally lost it on national television.”

KO: And it’s only because I’m laughing so hard I’m crying.

DP: No, I wasn’t going to let that happen. Because you see, I’m a careful guy. So, Ben Agosto, with the DISSSSSC in his back healed, made it back to worlds with Tanith Belbin –

KO: Whose philosophy is, you only go around once in life, so grab for all the Agosto you can.

DP: Ouch.

KO: What?

DP: I’m trying to do serious coverage of a sport here in preparation for the Olympics, and the best you can do for catch phrases is go all the way back to a beer commercial from 1972.

KO: Look, I’m doing my best here.

DP: That’s what scares me, Keith. So, anyway, Belbin & Agosto skate well, and so do Davis & White and the Canadians Virtue & Moir, but for some reason it’s just not enough to beat Russia’s Dominina & Shabalin.

KO: Whose battle cry is: “We ARE Spartacus!”

DP: Don’t ask me why, I just report ‘em, I don’t pick ‘em. Finally, we move on to the ladies, where you couldn’t stop South Korea’s Yu-na Kim, you could only hope to contain her. It wasn’t going to be an easy job, especially with the limits the US was laboring under. Once again, Keith’s girlfriend had to be left off the team for being too young to qualify under the age rules –

KO: Nice.

DP: — so the women they brought to the party were Rachael Flatt and Alissa Czisny.

KO: Gesundheit.

DP: As you can see from this video, Alissa committed the WHIFF!! in the short program, and Rachael had her troubles too, but did some improvisation that could’ve gotten her into the Second City to make up for it.

KO: I especially liked the performance by her partner, Scruggs.

DP: Yes, their rendition of the “Beverly Hillbillies Theme” was exceptionally soulful, was it not?

KO: I thought so.

DP: But let’s be honest here, Joannie Rochette of Canada looked much better –

KO: Take that for Alanis Morrisette’s pain!

DP: — but the real surprise here was, in the battle of Japanese Skater vs. Japanese Skater, how much better Miki Ando looked than Mao Asada –

KO: –who was left drooling the drool of regret into the pillow of remorse.

DP: As for Yu-na Kim, she pretty much put on a clinic out there.

KO: Take a look at this jump combination! From way downtown…BAAAANG!

DP: After she skated, it was goodbye. Game over. Drive safely.

KO: Although I do have a bit of a quibble over how the judges marked that performance.

DP: What?

KO: I thought Brian Orser deserved much higher Grades of Execution on his elements at rinkside than he received, don’t you?

DP: I guess you could say that.

KO: I don’t know, I thought he really put the biscuit in the basket. Anyway, time for our new feature, “Worst Persons at the Worlds!” Cue the Bach Toccata & Fugue, please!

DP: Keith, must you do this?

KO: The bronze! To whoever decided to put such a young and inexperienced judging panel on the men’s event! A panel that gave a Level 3 to footwork that reminds me of Vince the ShamWow Guy’s SlapChop!

DP: I gather you did not love Brian Joubert’s nuts?

KO: No, I did not! The silver, to whoever on the ISU Dance Committee decided a Shostakovich waltz qualifies as a “rhythm of the ’20s, ’30s and ’40s”! Maybe next year, someone will take “Feelings,” the big Morris Albert hit from 1975, and call it “disco”!

DP: It would make about as much sense.

KO: And our winner: the perpetual gold medalist until he resigns, dies or moves off to an island in Tahiti somewhere…the man who never stops thinking of new ways to ruin figure skating, ISU President Ottavio “I Don’t Care, I Don’t Have To” Cinquanta…this week’s WORST – PERSON – AT THE WORLDS!!!!

DP: Well, I’m glad you got all that off your chest, Keith, because it’s time for us to go.

KO: But wait — I prepared a Special Comment about the current state of figure skating, and I was going to –

DP: Sorry, Keith, but we’ve run out of time.

KO: But I was going to change camera angles a lot, and talk directly to Ottavio Cinquanta. “You, Sir, are ruining this sport –”

DP: What can I say? They’d only let us make this video so long. So, that’s it for the World Figure Skating Championships this year. Keith has nothing more to say that is either relevant or true. Trust me on that.

KO: Excuse me? Like you know more about figure skating than I do? I know that Debi Thomas is Dr. Debi Thomas now.

DP: Good for you, Keith. You get a cookie. Now, if I’m not mistaken, don’t you have some Republicans to go after? Oh, and if I recall correctly, baseball starts this week.

KO: Baseball? Did you say…baseball????

DP: Yes, I did.

KO: Baseball…*sigh* Baseball…Um, look, sorry, kid, but I got tickets to Opening Day at the new Yankee Stadium, and I understand the lines are gonna be real long. Gotta go! (disappears)

DP: I thought that would work. Anyway, to all of you who watched this, he was and will always be Keith Olbermann, and I’m Dan Patrick. Good night and, heh heh, (whisper) good luck.

KO (off camera): I heard that.

DP: I know.

Comments on the ladies and a “how’d we do?” comparison

Well! You couldn’t say last night’s ladies’ final didn’t bring the suspense and excitement. It did, in the form of Mao Asada giving it all she had by trying the two-triple-axels-in-the-same-program thing again, only it didn’t work this time; Miki Ando looking the most together that she has since winning her own world title; and Joanne Rochette not being perfect, but being good enough to hang onto the silver medal that gave Canada its first of any color since 1988. Good for her.

It’s too bad things didn’t go better for Alissa Czisny, but it was about what I feared. At least she had a better long program than the disastrous short. And I have to give Rachael Flatt credit for the level head she keeps on her shoulders. Her skating may not be a thrill yet, but she thinks on her feet and doesn’t let crap rattle her, and that’s a good quality to have in competition. Fifth at her first worlds…that’s better than Sarah Hughes did. In case anyone’s noticing. If she ever combines Magic with Consistent, she will be one scary skater.

And then there was Yu-na. Yep. Even with the small blemishes, she was something exquisite. Did I feel emotional, knowing what she was doing, who was helping her do it? Yeah, I did. So there.

But lest we get too sentimental, let’s have a little humor to lighten things up. You know you’re an icon in your homeland when people are doing parodies of you, and the lovely Ms. Kim is no exception, as this fellow proves in his spoof of her air conditioner commercial:

Yep, that’s the kind of year it’s going to be — in South Korea, anyway. The good news is, Yu-na gets to stay a comfy distance from it all and train for the Olympics in Toronto, where it’s easier for her to walk around town without drawing a crowd, at least so long as she stays away from certain parts of Bloor Street.

Now, how did you guys do at predicting the podiums, vs. me? For the sake of argument, let’s compare our bracketology by awarding a point for every podium spot I predicted correctly, a half-point for every skater I correctly predicted would make the podium even when I got the medal color wrong, and a quarter-point every time I got another vaguer prediction right. To be fair, because you guys didn’t get judged in that area, I’m subtracting a quarter-point every time I was wrong about such vague predictions.

So, here’s my score: a big point courtesy of Ms. Kim as my only correct podium prediction, plus another half point for Joannie Rochette in ladies’. Add to that a quarter-point for my “no medals for Americans” prediction — nah, skip that because that was a given, seeing who I selected. All right. But a quarter-point for saying Czisny would not do well. A quarter-point off for saying Flatt would have no obvious errors (she was good but had errors), but another back for correctly predicting it would end up being good enough to send only two US ladies to Olympics. That’s 1 3/4 points in ladies’. Add for men a half-point for Lysacek on the podium, plus a quarter for predicting Mroz in top 10, but a quarter off for saying Abbott would win bronze–which I then take back because that was implicit in my podium choices so I shouldn’t ding myself twice. That’s 3/4 points in men’s which, added to my 1 3/4, gives me 2 1/2 points. For pairs, add 1/2 point for putting Savchenko & Szolkowy on the podium and another 1/4 for predicting the US teams to “to place no higher than the mid-to-lower reaches of the top 10 or even the upper reaches of the teens” (but no credit for predicting Canada wouldn’t make the podium because that, again, was implicit in my picks). That’s 3/4 points to add to my 2 1/2, which gives me 3 1/4 overall. In dance, I get two half-points apiece for putting both Belbin & Agosto and Dominina & Shabalin on the podium, and I’m not going to give or take any points for my other predictions (both the correct one and the incorrect one) about neither Virtue & Moir or Davis & White making the podium because that was implicit in my picks, too. So I end up overall with a whopping…drum roll please…4 1/4 points!!!!

As for you the collective voters, you didn’t get to vote the whole podium, but let’s pretend you sorta did based on who came in first, second and third percentagewise for your gold predictions. In ladies’, you also gave it to Kim, so you win a point just as I did. But you picked Mao Asada for second like I did, too, and your other ladies were way, way back in the pack. As for men, you get a half-point for saying Joubert would win, another half-point for putting Chan on the podium and another half-point for maybe giving Lysacek a chance, but I’m taking that half-point away for giving Abbott an even chance. So you guys score 1 point for the men, making 2 so far. Then in pairs, you made the same mistake I did: you thought Pang & Tong would win. Oops. You get a half-point here for picking Savchenko & Szolkowy for the podium, total so far 2 1/2. And in dance…oops! You guys drank the Khokhlova & Novitski Kool-Aid, so it’s only a point for you here: a half for putting Virtue & Moir on the podium and another half for saying Belbin & Agosto might make it there. So, your grand total is…3 1/2 points!!!!

There you have it. With some cheating, I beat you guys by a three-quarters of a point. Which just goes to show, there’s no predicting skating, and it’s true, a blindfolded person with a list of skaters and a set of darts could probably predict the winners just as well as any of us. Just stand a good distance back from that guy, OK?

Later, because I said I was going to do it: a comment on the Skating World As It Stands Today. But before that, a wrapup of the highlights from a couple of guys whom NBC Sports just happened to have hanging around the studio after football season ended, whose “dream SportsCenter” worlds wrapup was well enough received in 2005 that they decided to do it again this year. Why not?

OK, so I’m getting a teeny bit better here.

In dance, I get credit for predicting TWO podium qualifiers without getting the spots right, and correctly predict that Davis & White will establish themselves firmly as contenders but not get a medal. (Oh, and I forgot — I was also right about Canadians not winning a medal in pairs.) Which is about par for the course for me.

I don’t have a lot to say about the results. I can’t tell whether Dominina & Shabalin won strictly on “Skating While Russian” points that somehow managed to get Belbin & Agosto magically downgraded on the quality of their twizzles. All I know is, Tracy Wilson’s reason for liking Dominina & Shabalin less was about as weak as I ever heard. After criticizing their speed and his two-foot skating near the end of their program, the best she could come up with was that she didn’t like their music? Which she, incidentally, appeared to have forgotten was from Spartacus? Weak. Weak. Weak. When I heard that, I knew they were going to get the win.

Oh, and I still don’t get why it was OK for them to use a Shostakovich waltz for their OD. Because it was a “1920s, ’30s or ’40s” waltz? I wonder if they’d have gotten the same kind of reception for using, oh, a Frankie Yankovic Cleveland-style polka. “But Frankie made this record in…”

Maybe the ISU Dance Committee needs to be more specific about rhythms and styles of music, rather than defining them in terms of eras or decades? Thing is, I thought they were. Maybe I just imagined it.

On to the ladies’ short. I’m not going to say much, because right now things look good for maybe two out of three of my predictions and I don’t want to mess them up. But a few things I will say: It was certainly a more disappointing outing for the US than even I expected. Now they’ll be struggling mightily to qualify two for next year. And dammit, it was really, really nice to see such great skating from Miki Ando and Joannie Rochette, even if it was disappointing to see Mao Asada off her game. And that I don’t care who pooh-poohs her and says she ain’t all that great (and there are such people), Yu-na Kim was the class of the field, and no matter how much some of you want to discount his influence, that guy jumping up and down at the end of her program is, too. So there.

One small caution for Sarah Meier, which she has probably already been warned about (I hope so, anyway): don’t wear that AIG sponsor logo of yours out on the streets of Los Angeles. It might not be safe. Don’t get us wrong, we know it’s not your fault that they decided to sponsor you, and you’re not responsible for their shenanigans. But right now, wearing that logo on the streets of an American city is probably going to make you about as popular as a dachshund or a German shepherd in 1917.

About last night…

I’m finally caught up on my skate-watching, and can say that while the pairs final was kind of messy, it was certainly fair. You have to give credit to anyone with enough guts to land their program on a throw…so long as the throw works. I’m also very impressed with how good Kavaguti & Smirnov have become. Most of all, it’s reassuring to see that while the thin young women of figure skating are still thin, they no longer look dangerously so. I no longer feel the need to feed any of them a sandwich.

So, Pang & Tong surprisingly didn’t quite have it this go-’round, although they weren’t bad. I managed to predict two out of three podium placers, although the spots I picked were wrong (and I predicted the American finishes quite well). That’s better than I did in the men. I must heave a sigh of relief, though, that Evan Lysacek did indeed skate as if he were angry at himself and had something to prove, and that his powerful-all-the-way-through program got more credit from the judges than the dialed-down performance from Brian Joubert. Yikes, he brought the difficulty way, way down on that one, stumbled while he ran out of gas toward the end…and that’s not even counting the totally judging-irrelevant comment that he’s becoming as dependent on music from various incarnations of The Matrix as Philippe Candeloro ever was on The Godfather or David Santee on Rocky. When Scott Hamilton kept babbling on about how, given Joubert’s subpar performance, Lysacek was sure to win, I wanted to yell at him “Shut up! Don’t you remember the pairs at the 2002 Olympics? Do you learn from NOTHING????” Well, luckily he was right this time, and Lysacek managed to pull the Todd Eldredge in ‘96 thing just as he hoped for.

As for The Amazing Chan, don’t you worry about him. It’s like I said: he’s better off going into the home country Olympics as the guy who only won silver. And not because it just turned out that way, but because he kinda blew his chances in the long program. This way, the Canadian media will not treat his performance there like an inevitable coronation and he will not be as antsy about tripping on the way to the throne. Other guys will be given a legit chance of beating him (at least Lysacek and Joubert will) and the pressure will be off. As for Evan, though…well, look at it this way, at least the Olympics aren’t in THIS country. You do recall how long it’s been since an American guy won, don’t you? Agggghhhh…

Anyway, that means for the men, I picked just one podium guy correctly, wrong spot. However, it also means that Johnny Weir has a very good shot at redemption coming up next season. Will he be able to grab it in time to earn himself another trip to the Olympics? Good question.

No dance results have been aired as yet. so I’ll be taping them this afternoon and watching them tonight after ladies’ short. And then there’s dance final at midnight…thank God it’s Friday…

Well, my brackets are shot so far…

…how about yours?

(In case you were wondering, spoilers be here for those who are not yet caught up on all the action. Sorry, but I see skating as a sport and what’s done is done, not a suspenseful story for you to read the last page of when you get a chance to. Proceed with that in mind.)

In pairs, I was able to pick two out of three podium placers, but got neither of the spots right. As for men, if I get one podium placer right, I will probably be lucky, and dance isn’t looking much better.

I’m not done actually watching all the pairs — only partway through short program (a girl has to get her beauty sleep, so I taped last night’s freeskates and want to watch the shorts I taped yesterday afternoon before I watch the freeskates), but already I’ve been enchanted by how Zhang & Zhang have developed into a pair I really like to watch. And a large part of that is the masculine part of the Zhang equation: he’s just so elegant. The American pairs did not surprise me at all, sad to say; until we as a country develop more consistency of performance in our pairs, this is going to be the story at worlds for a long time to come.

Now I have to talk about the men for a bit. Do I think the short program outcome was nutty, crazy, outrageous? Yeah, I do. OK, call me one of the followers of The Amazing Chan, but dammit, Evan Lysacek was also fierce and deserved better than he got. Brian Joubert really impressed me in Calgary a few years ago because I wasn’t sure he could transform himself from the typical “crowd pleasing but not actually doing very tough stuff aside from the jumps” skater he was pre-COP into the kind of skater who had tough enough footwork, spins, etc. to do well under COP, yet he did. But now, to me, he looks like he’s going backwards, only somehow it’s OK with the judges because he made his bones in ‘06-’07 and he doesn’t have anything to prove anymore. Now it’s OK for him to skate a short program that looks as if its theme is “Tribute to Elvis Stojko and the Macho Dudes of the ’90s,” with all kinds of little pauses and rests and places for the crowd to go wild while he stands there and shuffles his feet back and forth, points at them or (that last footwork sequence) stands there like a gymnast about to attempt an especially difficult tumbling run, and they absolutely shower it with points. I guess I missed the memo that says they prefer the Chazz Michael Michaels school of skating over that which concerns line, posture and elegance on the ice. Oh well.

Skating bracketology from you, the fans

Looks like the people have spoken, and here’s how they think March Bladeness will turn out this year:

Men
It’s a neck-and-neck race pretty much between Patrick Chan and Brian Joubert, according to you guys, with 34& of you giving the nod to Chan and 30% to Joubert. Jeremy Abbott and Evan Lysacek are given outside chances (15% and 13% respectively). A few of you like Nobunari Oda as much as I do.

Ladies
A whopping 59% of you agree with me that it’s Yu-Na Kim’s turn for gold, making her the biggest favorite amongst whoever’s still reading this blog, or came over just to vote after seeing it pimped on SkateFans List (make of that what you will). The next best result is Mao Asada at 31%. The other poor darlings might as well not be in the hunt at all.

Pairs
Most of you seem to agree with me that this will be a two-way nailbiter; Pang & Tong came away with 48% of the vote to Savchenko & Szolkowy’s 46%. Other choices are a distant third.

Dance
I guess a lot of people think I’m talking out of a not-too-clean bodily orifice here, as there seems to be a consensus: Khokhlova & Novitski won the prediction for victory by a runaway 40%. Virtue & Moir get a distant second with 20%, followed not too far behind by Belbin & Agosto and Davis & White at 16% each. Don’t know whether this is a reflection of how well people don’t think Ben Agosto is recovered from his back injury, how good they think Khokhlova & Novitski really are, or how many “Skating While Russian” brownie points they assume Khokhlova & Novitski will get from the judges. Anyway, it’ll be interesting to see how things really do turn out.

So, that’s what you guys think…Can I stop now? Nah, I’m on a roll. It’s Worlds week, I’m not there (although I now really badly wish I could be…sigh), but at least I get Oxygen Network, and it’s going to be like oxygen to me all this week. I probably won’t be able to resist making a comment or two…and I know I’m going to wrap things up at the conclusion of the week with some kind of comment on my feelings about the current state of the skating world before heading off into the sunset of the Cleveland spring. (Speaking of which…it’s been an uncustomarily long time since it’s s-n-o-w-e-d here. Shh, don’t tell anyone I told you. I figure we’re due for at least one more good dump before spring settles in for good, but if the dump never comes, I’m not complaining. It’s almost time for us to go into the national spotlight once again — we’re actually hosting the Rock Hall induction ceremony this year, for the first time in ages — and we need all the good weather we can get for the tourists.)

So, tell your neighbors, tell your friends, tell your fellow skating fans. Ought Nine Nationals has arisen like a phoenix from the ashes to become Ought Nine Worlds, Long Distance Version. One more turn around the rink before we give up the ghost. Join us.

Better late than never: Worlds predictions (for what they’re worth)

OK, I’ve been putting it off long enough. Worlds is getting started, and I promised one final speculation as to how things would go before I wrapped up this blog, so here it is.

Please keep this in mind as you read: Once upon a time, at a previous job, just for fun, I used to run the office Olympic figure skating pool. Yeah, just like March Madness brackets and all that. I’d put together a “tip sheet,” based on what was supposed to be my superior figure skating knowledge, and distribute it to my officemates, then take their predictions as to who would win which medals in each discipline. The winner got some kind of prize — exactly what it was, I cannot now recall.

I never won these office Olympic figure skating pools. No, not because I recused myself due to my supposedly superior knowledge. But because my sheet of likely winners, based on that knowledge, was invariably less accurate than that of some dilettante who watched figure skating only quadrennially when those five interlocking rings were depicted on the rink boards, and otherwise didn’t know Nancy Kerrigan from Nancy Kulp or Todd Eldredge from a hot toddy. In short, a blindfolded person with a poster full of skaters’ names and a set of darts could have achieved a better percentage of prediction accuracy than I did. Someone who chose Midori Ito to win silver just because she had a pretty-sounding name could do better than I did.

So, take the predictions presented below with that knowledge in mind.

Dance: Let’s get this out of the way first, seeing that it’s the area I know least. OK, I’m going to take a big leap here and say that Belbin & Agosto, in their big return to competition this season, are going to take it all. No, don’t mock me; it wouldn’t be the first time this kind of thing has happened. And all it will mean in the end is that next year, at the Olympics, they will lose to either Khokhlova & Novitski (who will lose to them by only a hair in Los Angeles, then go on to win the next two Olympics) or a revived Delobel & Schoenfelder, who will retire joyfully after Vancouver with the top prize in hand and the story about their “big comeback after their ruined 2009 season” following them everywhere. Third place will go to Domnina & Shabalin, leaving North Americans furious that neither Virtue & Moir nor Davis & White were considered medal-worthy this year. (Don’t worry, furious Canadians, Virtue & Moir will make up for that next year.) Davis & White will firmly establish themselves as “on the bubble,” but no medal.

Pairs: This is usually a wild and wooly competitive event, and that might well be the case here. Call it a head-to-head matchup between Savchenko & Szolkowy and Pang & Tong, with Pang & Tong just pulling it out. Canadians will be disappointed when Zhang & Zhang take third, but they should hang in there, as things will be better at the Olympics next year. (Prior to that, however, there will be much hand-wringing in the Canadian press about home country prospects, judging and so on.) As for the American teams, count on them to place no higher than the mid-to-lower reaches of the top 10 or even the upper reaches of the teens.

Ladies: Oh boy. Dare I say this, because the Americans aren’t going to like it: Yeah, no medal for the USA this time out. Why? Because as delightful as Alissa Czisny’s skating can be at its best, and as nice as it was to see her get the national title, she has the competitive toughness of the many Jenny Kirk/Angela Nikodinov/etc. types of American skaters that have gone before her. Forced to do the main banner-carrying here, she’s highly unlikely to hold up (and if she proves me wrong, I will gladly print out a copy of this blog, shred it and eat it with milk…and I HATE milk). Rachael Flatt will do what she can — and will probably give a solid performance free of obvious errors — which is a good thing, because at least it will help enable the USA to send two ladies to Vancouver instead of just one. Ouch. Yeah, I know, the truth hurts — but you know it and I know it: this is the Golden Age of Asian Ladies, and in its face the Old Guard of dependable American champs is looking kind of defenseless right now. But cool your jets, because that’s this year — not necessarily next year. The US Ladies’ Baby Ballerina Factory is far from through crankin’ ‘em off the talent assembly line and, unlike Detroit (the auto industry, that is, not the Skating Club) is not in need of any bailouts. And there’s still hope in the form of Mirai Nagasu and Caroline Zhang, one or both of whom I predict will be on next year’s Olympic team, and will win a medal…of some color.

This is all my way of saying that I’m going to go out on a limb here and call this the year for Yu-Na Kim to win worlds. She’s going to be happy, South Korea is going to be delirious…and Brian Orser’s going to feel as if he’s living 1987 all over again. A beloved national champion, with name and face plastered in every magazine ad and on every billboard and TV ad and milk carton across the country, with the assumption that a win at the upcoming Olympics is almost a done deal, then actually has to go there and deliver the expected…The only good thing? They don’t have to do it in Seoul.

Oh yeah, silver and bronze. Let’s say, Mao Asada and, oh my stars can it be true?…Joannie Rochette. This will, of course, cause the 800-pound gorilla known as the Canadian Expectations Monkey to leap immediately onto her back and hang with her all the way to Vancouver, where things may not go so well, which is what’s going to open the door for that lone American on the podium. The winner there? Asada. Guess who’s going to be second?…Well, if you don’t know, ask Brian Orser. (Do I hope this is what happens? Not really. Do I fear this is what happens? Yeah.) The Korean-Japanese feud over whether Japanese skaters are pulling a Surya Bonaly/Sasha Cohen on Kim during warmups will only heat up, becoming a big side story to be covered at the Olympics, where stories about alleged feuds are always welcome.

And yes, you’re right: I’m not exactly taking any of the European ladies seriously this year. Sorry, but their field is the weakest it’s probably been since 1990. You know it. I know it. I will be shocked if anyone disproves it.

Men: Hmm. Does Patrick Chan have what it takes to win it all yet? Personally, I hope not, because he’s really better off without that Canadian Expectations Monkey hitching a ride all the way to Vancouver on HIS back. (Once again, if you don’t know why, you know who to ask.) Probably the best thing that could happen to him this year is to miss the podium entirely, causing the Canadian press to label him a nine-days’ wonder and a disappointment of whom nothing further can be expected. Then he can go to Vancouver and whatever color medal he wins will be considered wonderful (think Liz Manley). If he wins Worlds this year, he has to trod the well-traveled path of Orser, Browning and Stojko, which he’s really better off avoiding…and if they actually pick him to CARRY THE DAMN FLAG INTO THE OPENING CEREMONIES…Run away, Patrick, run away!!!!!*

(*Lest anyone think that my comments here are serious, let me emphasize: I am ONLY JOKING! To be chosen to carry one’s national flag into the Olympic opening ceremonies ahead of the home team is a tremendous honor, the pride and memories of which will last a lifetime, and is an opportunity only a fool would refuse, whatever kind of “curses” were supposedly attached thereto. Right, Brian?)

As for the American boys, Brandon Mroz will finish respectably in the top 10, Jeremy Abbott will be a tad disappointed, but still thrilled as hell to get the bronze, and a re-energized and angry-at-himself-with-something-to-prove Evan Lysacek will grab the silver. Who will be number one? Oh, let’s just go out on a limb here and say Nobunari Oda, with Brian Joubert and Tomas Verner frustrated by their inability to hit the podium this time out. Especially because they know that next season, Daisuke Takahashi will be back and then all bets are off.

I don’t even want to make predictions for the men in Vancouver. My predictions of the other three disciplines are likely so bad that I could probably do better predicting the men’s outcome by using a Ouija board. And really, while I do it here for fun, it’s hard for me to take my own 2010 predictions seriously, given that they must fail to take into account things like injury, illness and unexpected partner splits.

So, there you have it: my Los Angeles predictions. Love ‘em or leave ‘em:

Men
Gold: Nobunari Oda
Silver: Evan Lysacek
Bronze: Jeremy Abbott

Ladies
Gold: Yu-Na Kim
Silver: Mao Asada
Bronze: Joannie Rochette

Pairs
Gold: Pang & Tong
Silver: Savchenko & Szolkowy
Bronze: Zhang & Zhang

Dance
Gold: Belbin & Agosto
Silver: Khokhlova & Novitski
Bronze: Domnina & Shabalin

Did I pull these predictions out of my butt? You be the judge. Pick YOUR winners below. I will come back Tuesday for final comments and observations on them.

So, what did Cleveland do wrong and right…and what can Spokane learn?

Here’s my summary:

The staging of this Nationals was uneven. The venue was good and the majority of people in it were useful and helpful, but there were still too many who didn’t seem to understand that what was being run was a competition, not a show. While plenty of folks at the Q took their responsibilities in stride, others got pushy, and still others saw no problem with doing things like seating people during skating performances. And not enough concession stands were open early in the competition, or even in some cases toward the end.

Ticket sales seemed to be run by people who didn’t have a clue what they were doing. At first everyone got charged full price, then prices began to be slashed as it became evident that demand would not be as great as in 2000. This is the wrong way to go about things, as I see it, because it punishes devoted die-hard fans by making them pay top dollar, while rewarding the less committed and the casual Johnny-come-latelys. The idea to provide a $5 discount on some tickets for RTA pass holders was also poorly executed. It was not retroactively available to pass holders who already had purchased tickets, and it seemed aimed primarily at the goal of getting locals to park their cars at a Rapid station and ride the Rapid to and from downtown. The simple fact of the matter is that the vast majority of suburban Clevelanders don’t live anywhere near a Rapid station. They live out in the wilds of suburbia, where neither bus nor Rapid venture. If RTA really wanted to do something to help out Nationals attendees, it should have sought to meet the needs of out-of-towners needing easy, inexpensive transportation around downtown before, during and after events.

In all, ticket sales were nowhere near 2000 levels. There might have been as many as 10,000 in attendance for the Ladies’ freeskate, but that was about it. Otherwise, events drew from a few hundred people for the novice events to maybe 7,000 for the best-attended of the other events — and that’s being generous.

The organizers of this event should have realized that Cleveland has pretty much been in the grips of a recession of its own since 2002 and that Michelle Kwan is retired, and the combination of those two factors was going to make this year’s Nationals a harder sell to locals than it was in 2000 — and acted accordingly to try to lock in support with discounts and deals from the start, not only to locals but to diehard skating fans on the fence about coming in from out of town. That’s what Spokane is doing, or at least what the organizers STAR USA are doing, for next year. They realize they have a tougher deal to sell because of the finals being spread out over two weekends, and they didn’t waste any time offering special packages and deals that have resulted in them selling record-breaking numbers of tickets early.

It was also quite evident, from checking out the Spokane 2010 table on the concourse at this Nationals, that they were not stopping there. Every effort was being made to woo Clevelanders to the next Nationals by offering them special deals. Vacation literature was spread across the table attempting to persuade locals that Spokane is a winter wonderland — whether it is one or not. They seemed to realize that the burden on them to give visitors something to do besides watch skating might be heavier than it is on most Nationals host cities. They’ve also tried to attack that problem by promising an even bigger version this time of their “FanFest” — which they call “a celebration of fans and supporters alike from all over the world who love the sport enough to travel…to meet others who share the same passion.” (Cough, cough, Cleveland…this is what we mean about showing the visitors they’re appreciated.) FanFest 2010, they promise, will offer food and drink sampling, autograph signing and live entertainment, “all providing special hours and staffed to accommodate the fans.” At the Q, they even had little flyers printed up listing the number of flights — direct and nonstop — between Cleveland and Spokane, to attempt to persuade locals that Washington state wasn’t all that hard to get to.

Will all their persuasion work on Clevelanders? I doubt it will on many. Things have only gone from bad to worse here economically as a result of the global/national financial mess, and if people here are reluctant to buy a ticket for a skating event at the Q because of the prices, the chances of luring them clean across the country for an event being held in what is admittedly a non-destination city, which will require them to purchase at least one air flight and many nights in a hotel, are slim to none. But the point is, the Spokane people were trying.

The big questions now are: Will Spokane be able to afford to stage the Nationals they’ve planned? And will all the people who bought tickets so early be able to afford to show up and attend a year from now?

First things first. Seems that the STAR USA organizers were counting on the state kicking in $600,000 in funds to match the amount pledged by local governments and business groups and pay the $1.2 million bid fee to US Figure Skating, but that money is not yet in Governor Christine Gregoire’s budget (story here). Now they hope to enlist the aid of State Senator Lisa Brown to work that financing into the senate’s budget — because if they don’t, they have no Plan B as to how to get it, other than having to scramble to sign more sponsors or make up the difference through revenues earned from the event.

It seems highly unlikely that USFS will pull Nationals from Spokane if the budgeting falls through, so it’s most likely that either the money hole will be filled, new sponsors will be found or (and this isn’t out of the realm of possibility) the profits from this event won’t be as hoped, unless it’s staged more cheaply than plans now call for. At this point, nothing’s for sure.

It might seem like a no-brainer to skating fans that Washington should ante up for an event that will bring tourist revenue into the state like this one will. But if you say that, you figure without those to whom any sort of taxpayer funds that go to finance someone else’s project instead of the one they think is important constitute frivolous, unnecessary “pork.” And then, of course, you have folks on one side of the state not wanting the other side of the state to get money that they won’t get. Sigh.

When I look back, it really is rather amazing that my home state of Ohio is one of only six (the District of Columbia not counting) ever to host, or be about to host, the World Championships — and that we did it in the “modern era,” and not in our largest city (the honor of that title has wavered between Cleveland and Columbus) but in only our third largest, Cincinnati. Perhaps it was only possible because it was in 1987, an era in which the poor might be very poor but the rich were also very rich (the stock market wouldn’t crash for another seven months) and it was the hometown of one of the great global corporations, Procter & Gamble, who helped sponsor the shindig. Also, even in 1987, Worlds just wasn’t as big and expensive as it is now. I don’t know if we will ever host another Worlds in this state.

Hell, right now we’d settle for some jobs.

Speaking of which…when it comes to finances, I worry about more in the future than Spokane’s ability to stage the Nationals next year. I figure that the global financial meltdown took place a little too recently to have too enormous an impact not only on the staging of this year’s Nationals (the poor attendance could just as easily be blamed on low publicity and the longtime bad local economy) but also on the ability of the skaters themselves to afford their own training and travel. Sure, USFS is subsidizing some of them, and to some extent that organization has already had to pull in their horns with the general drop in skating-related revenue over the past few years, so they haven’t had too much of a shock so far. But what about the athletes who depend largely on parental or sponsor (either corporate or individual angel) financing? What happens to them if Dad or Mom loses a job? What happens if the angel lost a lot of money in the stock market? Will continued investment in the skater remain possible? Or will the money dry up — and deny some great talent the opportunity to reach its full potential?

And what about the fans? How many of them will suffer financial misfortunes that make them think twice about whether they can afford a trip to Nationals? How many will lose their jobs and not be able to finance the trip? How many who lose their jobs will manage to find new ones, but not ones that pay enough to solve their cash-flow problems…or not be able to get the vacation time to go away? Only time will tell.

Hey. If you think this post is depressing, stick around for a later one on the U.S. prospects at this year’s Worlds — and the future of figure skating.

Code of Points: the good and bad, revisited

Every time I go to a skating competition these days, I’m reminded of both the good and bad sides of the current judging system and the Code of Points. Here are some of the observations that came to mind, fresh again after this Nationals:

–Yes, there are some choreographers who have learned how to make a program both COP-rich and a work of art, and skaters who have learned how to make it so with their performances. But those choreographers, and skaters, are still few and far between.

–More singles skaters these days seem to be “frontloading” their short programs — getting the jumps and jump combination out of the way as the first three elements and then moving on to everything else. More short programs are ending on the footwork, rather than on a spin. Not sure why this should be, but it seems to be happening quite a bit. Of course, what this means is that skaters are more tired when they reach the footwork sequence and more likely to make it slow and labored, which is hardly the bang-up ending you want.

–Much has already been said about the overweighted value placed on skate-grabbing that has resulted in almost no spiral sequence or ladies’ spin being accomplished without at least an attempt at foot-clutches (which has, of course, migrated over to the men somewhat as well). But seriously, something needs to be done about this because it’s ridiculous. When you find your own SELF feeling that a spin combination was somehow “incomplete” because the skater did not end it with a Biellmann or a Sasha Cohen straight-leg foot-grabbing spin, you know it’s bad. Why can’t the ISU come up with other ways to score big points that will add more variety?

–In junior pairs, especially, the attempt to score extra points by doing “tough stuff” is getting scary.

–Some observers complain that skating is “going technically backwards” because COP’s emphasis on all elements, not just jumps, means that skaters can win big titles without quads. Of course, these people (Phil Hershcoughcough) are forgetting that “technical” does not equal “jumps,” and that some people don’t think it’s a horribly backward thing that a quadless skater like Patrick Chan should be considered a top Olympic contender, because he exemplifies the kind of emphasis on all elements that to them is what skating is all about — as opposed to the 1990s obsession with quads, quads and more quads.

–To some extent, the attempt by COP to balance out and value skating skills other than jumps is working, here and there, to add little things to skaters’ skills and skating programs that were once rarely or never seen. For example, we now see more things like skaters doing spins in the opposite of their natural direction. We see more of them doing things like the double jump at the end of a jump sequence with one or both arms overhead, or on their hips, Don Jackson-style. Or, in a three-jump sequence (something rather cool that we never used to see in figure skating pre-COP), the third jump done with an arm variation. And yes, some of those complex footwork sequences are slow and plodding as molasses and have nothing to do with the music, and ofttimes the skater’s reach exceeds the grasp and we see falls on footwork, but at least the skaters are TRYING more difficult and complex sequences. They’ll never learn how to do them if they don’t try. Should they be better incorporated into the program with appropriate music? Yes. But I’m really not sorry the days when a skater could whiz down the center line of the ice dancing on his toepicks and “veggie-chopping” while the audience swooned its approval are gone.

–The “dance spin” in ice dancing is really not working for me. The longer it’s around, and the more complex the dancers try to make it, the more it becomes indistinguishable from a pairs spin. (For a good example, look at the one Davis & White do in their free dance. Blank out your mind before you watch it and pretend you don’t know they’re ice dancers. Can you really tell the difference between this and pair skating?) There was a time when being “pair-skatey,” as it was called, was considered a negative thing in ice dancing, but where the dance spin is concerned, being pair-skatey seems to be what everyone wants to be.

–On the positive side, COP has definitely ended forever the days of male ice dancers who just skated on two feet and propped up their partners most of the time while the lady did all the twizzling and tough stuff. It has also ended the days of dancers who spent little time in actual dance holds and placed most of the emphasis in their program on drama and angst. However, it has caused so many of the elements in a program to be prescribed that just as in the other disciplines, the programs have tended toward the all too predictable, and it really takes serious choreographic talent to work in all the elements without making the program formulaic.

–The way the judging system produces winners still needs tinkering and fixing and balance (although there is probably no way everyone will ever be happy with it) to ensure that neither short nor long programs are overweighted and that a program with an abundance of failed jumps isn’t heavily favored over a more balanced program by very heavily counterweighting the success of the other elements in the final result.

–I’m glad that technical correctness in jumps, and not just the fact that the jump was somehow landed, matters — but it sure doesn’t do a whole lot for the public appeal of skating, because the average fan is neither observant enough nor anal-retentive enough to see or care about cheated takeoffs and landings. All most of them see is the completed jump, and they love it. When skaters are downgraded for cheated jumps caught in replay, they don’t know this is happening or understand why the skater’s score is lower. The only remedy I can think of is to replay downgraded jumps on the Jumbotron after a performance and have an announcement explaining that the following jumps were downgraded because…Yep, just like when the big screen replays a touchdown in slo-mo so if the referee judges that the player’s feet were out of bounds or he lacked control of the ball at the time he went down, the crowd can have some clue as to why the touchdown didn’t count. I know this sounds like putting the individual skater on a Pedestal of Shame and I wish there were some other way of doing it, but if skating wants to improve fan understanding of the sport as it is now, there may be no alternative.

–The system is still too mathematical to carry broad appeal for the general skate-watching public. True, it’s come to the point where they can now develop a sense of “how many points a skater needs to win” and cheer or sigh accordingly, but why and how those points were accumulated is such a complex matter that the average fan (and even some of the less average ones) can’t begin to understand. This doesn’t do a lot to make the sport fan-friendly…and the only way to make that point moot (more or less) is for the sport to develop superstars so popular that the fans either don’t care or will go to the trouble of learning whatever they have to in order to understand it.

In the USA, we haven’t had a superstar like that since Michelle Kwan, so the fact that the judging is so hard to understand matters. In Asia, they’re too busy cheering for their heroines Mao and Yu-Na and Miki and Yukari to care. And that makes all the difference.

More later.

My donation’s made…how about yours?

Well, I pushed the button today…made my online donation of a grand total of $275 to the Cleveland Foodbank in honor of the following Ought Nine Nationals skaters:

Nina Jiang
Joshua Farris
Ross Miner
Meryl Davis & Charlie White
Alissa Czisny
Jeremy Abbott
Brandon Mroz
Nicholas LaRoche
Keauna McLaughlin
Mirai Nagasu

If you participated in our Ought Nine Nationals polls for Skater (Team) of the Day and Competition, as well as Gutsiest Performance of the Competition, I hope you will make your own donation to your local food bank. They will be most appreciative, and you’ll be helping a lot of people in one of the worst economic crises America has ever faced. Even if you can’t give a lot, give a little…you’d be surprised how many people it will feed. And if you can’t give money, maybe you can give some extra food, or your volunteer time. That will be appreciated just as much. And let me know about it…if you don’t want to look like you’re bragging, tell me at oughtninenationals@gmail.com, and I’ll mention it anonymously.

More later!