FR LIVE EVENT-Olympic Scandal Press Conference..

MSNBC.com ^ | February 13, 2002 | Kelly O' Donnell

[Pres Raygun]

Please let me know, was it the artistic marks that put the Russians over the top? Or simply the ordinals? Does anyone know?

On a thread yesterday someone posted the scoring. Two of the judges that gave the Russian pair the first place ordinal, actually had given the same combined (technical + artisitc) scores for both pairs. If tie ordinals were possible, then the Canadian pair would have gotten 4 first places, the Russian pair 3 first places, with two judges giving first place ties.

[discostu]

xExcuse me, but if that's the case, why do they even GIVE out scores for technique and artistic merit?

As near as I can tell the scores are handed out so that the audience get's some idea for what the judges are thinking. They're kind of presented as the justification for the vote (and possibly a reminder to the judges later, scoring is done after each routine the voting is (theoretically) done after the final routine.

The RUSSIANS made 4 big mistakes....TECHNICAL ERRORS...that SHOWED the WHOLE WORLD they shouldn't be the gold medal winners...and their performance was boring as hell.

That's your opinion. Since they never fell on their butt in normal judging they at most made minor errors. And their routine was much more difficult that the Canadiens. Like I said base + difficulty - errors, if the difficulty bumped them more than the errors sank them there's your higher score.

The Canadians had higher SCORES in BOTH areas, but ONE JUDGE gave them a 2nd place ranking....the FRENCH JUDGE.

No, 5 judges gave them a second place ranking. That's why they lost. We don't know enough about the voting process to know who, if anybody, cast the "tie breaking" vote. Much as I love to blaim the French (it's a hobby of mine) you're a little off base with that one.

If you watched the competition, NBC even panned over to the judges who looked absolutely STUNNED at the outcome themselves..as if they had no IDEA why the Russians won it. That in itself was a HUGE CLUE that the fix was in already.

Or maybe they were stunned at the reaction of the audience. Since presumably 5 of them voted the Russians as #1 I see know reason why they would have been stunned by the outcome.

[steve-b]

The really unbelievable thing is that the French will STILL win -- they don't have a clue NOT to reverse the fix just for good PR!

These guys are so stupid and arrogant that they'd keep the fix in if their predetermined winner fell on his @$$ two seconds into the performance.

[Constantine XIII]

Lol, it'd be a two-fer!

[alisasny]

Head Referee PFENNING, Ronald USA

Assist. Referee LAKERNIK, Alexander RUSSIA

[steve-b]

Eurotrash now complaining of getting booed by the reporters in the room.

Wow! This sounds more entertaining than any of the events!

[connectthedots]

Since it could potentially affect interstate commerce, it just might be.

The Canadian skaters probably have a slam dunk common law fraud case that could be worth millions.

[writmeister]

When they are tied, the tie-break for the ordinal-placing is the artistic score.

[steve-b]

And if the SOB snorts one more time at us, I'm gonna punch him.

How does that guy breathe with his nose stuck up at that angle?

[Petronski]

The RUSSIANS made 4 big mistakes....

Most observers have referred to one big mistake.

OTOH, the Russian program was more difficult, more artistic, and was not retreaded from another competition.

[discostu]

Which has exactly what to do with anything that I said?

[mlo]

This is not a controversy manufactured by the announcers. The people in that arena weren't watching it on NBC. The Canadian's really did a better job. That it is subjective means there will never be 100% of us that agree, but you are in a very small minority. The Canadians won more total points. They should have gotten better marks on presentation. Despite whatever one's personal opinions on their costumes or the the Love Story theme, their performance of it was outstanding. The moment it was over I told my girlfriend that it was the best pairs skating performance I had ever seen. I didn't need the NBC announcers to be shocked at the results.

[KansasGirl]

Thanks everyone for filling me in on that game. I was only 1 yr. old at the time. :-) What an outrage!!

[steve-b]

What what McMillan's party affiliation? Guess.

Uh... Communist?

[Colonel_Flagg]

You have a good memory -- better than mine, to be sure.

I couldn't remember if the Russians got two or three tries but anyway, it was more than they should have gotten. You're right in that the Americans probably should have face-guarded the inbounds pass with their biggest player, but when you wondered how many tries the Russians were going to get in the first place it might have been a moot point.

[mlo]

There was more than one Russian mistake. Their program was certainly NOT more artistic, and the greater difficulty of it is debatable. The Candians did some difficult tricks too.

[Amore]

Obviously all our outrage was manufactured and unjustified. What WERE we thinking?! Guess this is one of those, "Nothing to see here, move along" situations! </ sarcasm>

[alisasny]

The Russian team already does stars on ice type events.

In fact they are already signed to do a tour this summer Champions on Ice.

[Amore]

Oops, in case it wasn't clear, my post was supporting you, and my sarcasm was directed elsewhere.

[discostu]

Thank you. Although given your screen name they're going to say your biased (I'm biased too, I think figure skating is silly). I really think if the sissy-boy doing play-by-play doesn't declare the Canadians' to have executed a "gold medal performance" before they were even finished we get no controversy here. Unfortunately even FReepers have a tendency to want to believe what they hear on TV (plus a strong distrust of authority figures) so the general assumption is that if the talking head and the judges disagree with eachother the talking head must be right.

I even forgot to mention the retread routine. I've known for 20 years that retreaded routines are a strict no-no in hte big competitions, the judges frown on it dramatically and consistently. For something as big as "The Olympics" they want something new and consider dragging out an old stand-by an insult to the event and the sport. The fact that they even medaled with a retread is a high compliment from the judges, usually they keep those out of the medals entirely.