Baseball finally goes legit

I've read that Major League Baseball has decided that, due to the New York Yankees having won more world championships than any other team, and due to them being from New York, which everybody hates, and due to a huge payroll, which is unfair, and due to Derek Jeter's smug mug, which is annoying, from now on in title play the rules shall be as follows:

1. When the Yankees are pitching, the strike zone shall be less than half the size of the opposing team's strike zone, with mandatory replay on every pitch.
2. When the Yankees are at bat the foul lines at the stadium shall be squeezed further towards the baselines, and, in the outfield, closer to the outfield, narrowing the field of play.
3. When the opposing team is pitching, the strike zone shall be double the ordinary strike zone.
4. When the opposing team is at bat there are no foul lines.
5. If a Yankee hitter hits a ball "over the fence" it is foul. Only balls inside the stadium may be considered home runs.
6. The Yankees may not attempt to 'steal' any bases.
7. If an at bat on the opposing team makes contact with the ball and the ball touches the ground on the field of play, it is a home run.
8. Disputed strikes and balls will be determined by the noise of the crowd and the opinion of the fans, except in New York.
9. Disputed tags of baserunners will be determined by the noise of the crowd and the opinion of fans, except in New York,

Since Davis White have been cleaning up in pcs, I just want to look at a couple of examples of the best and cleanest, highest quality technique in the world.

Worlds 2013



For instance when the toe of your skate boot slides into the side of the toe of your partner's skate boot and remains there. This is the stuff they show at judging seminars to illustrate top quality spinning.

Charlie's inside edge move there is smooth.
We see all the qualities that established them as
the best spinners in the sport.

Where Alex has gone wrong is keeping a long spine, open shoulders, open hips and straight legs. He and Maia together erred in entering the element with edges, and as you can see, it's impossible to generate rotational speed.

 

When he's in a "sit" position he should be yanking his head to the side, like Charlie does, to force as much rotation as he can, while rounding his shoulders.

 

Also, in the change position, Maia changed her leg position by herself, without Alex hoisting it or getting her started. She's also maintaining that position while spinning without having Alex clutch it or her clutching it herself. This is probably why they're such slow spinners. Also, they skate out of the element, which - lame.

 

BTW  - this was when Alex and Maia were getting points not equal to, but in the ballpark of DW. Subsequently, they've been lucky if they're only 20 points out. I guess the quality of their skating has been reviewed and discovered its not nearly as good as people thought.

 

 

 

I've got a lot to say about this both generally and particularly, but will get to it later. For now,  I think the best figure skating in the world and highest level pcs doesn't look like this.

 

 

This is the curve lift from the US Championships. At least her boot didn't touch the ice when Charlie drops her like a yo yo. Here you can see that she's completely braced by and girdled to Charlie, that he is the one tipping her into her rotation, but most of all, the way he has her arms yanked back going down, and while she's down.

 

I'm going to be doing the mechanics of Virtue Moir and other teams and asking the question- why doesn't everybody else forget about quality and difficulty and just do simplistic, bullshit moves as fast as they can however they can do them? Cheat the fuck out of the requirements. That's what the judges want. Do it, and they'll award you the points of the requirements.

 

Meryl and Charlie are "clean" and "fast" in lifts because the lifts are wrong and primitive and require no control. That's what the ISU wants. They don't want something difficult done with good technique and smooth speed. Do roller Derby, do mud wrestling on skates - just do it fast and fuck the edges. Edges don't matter in ice dance except for the "footwork" part where you have to show a couple of turns for a few seconds in between toe skipping, trotting and leaping.

 

I'm not saying do high level elements roughly. Don't do high level elements at all.

 

I think Virtue Moir, the Shibs, Paul & Islam and Weaver & Poje need to get with the program.

Curve lifts

When I watch this lift, I see that Tessa's foot may have briefly touched the ice immediately before she is put back on her feet.

It's a CoP world now. Details count. Perhaps that's why Davis White's lift got better GOE. We know how GOE is determined. Was something fractionally imperfect in something VM did? Strip points!

Did DW skate without falling on their face? They win.

We can see that DW's curve lift is equal to VM's in difficulty. And GOE is better.

But why not look at a few things. Screen caps, then gifs.

Charlie's arms, his torso vis a vis Meryl's torso. His right arm completely encircles her trunk. But her legs need support. And his left hand is not just between her legs supporting them, but his bicep and shoulder is braced against her leg. Plus his torso. And, you know, his face. And her right arm is around his trunk, just below his shoulders. 

I love the big deal she's making of her free arm. Her trunk, her legs, everything actually engaged in the move is pasted to Charlie. But look ma - left arm is waving.

You know what I notice? How Charlie has her arms yanked back which keeps her chest up. She's not doing it - how they got into the movement is fucked up, so she's in no position - literally - to manage her own body. It's a pure force move - she's got her right arm clinging to him but the rest is fucked up. There's no technique here at all.

I'm curious about that left foot of hers, particularly what the toe pick is doing. I don't know if there's video from behind, so we can see what's happening with her left toe pick.

Both damn arms yanked back by both of Charlie's arms, and, again, seriously with the toe pick.

What does GOE even mean in a lift when the mechanics are this trash heap.

I don't get why this has anything above L1. Her fucking crotch is straddling his fully planted skate boot. There is no skating skill demonstrated here. He's leaning the other way. He's got her left arm fully yanked in as he leans in the opposite direction. She's full on theatre with the right arm and the head, but the arm and the head are showing off what? That she can elevate her limbs around her damn pelvis? Shit, so can I.  He's the one holding her in that position - she's not.

And now for a gif (we've already seen the exit of this thing screen capped).

What do you think? The left foot touches the ice or no?

I am still grounding all of this in the rulebook. "Level of difficulty" is obviously whatever they want it to be, as far as the ISU is concerned. 

The next gif will go back to the DW spin, and I'm curious. If the guy's skate boot butts up against the instep of his partner's skate boot for more than one rotation in a spin, does that matter?

Meryl. and then Tessa.

In a comments back and forth under one of the posts below, a participant told me the 'baby lift' I mentioned was actually the curve lift.

I had forgotten about the curve lift (the one where Meryl's pelvis is riding Charlie's boot - the pelvis being ground zero of your gravitational center, and Meryl's pelvis sits on Charlie's boot in a position any intermediate pilates student can hit, and Charlie's boot is on the ice, and she has her arm stretched back for Charlie to hold, and Charlie is manfully leaning in the opposite direction.).

As it happens, what I'd had in mind as a 'baby gif' was indeed a throwaway lift and not the curve lift, because, as said above, I'd forgotten all about it.

How could I? It was one of the first things I'd gifed due to its super difficult exit and its over all tremendous execution that well deserved getting higher GOE than Virtue and Moir's curve lift at Worlds 2013.

This exit.

Oh, let's have better quality

What's this? Davis White's tribute to Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth?
Please note her leg and knee are clearly on the ice.

L

Level 4 lift and higher GOE than Virtue Moir in today's ice dance, ladies and gentlemen.

This curve lift will be gif-ed in a moment, both Davis White's and VM's from Carmen, but it sent me back to Tessa riding Scott's boots in Pink Floyd.

Of note - Tessa's core is the glue holding this fucker together. It's not everything and the kitchen sink in there to support her core. The control shown by both of them - Scott's blades so that Tessa doesn't slide right off, Tessa's magical core which kicks Charlie White's magical hair's ass since Tessa's core is a real thing.

Look at Scott's position.

Look at Scott's hands and realize again it's her damn core holding this thing together.

Look at the continuity. When Scott lifts her up and rotates her into the set down her hand is on his neck. That same hand remains there (only releases even more, so she is balanced even more independently) during the split glide. Look at the angle of Tessa's torso and head. Look at the angle of Scott's torso. He's inclined towards her - from his hips, not breaking the line of his spine. He's not counterbalancing her angle. He's on the same fucking angle.

I'm sure they really review this shit at ISU Judges School because "difficult" is obviously a concept the ISU takes seriously.

One hand on the side of Scott's neck. Why isn't it a full arm, and wrapped around Scott's leg in a vise grip? Do we doubt the choice of neck is choreographic, and that she couldn't as well have done this as easily with her hand on his chest, hip, leg?

To finish it off, why didn't she just slide off Scott's boot with her ass on the ice, kneel, and have him haul her up to her feet with both of his hands? Why be fancy?

I'm continuing this is the next post but wanted to throw this in from Pink Floyd as well.

I had remembered this as Tessa stepping down assisted by holding Scott's hand, but no, she steps down by herself and then takes Scott's hand.

P.S. -  Brilliant as Tessa is here, not possible without dead steady, secure edges and stability from Scott. Look at him. What she's doing actually shows off what he's doing. This team.

Carlos Kleiber is one of my favorite conductors - well he's the only conductor whose stuff I'll seek out just because he conducted it. He was a genius - for some people he ruins every other version of the compositions he conducted.

He always felt inadequate to the music. The angst! But when you listen to anything he's conducted, it kills. His friends (who talk in a filmed profile called I am Lost to the World) all threw up their hands - how could he have felt inadequate! He was the best!

Other conductors said this. Other conductors were all - why is this dude beating himself up? He's better than us all!

I thought about Kleiber while watching Tessa warm up for Carmen at worlds.  Posture looking a little low-spirited.

The girl is a genius. That's how geniuses are. What they're aiming for is usually unobtainable. They're not "shoot for the moon, even if we fall we'll land among the stars" types. They want the fucking moon. It's in them, they can't help it.

Every time I go back and look at something she's done on the ice, I see something new that makes it more sensational than I realized when I first saw it, and it was pretty damn impressive the first time.

Well, this is lovely.

Seriously lay it out already.  You'd have to be super, super bad for anything to come unglued from your waist down as it's set up now.

Oh. That's right.

There ya go. Love how Charlie's left arm is all "yeah!" and his right is all "just in case the part where she's laid out across my shoulders doesn't do it, and just in case the part where she's got her ankles crossed so as to lock in her leg line doesn't do it, can it hurt to thrust my forearm across her outside leg just in case of emergencies and it springs out of line and bashes me in the nose? We could lose GOE!"

Ha ha. J/k.

Ta da! The way her chest, arms, and head are hanging, and the way her torso and hips are braced, I'm not sure why she needs the ankle cross and Charlie's am bisecting her legs. But everybody's different.

Come on Meryl. With all the bolstering you've got there, surely the plane described by your extremeties can accomplish something as basic as extending parallel to the ice, versus drooping like wisteria.

Enough of that hands free shit. I did it. Give me the GOE!

Oh I get it. Even though your entire core/gravitational center is straight across Charlie's shoulders, when that hand of his isn't stuck between your legs and you uncross your ankles, it just all collapses.

Well why should this matter. She's "showing" a free hand, isn't she. What more difficulty do you want? She can't play quidditch out there.

No comment.

 Her foot. Her arm.

Even though he's set her down her alignment is so off center she has to keep his neck headlocked. Appreciate the "showing" of the right inside edge though. She can't balance on it, but damn it, her foot is tilted. Give her some pcs!

Oh for God's sake Meryl - lift your core! I know you have the abs. This is just lazy.

 Okay done with that. Time for some cool ice dancing!

 Oh, right.

I love this so much.

I think VM only outscored DW on one lift. Is it any wonder.

Esmerelda est encore mort

I see Charlie's arm has crept up even further.

Funny, when Virtue Moir do lifts they try to let go of supplementary supports as soon as they can. They don't increase them.

She's about to change position without compromising the extension of her free leg - look how open and extended the hip, how it carries through the thigh and knee, down through the turn out of the free foot.

I  bet judges-in-training are shown slides.

Come to think of it - VM were used in instructional videos when they were juniors. The Shibs have been used in instructional videos.

Where have Davis White been used in instructional videos outside Scarborough?

Look how easy, say Meryl's arms! My partner's head is up my skirt and both his arms are hanging onto my leg like it's a fireman's pole, but what a gorgeous example of balancing myself in space at a remove from my partner's gravitational center. Except I'm not doing that!

OUCH.

Oh wait. She's not a dude.

Lock around that leg Charlie. You don't want her to manage her own legs, do you? That would not be good. We'll see why later.

She's about to drape herself across Charlie's shoulders, which means her whole torso/core will be carried/supported by his shoulders, she'll be square across his shoulders, like a posture bar or shoulder pads.

Charlie is, of course, doing this with great ease.

Wow. That is AESTHETIC.
Meryl's arms are flailing free, so, you know - +3 GOE.

She's got Charlie's arm hooked through her legs, her legs are dangling fuck all, Charlie's head is trying to listen to what his shoulder wants to say, and Meryl is actually using the side of his head like the "seats back" position on an airplane.

Continued on next post.

Esmerelda est mort

I think my favorite part of this sequence is how the faces angst it up while the bodies are grabbing on, and how MUCH grabbing is required before they even get into the lift. It's not a hand on a shoulder for ballast or Charlie really getting his knees into it to drive her up (which is something Maria Mountain has said is not optimal. She thinks lifts should look easy and light. Why is she conditioning figure skaters?)

Here is the third lift (there was a baby lift as well) and despite the hair and the flail, the arms and the beseeching gestures to the crowd, when you get down to it they have to drop that shit, drop the "style of the dance" and Meryl has to hook her entire arm, up to the armpit, around Charlie's neck, and Charlie has to use BOTH arms to get that heifer, Meryl, in a vise grip, and then they have to paste themselves together before Meryl even puts her foot up. Her free hand is waving around though, like, look how athletic!

 

This is just fucked up. Why don't they just take rock climbing equipment out onto the ice?

There's the arm.

The reason Charlie has to break at the waist and bend in like that is - he's not assisting Meryl, he's fucking hauling Meryl. And obviously, it's not because the girl ate a sandwich over the weekend and morphed back into a three dimensional being. It's lack of control when done "quickly" and it's crap technique. The only way to get it done is to bend down, grab and haul.

And btw, this is not necessarily all on Meryl. We have no idea how "stable" the platform is that Charlie is providing. When I watch him skate I think I'd probably request my coach come out with a harness before I'd crawl up on his thigh.

She's stepping up and needs not only the assist of Charlie's arms, and not just her hand on Charlie, but she has to go around his neck. WTF? A balance point is a balance pint. Just put your hand on his upper arm, Meryl.  Unless the arm around the neck is because their torsos/trunks need to be glued while she gets up, which is hard to believe, considering their mutually exquisite core control and mastery of dissociative movement.

Here we see poor core control/stability, or all of Meryl's weight wouldn't still be in her hind end, as it were. She'd be carrying herself, her energy UP and moving forward. She sure can go "up" on the ice when the alternative is channeling momentum into an edge. Why is she keeping her weight on her back end here and using her arm to pull herself into position instead of using her core and why is she bent forward at the waist instead of opening up her chest and shoulders? The latter isn't "style" - it helps the lift.

Meryl for Christ's sake, tuck your butt under yourself. If you had alignment, you'd be in a stable position by now.

Yeah!

Continued next post.