Gabby Douglas Comeback Thread (New goal: LA 2028)

[GymBeauty]

Let’s look at the facts, which you Trump-ishly continue to ignore and gaslight about:

1. Skinner was the part of the higher scoring team over McCallum
2. Skinner had more individual medal chance than McCallum
3. Skinner had the higher top AA score at trials
4. Skinner beat McCallum in the AA at Olympics
5. Skinner had a far longer career than McCallum, aka more experience, including Olympic experience and doing extremely well in NCAA while maintaining a higher degree of difficulty than anyone else there (near elite level difficulty)

Skinner got lucky that McCallum missed her leap requirement on beam and incurred .5 off her D score for missing CR.

That isn’t luck. It’s McCallum being inconsistent, which was not unusual for her, despite the attempts of some people to make it seem like she was some kind of rock. Skinner could have scored higher herself with idealized level of performance, if you want to go down that route.

Skinner beat McCallum in the AA at 2019 trials after just coming back from NCAA. This wasn’t new.

This is revisionist history. No one was planning on having Chiles do BB in TF. It was always going to be McCallum.

The revisionist history is from you. Chiles outscored McCallum on Beam at Trials and had the higher peak Beam score for the year. The highest scoring team for the Olympics, going by performances up to that point, was Biles and Chiles for the AA, Suni for Bars + Beam, and Skinner for Vault + Floor.

 

[irichluck21]

• Skinner was the part of the higher scoring team over McCallum
• Skinner had more individual medal chance than McCallum
• Skinner had the higher top AA score at trials
• Skinner beat McCallum in the AA at Olympics
• Skinner had a far longer career than McCallum, aka more experience, including Olympic experience and doing extremely well in NCAA while maintaining a higher degree of difficulty than anyone else there (near elite level difficulty)

1. Barely and by less than .3, and that was only due to Skinner’s Cheng vault difficulty compared to McCallum’s DTY. When it came down to it Skinner was only usable on one event in team finals which was vault. McCallum was capable for team finals on several events (which she demonstrated in team finals at Tokyo, but also at two different World team finals). The selection report clearly stated this as well.
2. That’s incorrect. McCallum had shown that she was capable of making event finals previously being 2 per’d out of event finals as well as 2 per’d out of being a reserve. She was capable of making beam finals and medal with a hit routine. Skinner had just as much individual chance as McCallum as Skinner was always going to be 2 per’d out of vault finals unless for a fluke (which happened) and medal (which happened again).
3. If you take top AA score from one day into consideration, now do averages, which McCallum comes out on top.
4. This has already been addressed, Skinner got lucky with a fluke, with a McCallum hit Skinner is behind McCallum.
5. Longer career amount to age eligibility and nothing more. Skinner had Olympic experience? When did she compete in Rio? Either way, this “point” is silly because you can’t compare experience by age. To counter, McCallum had more team finals and 3 up 3 count experience than Skinner. 4 routines for McCallum vs 2 routines for Skinner. Additionally, McCallum had more experience on apparatus in team finals than Skinner had with Skinner only doing vault and floor in 2014 and McCallum having done bars and floor as well as vault in 2018 and 2019.

 

[JaJa]

Nope.

Natalie was heavily involved in 2016, and was a major reason for the coaching change.

Natalie was still running the Gabby show up to and past the Olympics.

absolutely she was. And I think Natalie was a very big part of the larger problem with Gabby

 

[JaJa]

Gabby’s religious beliefs and her expression of those beliefs are a major, major barrier for just about everyone.

I do not think that is true at all

 

[irichluck21]

And I think Natalie was a very big part of the larger problem with Gabby

100%.

Kittia knew that Gabby’s placement on the team was never a guarantee, especially with some comments from Marta. (Marta really wanted Gabby with an Amanar).
Natalie seemed to think that Gabby was a lock for the team regardless. (And maybe she was given Steve Penny’s sliminess).

Kittia wanted Gabby to train more and up difficulty. Natalie wanted Gabby available for more endorsements leading up to Rio, which of course limited her training time.

Also, Natalie being part of the major issue(s) with Chow during the initial comeback and the major reason why Gabby and Chow partnership ended up dissolving.

 

[blake]

Rehashing Skinner vs McCallum when we could’ve had Wong or a healthy Hurd/McCusker instead is depressing af.

 

[YurchenkoLoop]

2021 Floor Scores
Competition - McCallum - Skinner
US Classic - 13.550 vs. 12.900
Nats Day 1 - 12.450 vs. 13.000
Nats Day 2 - 13.400 vs. 13.750
Trials Day 1 - 14.166 vs. 13.866
Trials Day 2 - 13.500 vs. 13.500
Averages - 13.413 vs. 13.403

Tell me again how Skinner was more of a FX EF threat

 

[tempest]

including the games
McCallum’s average is a 13.433 and Skinner’s is 13.430

I would have trusted Grace over Skinner any day though(and I am not a fan of Grace… she was so uninteresting)

 

[irichluck21]

When choosing the team, you can’t use Olympic Games scores…as those were not used to determine the team make up.

The numbers don’t lie. Fact is McCallum was the better gymnast for the team make up of 4-4-3/4-3-3.

Statically, McCallum was the better all arounder on two nights of competition, by average, and by total scores accumulated over 4 nights of competition.

Statistically, McCallum was the better gymnast of the two for team finals scenario as well, with three events better than Skinner, who was only better on vault.
Vault being due based on start value only, a .6 difference. Which turned out only to be a .4 difference in Olympic team qualifications due to McCallum’s better execution. (Skinner 8.933/ McCallum 9.133)

 

[CameliasFingerpaint]

It’s so much more this to me. McCallum was wildly overpraised by the gymternet the entire quad, especially with people drooling over upgrades that never materialized. She undoubtedly was the right pick over Skinner, but let’s not pretend that she had individual medal chances or even was EF material. She was the weakest gymnast put on any US Olympic team post Sydney.

If Wong had been more consistent and Al Fong wasn’t up to his usual bullshit (lulz), then Wong would have been a much better choice. Doesn’t she get placed on the team if we go by Day 2 Trials scores alone?

 

[YurchenkoLoop]

McCallum injured her hand in January of 2021 and needed a plate and seven screws. Prior to this, she was training a monster UB routine



Weiler 1/2 + Komova II + Tkachev DED .3
Ricna + Pak + Chow 1/2 EDE .4 (also had a Downie + Pak)
Toe 1/1 D
Fabrichnova F
FEEEDDDD 3.7 + 2.2 + .7 = 6.6

So yeah, the upgrades didn’t materialize but let’s not pretend like she was at peak form in 2021. It’s not as if Peszek, Sloan, and Kocian were leagues above her

 

[irichluck21]

but let’s not pretend that she had individual medal chances or even was EF material.

I would disagree with this, McCallum was a victim of being on the US team with Biles and then Carey and Lee. So making any sort of event final over them was impossible for anyone, Chiles and Skinner also included.
McCallum had made event finals at Worlds before but was 2 per’d out of finals, had she been from another country, she would have been in.

Also, individual medal chances on beam were possible, I think, before Tokyo shenanigans.

 

[Hatsumomo]

Grace was the Kyla Ross of 2020/1; a solid-scoring gymnast who could be put up on any event as needed. Not a stand-out, but definitely a needed part of a team, especially a four-person one that doesn’t leave room for specialists. Especially especially when the star of the team has to pull out of team finals.

Let’s keep in mind that Skinner’s Tokyo qualifications was the best competition of her life and yet she was 2-per’d out, didn’t make first reserve on FX so wasn’t called in when Simone pulled out, it took a balk from Carey and a fall from Yeo for Skinner to get on the vault podium, and her best beam routine of her elite career got a 7.133. And the only Worlds she competed at was 2014, IIRC; she was alternate in 2015 in lieu of a gymnast we thought would’ve ended up in the alternate position if on the team at all. She was always going to be alternate at best for 2016 after Raisman’s comeback; the last spot was between Douglas and Locklear as per Marta’s own words (so not even Maggie Nichols factored in). And back then Skinner’s camp’s strategy was to pack on the difficulty, execution be damned, and Skinner didn’t have the endurance to get through her full difficulty in competition, hence the beam splatfest Irichluck posted above.

 

[YurchenkoLoop]

it took a balk from Carey and a fall from Yeo for Skinner to get on the vault podium,

A fall from who?
https://64.media.tumblr.com/d87e2b5840acaee0e61e7fb816199092/b1b7fec6dbdf917d-3c/s540x810/b94202c5245bc2ad29fefb66138c3ca63ecab8e0.gif(image larger than 4 MB)

Moreno was robbed of a medal and not Yeo’s

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

Let’s all take a moment in this busy thread to think about how much we fucking despise Al Fong.

 

[tempest]

Well Yeo almost fell on her DTY and still managed the bronze… I would have loved her to get silver and Moreno got bronze

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

I enjoy a lengthy pissing match as much as anyone, but the ultimate answer to Skinner v McCallum is that they might as well have tossed a coin. Although if anything that makes the discussion more fun.

 

[MaryClare]

The problem, the only problem, was Tom

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

He truly made an art form out of providing terrible explanations for legitimate decisions, didn’t he? Morgan’s petition is my favourite.

 

[Hatsumomo]

I thought Yeo fell on her eponymous vault, but my memory of Tokyo is a little fuzzy, so I’ll gladly be corrected.