The Op-Ed: Am I sipping on the Euro Haterade?

For my Q&A earlier this week, Susan at Lifeskate asked me a question...'Which skaters do I feel are overrated?'

I thought about this for sometime and my short list included Evgeny Plushenko, Carolina Kostner, and Laura Lepisto.

Enter Sirprongs, who in a comment noticed that I was lavishing praise on North American and Asian skaters while criticizing European Skaters. Interesting...

I decided to continue my list of overrated skaters after reading that comment. I'd put Brian Joubert on that list, Khoklova and Novitski, Domnina and Shabalin (uh oh!)...I'm realizing that these are all European skaters.

So I put myself to task on really thinking about North American and Asian skaters I feel are overrated. Trouble is...I couldn't think of any.

So I found myself in a quandry..."Wow, do I just dislike European skaters? No, no, that can't be right...can it?" So I put myself to task on creating a list of European skaters I like that I feel are NOT overrated. Thankfully, this was not a problem. Stéphane Lambiel, Kerr and Kerr, Tomas Verner, Sergei Voronov, Samuel Contesti, Kavaguti and Smirnov, Kiira Korpi, Delobel and Schoenfelder, Kevin Van Der Perren, Savchenko and Szolkowy, and more.

So, therefore, I believe it to be pure coincidence that the skaters I feel are highly overrated are European. It's not a regional or continental thing, it's a style skating skills thing.

But I still wonder if my style preferences are influenced in some way. I also interested in knowing who others feel are overrated.