LOS ANGELES — This week’s episode of what is already one of the most clever shows in television history, “30 Rock,” underscored, in its own unique way, just what’s wrong with figure skating, and the 2009 world figure skating championship competition that wrapped up Saturday night at Staples Center.

Here was Jack Donaghy, the Alec Baldwin character, reciting a childhood list he had made of things he wanted to do before he turned 50: “Go to Disneyland. Ride in an airplane. Kiss Peggy Fleming …”

A few moments later, he came back with: “Done, done and, oh, boy — done.”

Is there anyone, among today’s world-class skaters, likely to produce, especially so many years later, that same evocative response — the “oh, boy” glee sparked by Fleming, the 1968 Olympic gold-medalist?

There’s Michelle Kwan.

She didn’t skate here.

There’s Sasha Cohen.

She didn’t skate here.

In this country, this is perhaps the primary challenge confronting figure skating.

It’s not that U.S. success in other skating disciplines should be discounted. It’s noteworthy indeed that Evan Lysacek won the men’s title here and that Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto, the 2006 Olympic silver medalists, took second here in ice dance.

But what matters most of all in figure skating are the ladies.

One of the enduring truths about the Olympics is it gets women to watch sports on television, to care about certain sports in the manner the male audience cares about, for instance, the NFL. At the Summer Games, that interest is often in gymnastics; in the Winter Olympics, it’s figure skating.

Until now, figure skating has produced transcendent figures, female skaters with whom the women watching back home can identify and the men can take an interest — more ardent — as well.

As one example: Dorothy Hamill.

Another: Kristi Yamaguchi (which is why she got onto “Dancing With the Stars” in the first place).

Or Katarina Witt, who proved unequivocally that you don’t have to be American to get Americans to know all about you — to pose, for instance, for “Playboy.” 

Guess who occupied considerable attention at the 2006 Torino Winter Games, in her seat in press row? That would be Witt, and I know because she and I sat next to each other, and it was all I could do to see the ice through the crowd of men who wanted to come by and, you know, just say hi to Katarina.

Presumably, those in attendance at Staples on Saturday have at least a passing interest in figure skating. How many could, without prompting from the public-address system, name the 2009 U.S. champion?

Alissa Czisny, the American champion, finished 11th. The other American skater, Rachael Flatt, finished fifth.

Together, their finishes had to add up to 13 or fewer to earn the U.S. three places at the 2010 Vancouver Games.

Vancouver will thus be the first Games since Lillehammer in 1994 with but two female American skaters — who at those Games happened to be Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan.

With both Czisny and Flatt finishing Saturday well out of the medals, the standings also marked the first time the U.S. has gone three straight years without a top-three female finisher since 1964 — in the aftermath of the 1961 plane crash in Belgium that killed the entire team.

This is not to take anything away from Kim Yu-Na, the 2009 world champion from South Korea, who is ethereal and graceful and on Saturday affirmed her emergence as the world best skater. Kim, who on Friday scored a record 76.12 points in the short program, followed up Saturday with a dazzling 131.59, for a total of 207.71, cheered on with fervor by, among others, Los Angeles’ Korean-American community.

That score made Kim the first woman to top 200 since the new scoring system was instituted at the 2005 world championships. Kim, who is still finding her way in English, told the crowd, “I just wanted to focus on my long program and I did very good.”

Canada’s Joannie Rochette finished a far-behind second, Miki Ando of Japan third. Last year’s world champion, Mao Asada of Japan, endured a tumble and finished fourth.

You can be sure that the emergence at the past two editions of the worlds of Korean and Japanese skaters, and the rivalry and history between the two nations, will be featured next year in Vancouver. Don’t take that from me; I’m not making those decisions, just reporting on them, and that’s what the chairman of NBC Universal Sports and Olympics, Dick Ebersol, said earlier this week, speaking to a crowd gathered at the SportAccord conference of Olympic and international sports figures in Denver.

Ebersol also mentioned that speedskaters Shani Davis (long-track) and Apolo Anton Ohno (short-track) will likely bear special attention.

And snowboarder Shaun White.

And, most of all, skier Lindsey Vonn — who, like Michael Phelps, carries the advantage of appearing in multiple events over multiple days. The Phelps phenomenon at the 2008 Beijing Games was what it was in part because his appearances took on what Ebersol in Denver described as a “mini-series element.”

Vonn, who races in all five alpine disciplines, is perhaps poised for some of that next February.

Two American figure skaters would bear special attention in Vancouver as well.

Maybe Sasha is coming back, the word due out this summer. “That would be exciting,” Czisny said when asked just moments after leaving the ice Saturday about Cohen.

Maybe Kwan will come back, too. Czisny was asked about Michelle as well. “That would be really an exciting nationals,” Czisny said.

Yes, it would be.

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 28th, 2009 at 7:55 pm and is filed under alanabrahamson. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.