Kelly Slater Weighs in on WSL Judging at Trestles, Calls Controversy “Silly”

WSL / Kirstin Scholtz

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Kelly Slater’s social media feeds, just like yours and mine, have filled up with plenty of gripes about the judging at the Hurley Pro at Trestles over the weekend.  Between Jeremy Flores, Tom Carroll, Gabriel Medina, Matt Wilkinson, and Matt Meola, there was a good chunk of recognizable voices chiming in with their discontent or just confusion, with it all reaching a fever pitch when Tanner Gudauskas edged out Gabriel Medina in a Round 3 heat.

The main difference, of course, between Average Joe’s Instagram feed through all of this and Slater’s is that Average Joe doesn’t have a thousand people tagging him in every post, pleading for him to weigh in on the whole ordeal. Let’s not forget, this is the same guy who pulled off the most ridiculous recovery you’ve ever seen in competition and was handed a 4.17 for his efforts in the exact same event a year ago. Not one to be dismissive, Kelly handed us a thorough account of his observations.

Here’s what I think about the heat between @gabrielmedina and @tannergud… Tanner’s first wave (8.5) was the best surfed wave of the heat with the most variety and commitment in maneuvers. Gabriel got the better score in the first exchange (8.83) which I thought was incorrect both live and watching replays later. That set a strange tone for the heat. The wave Gab got an 8.3 on should have been easily enough to put him in the lead AT THAT TIME. Tanner had an 8.67 in the middle of the heat that I think was very over scored by more than a point. So when Tanner rode his final wave he should have been in second place needing a mid 8 point ride. And he surfed that wave very well. I feel the judging got lost from the first exchange. By the time Gabby got his good wave (8.3) and didn’t receive the score, everyone was confused, myself included. No matter what you think it was a close heat that could have gone either way. I also think most people take easy opportunities to make big deals about things that aren’t super important in the scope of their lives. The extent to which people have taken this heat is seriously silly. It was a close heat that could have gone either way. Actually, three of us who go to every event scored it later at home and had Tanner with a slight lead, all things considered. My solution? The judges shouldn’t be able to hear the current situation and score accordingly but even with that they are trying to decide who surfed the better heat. We’ve all had close ones go our way or against us. So there you go. Let the controversy (and blocking) continue! 👊🏽😀

A photo posted by Kelly Slater (@kellyslater) on Sep 12, 2016 at 8:15am PDT

Maybe the best part of it all:

“I also think most people take easy opportunities to make big deals about things that aren’t super important in the scope of their lives. The extent to which people have taken this heat is seriously silly. It was a close heat that could have gone either way.”

Jeremy Flores used his platform to remind us all that this is his livelihood and in the grand scope of his life it is a big deal. But for the rest of the masses thumbing out F-bombs and thinking their “W$L” tags are oh so clever, is this really worth the grief on the 15 year anniversary of 9/11?