Dancing With The Stars 12 – Mark Ballas Can’t Remember When He Was This Excited
And his foot has never been this cold! 
Mark has a new blog up at USA Today. He gives us a hint of what’s to come of the team dance and he and Chelsea’s new dance coming up where they get to choose the music (uh oh, watch out!). More below. Be sure to read the link too if interested for he details what happened with his injury this past week as well. He’s been icing his foot and will continue to do so. Picture above from his twitter.
….I was thrilled with our scores this week. I feel like Team Kanenball is really hitting a groove. In fact, we’ve been scored first twice in the last three weeks, and came in second by only one point. We’ve been at the top of the leader board, and we have no plans to leave. Hopefully the judges and the fans feel the same way.
I’m looking forward to this week because we have two dances, one being a group dance. That’s means there will be additional stress on Chelsea to learn more choreography but we also have to work as a team and be at the mercy of our teammates. I can’t remember the last time I was this excited to dance to our song for the week. I can’t tell you what it is, but just know that I’m really pumped about it. As pro dancers and choreographers, we get to suggest music that we want to dance to and when our wish gets granted, it’s both exciting and inspiring. I can’t wait!
As you saw this week, I’m a very competitive person. Being able to pull out the competitive side in Chelsea has been a challenge, but she definitely stepped it up this week and showed that she wants to win. Tonight’s our first group rehearsal and in order to make it through all the grueling rehearsals this week on a lame ankle, I need to keep up with my icing schedule.
Can’t remember when he was this excited? Do I really need to refresh his memory with video of his Lindy Hop with Shawn Johnson?
OMG!!! Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
WANKY!!
It’s pretty telling how he dismisses the team dance. Just a little trivia, from what I recall Mark has been in two team dances, once with Shawn and once with Bristol, and both times the team lost.
Mark’s team will lose next week, too. He knows that all ready. Ralph is the only celeb that hasn’t done a cha cha cha he will be learning that as well as the Quickstep from scratch. The producers will be able to keep Hines and Kirstie ahead of Romeo and Chelsea in this senario. IMO
@Wendy – I can’t guarantee that will happen, but I am starting to get a bit worried that 1) Kendra will end up lasting yet ANOTHER week, and 2) Romeo will end up getting sent home this week, just because of the way things are set up. I think after the very skewed team cha-cha last season (Team Apolo was noticably more skilled going into the team dance than Team Kristi), they were trying to make things looks more “even” this time – so they took the 2 weakest links in this case (Ralph, since he hasn’t done cha-cha, and Kendra, because she just sucks) and gave one to each team. As for the other 2 members of each team – I honestly would have probably put Hines, Ralph, & Chelsea on a team together and Kirstie, Kendra, & Romeo on a team together, just to distribute the age a bit more. But alas, we got the 2 youngin’s on one team and the two more mature fan favorites on another. Team Hines/Kirstie/Kendra seems to have the upper hand in terms of experience & choreography – and if they win, a high team score could shield Kendra from elimination yet again. Romeo is stuck with the samba (which I’m worried about), and if his team loses – it could be him going home instead. Hell, Chelsea could even be in danger – I don’t know how well she’s gonna do in the paso, and a low team score likely won’t help if she doesn’t do so hot. Really, unless there’s some huge snafu made by the “big 3″ fan favorites in the next few weeks (Ralph, Kirstie, Hines), I think the next 3 to go will be Kendra, Romeo, & Chelsea, in no particular order. I guess we can only hope that Kendra really, really bombs the tango and a good team score just won’t be enough to save her.
Kendra has the tango, too? That might actually hurt her a bit (I hope, I hope) – with Hines (CAI’s best technical dancer) doing the tango as well, the judges have an apples-to-apples comparison they can make. That, plus the tango isn’t a dance where just “shaking what your momma & your plastic surgeon gave you” is appropriate.
Maybe I’m completely wrong here, but it makes me hopeful that after next week, we’ll be Kendra-less.
Marks team will lose. Chelsea is probably the strongest link, and Romeo lost some precious practice time, I believe he left Tuesday evening without Chelsie and returned Thursday. That upon all the other things mentioned already may be his downfall. Sadly. I dont think Ralph will do well in the cha-cha he doesnt seem to have moves as crisp and clean as Hines and Kristie have shown us. Kendras footwork wasnt too bad either.
I think we may have to endure another week of Kendra…..Hopefully Mark will be leave the dance floor next week and take the following year off. Fingerscrossed.
@Sally – Oh I’m right there with you – I wanted that twit gone 2 weeks ago. I’m just worried that even if she bombs the tango, she could potentially still be shielded from elimination by a good team cha-cha score. I think it will help having another, BETTER dancer doing the tango the same week – will probably deter any blantant overscoring – but again, the team dance score can often skew the results in an odd direction.
How do we know the team selection wasn’t random? Last year, the captains picked the teams, so there was no ‘producer’ set up.
I’m always interested in the conspiracy theories around when producers have people dance, what dances they get, etc. Don’t the stars get paid at this point more if they last longer? If the producers are ‘rigging’ things so favorites can stay longer, wouldn’t some celebrity that got voted off after things started being ‘rigged by producers’ have said something at some point in the past?
@SueB – We don’t know for sure if it was random or not. And yes, last year the captains picked the teams – although we can’t really say that for sure either, because they may have been puppets themselves and been told who to pick. We may never know who is really doing the picking – we’re just guessing. Although, if they’re selecting the teams at random, then they could potentially end up with teams that are all male celebs or female celebs, or they might end up with all the weakest celebs on one team and all the strongest celebs on one team – which likely wouldn’t be too exciting to watch. And if the show is “rigged”, I sincerely doubt they tell the contestants that…so any celeb voted off before what was perceived as being “their time” likely wouldn’t be going around spouting conspiracy theories about how the show is rigged, lest they look like a sore loser or a lunatic.
I think it’s important to keep in mind that the bottom line in this whole competition is ratings – whatever is going to draw in viewers is what the TPTB want. So if someone like Kendra is getting attention for the show, then it doesn’t seem like an impossibility (at least for me) that they might “tweak” certain aspects of the competition to help keep her around longer – maybe putting her on the stronger cha-cha team, giving her a better running order position, or giving her an easier dance a certain week. I don’t think they’d go so far as falsifying vote totals, but there are minor things they do have control over that they could potentially manipulate in an attempt to alter the course of things.
Yeah, Ralph worries me with the cha cha as well. JMO, but Ralph and Chelsea both don’t seem to have good hip action side-to-side. You know, where you throw the hip out, and bend ever-so-slightly at the waist to accentuate it? So I’m thinking that a team cha cha with both Ralph and Chelsea is something of a “no hip action here” setup..
It will be really interesting, also, to see team dances with no Derek to bolster the choreography. Say what you want, but that boy knows how to choreograph a Team to please a crowd – he’s been in all team dances and never lost. Of the remaining pros, I have to give the edge to Maks for not only being on a winning team recently but also having experience choreographing a larger group of dancers.
It’s just a guest, but it might have went something like this… Hines and Chelsea as the top overall scorers were the team captains, so Hines probably let Chelsea chose first and she chose Ralph,(not sure of the strategy except that I’m sure there was an effort not to have Maks and Karina on the same team, and the Ballas’ would be sympathetic to one of their “own” in Karina. Hines went with Kirstie, Chelsea picked Romeo and Kendra was the final pick. Overall as was mentioned I think the Hines, Kirstie, Kendra team will have strong choreography. I often wonder about the choices too, but I think Last season Kristie just wasn’t as clued into the process because she was going to go with her loyalty to Mark and Bristol no matter what. The season previous to that Evan and Nicole were the captains, and Nicole picked Ocho first (mostly I think because Cheryl works well with Derek and I got a vibe that Erin just wasn’t into being on Nicole’s team), Evan went with Erin, and Pam and Niecy were final picks.
I know Derek never lost a Team Dance challenge, but my favorites were the earlier team dances, like the first Team Paso with those gorgeous navy blue dresses that Kym Cheryl and Brooke wore… I also thought Warren Sapp did a lot to keep the “team”spirit with his classic “We’re going to Paso over your Doble” line. And I loved the first Team Tango with Lil Kim Gilles and Ty murray. That was classic fun. The Team Cha Cha’s for me haven’t been quite as good choreography wise. I actually thought the choreography on the losing team last season was better, but the dancing lost it for them.
One of my favorite team dances in the last few seasons was Team Tango, with Derek, Kym, and Louis dancing to Bon Jovi. They were fabulous. So adding Maks to that team instead of Derek, sounds like a winner to me.
Kym actually has the best record going into the team dance – she’s won it twice. Maks and Louis have both won 1 and lost 1. I daresay Maks will probably be the MVP of this one – I think he’s the best at choreographing groups of people. I just hope Louis doesn’t try to hijack this team – because some of his group choreography just makes me wanna take a nap.
The other team is not so fortunate in the experience department – Chelsie has won once; Karina has lost once; and Mark has lost twice. I kinda worry that Mark is gonna take the lead on this one, and we’re gonna end up with a cha-cha that looks pretty similar to Team Kristi’s last season – so kinda wacky. Then again, Lacey was on that team too, so maybe she was partly to blame for some of the nonsense…
I don’t think the pros “track record” really matter in the team dances because there are so many factors involved–song choice, combined effect of the couples involved, dance order–that you can’t attribute success/loss to one particular pro.
Oh, and I actually preferred Team Kristi’s cha cha last season in terms of choreography, construction, and overall fun factor.
LOL@ Courtney, I’m happy someone appreciated that.
I thought Apolo’s team blew the others outta the water, although I appreciated what Kristi’s was trying to accomplish because they knew they didn’t have the talent that Apolo’s did, but they tried to be a bit fun.
I really hope Kendra bombs this week.
I think the track record DOES matter – and not just because Derek has never lost one.
But that little fact is hard to just ignore and say that you liked the other one better. If the pros don’t work together well, you get a less cohesive dance. Kinda like that nightmare of the boys in tights up on the judges table. :::shudder:::
I think the track record absolutely matters in the group dance – it allows the pros to draw from previous experience in order to determine what and what not to do this time around. For example – men in leotards? Clearly a DON’T
Lots of interesting formation changes? That’s a do. And those who have won a few times have clearly “cracked the code” and are probably going to be able to crank out a more judge-pleasing routine than those who are still trying to figure out the formula.
And Heidi’s right about the pros working well together – too many type A personalities and we’ll probably end up with bickering and a routine that feels disjointed, since none of them are likely to compromise on what they want; too many type B’s, and nothing really interesting happens because everyone’s too afraid step on anyone else’s toes. Each winning team has been a good balance of personalities – and the losing ones have often been kinda mismatched.
This season, I think it’s good that Mark & Maks are on different teams – both seem more like leader-types and would probably butt heads quite a bit on choreo. Kym, Chelsie, Louis, & Karina seem more content to follow and add their input as needed.
@Courtney, you reminded me of a Results show package once, in a previous season. I don’t remember which one. But, they talked about the pro dances and choreography, and how they determined who was going to choreograph the dance. One thing that I remember, is someone said that the more people in the group, the more egos there are to work with, the more input each person feels they have to have, and the longer it takes to choreograph the piece.
As for the team cha cha challenge, I do think the choreograph advantage goes to the team of Maks, Kym, and Louis. All are great choreographers, and each has their strengths. I do think that this season, each has been good to give choreography that emphasises their partners strengths, mostly… (Louis does have a disadvantage with Kendra, but he does seem to be able to choreograph to cover her weaknesses). For the other team, I think that both Mark and Karina are hit and miss… Chelsea seems to be a wild card to me….
Lori, it was Louis talking about egos when he was talking about the other team having more people. He was on a team with Derek and…Kym?
Heidi, I do remember that, but I also remember a results show package where they were talking about how the pros go about choreographing the pro dances on results show nights, and SOMEONE… (I want to say Derek, but I could definitely be wrong) mentioned that the more pros there are, the more people want input… And it showed a clip of lots of “creative differences” they were having.
I had forgotten that clip of Louis, until you mentioned it. This was something different….
Could it maybe have been something to do with the team paso doble from season 9? I remember there was some head-butting between some of the pros in that dance – more specifically Lacey and…Dmitry, maybe? Something to do with choreo, & I remember Michael Irvin kinda breaking up the fray by giving them all a peptalk about teamwork. And Lacey ended up not even doing that dance because she got sick – Anna had to fill in for her. Which brings me to another observation: no team that has ever had to use a “fill-in” for the team dance has ever won. It’s happened 3 times – season 7 (Edyta filled in for Julianne after her surgery), season 8 (Lacey filled in for Melissa after her back injury), & season 9 (Anna filled in for Lacey while she was sick). Those 3 teams all seemed to do exceptionally bad – the losing teams the past few seasons have been much better. Or at least closer to the winner teams, points-wise.
Warren Sapp said in season 7 that they just had fun sitting back and watching the pros work. He said how as soon as they got started, Cheryl, Kym and Derek were just having fun and worked so well choreographing the routine. Pros that work well together makes a difference. Hines was smart because even though I feel like the other team will win because I think the show wants them to win (judges scoring has been off this season), Hines is working with Louis and Maks who I think can help him a lot.
It is interesting because the judges have said how Romeo and Chelsea are both good and I think most see Chelsea as the best dancer. She is young and the best performer. When Carrie Ann said she has good facial expressions, it is true. Even if her feet are not right, she looks the part. But the judges said Kirstie and Hines have the best technique and I agree. I think this is Kendra’s week to go. Maybe she will be like Pam Anderson who won on Team Gaga but was eliminated that week.
Lori, I think that was referring to Lacey’s team because they showed a lot of conflict between Lacey and…I want to say Anna, but it could have been Karina. They then showed Derek’s team getting along sweet as pie.
Courtney, the teams the last two seasons have also had better dancers on BOTH teams – I think that likely plays a large part in the scores being closer together. Season 9, for example, had Aaron, Mark, Michael and Mya on the losing team – 4 couples with one great, on good-ish and 2 questionable dancers, going against Derek and Joann, Kelly, and Donny Osmond – also known as the entertaining group.
Season 8? Some nut decided to put the men in tights on the losing team. Nuff said. Season 7 had Susan, Lance and Cody versus Brooke, Warren and Maurice – the only weak link on Brooke’s team was Maurice and Derek spent a good bit of time working with him. And we can’t forget that Derek was on ALL the winning teams. So, there is a lot that goes into winning versus losing. I’m not sure how much three pro substitutions will play into a team that puts it’s men in tights, or a team that includes the more questionable or downright boring dancers. Heh.
Wow, I’m having a hard time remembering when the Team Dances started. Season 7? I remember a Samba challenge on the finale, but for some reason I cannot remember a Team Dance. Granted, Season 7 was a snooze fest for me personally, so I can’t really recall a lot from that Season.
I definitely remember season 8 (one of my favorite Seasons) because I remember Carrie Ann (And Len?) calling out Lil’ Kim for some error that “cost” them the 10 except from Bruno. Those were the highest scores Ty received too and I remember thinking “That dude is very fortunate”. Of course, I saw nothing but red once Lil’ Kim was eliminated.
And I will never forget Mark & Chuck in a leotard. That was dreadful & I think I went blind for a minute except I seem to remember Mark was the one who came up with the idea (after a week a prior where he “told” Shawn he wasn’t wearing a leotard). I don’t know sometimes that boy confuses the world.
Season 9 was my least favorite season so I can’t really remember a Team Dance. I try to forget Season 9 period but of course we have Donny Osmond to remind us of it and how he won. *rolls eyes*
Team Gaga OWNED the Team Dance in Season 10. I remember Pamela messing up something that didn’t earn them 10′s but that cha cha was pure genius!
And yes, Team Apollo was MILES ahead of Team Kristi in Season 11. Ironic because I also think Apollo was “miles ahead” better than Kristi in their respective seasons.
So what were the Team Dances in Seasons 7 and 9?
Nathan, Season 7 was the “Team Paso” – which is probably my favorite of all the team dances for the choreography and the dresses the women were wearing. Another reason why the other team lost – they were at a slight disadvantage (one that Derek later disproved as a disadvantage) having to do a Cha Cha.
Season 9 was Team Tango versus Team Paso – with Derek/Joanna, Donny/Kym and Louis/Kelly on the winning team. Again, I think the key to winning this one was the flashy, crowd pleasing angle of them all doing those kicks across the floor to the heavy drum beat of Bon Jovi. The team of Aaron, Mya, Michael and Mark could quite match that level of entertainment. Not for me and not for the judges, anyway.
I know everyone is entitled to their opinions so I’ll just tell how I feel. I really hate it when people speak so negatively of Donny Osmond. No, he was not the best technical dancer. Mya was. If the viewers weren’t voting, Mya would’ve won but it’s a reality show, not a dancing competition. Donny worked so hard. He had many obstacles week by week like the injuries, the flu he had and the exhaustion because he was traveling the most between LA, Vegas and Utah to see his family and just doing the shows in Vegas. No matter what happened, he kept on going. He had the upbeat personality and connected to the audience that way and he had great chemistry with Kym. This was not an easy journey for him… well, or for anyone either. I wish people would just give him credit for that. I don’t think anyone else in season suffered that much or traveled that often. Donny often praised his competitors for doing a good job and he was getting along great with them especially Aaron and Michael. He worked so hard and didn’t use anything to win like saying, “Oh I have the largest fanbase so I’m going to win this.” There were no ego there like many people said. Can’t a guy get happy when he gets high scores? I’m just really annoyed at all the negativity about Donny. I’ve been unhappy before because my favorites didn’t win but I didn’t call the winning couples a bunch of egos. I just let it go after a short time and just say, “there’s always next season!” The world would be a better place if we had so much less negativity, ya know? You gotta remember that the man worked extremely hard and fought through everything that could’ve gotten him eliminated.
Now that I got that out of the way…. well I thought the leotard tights were funny for the men in season 8 lol. Guess I have a little strange sense of humor.
Lacey filled in for Melissa that night because she hurt her rib, not her back. Well, I talk to a friend of her mom’s sometimes and if Lacey didn’t appear at her best that night, she just had her wisdom teeth pulled soon before that so she probably wasn’t feeling 100%.
I agree with Courtney, Kym has never lost a team dance so I think whoever is with her and Hines are in good hands! I always thought she won not only because she had Derek with her but because she is a terrific choreographer and leader. Wish they’d let her choreograph more pro dances on results shows. I have a feeling that Hines’ team is going to be a great one!
Liz—Donnie Osmond NO ego….your kidding right? That guys ego is sooo big he has to keep ordering a bigger rug to fit his swelling head…