Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Baseball/Archive 14

This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject Baseball. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 10

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Archive 12

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Templates for deletion nomination of Template:Fort Myers Miracle roster navbox

Template:Fort Myers Miracle roster navbox has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. Spanneraol (talk) 18:35, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I presonally agree with deleting it. I only created it because I was putting the template for team rosters on the player pages, and was told it was incorrect and that I was supposed to do this instead. I think it is stupid to have one for a minor league team, but whatever. Consistency is important, I guess. If this is deleted, I think there needs to be a concensus to allow team rosters on minor league player pages.--Johnny Spasm (talk) 13:20, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

IBAF World Rankings - Rankings based on average

There looks to be a fair amount of effort that's gone into this section that's been added to the article, but it looks like original research to me using phrases like "the rankings should be based on average" without attributing it to a source - verified, appropriate, or otherwise. An that's before you consider the argument over the fairness of the exisiting system compared to the proposed one, or any other variation you might like to introduce.

I've commented on the talk page saying the same thing, and on the talk page of the user who put it there, asking him to reference it to a source or remove it. If it's not done within a few days or so - and assuming no one here thinks its ok to stay as is - I'm going to get rid of it myself. Afaber012 (talk) 07:39, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

The user's removed the section, so that's been sorted.

Another thing I've realised about the article is that it doesn't have the full list of nations on the list, just the top 16. We've got the link to the current list as one of the references, but should we have the full list of 40-odd teams on the article itself? And if not the article perhaps it should be a seperate list-class article, and this article just has the top 5 or top 10? Personally, I think somewhere we should have the full list. Afaber012 (talk) 15:09, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Misnamed article?

Is the Association of Professional Ballplayers of America correct? Shouldn't it have the word "Base" in it? As is it has very few Google hits, but the article claims it to have 11,000 members. Anybody know? Abductive (talk) 05:35, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

The name given by official website is the same as the title of the article. --Muboshgu (talk) 19:11, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Although a lot of sports use balls, terms like "ball player", "ball game" and "ball park" are understood to refer to baseball. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 19:28, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Plus, it says this was set up in 1924. There was no other ball game back then, really. --Muboshgu (talk) 20:09, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Various forms of football; basketball; softball; all were well-established by then. And all have the qualifying prefix. "Ball", by itself, implies baseball. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 20:12, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

They existed, but they weren't baseball. That was my only point. --Muboshgu (talk) 20:43, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

And my point is that without the qualifying prefix, "ball" is understood to mean "baseball". I don't think we're disagreeing on anything here. :) My comments were mostly fro the benefit of the original poster. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 20:46, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah we're not disagreeing on anything, we're just on an odd tangent :) --Muboshgu (talk) 21:21, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

If it is the case that the association was set up in 1924 and has 11,000 members, why does it only have 223 Google hits? Abductive (talk) 23:11, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Maybe because it doesn't include Angelina Jolie or Michael Jackson in its membership. I recognize the name Dick Beverage is a past president of Society for American Baseball Research. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 23:16, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

No, the name of the article was wrong. It has just been moved by a smarter user than me to Association of Professional Ball Players of America. It needed a space, not a base. Abductive (talk) 23:22, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I see. If you separate "ball" and "players" you get thousands of Google hits. One of which could be a usable third-party source that the article tag is currently requesting. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 23:23, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Hall of Famers infoboxes

I think some sort of script needs to be added to infoboxes so Hall of Famers can have the infobox for the team whose cap he is wearing on his plaque. Anyone out there NOT think that Brooks Robinson should have a Baltimore Orioles infobox? Ozzie Smith a Cardinals infobox? Tom Seaver a Mets one?--Johnny Spasm (talk) 13:15, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

What if they do not have a Hall of Fame team, like Catfish Hunter. Adam Penale (talk) 16:38, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I've given my opinion on this above. The discussion was started in two places for some reason. I oppose the change. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 16:45, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Also oppose for various reasons, but one reason stands out. If I recall correctly, wasn't the whole reason this was changed to the grey infobox in the first place due to a fight over this very issue? Check out Talk:Reggie Jackson for a good chunk of the discussion. We don't need more edit wars. -Dewelar (talk) 17:12, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I oppose. It would open up a whole can of worms that we don't need. --Muboshgu (talk) 18:38, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

While I think it would be nice to have the colors, I agree that it's better not to change course at this point. Like Dewelar stated, the Reggie Jackson debate was not constructive, and issues like this just devolve into wars over rooting interests (aka completely subjective). - Masonpatriot (talk) 18:53, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the debate was over Reggie, and I say that the use of any colors for retired players of more than one team approaches original research on our part. For active players, obviously you can have the current team colors. But those colors are nothing more than a decoration - they serve no encyclopedic purpose. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 19:07, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Mariano Rivera is a featured article candidate

I'm looking for some people involved with the Wikipedia:Baseball project to review the article and comment on it at the nomination page. Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns. Thank you. Y2kcrazyjoker4 (talk) 16:48, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Billy Sunday GAR

Billy Sunday has been nominated for a good article reassessment. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to good article quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status will be removed from the article. Reviewers' concerns are here. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 06:15, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Baseball Reference link fix

Just a heads up to note that I've made a bot request here to have a bot created to add the extra directory level to all the old Baseball Reference player page links. -Dewelar (talk) 14:41, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Y'all should just create a template like {{hockeydb}} and put that on each page so that when the address changes you just change the template to reflect that and you don't have to get bots to make hundreds or thousands of edits. It would of course require y'all to slowly go through pages changing links to the template... -Djsasso (talk) 15:36, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Nevermind I just realized they don't use a naming system that would lend itself to this version. They really should just number each profile. -Djsasso (talk) 15:38, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

For those interested, this got rejected based on WP:NOTBROKEN. It was my understanding that this applies only to redirects within Wikipedia. Anyone have any experience with this? This is my first bot request, so perhaps there's something of which I'm unaware. -Dewelar (talk) 18:42, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

If the links still work then yes I would agree with WP:NOTBROKEN. The point of not broken is to not waste resources and needlessly spam page histories if the change has no effect on whether or not the link works. -Djsasso (talk) 18:44, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's a valid argument that we need to wait until they are broken before fixing them, given that the likelihood that they will be broken at some time in the near future is high. And there are an AWFUL lot of these links -- probably in the tens of thousands. -Dewelar (talk) 18:50, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

On a site as big as baseball reference, I would bet they remain as redirects forever because the webmaster would most likely want to preserve links directing into his site. That being said the effort involved in fixing them after they break is no greater than fixing them before they break. -Djsasso (talk) 18:55, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, yes and no. While I haven't spoken with Sean Forman about this specifically, I have already had to fix links to certain player lists that got deleted during the shuffle, so your argument there goes out the window. As for the effort being greater...well, no, but I'd think it would be in Wikipedia's best interest not to wake up one day with tens of thousands of broken links that they could have avoided having, then have to scramble to fix them (or, more likely, leave them to rot for a few weeks before doing it). -Dewelar (talk) 19:25, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

You have probably seen already, but {{Baseballstats}} is actually what I was suggesting. Why not just start chaging pages over to using it as you see them. Or as was mentioned on the other page maybe someones bot can make that change. -Djsasso (talk) 19:37, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

(ec) I was just about to ask why the template idea wouldn't work. Sounds good to me. Yes, maybe an extra parameter would be needed - although maybe not. A template can extract the first letter of a word. Wknight94 ^talk 19:38, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Looks like baseball reference is already written into that code so it should probably work as is. -Djsasso (talk) 19:40, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, these are not the links I'm talking about. I'm talking about the links within articles (especially team-season articles) that are used as references for a player's transaction history, biographical information, and the like. Perhaps a second template could be made for references within the article? -Dewelar (talk) 20:24, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh yes, I didn't mean that exact template. I just meant that as an example of what could be done - in "a second template" like you say. Wknight94 ^talk 20:26, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. I wonder, though, if that would be an acceptable use for a bot, because I don't relish having to change 10K+ links by hand. -Dewelar (talk) 20:34, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh definitely - if it can't be done by bot (I don't know what the standards are there either), then I'd recommend ignoring the problem until it's serious enough for people to take notice. Wknight94 ^talk 20:54, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

1950 All-Star Game

I created the 1950 Major League Baseball All-Star Game, but something is wrong with the MLB All-Star Game template. The extra innings do not appear properly. I can't figure out the problem. Can someone look and fix this? I'll create the remainder of the All-Star missing pages soon. --CPAScott (talk) 18:15, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

All fixed. top10, top11, ... were in there twice instead of top10, top11, ... and bot10, bot11, ... Wknight94 ^talk 20:52, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Minor League Players

I am curious what this project has set as the notability lines for players? I noticed that several of the Washington Nationals minor leaguers who had pages have been turned into redirects to the Washington Nationals minor league players page. Adding those stubs to the top of the page makes the page disjointed and disorganized. According to WP:Athlete all minor league players are notable as all minor league teams are fully professional. Therefore, all minor league players could conceivably have articles. At the very least, adding these stubs to the top of a roster page should not be done and should be handled in a different manner. Shootmaster 44 (talk) 06:51, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Those minor league player pages were created for the purpose of hosting those bios. See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Baseball/Archive 7#Mini-articles for minor league players for the original conversation. Spanneraol (talk) 11:19, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

There has never been any consensus that all minor league levels are fully professional. In fact, there has been fairly wide consensus that some levels, such as Rookie League, are not fully professional. The sticking point has been where the dividing line is. Certainly, if a player has enough independent, reliable sources that show notability, they should have an article. If they don't, a large number of the articles have been closed as "redirect/merge" at AfD lately. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fabrictramp (talk • contribs) 14:59, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

The lists of "xx team" minor league players articles were never intended to just be a repository of roster templates anyway, as I understood them. They are supposed to be a resting place in a centralized locations for those players who have some specialized coverage but don't yet meet WP:GNG. They are basically supposed to be stub factories, wherein a stub or start-class article can easily be broken out from these locations already written and ready to go, instead of starting from scratch. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 15:32, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that minor leaguers with affiliated teams are fully professional and not semi-professional, because a team wouldn't want their top prospects to do anything are enough reliable sources. Those minor leaguers who have been merged into minor league pages could be worthy of their own pages, if there's enough coverage. --Muboshgu (talk) 02:02, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

This subject has been debated many times and there's never been a consensus on whether minor leaguers are "fully professional." Yes, they are paid so they are "professional" according to the usual definition. But some editors point to the very low salaries paid to lower level minor leaguers and the fact that the main purpose of the farm system is to train and develop these players as reasons not to consider them "fully professional." The WikiProject has developed its own notability essay that says that notability of minor league players must be demonstrated by significant coverage in reliable sources. See the talk page for more discussion. BRMo (talk) 02:18, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I totally agree with you that for a minor leaguer, notability means significant coverage, since the point of the game is to make the majors. As far as the definition of "professional", here's my two cents: the best prospects get the big money, which would keep them from having to work odd jobs. The minor leaguers who make the minimum, which may not be enough to live on, aren't likely to be notable anyway. --Muboshgu (talk) 02:29, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I'll add that one of the things that I like about covering the marginally notable minor leaguers in the "Team minor league players" articles is that if a player washes out, his mini bio is simply dropped from the article. There must be over 100,000 former minor league players around; can you imagine if they each had their own article? I've known several—they aren't public figures and sometimes their friends don't even know they once spent a summer or two pursuing a baseball dream. It's hard to imagine the BLP problems that would ensue if every former minor league player had his own Wikipedia article and we had to try to monitor them all. BRMo (talk) 02:39, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Yankees Draft Picks

Yankees Draft Picks is a brand new article I came across in NPP. Several questions come to mind:

Does this topic have enough encyclopedic potential to become an article?
Is it / can it be covered well enough elsewhere to be turned into a redirect?
If either of the above are "yes", it obvious needs to be renamed. To what? New York Yankees draft? New York Yankees draft picks? Something completely different?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:00, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

The article is a mess... and seems to be written as a blog entry. I'd get rid of it. The Yankees Draft picks should be covered on the season articles and the draft pages.. I don't think they'd need their own page. Spanneraol (talk) 22:07, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree with the above. If someone needs a model to build from, we do have the FL List of Philadelphia Phillies first-round draft picks, but that probably won't work for every draft pick ever (and we shouldn't be writing on every draft pick ever!). KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:18, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I just marked it for speedy deletion. It's obvious vandalism. JustSomeRandomGuy32 (talk) 22:25, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I didn't think it meets speedy deletion criteria, so I nominated it at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Yankees Draft Picks BRMo (talk) 01:54, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Agree with BRMo. I think it was a good faith attempt at an article -- calling it vandalism is a bit harsh. It won't hurt anything by being around for 7 days, and someone may come along and turn it into something. (I doubt it, but I've been surprised before...)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 01:59, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreed with BRMo and Fabrictramp, the user is fairly new and thought that it was a good article. I'd be surprised if in its current state it makes it through the full 7 days.--Giants27 (c|s) 02:09, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Is the author trying to make the point that the Yankees have allowed alot of good draft picks leave while getting nothing in return, like when Frank Costanza yelled at George Steinbrenner for trading Jay Buhner? If so, this article totally missed the mark. Any discussion of Steinbrenner's history of dealing prospects for overpriced and underproductive veterans should be incorporated into existing articles; it doesn't need an article of its own. --Muboshgu (talk) 02:09, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

What puzzles me is why Omir Santos and Brandon Boggs are on the page, I mean I get Leiter and Jeter but Santos and Boggs? And great Seinfeld reference there Muboshgu.--Giants27 (c|s) 02:13, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I removed Jeter entirely, as the whole section was POV. I also removed the infoboxes. Doesn't leave much, really. -Dewelar (talk) 02:18, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I know! I said that in the AfD. Santos was a scrub (who I think is just having a lucky season) and Boggs was a high school player who chose to go to college, like hundreds of high school players who are drafted each year do, as well. And Boggs isn't that good anyway. These are the "ones who got away"? Yikes. --Muboshgu (talk) 02:25, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

TFD for Topps All-Star Rookie Roster navboxes

I have nominated several baseball navboxes for deletion here. I commented about this in the Stat Box discussion above and wanted to let project members know in case anyone cared to comment. Thanks. - Masonpatriot (talk) 02:29, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

As the person who made most of them, I approve of this TFD. They should go. --Muboshgu (talk) 03:08, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

2004 World Series PR

Thought you guy might like to know the 2004 World Series is currently have a peer review. BUC (talk) 16:50, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

BostonDirtDogs.com

Along the same vein as the Sons of Sam Horn deletion in the past month or so, I've nominated BostonDirtDogs.com for deletion under the same basic criteria. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/BostonDirtDogs.com (2nd nomination) to comment or for more details. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:09, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Accent Marks

I've noticed that all players born is hispanic countries with hispanic name have acccent marks were applied, but not all players born in the U.S. with hispanic names have accent marks were applied. Is it they are not of hispanic culture? I think all players should have accent marks were applied even if they are not hispanic. Without the accent marks it changes the pronounciation of the word. Some of the players name are spanish words only (Hernandez) and while others are spanish and english (Adrian). Comments Ositadinma (talk) 19:36, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

However, the player is listed is what it should go by, not by their culture.--Giants27 (c|s) 19:45, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I would think that we should use the accent marks that the player uses. As people become assimilated, they tend to use the spellings of the place they are at (this isn't just Hispanics -- my own in-laws, originally from Eastern Europe, within a generation had changed the spelling of their last name to be much more "American".) Could you give a couple of examples of players where this is an issue? --Fabrictramp | talk to me 19:52, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

My opinion is that if you can find big web sites which show accent marks - MLB.com, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, etc. - then let us know and we'll evaluate. Otherwise, they should all be removed. Éric Gagné looks so silly with accent marks that I initially thought it had been hit by a move vandal. Wknight94 ^talk 19:55, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

What if it changes the pronounciation of the word: Jose instead of José. Should only the players born in Hispanic cultures have accent marks and not the players in the U.S., even if there is an Hispanic name that needs an accent mark. ex. Adrian Gonzalez, Cesar Ramos and Gaby Hernandez. Ositadinma (talk) 20:02, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Taking the examples one at at time. Adrian Gonzalez doesn't use accent marks at www.agonzalez23.com/, which claims to be his official site. Neither do any of the stat sites (ie mlb.com, espn.com, baseball-reference.com). Unless someone can show that Adrian does use the accent marks, we should stay with what he uses. Cesar Ramos doesn't have accent marks at baseballcube, baseball-reference, or milb.com. Again, unless we can show he does use the accent marks personally, we should stay with the way it is. Same for Gaby Hernandez.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 20:52, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Changes the pronunciation how? I only know of one way to pronounce Jose. Wknight94 ^talk 20:09, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

From Hoh-say to Hoh-se. Ositadinma (talk) 20:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I know a number of men named Jose who would be upset if I used the accent on their name, and a number who prefer José, all born in the US. (The joys of living in an area with a couple of hundred years of Hispanic / Anglo interaction). Why should we presume to write the player's name in a way they themselves aren't writing it? Yes, if the article has the accents wrong, let's move it by all means. If people would think there's an accent when there isn't, then let's add a redirect to help the reader out. If pronunciation is the only issue we should consider, then we'd have to move Ryan Theriot to Ryan Terio. Instead, we use the spelling the player uses. Why should it be different for Hispanic players, no matter where they are born?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 20:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

But how do we now what spelling they use. Ositadinma (talk) 20:16, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

See Wknight's comment above, if ESPN, SI etc. use José instead of Jose then that's the proper location.--Giants27 (c|s) 20:21, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I've noticed ESPN, baseball reference, etc. seldom if ever use the accent marks on their pages.Spanneraol (talk) 22:10, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Most don't because they are a pain in the butt to code into a website, but that shouldn't stop us from being correct. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:15, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Good point, both Killervogel5 and Spanneraol. Just for grins, I took the first Padres player I saw with an accent mark, Luis DeLeón. No accent at baseball-reference, mlb.com, or baseball cube. So the question is how do we know that Luis DeLeón is correct? Thoughts?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:18, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I'd assume the accent isn't supposed to be there, unless someone finds a source where there is an accent (which appears to be more than accidental). --Muboshgu (talk) 22:25, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I mean, Baseball-Reference is authoritative, but who can deny that Tony Pena should actually have an N with a tilde? I don't know that we should be using those sources as authoritative for spelling. Case in point: the same player, on the same site, spelled two different ways. (with accent without accent) Does IBAF keep a site with correct international spellings and such? KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:31, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Interestingly, Yahoo seems to use them in some situations — yes for Tony Pena (and Jr.) and Adrian Gonzalez, but no for Eric Gagne. Mlaffs (talk) 22:51, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

As noted by others, spelling these names without the accent is, literally, spelling them incorrectly. Spanish has very specific rules for word pronunciation, which are that for all words that end in a vowel, 'n' or 's', the accent is placed on the next-to-last syllable, while at all other times it is on the last syllable. Putting an accent on the 'o' in DeLeon changes the pronunciation from day-LAY-own (or, perhaps, to a less-informed reader, dee-LEE-ahn) to day-lay-OWN. The accents need to stay. -Dewelar (talk) 23:21, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

But again, what if the player spells it without the accent? (For example, my own last name is technically spelled incorrectly. But it's the way that my inlaws have spelled it for three generations, and if someday I was notable enough for a Wikipedia article, I'd be pissed as hell if someone "corrected" it.)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 23:50, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Is their a database of player signatures around to check how they spell their own names? Spanneraol (talk) 00:00, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

My first thought was google images. But our friend Adrian Gonzalez apparently spells his name with just four letters. I'll poke around some more.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 00:09, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Gonzalez also may not be a good example, as he was born in California. For those players born in Spanish-speaking countries, I would use Spanish-language sites as more definitive than English-language ones. -Dewelar (talk) 00:14, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Of course, the original question was about US born Hispanics. I'll poke around tomorrow on this some more.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 00:16, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Good point. My brain disengaged that part of the discussion during my last reply :) . -Dewelar (talk) 00:33, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

How about this - Players born in hispanic countries that have names which allows for accent should have them. Players born in the U.S. with hispanic names that allow for accents should not keep them. Since hospitals in hispanic countries almost always put an accent mark were needed on the birth certificate and in America they don't. Alex Rodriguez and Gio Gonzalez should have accent marks, but don't since they were born in America (and no one will argue with A-Rod since it has been like this forever) and Carlos Beltrán and José Reyes have them since they were born in Hispanic countries (And they too have been forever like that.) Ositadinma (talk) 00:45, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

All I can say on this topic is good luck. To use diacritics or not is very much argued across all of wikipedia and very few projects can come to a decision to use them or not. About 50% of the wiki thinks they should be stripped from all articles, their argument being english doesn't use them. About 50% argues that they should be included as they are part of peoples proper names. -Djsasso (talk) 01:07, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Baseball fans are noted for loving to discuss things that can never be settled. ;-)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 13:33, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Pete Rose? Hall of Fame?

Barry Bonds? Cheater?

I could go on and on... KV5 (Talk • Phils) 13:51, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

And as baseball fans, we do. :) And The Babe never called his shot... --Fabrictramp | talk to me 14:08, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Atleast you all only really have to worry about Spanish extensively. At the hockey project we have to deal with eastern european and nordic countries where there are a million different accents/diacritics. More than a few editors in our project have quit because of those silly battles. We mostly have calmed the storms by saying player pages have them and that on North American related pages such as team pages and league pages we don't use them because the leagues don't put them on jerseys (don't know if this is true in baseball as I haven't looked closely). On European related team and league pages etc we leave them on since people in those areas would expect them. Really this is a pretty crappy solution but its the closest we could come to any sort of agreement. Took years to get there...and tends to be reopened by someone who doesn't like it every few months. -Djsasso (talk) 15:05, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

A few baseball jerseys do (Tony Peña for example), but not all. And a jersey doesn't help with first names. :( However, I'd say that if a jersey does have a diacritic, it's a sign the player prefers that spelling (but we can't infer much from the absense of one.)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 15:19, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

To bring this back to the question at hand... I could definitely support Ositadinma's proposal as a default position when we don't have a solid source for what the player uses. Born in the US defaults to no diacritics. Born outside the US defaults to diacritics. Redirects made as appropriate, solid sources for what the player uses trumps defaults. Think this will work?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 15:15, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I support this, as it is how I currently handle things when creating player pages. -Dewelar (talk) 15:18, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Seems like a reasonable solution to me. -Djsasso (talk) 15:22, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreeable to me, as long as we're clear that this is only true without a clear source. Question: Raúl Ibáñez. Born in the US, uses the "ñ" on his jersey, does not use the accent, but removing the accent drastically changes pronunciation. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 15:53, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

And his autograph is absolutely no help. *sigh*--Fabrictramp | talk to me 16:01, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps we can extend the guideline to say that it's either all or nothing -- if there's evidence a player uses at least one diacritic, then we should assume they use all appropriate ones for their name unless there is specific evidence to the contrary. -Dewelar (talk) 16:06, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) This is why the proper position is supposed to be reliable sources. Yahoo, ESPN, Sports Illustrated, etc. It's the best way not to twist yourselves into knots like this. To me, where someone was born should not factor in. Jersey as a first resort seems reasonable. MLB.com should be high on the list. Non-generated sources like news reports, etc. should be next. Non-MLB.com database-generated sources like Baseball-reference and other statistical tables should be after that (maybe their statistical databases aren't properly set up to handle accent mark characters for technical reasons). Just blindly using country of origin as a basis should be way further down the list. Wknight94 ^talk 16:12, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

There's one large problem with this, going back to my first reply. While English-language media (which includes MLB.com) may be verifiable for this kind of reporting, they are NOT RELIABLE. As KV5 points out below, Baseball-reference does not have diacritics for anybody, so they're unhelpful. Baseball Cube is a little better, but still spotty. If we're going to use media sources at all, they should be Spanish-language sources. -Dewelar (talk) 16:23, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

And thus you have stumbled onto the problem that plagues wikipedia. You see WP:COMMONNAME is the other thing most people who support removing them trumpet. Claiming that if the majority of English media doesn't use them then the common name in English is to not have them. I personally support using whatever is used in the native language as you mention. -Djsasso (talk) 16:31, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I believe the above to be an excellent idea: reliable Spanish-language sources for players with Hispanic names, French-language sources for the Canadian players if there is any doubt. It works. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 16:32, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Unless the Spanish-language sources are putting in accents no matter what to help their readers... (my head is starting to hurt from thinking about this. Time for some dark chocolate and a cup of tea.)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 16:35, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

As per the Alexei Ramirez example above, B-R doesn't have a technical problem, since they and Sports-Reference run from the same location. I don't know why they don't use them. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 16:17, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I'd say get rid of them completely. This is the English language Wikipedia.. for the Spanish language version they can use them. Very little if any of the English language media uses these symbols, why are we using them? No one is going to search for a player by typing in his name with accents.. it's just too hard... This debate is just going to go around and around and lead to arbitrary choices... best to just not use them at all, at least that way we are matching the verifiable sources. Spanneraol (talk) 17:01, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Correct. Use French sources for French names? Why not use Japanese sources for Japanes names? Then we'll have 鈴木一朗 instead of Ichiro Suzuki and everyone will be lost. One big problem I have is doing find's. If I copy "Peña" from Wikipedia into my clipboard, then go to his B-R page and hit Ctrl-F and paste in "Peña", I get no results! That's extremely annoying and unnecessary. Wknight94 ^talk 17:15, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

The difference being that one is a translation and the other is not. -Djsasso (talk) 17:29, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

As per the above comments by DB87, these sources are verifiable but NOT RELIABLE when it comes to foreign language information. Translation and transliteration are two completely different things. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 17:30, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

On this subject, why does José Canseco have the accent when his official website doesn't use it [1] and his book covers don't use it [2]. Spanneraol (talk) 22:29, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest we definitely use it if 1) the player's own website uses it, mlb.com uses it, 3) his jersey uses it, or 4) a book he writes uses it. Those all seem to me to be the most reliable sources. If none of those use accents, but 5) one of the main baseball stat sites (espn, baseball reference, fangraphs, baseball cube, baseball almanac, SABR -- we could of course quibble about the list, but I think these are sites most of us could agree on) use it, it is a harder case--but I don't know that that is actually ever the case. If none of those use it, then I would suggest we not use it.

I expect that some Spanish players in the US have dropped the accents, but that does not making it an incorrect spelling of their name, as one editor suggested above -- it is simply how it has been Americanized, much as many names were Americanized at Ellis Island a century ago. They may not be true to the original, but in those cases they became the new names of the ballplayers.--Ethelh (talk) 23:47, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Infoboxes

Is there a reason why we are using major league teams only in the infoboxes of minor league players? It's in violation of WP:V. The infobox is for their team, not the team with which they're affiliated with in the minor leagues. This doesn't make any sense to me. At all. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 19:10, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Because it is a Major League infobox - and the minor league teams are a part of the larger Major League team organization. JustSomeRandomGuy32 (talk) 19:15, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

But it says "team". Not "major league organization". They are different things. Plus, as at Mike Cervenak, players use different numbers at different locations. Does this mean we keep a major league number that a player isn't even using anymore? That another player on the MLB roster is using? Makes no sense to me. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 19:18, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Well if another player was assigned that # - then obviously its not his anymore... but that's not true in this case. JustSomeRandomGuy32 (talk) 19:22, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The number is not the question. WP:V is the question. This is a core Wikipedia policy. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 19:27, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

What's not verified? He's a member of the Phillies organization. JustSomeRandomGuy32 (talk) 19:33, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

But the infobox says team. Just like I said above. He is not, and minor leaguers not on 40-man rosters are not, part of Major League teams'. Team and organization/affiliation are two different things. The company I work (company A) for is affiliated with another company (company B), part of a business agreement. That does not mean that I work for company B in any way. There is a minor league union and a major league union specifically for that reason: they are two separate classifications of players. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 19:36, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) KV5 brings up a good point. However, I disagree with how he wants to fix things. The major league organization in which a player plays is more notable than the particular minor league team within that organization for which he happens to be playing at a particular time. What we need to do is fix the infobox to say "Current organization" or something similar. -Dewelar (talk) 20:23, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I actually was not proposing a specific fix; this is what I would prefer as well. It's much more efficient. If there was a separate field for the current minor league team, I wouldn't hate it, but I definitely want the infobox to be clearer in that this is a major league organization, not a team. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:28, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, sorry, it did seem like you were advocating changing the team to the minor league team. My apologies if I misunderstood. -Dewelar (talk) 20:33, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

No, not a problem; I actually was changing it to a minor league team. I just want to bring us in line with WP:V, with whatever method is most accurate, most efficient, and presents the information best. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:39, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I prefer keeping things the way they are. It's more important that he is part of the Phillies organization than that he is assigned to some minor league team. The uniform # should only be used if he has a # listed on the 40 man roster.. If he isnt on the 40 man roster he shouldn't have a number listed. Spanneraol (talk) 20:41, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The way things are, we don't say that they are part of an "organization". It's a mistaken assumption. I don't care if we say the minor league team or not, though I wouldn't be averse to showing this information. But we should be telling the truth, and saying what is verifiable: that they are a member of an organization, if they are not on the 40-man. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:48, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I would not be averse to having some kind of "presently playing for" line either, but it should be in addition to, not instead of, listing the MLB organization. As JSRG32 pointed out, this is an MLB template, not a minor league one. -Dewelar (talk) 00:12, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm for a one-line "minor league team" optional additional field - nothing else on it though (no numbers or anything) - leave the rest as is. JustSomeRandomGuy32 (talk) 00:19, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

So that would be an optional parameter added to the template (so that it doesn't show up for major leaguers and players on the 40-man) that says, approximately, "Assigned to {{team}}>". Comes up with a single cell under the current team. Could also be in the secondary color, or no color at all. No numbers for players not on 40-man rosters. Is that where we stand now? 'Cuz I'm good with that. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 00:30, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Just because someone isn't on the 40-man roster doesn't mean they don't have a # assignment to them by the team. Cerenak still has #24 listed by his name on mlb.com, and nobody on the Phillies has worn it this year since he did in Spring Training. JustSomeRandomGuy32 (talk) 00:53, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Doesn't make it his. If Pedro Martinez had wanted 24 when he signed, it would be his number, not Cervenak's. That part of the site is not updated anyway because he's not active. If you want to quote WP:V on that point, MiLB is more reliable than MLB's site in this case, "major league infobox" or not. Regardless, that's not just my opinion, someone else said it above. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 01:08, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Template:Philadelphia Phillies

Could someone else put some eyes on this template? There is an IP user duplicating links in the navbox through pipelinks and it's becoming messy. I'm closing in on my revert limit and could use a hand. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 01:22, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Watchlisting.--Giants27 (c|s) 01:29, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Thx. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 01:33, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

I made the title of this section into a link so it's easier to follow. --Muboshgu (talk) 20:32, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Current events

In light of Mark Buehrle's perfecto, we should keep an eye on all articles involved, including those two, 2009 Chicago White Sox season, and 2009 Tampa Bay Rays season. Some pre-emptive protection by a project admin might not be amiss. Cheers, and congrats to Buehrle as much as I hate the ChiSox. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:15, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Pre-emptive protection is very controversial, but I'll add Mark to my watch list and step in as needed. Ditto on the congrats. ChiSox fans need something now and then to make up for having Ozzie as a manager. ;-P --Fabrictramp | talk to me 20:57, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Are we expecting problems with those pages? Obviously someone should add the info about the game to at least his page and the Sox season page... Though what's with the spring training game log on the Sox page? Spanneraol (talk) 21:02, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

There's a lot of cross Sox/Cubs vandalism right before the season starts; I wouldn't be surprised if the middle school students in Chicago get ideas. --Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:38, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Add Chicago White Sox to the watch list. Already been hit at least once - grrr...--Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:56, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Article Improvement Drive

Might it be time for a new choice, or at least something in addition to the managerial one? I hope to work on that subject a bit, but the nominated no-hitter seems like a reasonable one (or anything else). Staxringold _talk^contribs 16:53, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Second that. When an article choice doesn't make any progress for a while, it's time to make a new one. Someone'll need to step up and restart it. Wizardman 03:05, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm restarting this. You guys can add nominations until the 29th, then we'll vote. Hopefully this will be successful enough to give us two GAs like last year. The two current nominations can stay up. Wizardman 15:02, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, so, I've made a nomination, but it's probably not an article we can get to GA status any time soon. Dickey Pearce, the man often credited with inventing the shortstop position in its current form, has a truly pitiful article. I'm not sure if this is the spirit of this project, as I was not around for previous versions. Also, can we make multiple nominations? If so, I'd add Al Schacht to the list. -Dewelar (talk) 15:34, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

For now I'll say one nom per person, just so that we don't have an overflow of options for voting. Wizardman 16:51, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Team/franchise naming conventions?

A lengthy discussion has been occurring here regarding what the name of the page that has at various times resided at both Worcester Ruby Legs and (its current location after a recent move) Worcester Worcesters should be. It has since evolved into a broader discussion of team names in general. Given the history of team nicknames, I thought this might be a good opportunity to establish some guidelines regarding how to name pages for teams that had no official nickname. I know this is a discussion that has been had in the past, in relation to teams like the Boston Americans and, more recently, the Cincinnati Kelly's Killers, but to date I don't believe we've had a truly consistent approach to this subject. I propose that we establish one now. -Dewelar (talk) 21:29, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Are there enough articles on this subject to justify an Outline of baseball?

Here's a discussion about subject development you might find interesting.

The Transhumanist 00:07, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

P.S.: See Wikipedia's collection of outlines at WP:OOK.

I believe we have more than enough information to do so, and it would definitely help the project's development. All of the outlines I have seen have had overwhelmingly positive responses. I think it would be great. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 00:21, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

I also agree that it would be a great idea. black ngold29 18:03, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Article Improvement Drive now in voting phase

The Article Improvement Drive has entered the voting phase, and will remain there throughout the weekend. The article will be chosen at the end of August 2. Only 3 options, but vote now. Wizardman 15:59, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Separate pages for relocated teams

Why does the Montreal Expos have their own separate article, but the Philadelphia Athletics, who were in Philly longer than the Nats/Expos were in Montreal, are a mention on History of the Oakland Athletics page? What determines when a relocated team gets a separate article from its predecessor versus a section on the current team's history? ~~Eagles~~Fan In Tampa 19:35, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

The short answer to why they have their own separate article is that a vocal group of people would (and still do) scream and yell if the subject of merging the articles was (and is) ever mentioned. Otherwise, they would be merged just like every other team/franchise. It's just been easier this way, and the rest of us are just waiting for the time when it's safe to merge the articles without a lot of histrionics. -Dewelar (talk) 20:12, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

By jumpers, if the vocal group-in-question had large numbers & attended the Expos games? MLB would still have the franchise in Montreal. GoodDay (talk) 20:17, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)The archive of the Expos talk page should shed some light on this. I'd start at Talk:Montreal_Expos/Archive_1#Merge and read down. HTH--Fabrictramp | talk to me 20:17, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

The most recent bit on that page, of course, is from two years ago. A more recent discussion (from April-May 2009), and perhaps one more indicative of current feelings, is located here. -Dewelar (talk) 20:29, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't believe your characterization above is correct, and the discussion you linked to in your last comment is a quite civil conversation. Isaac Lin (talk) 04:26, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it was. I was being a bit dramatic, I suppose. Still, it is quite frustrating to have folks insist that the Expos must be treated differently than all other teams, because they have special circumstances (which, when held up to scrutiny, aren't special at all). -Dewelar (talk) 14:51, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Though there have been editors in the past that relied on emotional arguments, the most recent discussion dealt with practical issues of article length and evolution to multiple articles, which are generally applicable. Isaac Lin (talk) 01:25, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't believe, in the course of that last discussion, that an actual solution was reached. The History of Washington, D.C. professional baseball article isn't an acceptable substitute for an actual History of the Washington Nationals. In all other cases, information regarding teams that currently exist under other monikers has been subsumed into team history articles. Given that the history of the Nationals does not currently exist, it's an appropriate location for the Expos information. Information that's not directly related to baseball, like the relocation of Youppi and the retired numbers debate, can easily be mentioned in both pertinent articles (Nats history and the Montreal Canadiens). KV5 (Talk • Phils) 01:34, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with Killer. If they're the only team with "special circumstances", those same "circumstances" could be made of the NY/SF Giants, who won all their World Series championships and all but three of their NL pennants in New York, the Brooklyn/LA Dodgers, who spent more years in NYC than LAX, or the Boston/Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves, who are the 2nd-oldest team in MLB. You make an exception for one and you open the flood gates. It's just not acceptable for one to be glorified over another for no reason other than a few people from a city that didn't support it enough to stay in the first place are upset. Sorry, but that's the truth of the matter. If the Rays leave (God-forbid), it'd be because they had no sustainable fan base and I wouldn't expect a separate page for them, either. The logic just isn't there as to why it can't be like every other franchise, as a section in a "History of..." article. ~~Eagles~~Fan In Tampa 19:27, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I also agree, and would support a merge of the Montreal Expos and Washington Nationals pages, if someone proposed one. --Muboshgu (talk) 19:42, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Same here. - Masonpatriot (talk) 19:45, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

So create a page for the history of the Nationals. There is no reason why the pages should be merged. The other teams mentioned should also be split, just because their articles have been mashed together due to recentism doesn't mean that articles that are newer and have more available sources should also be mashed together. Or just rename the Expos page to History of the Montreal Expos if the name bothers you so much. I would also note that the Expos aren't being treated differently from every other team, as was shown in the last discussion on this page as opposed to the team page, there were very many examples shown of teams in all different leagues including baseball which are split into separate articles. Merging articles plain and simple causes important information to get cut from articles. Articles in every other subject are cut at locations that make sense to split into child articles, why should a sports team article be any different? -Djsasso (talk) 19:47, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Just because other projects treat moved teams as separate franchises doesn't mean it's right. The franchise is what it is; continuity exists from one season to another whether names or locations change. The other teams should not be split, and I'll go ahead and formally propose the merger of Expos and Nationals here, with the majority of the information in the Expos relocated to the new History of the Washington Nationals. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 19:51, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

IMHO, wheter it's seperate articles or merged article for 'relocated' franchise? all 30 should be the same (making Expos/Nationals an exception, stinks). GoodDay (talk) 20:20, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

You actually have to formally propose it on the talk page of that article. I think people confuse the franchise as being the same thing as the subject. The subject of Montreal Expos is a different subject than the Washington Nationals. Just like Calculus is a different subject from Geometry, but both are Math. I don't know why we are arguing it again, I thought everyone agreed in the last discussion that we should just rename the articles History of the Montreal Expos or the like. No one is arguing the franchise isn't the same, what we are arguing is that the subject matter is different. In wikipedia you give different subjects their own articles. The Montreal Expos are a vastly different subject from the Washington Nationals even if they are linked by being the same franchise. -Djsasso (talk) 20:20, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Proposed. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:31, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

My take on this is when the Nationals acknowledge the fact they are the descendants of the Expos, I will support the merger into the Nationals page. However, all retired numbers were forgotten, all team records (according to last season's Media Guide, I haven't got the new one yet) were split into a pre and post move era indicating that the Nats consider 2005 to be Year 1, not a continuation of the lineage and the written history includes very little regarding their time in Montreal, but rather incorporates the various incarnations of the Senators. If anything, the way the Nationals see their history, the pre-Texas and pre-Minnesota Senators history should be merged into here instead of the Expos. Plus, isn't Wikipedia's goal to keep pages small? Adding in the entire Montreal Expos page, which I believe is inherently necessary under a merger, would make the page too large. The way I would think we should handle teams that move is to create separate pages, wait until the next season and see how the team views their history, if they see the team as the continuation of the lineage, then merge the pages. In this circumstance, the Brooklyn Dodgers should deserve their own page as the LA Dodgers, only talk about their history in LA for the most part in their media guide. The New York Giants on the other hand have their story weaved into the San Francisco Giants' history in their media guide. Instead of creating a hard and fast rule, why not evaluate on a case by case basis? As history is never changing, the easiest way to deal with it is to see how the current incarnation deals with it. If the people in this project are convinced that calling the page the Montreal Expos is an injustice to the glorious history of the Washington Nationals, then why not rename the page History of the Washington Nationals/Montreal Expos Pre-2005? That way the title indicates that this franchise is the Nats, but also allows for the Montreal Expos to be indicated. The other thing I would point out is that I believe when the franchise moved, the history was given to Quebec Baseball ala the Baltimore Ravens/Cleveland Browns. So by doing this, isn't MLB indicated that the Expos ceased to exist and the league "expanded" to Washington? That's how I would read said actions. Shootmaster 44 (talk) 21:01, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

The Dodgers media guide actually talks about the whole history of the franchise since the Brooklyn days. And the Nationals do acknowledge their history, just look at their website [3] which can "trace Nationals history, from Tim Raines to Tim Wallach to Nick Johnson".. I don't recall Raines or Wallach playing for them since the move to DC. In any event, due to the large Expos fanbase that is preventing an outright merger, I'd support renaming the page as a subpage of the Nationals like he has above. Spanneraol (talk) 21:33, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

A ridiculous rename would be opposed for the same reasons, while also being a rather large violation of WP:COMMONNAME. Reso lute 00:06, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) I think the underlying issue is being missed by people like Djsasso that have a slight bias toward the Expos. I'm from Philadelphia, and while I wasn't even alive when the A's were in town, I take great pride in knowing we were, at one point, a two-team city. However, even with that said, I still feel that the Philly/KC/Oakland A's need to keep it all in the article History of the Oakland Athletics. This entire project is not about pride or loyalty; it's about ease to the common user trying to find info on a particular topic. If they're coming here to do research on teams prior to the Expansion Era (and before Finney got a bug up his butt to move the team), if a user sees teams like the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants listed in the current teams' history articles, they would expect continuity throughout the pages of Wikipedia, right? Well, guess their surprise when they learn they missed one team, the Montreal Expos, because it wasn't listed in the red-linked History of the Washington Nationals. If they're 15 years old or younger, they may not associate who the team was before the Nationals nor know there was an NL team in Canada. It's hindering progress based on personal allegiances and that's not conducive to expanding the project out of the public's impression of "misinformation" (a la John Stewart and Stephen Colbert). We need to merge them without bureaucratic bickering and by-gone allegiances standing in the way. (And on a side rant, where were you, Djsasso, and all your friends when they were still in town if you're fighting so hard for their memory now? Maybe more people frequenting the Olympic Stadium before 2003 instead of in 2004 as a "last-ditch effort" would have caused this problem never to happen. I only say that because my team is being threatened, too, and I do my best to support them today before it's too late.) ~~Eagles~~Fan In Tampa 13:07, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

The inconsistency of the Nationals/Expos could also be solved by splitting all the other articles. As for ease of use/navigation, that is easily rectified with hat notes and links in the intro, etc. Wknight94 ^talk 13:32, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

So, make a user click multiple times to finish a story. Brilliant. Because that doesn't frustrate any computer user at all. Better yet: why not break each year up for each team that ever existed and talk extensively about it. I know those exist now, but get rid of the main article page regarding their overview. I mean, as it has pointed out already, having a summary page "causes important information to get cut from articles." ~~Eagles~~Fan In Tampa 13:47, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Oh noes, they have to click a whole one time to get to a full article covering 75 years of history (in some cases)? The humanity! (Yes, I can play the sarcasm game too). Forcing multiple 40-year histories into one article just for the sake of consistency, when there is virtually no connection between the two incarnations - like the old Washington Senators and the Minnesota Twins - is what strikes me as "brilliant". Wknight94 ^talk 13:57, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

More users will be frustrated by having to search through irrelevant nationals information when they type in Montreal Expos, or irrelevant Expos information when they type in Washington Nationals than would be upset by clicking a single link to another article. They would be even more frustrated when the information they are looking for is not there for them at all which is what will happen when you have to cut information as part of a merge. -Djsasso (talk) 13:54, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

I am actually not from Montreal. And I believe all teams should be split when they move. To be honest, baseball teams are actually in the minority when it comes to keeping the teams all on one article, alot of other sports split teams when they move. If you are arguing for consistency then it should be the other baseball articles that are split, not the expos merged. The problem with merging articles is that information ends up being lost and or cut for any team. -Djsasso (talk) 13:36, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

I never said you, or anyone else, was from Montreal. I said, as a Canadian, your arguement comes across as inherently biased. It'd be as if, being a Philly native, I started to argue for the A's to be split out from the Oakland and KC teams. Whether it's a fair assumption, I'm not judging that. However, I will say that you are incorrect on your point, because Baltimore Colts goes to a disambig page, where, if you choose the current team from Indy's predecessor, Baltimore Colts (1953-1983), you are redirected to Indy's page anyway. Same goes with St. Louis Cardinals (football), Philadelphia Warriors, Minnesota Lakers...shall I continue? So, if we're trying to be consistent, the NHL pages need to change. And so does this one. ~~Eagles~~Fan In Tampa 13:47, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

My being Canadian doesn't make me anymore biased than you being American and not caring about anything outside of the United States makes you biased. Baseball and Football are exceptions rather than the rule, and even both of those don't always keep the teams together when they move. NBA splits them see Seattle Supersonics. NHL splits them see Hartford Whalers. Plus many other sports outside the big for in North America I can continue with atleast 4 other major sports if you want me to, I can then carry it on to other historical type articles as well. I really don't understand why a baseball fan would want to choose an option which requires valid notable information to be cut from wikipedia. Its in the best interest of baseball fans to have more information about all teams, not less. Most of these combined pages were created when wikipedia was smaller and thus people hadn't gotten around to writing articles for each entity, wikipedia is growing incase you hadn't noticed and as such these articles should not remain stuck where they were 5 years ago, WP:PAPER exists for this very reason. -Djsasso (talk) 13:54, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) I'm a Canadian & feel the Expos/Nationals franchise should be treated as such (via merger). Consitancy across the board for all 30 MLB franchises. GoodDay (talk) 22:01, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Plan in the works to separate anyway?

On the Expos talk page, there is apparently a plan developing to split out ALL team articles without any prior discussion. I thought we all should be prepared for this. -Dewelar (talk) 17:55, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

A really bad idea to split out all these articles. Spanneraol (talk) 18:02, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Horribly bad. I see an issue in that there are probably a lot of editors who don't normally look at baseball looking at this article and saying "Oh, it should be like hockey". It's going to create an issue. I'm totally opposed to splitting the 29 franchises that are currently in line with the status quo. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 18:20, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Why is it horrible? There are actually guidelines and policies that encourage pages to be split when they get big enough. Can people actually list some actual problems that are caused by splitting out articles when they get big enough? Or is this purely a case of digging ones heals in because you don't like that other people think you should change because that is what it looks like to be honest. And I don't mean that as an attack, just stating how it looks. To be honest your status quo is against alot of principles of wikis. -Djsasso (talk) 18:23, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

The issue is not about "splitting out articles that get too big" but about keeping the continuity of the franchise in one place.. splitting out history sections into separate pages for space reasons is a different issue. If I want to read about the history of the Dodgers, I don't want to pretend the team started in 1958.. I want to read about the whole history from 1884 to the present, preferably on one page. Spanneraol (talk) 18:43, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

It's not really a different issue, this is precisely the issue, articles grow get bigger and then you cut them along "bright lines", moving of a team being the most obvious bright line. As for continuity, its not that hard to have continuity, you create links to other articles, of which there are many ways to do this. One example is Template:Evolution of the Toronto Maple Leafs which you can place on the page. 100 years of history or however many should not be restricted to the 65k limit that pages hold just for the sake of ease. -Djsasso (talk) 18:53, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

It's horrible because it's dismantling history. Sure, consensus can change, but right now some are trying to do it forcibly. It doesn't work that way. I'm not digging in my heels, my feet have been buried since this argument started, and I'm firmly planted against moving these articles. The arguments presented for splitting have done nothing to sway me. If anything, the team histories should be done like the History of the New York Giants series, split by years or eras, but they should all follow the "History of..." format. Splitting franchises arbitrarily is useless in my eyes. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 18:46, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

How is it dismantling history? If anything it makes it easier to have more historical information. And why is calling it "History of..." a better way of naming them? One would think the most appropriate name of an article would be that of the team at the time. -Djsasso (talk) 18:53, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Why can't we read about the whole history of the team on one page? Sure you can split the "history of" article off from the main team page but you that page should have the whole history. You don't need separate team pages for each version of a team... It's confusing and leads to multiple clicks being needed to track a team. Spanneraol (talk) 18:58, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Because WP:SPLIT and WP:Summary style require you to split the page once it gets large enough, or it requires you to cut information out to fall into ideal size. Obviously cutting out important information is not something that people would want to do I am assuming. Thus you split the page into two. In order to avoid being arbitrary in where you split that page you use a major defining moment. For a sports franchise there really isn't a more defining moment than a team moving from one city to another. Ideally some of this very old franchises would have a large number of pages on their history. (Even ones who haven't moved). That of course is the ideal and unlikely to be reached any time soon. -Djsasso (talk) 19:02, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

In particular this quote from WP:Summary style sums it up somewhat. "The length of a given Wikipedia article tends to grow as people add information to it. This cannot go on forever: very long articles would cause problems. So we must move information out of articles periodically. In general, information should not be removed from Wikipedia: that would defeat the purpose of the contributions. So we must create new articles to hold the excised information." -Djsasso (talk) 19:05, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

That doesn't mean you create NEW articles about different teams... If the history sections of the team pages are split out into separate articles (some already are) I don't think any of them go over the size limit. So you'd have the History of articles separate from the franchise articles... and that solves the space issue without splitting the franchise into separate franchise articles. Spanneraol (talk) 19:19, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Sure it does. If someone writes a big long 60k article of FA quality about the Brooklyn Dodgers, it is already too large to place into the LA Dodgers page. There is absolutely no reason to not just go straight to a new article instead of merging and then splitting right away. Team Pages/History Pages in most situations are technically the same thing. On active teams of course they are gong to have a current roster and standings etc on them which would differ from extinct versions of teams, but all the other information is still history. Just because an article is called Montreal Expos doesn't make it a seperate franchise article, that is why on the Nationals page you would summarize some information about the expos and on the expos page you would have the history about the expos. The franchise article would be the Nationals page and the History page would be the Expos page, or atleast the expos part of the history. -Djsasso (talk) 19:29, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) I came to a realization why I'm so adamantly opposed to this, beyond just consistency. Doing the split this way means that, in essence, there will no longer be articles that address these franchises as continuous existing entities. These entities have meaning to baseball fans that, perhaps, they do not to hockey fans. Right now, as it stands, all existing franchises have pages like this except one, the Nationals. Washington Nationals is not really about the Nationals. It is about the Nationals as they have existed since 2005. Their history as the Expos is barely even mentioned. It's a sad state of affairs, really, because baseball is, and always has been, steeped in tradition more than any other American sport. As a Twins fan, I am proud to have the great Walter Johnson be part of our history. Stripping the Senators out of the Twins franchise page is like taking a part of the team's history away. THAT is, at least in part, what is lost by splitting things up in the way that is proposed. -Dewelar (talk) 19:25, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

But we aren't suggesting that all information about the expos be removed from the nats either, quite the opposite, summary style dictates that you put a summary of the most important information on the main page, so in your twins article you would have a small section summarizing its time as the Senators and then you put the more detailed information on its own page. I am in no way saying the Nationals page is written the best it could be, there should be a summary on that page as their time of expos that covers the most important moments of the franchise, which a link to the expanded information. This is how summary style is done in all sorts of topics beyond sports. -Djsasso (talk) 19:33, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

The current version of the club would be what treats the franchise as a continuous entity, Calgary Flames is an FA example of how this is done. -Djsasso (talk) 19:37, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

I looked at that article. It's a lot like the current Nationals article, in that it's pretty much an "oh-by-the-way-this-team-used-to-be-in-Atlanta" thing. Uh-uh. -Dewelar (talk) 20:08, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

To be fair it only spent 6 years in Atlanta so its section would be smaller than one for a 35 year existance of the Expos as there is less history to write about. My main point was I can see clear continuity of the franchise here. I don't think the previous chunk of history has been completely taken away from the team as you maintain, its meerly summarized and put on another page so that more information can be included. If you were to merge the entire Atlanta article into the Calgary article for example the article would be unwieldy. -Djsasso (talk) 20:30, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

I consider a lot of baseball history to be geography-based. I don't figure how people in Minnesota feel a connection to Walter Johnson. Has Walter Johnson ever physically been in Minnesota? How many Minnesotans ever saw him pitch? The only practical connection between Walter Johnson and Minnesota is that someone who purchased the team Johnson used to be on decided to move the team to Minnesota. That's it. I used to leave near Hartford, CT and watched the Hartford Whalers from time to time. I don't even know where they moved to, let alone feel any connection to the franchise now. Do San Franciscans go ga-ga over Mel Ott? Does anyone in San Francisco even know who Mel Ott was? Wknight94 ^talk 19:52, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

That is pretty much how I see it as well, the connection is to the city, not the legal entity. Fans of teams that move rarely continue to be a fan of the new team. And fans of the new team rarely care about the old team. But that is all POV I suppose. -Djsasso (talk) 20:00, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

And that's why I say "baseball fans" and not "Twins fans" or "Giants fans" or what have you. Certainly I don't consider myself an average Twins fan, in that I spent a grand total of four years in Minneapolis in my life. Being a fan of a team may be geography based, but being a fan of a sport is not. -Dewelar (talk) 20:08, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Split all MLB franchise articles. The 'Seattle Pilots', the 2 'Washington Senators', the 'Brooklyn Dodgers' etc, need more recognition. GoodDay (talk) 20:11, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Without a rationale, that's unhelpful. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:21, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, I don't see how a failure of a merge proposal between 2 articles is the same thing as a consensus for dismantling 29 others. They are two very different things. - Masonpatriot (talk) 20:34, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

If you don't mind another voice chiming in… I'm not a member of any of the sports projects, but I've been watching this discussion with interest. I think one of the difficulties in trying to decide this issue based on what to do with the Expos/Nationals is that it's so recent — the Expos history and content overwhelms anything that you could create about the Nationals. I've looked at a few other examples, the Calgary Flames example noted above being one of them. In that case, where the team was in Atlanta for a while but has been in Calgary far longer, I think those two articles handle it pretty well. It gives a summary of the time in Atlanta in the Calgary article, but links off to a longer article about Atlanta for the full picture. The Dallas Stars article is much the same. It summarizes the team's time in Minnesota and links off to a longer article about Minnesota for the full picture. The Minnesota article ends by transitioning into the move to Dallas, and then the Dallas article picks up where it left off.
On the flipside, look at the Memphis Grizzlies article. A very short time in Vancouver at the beginning, and that's all been summarized right in the Memphis article and doesn't link off anywhere. It might be possible to write a more fulsome history about the Vancouver Grizzlies era, and then that could be split off as a separate article, but it works well as it stands until someone wants to take on that task.
Finally, I looked at one baseball example, the San Francisco Giants. I don't know if that's a good example of the approach many seem to want followed, but it's the one that came to mind first. That article links off to an article about the history of the franchise. I think what I expected was that it would be more heavily focused on the team's time in New York. However, it appears to me that there's almost exactly as much history about both the New York period and the San Francisco period in both articles — while the words may be different, there's not really been much split out and separated, or summarized in the main article. So you end up with two articles that are about the complete franchise, the difference being that one of them doesn't contain information about the current roster.
So, what am I saying. I think I'm saying that I'd like to see an article about the Montreal Expos, that talks about how they came to be, goes in depth through their time in Montreal, talks about how things wound down there and what happened to the franchise (linking over to the Washington Nationals article), and then provides some perspective on the post-Montreal era (how much history has been recognized since the move, etc.). I'd similarly like to see an article about the Washington Nationals, one that gives a good and decent-sized overview of the Montreal era (linking off to the Montreal Expos article), talks a bit about the history of baseball in Washington, how it came to be chosen as the place to where the franchise should be moved, and then continues the in-depth history up to the current day. 30 years from now, assuming the franchise hasn't collapsed under the weight of mismangagement or been moved to Las Vegas, maybe I'll feel differently. But right now, I think this is the right solution.
Just my two cents, or one-and-a-half cents Canadian. Yes, for full disclosure, I am Canadian, I was an Expos fan growing up, and I think MLB handled things disastrously. However, I am more of a Blue Jays fan and — most importantly — a Wikipedian. I provide the thoughts above not out of any inability to let go of the team, but because I honestly believe this is the best solution in this case, and the most user-friendly for readers who are looking to find out the most information possible about the franchise. Mlaffs (talk)

lol, all of this handwringing over nothing. There is no plan to split out the articles regardless, so you can relax, Delwar. As much as it makes sense to me for any number of reasons, I don't think anyone has the desire to waste their time researching and writing a history that nobody here cares much about, and will fight to the death to revert anyway. For my part, my comment about writing a pretty good article on the Seattle Pilots was intended to serve as an example of what could be done, not what would be done. I think you guys are unnecessarily limiting yourselves and cheating baseball's history in the process, but I have no desire to alter the status quo. And that, obviously, includes how the Expos are handled. Reso lute 02:41, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Steroids in the lede?

I've noticed that the pages for Sammy Sosa and Alex Rodriguez discuss steroids in the article lede, but the pages for Manny Ramirez and Barry Bonds don't. It should be one way or the other for all four. Which way should we go? --Muboshgu (talk) 17:30, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't know about Manny, since he didn't actually take steroids, but Bonds definitely should. Just my opinion, though. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 17:45, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Not that there should be consistency on this particular issue, but WP:LEDE is pretty clear that the lede must summarize the whole article, "including any notable controversies". Abductive (talk) 17:46, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Manny tested positive in 2003. --Muboshgu (talk) 18:07, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh. Well, go for it, then. Apparently Papi did too, so have fun. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 18:18, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok. Keep an eye on me though, lest my true feelings of those damned Red Sox comes through. --Muboshgu (talk) 19:57, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Me!? Policing someone who hates the Red Sox almost as much as I do!? Not the best course of action... KV5 (Talk • Phils) 18:18, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, I probably hate the Yanks as much as you hate the Sox, Muboshgu, so maybe we keep an eye on each other ;). Masonpatriot (talk) 18:37, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Accent marks and DEFAULTSORT

As a sorting gnome, I've recently stumbled on some baseball folks cleaning up articles where the subject has an accented character in their name. I'd like to point out to a more general audience that, while the article text should have the appropriate accenting, the DEFAULTSORT (and any special sort keys) should ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS have the non-accented versions of the character. Doing otherwise causes the articles to mis-sort. See WP:NAMESORT, particularly the (currently) 3rd bullet point of WP:MCSTJR. Studerby (talk) 19:53, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Duly noted. --Muboshgu (talk) 19:56, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

2004 Boston Red Sox season

Someone is making a mess of this season page, writing about the steroid use almost blog-like... I'm not sure this should be on the page at all but it certainly needs to be rewritten if it's gonna be there. Spanneraol (talk) 18:16, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

I rv'd a lot of them... you're correct, it was written like a blog and became a posing place for other opinions from around the net. The issue should be addressed but not in that format. - Masonpatriot (talk) 18:32, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

In order to avoid an edit war and/or running afoul of 3RR, if any of you could take a look at 2004 Boston Red Sox season and provide some more looks ad perspective it would be helpful. The most recent editor who reverted my edit if a brand new user and has only made edits to that article. The issue needs to be addressed but not in the way initially presented, as Spanneraol noted above. Thanks. - Masonpatriot (talk) 20:56, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Since the testing took place in 2003, isn't this information more appropriate for articles related to 2003? Isaac Lin (talk) 21:57, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Not necessarily. A lot of the coverage is slanted toward both 2003 and 2004 because of the Sox' World Series win. I've tried to do some re-wording for formatting purposes. Hopefully we can keep this from getting blown out of proportion. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:31, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

But it shouldn't be left out of the 2003 article, right? I appreciate the interest in the 2004 team, but I fear that every single article for an event with one of the players testing positive will gain an extra section, giving it undue attention. Maybe there could be a category that can just be added to any related articles? Isaac Lin (talk) 22:45, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

I would say that none of this belongs on team-season articles at all. Individual player articles, yes, but unless the team itself is involved somehow, then no. Otherwise, every team-season article of the last 25-30 years is going to have a section like this. -Dewelar (talk) 23:20, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

I would tend to agree with Dewelar that the information should not be included on the page. I'd like to point out that the guy that wrote most of that stuff admitted on the talk page that he is a Yankees fan that is still mad about losing to the Sox that season... and is aparently blaming all that on steroids.. despite the fact that several of the 2004 Yanks have been linked to steroids also... In any event this is all pov stuff and should be left off the page. Spanneraol (talk) 00:31, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Our next article to improve: No-hitter

The Article Improvement Drive voting phase is now over, with the result being the article on the no-hitter. This will remain the AID article until we can get it to GAN status or editing stagnates. Wizardman 03:47, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Stat lists

There are a couple of things that have bugged me a little regarding some of the stat lists (List of top 500 Major League Baseball home run hitters, for one of many examples). I feel as though the "real time" updates to the stat lists are not helpful, as I have found that more often than not the edits are incomplete after each night's games and do not reconcile to the dates listed on the top of the articles. Additionally, I think that making an edit for each change in a list isn't necessary as the sheer amount of edits makes it difficult to go back and look at older versions of the article (which I've had to do on a few occasions). I propose changing the date line on the lists to something like: "The stats are updated as of the start of play on August 1, 2009"

This would imply that updated are made on a daily basis at most (and since WP is not a stat warehouse, it's fine if they aren't updated daily). The whole thing may seem like a small issue to most, but I feel as though the "real-time" edits takes away from the quality of the articles and confuses WP with stat aggregators like baseball-reference, ESPN and MLB.com. Our aim shouldn't be to replicate those sites.

While I only regularly edit two or three lists (out of the many that exist), there are some formatting issues that need to be resolved to establish a common format across all of them. Some do a straight list of the top 300 or 500 for a particular stat, while others pick an arbitrary number and list all players with more than a certain amount. I think the project should endorse one or the other (my vote is with the former). Any changes, of course, would need to be reflected in the list titles as well.

I just wanted to see what opinions there were on this, if any, before I made any changes. Thanks. - Masonpatriot (talk) 05:40, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with this in theory, but I'm not sure how we'd prevent the problem from happening in practice. -Dewelar (talk) 14:54, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Concur with Dewelar on both counts. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 16:51, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I understand what you're saying, it's tough to patrol. I may give it a shot on a couple lists and see if it's doable. If it's a losing battle, so be it. Any thoughts on the second issue: List names and scope? Thanks again. - Masonpatriot (talk) 20:23, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Regardless of what we do, it's going to be arbitrary, so I'd say we go with a solid, round-number cutoff instead of an arbitrary total. It's cleaner. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 20:29, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure which one that vote favors, KV -- a round-number, as in "List of people with more than [round number x] floo", or "List of top [round number x] floo-doers" :-D . I think you mean the latter, in which case I agree, because then we can use the same round number for most lists. -Dewelar (talk) 20:40, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Sorry if I was unclear. I do mean a "List of top x00 blankers". KV5 (Talk • Phils) 11:36, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good... I'll after some of the stuff I'm working on now over at WP:UNI I will take a crack at this. Thanks for the input. - Masonpatriot (talk) 13:51, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Stat Boxes

Does anyone hate the long stat boxes that are at the bottom of players pages (e.i. Tim Lincecum) that lists all of their stats. You can just go on MLB.com or ESPN.com and get their stats. There are even links at the bottom that bring you to those pages. It think is just a waste of room and is stupid/confusing - see WP:NOT#STATS. Ositadinma (talk) 20:17, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you. It's gotten out of hand, especially in cases like Lincecum's. --Muboshgu (talk) 20:49, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I thought this came up before and we agreed not to do the stat boxes? In any event, I don't like them and agree with Ositadinma on this issue.--Spanneraol (talk) 21:01, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't care for these, either. Certainly there should never be college/minor league versions as there are on Lincecum's page. Lincecum's also violate WP:ACCESS -- I can't even read the totals rows. -Dewelar (talk) 21:13, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Hate 'em. Good riddance. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 21:45, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. When I come across them, I'll start nixing them. - Masonpatriot (talk) 21:49, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I don't dislike them, but I can see where they could annoy some people. It's a convenient way to see all the stats in one spot. Maybe a compromise can be reach, like say, make the boxes collapsible, or the entire section collapsible.Neonblak ^talk - 22:53, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There doesn't appear to be a desire for compromise on this issue, which I've tried to do. The haters want them all gone, even for the current year which seems completely excessive in deleting and which I find appropriate to show, along with a summary total. Katydidit (talk) 21:02, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

The stat block exists on a number of the highest-rated current baseball player pages, such as Luis Castillo (baseball), Mariano Rivera, Chris Young (pitcher), and Tim Lincecum (as well as the FA page for the former pitcher J. R. Richard and the GA page for Jackie Robinson), and is therefore I feel appropriate. If you were to delete the stats boxes from those FA and GA pages, I would imagine opposition would be voiced. The Wiki standard is subjective, and calls for tables where necessary (Specifically, what it does say is: "Long and sprawling lists of statistics may be confusing to readers and reduce the readability and neatness of our articles..... In cases where this may be necessary, .... consider using tables to enhance the readability of lengthy data lists"), and I feel these stats fit within what is acceptable under the standard. IMHO, a violation of this directive would be the case if, for example, one were to copy and past every single baseball reference stat, and that's simply not the case here. Interestingly, I've never been the first to insert those stat boxes on a baseball player page. I do, however, find them to be helpful, and not overly long/sprawling/confusing. While it is true that a person accessing the page on a computer could click through to baseball reference, for example, that is not the case with someone using a hard copy printout of the page, so it is helpful to have it in the Wiki article (and of course the same information that can be clicked through to is in the infobox -- yet we do not delete all infoboxes ... presumably for the same reason), which I had already pointed out to Ositadinma when he made his above point previously.--Ethelh (talk) 19:16, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

A few problems with your arguments...

1) The goal of boxes like that is, precisely, to convey information that is not conveyed within the text and yet is important to the article. Ergo, if the stats which are important to the article are well-represented in the prose of FA's and GA's, then the stat boxes could be eliminated entirely without a reasonable argument against it.

First of all, the info box conveys information that in all cases is already conveyed by the text. It does so redundantly. The team name, the birth date, the location of birth, and often the teams played for and the years played, as well as awards, are I expect without fail (or nearly without fail) mentioned in the articles. I don't have a problem with that, but that suggests that your above statement as to the goal of the infobox is not quite accurate (and I would be interested in your source for making it; is that simply your assumption, stated as a fact, or is it written somewhere in Wiki lore?). In any event, one could say the same of the stat box. a) The stat box can convey information that is not conveyed by the text, and yet is important to the article. b) And as I said before, if the "but one can click through to Baseball Reference" argument is to have any weight, one must it would seem apply it to the infoboxes as well. Surely all, or nearly all, of the information in the infobox (save the photo) is contained in the Baseball Reference entry, which one can click to.--Ethelh (talk) 04:00, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

It seems you are arguing against a misinterpretation of my statement. Let me turn it around a bit: what do you think is the purpose of an Infobox? Not of a stat box embedded in the body of an article, but the box that is used on most biography articles? -Dewelar (talk) 17:45, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

2) WP:NOT#PAPER

No one said it is a paper. Or Baseball Reference -- if it were, it would have many more stats than the few lines of the infobox. And, of course, the same (to the extent it is relevant) can be said with regard to the infoboxes. The bytes of the photos and the infobox eat up space (as doe the few lines in the stats box). It doesn't appear to me that the amount is onerous, and it is limited -- again, unlike Baseball Reference.--Ethelh (talk) 04:00, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Also, WP:NOT#STATS. Prose should be favored over pure statistical tables where possible. -Dewelar (talk) 17:45, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I would note that NOT#Stats isn't really applicable in this situation, as long as the statistics are not indiscriminate then they are ok to use/ Since these are stats about a specific player and are clearly relevant to the article they are not indiscriminate. Also its been shown time and again the question "Why are these people notable." And the answer of course is that they are notable for playing baseball and for the statistics they achieved while doing so. Thus to omit the statistics is omitting the reason they are notable. I would also note that it is impossible to write out an entire career worth of stats in prose, not#stats doesn't say to use prose instead of stats, its says to only use stats where appropriate. -Djsasso (talk) 14:31, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

3) You confuse the nature of an infobox with the nature of the body of an article.

Actually, I'm equating the listing of statistics and other material that are contained in the infobox (as well as in Baseball Reference) with the listing of statistics contained in the stat box. Both are part of the article, with the infobox typically place at the top of the article, and the stat box being placed after (and therefore not interfering with) the prose.--Ethelh (talk) 04:00, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

At the risk of repeating myself, you confuse the nature of an infobox with the nature of the body of an article. The infobox is part of an article, in that it provides an introduction to the subject, but it is not part of the body of the article. Quite simply, it serves a different purpose, and therefore has different standards for inclusion. Equating the two is therefore an invalid basis for an argument. -Dewelar (talk) 17:45, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Stat tables should be placeholders for good prose, not a replacement for it. -Dewelar (talk) 00:20, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Hear, hear! Well stated. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 00:43, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

My previous comment may have sounded a little too glib and/or final, but I do agree with Dewelar's points and think that WP is not a substitute for baseball-reference and sites of that ilk. Both serve very different purposes. - Masonpatriot (talk) 00:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Which is why the vast majority of the stats in Baseball Reference are not included in the stats tables in the FA and GA articles of Luis Castillo (baseball), Mariano Rivera, Chris Young (pitcher), Tim Lincecum, J. R. Richard, and Jackie Robinson).

Clear case of WP:NOT#STATS. Ditch em. oknazevad (talk) 01:49, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm having this same problem at Albert Pujols, only a single user keeps putting the tables back in. The page is extremely slow as is. Wizardman 15:12, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Maybe if you get a modern computer it won't take so long to load. How come my computer has no problems with the page? Katydidit (talk) 17:18, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

My guess is that the main reason the page is slow to load is because of the 16 navboxes at the bottom of the article. Am I the only one who thinks this is excessive? BRMo (talk) 04:11, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, neither the navboxes or the stat boxes slow things down for me, personally, as there are plenty other reasons to object to the stat tables. Though the navbox issue is a bit off-topic here, I think most of the navboxes on the Pujols article are legit, but does anyone really see any value in a navbox touting the 2001 Topps All-Star Rookie Roster? I mean... really? - Masonpatriot (talk) 13:59, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, that one's definitely overkill. -Dewelar (talk) 14:21, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

You can direct them here to join the discussion; meanwhile, I'll add that page to my watchlist to help out. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 16:17, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

So the consenus is that we get rid of the stat boxes because Ethelh is just rambling on about her defence when a majority of people on wiki don't like them. Ositadinma (talk) 21:44, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

When I removed the stat boxes from Lincecum's page, it went down from 33k to 24k. I think we should make this a consensus decision. --Muboshgu (talk) 21:51, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I'll add to the consensus for removal. Link to stat sites (they're ususally more up to date for current players), and just highlight the important ones in the prose.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:10, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

This issue is still persisting at Albert Pujols. I've asked for a more specific discussion to take place either there or here. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:22, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I have reverted the page again. At this point, I am concerned that Katydidit may not be acting in good faith. Certainly she has misunderstood the status of the consensus, if her edit summaries are to be taken at face value. -Dewelar (talk) 22:44, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I can agree on many of the players' pages it got to be too much. However, I don't see the harm in having the current year's stats only and a career summary line instead of having a line for every one of his playing years. But now, people have gone overboard on deleting everything and not allowing the present year's stats and I think for active players that is a mistake. For inactive players, a career summary line is enough. For active players, having their current year line doesn't seem excessive to me, and for those who complain about the time to load, you might want to look at your own computer's age and technical specs to either add more memory or get a faster processor, or both. Don't let Lincecum's original overboard get you to make the mistake the other way. BTW, three or four people who hate the stat boxes with such an irrational passion (because of only one or two players who had too much on their page) is hardly a vast consensus of the entire Wiki community or even of the baseball community to delete all the boxes, including the current year. Katydidit (talk) 20:50, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Certainly 3 or 4 people aren't a consensus. However, Wikipedia:NOT#STATS is part of policy, so I'm going to assume there was some kind of consensus for it.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:06, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

The current years stats can be seen on many of the team season pages. Putting them on individual players pages and then constantly updating them seems to be an excessive and unnecessary task.Spanneraol (talk) 20:57, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I read that Wikipedia:NOT#STATS section: "Excessive listing of statistics. Long and sprawling lists of statistics may be confusing to readers and reduce the readability and neatness of our articles. In addition, articles should contain sufficient explanatory text to put statistics within the article in their proper context for a general reader. In cases where this may be necessary, (e.g. Opinion polling for the United States presidential election, 2008), consider using tables to enhance the readability of lengthy data lists." It says excessive, and after the former cuts made, it no longer could be considered "excessive" and it even says: "consider using tables." Katydidit (talk) 23:26, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, use tables to enhance readability. It doesn't say anything about tables being necessary or required. It also says that statistics "may be confusing and reduce readability". That is the issue at hand here. The infobox has a place for statistics that can (and should) enhance the text, as stated in the above-mentioned policy. It should be used. This does not mean that we should cram every statistic into the infobox. It means that we are to use the most pertinent statistics. Example: Ryan Howard hit a triple. Who cares? He's a home-run hitter. If I really need to know how many triples he hit in 2008, I can go to the season page and find out. I have no problem with a summary table, but only for a stable article. A BLP for an active player is not stable. This is why we need to pick a stable point, meaning the end of a season or the All-Star break. We've done this with manager and season lists; it should also apply to articles. I'll offer the stable FAs of Lee Smith and Sandy Koufax as examples. They don't have this issue because they are no longer active. Consideration for this has to be given. Wikipedia is not paper; it doesn't have to cover everything conceivable, and shouldn't. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 00:23, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm bumping this thread because the Albert Pujols stat box issue is still going on. If you care to be involved, please see the discussion here. Thanks. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 16:54, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Note: This issue is still persisting. Further input from other users is welcome. We have reached the step where mediation may be necessary, and I will post a notice here under a new section if and when that happens. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 02:32, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Template:Bullpen

Is this template really necessary? I'm sure it could be used in an edit summary or on the talk page instead. But I'm no expert on copyright so someone else might have a different opinion. Borgarde (talk) 10:42, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

It's not necessary because BR Bullpen is not a reliable source, and therefore shouldn't be used as a reference, period. -Dewelar (talk) 14:40, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Concur. Should be deleted. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 15:18, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

But before it's deleted, someone should go through this list and stub them all. There are an alarming number of links to Baseball Ref Bullpen here. I once started stubbing a bunch of those articles but my attention span gave out. Anyone else want to take a shot? Wknight94 ^talk 15:26, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Stubbing those articles removes lots of good information.. would be preferable to locate better sources for the articles to avoid losing helpfull info.Spanneraol (talk) 23:30, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

...which of course never happens. Wknight94 ^talk 01:17, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Rickey Henderson, Babe Ruth, Pete Rose and I'm sure there are others

It's always been my opinion that the infobox was supposed to offer an overview of a baseball playe's career; detail is left for the article. Babe Ruth's infobox lists him as a "Right fileder / Left fielder / Pitcher." I find that silly. In my opinion it should say, "Pitcher / Outfielder." Number one, it's more correct cronologically, and number two, do we really need to split up the outfield positions on an infobox? I could understand putting "Left fielder" for someone like Barry Bonds or Ted Williams or someone else who spent his entire career at one outfield position, but when he's played more than one outfield position, splitting it up like that is a little bit too much information and just makes the infobox look cumbersome.

Rickey Henderson's infobox poses a different problem for me: his shows him as a Left fielder. He was the everyday starting center fielder when he was with the Yankees, and he played enough of the other two outfield positions to make the title "Left fielder" inaccurrate for him. "Outfielder" is the best, most accurate title for him.

In both cases, I've changed the infoboxes to reflect the titles that I find more accurate, and in both cases, I've dealt with argumentative editors wanting to war with me. I never messed with Pete Rose's infobox, but is it really necessary to list EVERY infield position except shortstop instead of just calling him an "Infielder"?--Johnny Spasm (talk) 12:50, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

After considering it, I agree that I don't think Ruth's infobox should list RF, LF and P. However, I don't agree with listing it chronologically. I think it should be order of precedence, and Ruth is clearly thought of as an outfielder before he's thought of as a pitcher. Henderson... was more of a LF than CF to be sure (he hated playing CF), but I could go either way on that. To say IF for Pete Rose, though, would indicate he played all IF positions, but he didn't play SS, so I think that needs to be spelled out. --Muboshgu (talk) 19:53, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd say Ruth should be OF/P (he played roughly equal time in two different outfield spots and played a few games at the third), Henderson should be LF (significantly most of his time was in left) and Rose should stay as he is now (for reasons cited above).Spanneraol (talk) 20:43, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

This would have to be a case-by-case basis. Babe Ruth = Outfielder, Spent roughly equal time at left and right. Pitcher I can understand putting in, no strong opinion on that. Rickey Henderson = Left fielder, where he played over 80% of his time. Pete Rose = well, I have no idea. Over 500 games at Left field, right field, first base, third base, and second base. He sounds like a utility player, but does anyone actually call him that? Wizardman 00:59, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't think we can legitimately call him a utility player, because that takes you to an article that says, essentially, this guy's not good enough to be an everyday player (defining a utility player in baseball). Obviously, as the all-time hit leader, he was more than good enough. You could go "corner infielder/corner outfielder" to be clear (and you could use "corner outfielder" for Ruth as well), or you could just go "infielder/outfielder" for Rose, treating the infobox as an introduction (which it is) and then explaining in the lead and the prose of the article that he didn't play SS. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 01:12, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if you want to say "corner..." as it might confuse some people. Rose played over 600 games at 2B anyway; he's really all over the place. Seems to me it can be pretty vague as that's all the infobox needs to be; if someone wants to know what position Babe Ruth played "Outfielder/pitcher" should satisfy them. Rose could be "multiple" or something to that effect; having played LF, CF, RF, 1B, 3B, 2B. Henderson did play all three outfield positions at some point, so it would be fair to say "Outfielder", unless there's an argument that only 27 games in LF is too few. I've never liked getting too specific in the infobox... that's why the article is there. black ngold29 15:39, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

The basic problem is the underlying assumption that all 3 outfield positions are alike. They're not. Maybe the difference is not as pronounced as the infield positions, but the activities and skills needed vary across the outfield, especially centerfield. I expect the reason baseball cards and stats sheets lumped them into one is because the outfield positions are more likely to be shifted around than the infield positions are. To me, the fact that Ruth played right and left and NOT center (except for a few times) is significant. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 15:58, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know at what point a concensus can be determined, but I think we are pretty close to a concensus on Ruth. I find the best term for Rose to be "Infielder / Outfielder", but I could be convinced to leave it the way it is. As far as Rickey goes, a point I made on Rickey's talk page that I will make again here is that to call him an "Outfielder" would not be inaccurrate, regardless of which of the 3 outfield positions he spent the majority of his time in. I find "Left Fielder" inaccurarate as he played Center while he was with the Yankees. If we NEEDED to get specific, then I would call him a left fielder, however, there is no need to get specific in an infobox, and "Outfielder" seems to me to be the most correct term.--Johnny Spasm (talk) 00:54, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

He actually split time between left and right when with the Yankees (played both a couple seasons each). So it should be Left fielder. Wizardman 01:03, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Rickey you mean, right? Is it too early for Ruth to be altered and anyone disagree with "Infielder / Outfielder / Manager" for Rose?--Johnny Spasm (talk) 11:50, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

If you switch Rose to simply "Infielder / Outfielder / Manager" instead of listing the many infield positions, that would be a consistent approach and would justify listing Henderson as "Outfielder" and Ruth as "Outfielder / Pitcher". This contrasts with Willie Mays and Joe DiMaggio, for example, who are known primarily as centerfielders. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 11:54, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Of course, Mays played a good deal at first base late in his career. Where would we draw the line about recognizing him as CF/1B? Rlendog (talk) 19:57, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

True. But what of the fact that Ruth is more known as a RF than LF, and that Henderson is more known as an LF than CF? Should that play a role? --Muboshgu (talk) 15:41, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

No more than that Ernie Banks is more known as a SS than as a 1B, despite playing more games at the latter position. -Dewelar (talk) 16:41, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

That's right. I'm playing devil's advocate here. Banks is best listed as SS/1B based on the order of precedence, since he was SS before 1B, and is better known for playing SS. --Muboshgu (talk) 16:51, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Convention seems to be to list the most frequently played primary position first. Hence 1B listed first, and for Ruth, pitcher listed last. In the case of someone like Cal Ripken, Jr., as SS/3B, it happens to work out either way. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 17:24, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

On the other hand, they've got Alex Rodriguez listed ONLY as 3B, despite the fact that he's still played the significant majority of his career as SS.[4] The convention seems to be to list the primary current position, for active players. Then once he retires, he should be listed as SS / 3B, or 3B / SS, whichever it works out to be. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 17:28, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it should be only by the order the person played a position. Arguably, Pujols is more of a 1B than 3B or OF, so when the time comes that should be listed first. Ruth was more of an OF than SP. I agree that A-Rod should have both positions listed when he retires, the order TBD. --Muboshgu (talk) 17:59, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

This opens the can of worms about playing different positions during different phases of a career. Ruth is regarded as one of top lefthanders of the 1910s, but once he switched to the Yankees, he became an everyday player and only pitched 5 more times in the last 16 years of his career (and won all 5 of them, I might add). Rose spent fairly distinctive periods of time at each of his several positions, as did Henderson, it seems. To list Rose as simply "infielder" is a truthful summary, but suggests he was a utility infielder, a la Paul Popovich, which would be misleading. The dilemma with Ruth is that he played both left and right during the same stretch - but almost never centerfield. So just labeling him as "outfielder" doesn't quite cover it, and "not centerfielder" is kind of silly. In the section above I looked at Ruth's positioning for three different years. Left field is probably the least challenging of the three positions, and it seems that they wanted Ruth in left where possible - but in the ballparks of that era which were "lopsided", they instead opted to put him in the field that required the least mobility - or at least that's how it looks from the stats. What was actually going on there, I couldn't say. Ruth was a big enough star even while still in Boston that he probably had some say in the matter. For example, he wasn't interested in being both a pitcher and an outfielder, so he simply stopped pitching, except for the occasional stunt appearance. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 17:14, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

All good points here. This can get a little tricky. --Muboshgu (talk) 18:00, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I believe that both Rickey's and Ruth's infoboxes should say "Outfielder", but for two completely different reasons: Ruth's should say it because "Leftfielder/ Right fielder / Pitcher" is just overkill, and Rickey's should say it because "Left fielder" is incomplete. Even given the "He played left field most of the time" argument, calling a left fielder an outfielder is not incorrect. As far as Rose goes, I think it should say "Infielder / Outfielder / Manager". I could be convinced to leave the individual infield positions (though I think that is overkill, and not what the infobox is intended for), but even so, "Mgr." needs to be added.--Johnny Spasm (talk) 22:14, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I can agree with this on Ruth and Rose. On Henderson, though, I don't think so. Henderson played 79% of his career games in LF, but only 14% in CF. That's enough of a disparity to say it should be just "Left fielder". -Dewelar (talk) 00:46, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

How many of you out there are familiar with Yankees10? I don't know if he and I have ever agreed on anything, and I'm starting to think that his sole purpose in life is to get on my last nerve. Given that Rose's infobox has the abreviations "OF / 3B / 2B / 1B" on it, I thought it would look best formwise to add "Mgr" at the end. Yankees10 changed it to "Manager". Was it really necessary to do that, and does he do that little annoying crap to everyone? I think we have a concensus on Ruth, and I would love to change his infobox to "Outfielder", but I'm almost certain that Yankees10 will change it back 2 minutes later. Anyway, while I was at it, I made some changes on Rose's entry. It is my understanding that we are supposed to avoid arbitrary lists on these things, so I removed the "MLB records & Acheivments" section on his entry and added it to his infobox under "Highlights". Again, it is my understanding that this is how it's supposed to be done, but he now has a long ass infobox. I figured I'd mention it here before I get bitched at for it later.--Johnny Spasm (talk) 12:04, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Spelling it out is probably better, since the very casual reader might wonder why "of" and "if" are considered "positions" in baseball. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 13:18, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Bugs. They should all be spelled out. -Dewelar (talk) 15:54, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with that, too, however, writing out the name of all the positions Rose played would look silly, and for the sake of consistency, I think it should say "Mgr."--Johnny Spasm (talk) 19:56, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I question whether "Manager" should even be listed as a position. That said, while my preference is that all be spelled out, if it is decided that abbreviations will be used, then the next best situation is that they all be abbreviated. -Dewelar (talk) 01:11, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Manager isn't really a position.Spanneraol (talk) 03:18, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

It's not a position on the baseball diamond, but it's an important position in a baseball organization and an important enough part of their careers to be listed in the infobox, in my opinion. --Muboshgu (talk) 04:15, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Since I know we had this discussion about coaching positions and rejected their inclusion...general manager also? A more important position from a team perspective than a manager, certainly. Shall we list it on the infoboxes of the likes of Gene Michael, Woody Woodward, Al Campanis, and so forth? I suppose, eventually, everyone's box will look like Ron Schueler. -Dewelar (talk) 04:52, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Or, speaking of "Rickeys", check out Branch Rickey, where it says "Catcher/Manager/Executive". As a side note on another topic, note the caption on his 1914 baseball card: "St. Louis - Americans". If he were with Boston, it would have said "Nationals" or "Americans" depending on which team. A subtle illustration that "Americans" was not a team nickname, it was merely descriptive. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 09:14, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, back then the difference between leagues was more important than it is now. --Muboshgu (talk) 13:58, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Ron Schueler looks like hell. Cleaning it up is on my "to do" list, however, I am late for work. I believe manager needs to be in the infobox more often than not, but I guess it would be a case by case thing. Anyone remember Tommy Lasorda or Sparkey Anderson as a player? Granted, the other side of the coin is does anyone remember Ted Williams as a manager? Coach, in my opinion, should only be listed for active coaches.--Johnny Spasm (talk) 09:59, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

I certainly remember Ted Williams as a manager. He led the 1960s version of the Washington Senators [5] to their only winning season before the team transferred to Arlington, TX. There's an interesting chapter on that situation in Montville's book about Teddy Ballgame. Coach is probably not a good position to list, because it's hard to verify. Players have often been recruited to coach on the base lines, and the information would be very hard to come by, and probably often unrecorded. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 11:44, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd agree with that. Manager is important, but maybe not so much for interim managers. It's not as important to Ted Williams as his playing days, while Lasorda's managing was more important than his playing. And coaches should only be listed for active coaches. --Muboshgu (talk) 13:51, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Are we listing active coaches in the info box now? IT is not consistent at all.. Some are listed, some aren't.. some have the team colors & uniform #, some don't... did we ever set a consensus on that? -Spanneraol (talk) 14:59, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

What is the source for coaching info? Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 15:07, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

MLB.com is the main source for coaching info..current coaches are listed on team rosters and they have historical coaching info listed as well for most franchises. Spanneraol (talk) 22:18, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

We all seem to agree, so why does someone keep removing the "Mgr" I've been putting on Pete Rose's site?--Johnny Spasm (talk) 21:51, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe you should ask that user, whoever it is. As far as I can see, though, this discussion's not completed yet. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:01, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Did we agree that it should be "Mgr" instead of "Manager"? I don't recall that. Spanneraol (talk) 22:18, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Neither do I, in reading. However, I do think that if there are enough positions to warrant abbreviation (say three or more), then they should all be abbreviated, and in the same manner. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 22:28, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

As long as the abbreviations have underlying links that explain them to, say, a soccer fan. :) Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 03:10, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I've tried talking to that user, but he is somewhat on the stubborn side. On a different note, anyone care if I remove the Jim gray interview from Pete Rose's entry? I find it fairly insignificant for all the space it is taking,--Johnny Spasm (talk) 09:26, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I think it's relevant and should be mentioned within the section on his gambling, but in only a sentence or two. The entire interview does not need to be quotes in Rose's article to be sure. --Muboshgu (talk) 12:28, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

IMO, I think abbreviations are OK in infoboxes provided they are linked properly. I would also be in favor of limiting position info in the infoboxes to avoid clutter. While I hope we all agree that LF/CF/RF are different positions which players do specialize in, there are problems with getting that specific. How many games does a player have to play in to qualify? If they played 800 games in left, and 100 in right, are they strictly an LF? If consistency is truly at issue, I would recommend that using "OF" is the simplest way out .... let the article discuss the breakdown of what the man played. For Mr. Rose et.al, you could list him as IF, and further breakdown his position playing ability in the article. While not speaking of baseball, I have found too many infoboxes crammed with too much information, which takes away from the box, the article, and the aesthetics. Further, I don't think manager should be listed as a "position". That can easily be added to the leadin of any article to catch anyone's attention. Just my two bits. LonelyBeacon (talk) 18:14, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

LonelyBeacon, just wondering: does your opinion take into account players that were player-managers, as Rose was? KV5 (Talk • Phils) 18:16, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I thought about this a while, and the answer to your question is that yes, it did. I acknowledge that there were important player-managers throughout history, and it in no way belittles the role of manager. My thinking is its just one more thing to put in the infobox that clutters things up. This goes off track a bit, but its almost like you need separate boxes for guys who were primarily known as managers (Lasorda, Cox, LaRussa), and separate boxes for people who happened to briefly manage, but are primarily known as players (Williams, Rose ... very long list). With guys like Torre, Stengel, and Guillen who had significant careers as both, I think you come to a consensus as to which was more significant (in this case I would argue "manager" for all three), and go with that box to keep things neat, and discuss the other side of their careers in the article. I know that's odd, but I reiterate that I am coming off some recent editing where the infoboxes are in some cases coming our to be longer than the article, and the length aside, they don't look good. To follow, (and I can't quote one here ... I'm speaking hypotehtically), would there be a SS/Owner, 1B/scout, OF/pitching coach? I'm just coming from a perspective that in the case of infoboxes, less can be more. Again, my two bits and nothing more than that. LonelyBeacon (talk) 19:07, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough, I just was interested to know. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 19:15, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I assume your view extends to the listing of teams, so it should only include teams that the person played for, and not teams the person managed? I think the two should be consistent. As I believe managing an MLB team is an important phase of a person's baseball career, personally I think the manager role and the list of teams managed should be included. Isaac Lin (talk) 19:29, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) I'm not sure this is directed at me or the group, but I would concur with this. LonelyBeacon (talk) 19:41, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm not clear on what you concur with. Do you believe the infobox for a person involved in baseball should not contain a list of teams managed by the person nor the role of manager? If so, then unfortunately we are not in agreement. Isaac Lin (talk) 22:34, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

My fault ... I was not clear. I would say it becomes problematic to include managerial listings. If this is not the consensus of the project, then I would hope it is made clear that it is OK for managerial listing and not other jobs ... otherwise I see a free for all starting with scout, bench coaching, PR jobs, etc. LonelyBeacon (talk) 23:21, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Assuming that the infobox is intended to summarize the game-related aspects of a person's baseball career, then I would say that the manager and general manager roles are significant and relevant, but other roles such as coach and scout are not sufficiently significant, and roles such as VP of sales is related to the business side of the franchise and so not sufficiently relevant. Isaac Lin (talk) 23:34, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Summarize being the key word here, I'm dealing with a goof-ball who keeps reverting the edits I do on Pete Rose's site. It was my understanding that we pretty much had a concensus here as to what his infobox should look like. Apparently, there is one person out there who disagrees with us and thinks his opinion counts more. This also is not the first time I've deal with this person. Someone think you can help me out here?--Johnny Spasm (talk) 02:09, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I have tried to help; I did ask the user to join the discussion, but I don't want to get involved in a revert war. Honestly, you may be better off asking for a third opinion from an unrelated editor. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 02:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The only part of your edits that I revert are your infobox edits and are not consistant with hundreds of other infoboxes, they suck. I just got home from a two week vacation and didnt have time to participate in the discussion. Can someone summarize this discussion for me, I just got home and am too tired to read this--Yankees10 02:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The general discussion, summarized, is currently thus: Consensus may exist to show Babe Ruth as a left and right fielder (as well as a pitcher), not as an "outfielder" because he spent no significant time in CF; however, some compelling arguments have also been made for "outfielder" as well. No consensus currently exists as to whether "manager" is a position to be listed in the infobox. The discussion to whether abbreviations should be used is likely incomplete because it wasn't touched on very much. I put forth the suggestion that players whose infoboxes necessitate three or more positions should use abbreviations simply due to length concerns. Some editors have also said that they prefer them to be spelled out, so no consensus currently exists for this.

In addition to the above, I'm just going to drop a WP:CIVIL link here; we can all have mature discussion here, and there is no reason for name-calling or disparaging other people's edits in any form. I am not pointing fingers at anyone; I'm just asking anyone involved to keep their emotions in check, regardless of past or future actions, and to write with a civil keyboard. No need for fight or flight here. KV5 (Talk • Phils) 02:33, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The only information in the edit box I've been changing that-- by your standards-- suck is that I've been going with the abbreviated positions and I've been putting the highlights in chronological order. We seem to have a concensus on one and the other seems like common sense. By the way, I've started cleaning up Ron Schueler's site.--Johnny Spasm (talk) 09:54, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I know I'm a little late to this discussion, but would it be worth doing a straw poll to see where people stand (though I know this may necessitate separate Ruth, Henderson, Rose polls), or just have all the contributors list their thoughts in a nutshell to maybe distill some sort of consensus? Just a thought. I am in favor of including manager/GM roles in the standard infobox since 1) I really don't see where the problem is, visually the boxes look fine with both player and manager info included and 2) there is sufficient flexibility within the infobox to accomodate this type of info (including 6 stat fields that can accomodate managerial records along with playing stats). Maybe some minor changes to reflect the multi-purpose use of the infobox are necessary (adding an optional managerial record field after the stats section?), but why reinvent the wheel and have multiple types of infoboxes, where we either have to choose which one gets used (leaving some information out), or stacking them on top of each other (which is visually unappealing). As far as I'm concerned, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Lastly, I agree with KV5's position regarding abbreviations for multiple positions. Thanks. - Masonpatriot (talk) 13:59, 12 August 2009 (UTC)