Should defunct conferences like the Southwest Conference or Big Eight Conference have their own navboxes? I noticed a while ago that the CUSA navbox is on the SWC page. And if the SWC or Big Eight have navboxes listing the teams as former members, should those pages link to the teams article e.g. Rice Owls? If the answer is yes should the Big XII link to Nebraska, should the SoCon link to Alabama etc.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 18:29, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Bluejay, in one word: No. It's overkill to link all of the former members of a conference. And especially so for the old Southern Conference, which I believe had 40 or 50 members over time. For currently existing conference navboxes, the emphasis should be on the current members, not muddling it up with links to universities that left the conference 83 years ago (like Alabama and SoCon). For defunct conferences like the old Southwest Conference, I seriously doubt whether anachronistic links should be included to the navboxes for the Current conferences where the SWC's former members now compete -- The American Athletic Conference (2), Big XII (5), and SEC (2). All we are doing with these overlinks is contributing to the bottom-of-the-page cruft which already burdens too many of our sports articles per WP:OVERLINK. We should not be trying to link to every tangentially related article, but to the most important related articles. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:54, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
I agree with Dirtlawyer. This is why we have categories for former conference members, and for ones with a really varied history a list (List of former Southern Conference members). That and the various articles on conference realignment provide plenty of context and links to related articles as they already exist. Billcasey905 (talk) 18:59, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Okay fair enough. I don't have an opinion either way it was an observation. But why do we have a CUSA navbox on the bottom of the SWC page? And BTW the SEC navbox and football navbox links these teams UCO2009bluejay (talk) 20:18, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for pointing that out, Bluejay. I have removed the Sewanee, Georgia Tech and Tulane links from the SEC navbox, and removed the SEC football navbox from those team pages. Those teams have not been members of the SEC since 1940, 1964 and 1965, respectively -- 75, 51 and 50 years ago. This history should obviously be discussed in the history sections of the conference and team articles, but we really need to do a better job of policing our navboxes. Again, the operating principle should be we link to the most important articles, not every tangentially related article. Sometimes it is hard to explain editorial judgment to newbies, and even some long-time editors, but I remind everyone that Wikipedia is supposed to be a general interest encyclopedia, not a fan blog, and not a scrapbook of someone's CFB memories. When we cannot distinguish between the most important links, and those links of tangential importance, we do our readers no favors by burying first-tier links among lesser ones. And that applies to links in article text, too, per WP:OVERLINK. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 20:42, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
How do I get my new article to be noticed if I don't slap it on every conceivable navbox? Wait, I've seen some of the viewer stats, this either doesnt help or nobody outside of WP editors know that navboxes exist or how to uncollapse them.—Bagumba (talk) 21:08, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
I don't think you meant to imply that it is DL's job to make everything consistent himself when an editor makes a change. It's a good question to ask if the project needs to consider other similar changes. However, we should applaud bold edits that are improvements, and then worry about the inconsistencies in other areas, instead of discouraging piecemeal progress.—Bagumba (talk) 21:36, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
And I didn't take JW's comment that way, Bags. But I am looking at the other conference football navboxes as we speak, and performing a little surgery, consistent with my comments above and below. Of course, I am only one member of this project, and I expect some other folks will want to weigh in on this topic. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:38, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Then no harm either way. We all agree that it's better to have things inconsistently good as opposed to consistently bad.—Bagumba (talk) 21:53, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Sure, JW, and the circumstances of all conferences and their former members are not the same. Conference USA was/is, in reality, a direct successor to the old Metro Conference. The Big XII really is a direct successor to old Big Eight. And these are factors we should consider in deciding what links to include. Under those circumstances, I would suggest it is appropriate to keep the link to the predecessor conference; there is room for nuance here. That said, none of the Division I football programs lack for navboxes or links to related articles. I think the strongest argument is to exclude former conference members from football navboxes, and only include current members per WP:OVERLINK. Obviously, conference history should be discussed in the team and conference articles themselves. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:39, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Okay, surgery is now complete. All links to former conference members have been removed from the football navboxes for currently existing conferences, and all former conference navboxes have been removed from football team articles. Interestingly, someone had already removed/replaced the former conference navboxes on about 80 to 90% of the affected football team articles.
However, I don't know quite know what to do with the conference football navboxes for the WAC and former Big East -- in which all of the members listed are former members because the conferences no longer exist. If we are going to keep these navboxes, and I assume we will because they tie together various season articles, etc., of these former conferences, then we need to define how these navboxes (and any others created for former conferences in the future) should be used with regard to their former conference members. Thinking off the top of my head, they definitely should not be placed at the bottom of former member team pages, and maybe the former members should be deleted from these navboxes, too. Anyone? Anyone? Buhler? Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 22:11, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Bagumba, I actually was suggesting that Dirtlawyer take the lead on ensuring consistency around his initial edit. This didn't need to happen immediately, but it should have happened within a reasonable time frame (say maybe a few days), and it has. Dirtlawyer has seen to it. When it comes to editing standardized, dynamic structures like infoboxes, navboxes, categories, and even articles that are a member of a clear analogous set, we absolutely should be thinking about consistency from the outset. The idea of parallelism really ought to be a core principle of Wikipedia. It's necessary to ensure objectivity and usability; i.e. that you will find things where you would expect them to be. I see pluses and minuses to Dirtlawyer's move here. I'm not sure it was a slam-dunk improvement. But at the very least, we have maintained consistency with his followup editing. If we encourage local improvement without any regard to global consistency, we end up with a huge mess of forked formatting and standardization. Jweiss11 (talk) 23:37, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
I totally get that, but there is also paralysis by analysis too. With your saying "reasonable time frame", I suspect that we are more or less in agreement on things, and DL always leaves room on his plate anyways :-) —Bagumba (talk) 23:47, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
@Dirtlawyer1: If the navs aren't on the team pages, at some point someone will think WP:BIDIRECTIONAL and place them there. As the former teams are presumably already linked on the conference page, it has no need to be duplicated in the navbox. Remember, navboxes are a nice way to group what would otherwise be in "See also". In addition to former conferences, another former affiliation in team navboxes that cause clutter is the list of former stadiums. Its inclusion causes {{UCLA Bruins football navbox}} (and many other former teams' navs) to be part of the navbox clutter at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, even though UCLA hasn't called it home in over 30 years.—Bagumba (talk) 02:18, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Actually, it's taking the guideline of WP:OVERLINK to the extreme at 2015 NCAA Division I FBS football rankings and not having enough links. I'd imagine most readers go to the current week (or some specific week of interest), find a team they want to read about, but are SOL if the team wasn't ranked for the first time that week. OVERLINK has been interpreted to only have one link to each team in the table. So you either search the whole table for that link, open another tab and just type the name in, or say "forget it". However, OVERLINK allows that "if helpful for readers, a link may be repeated in infoboxes, tables, ..." I think we'd be better off linking every entry in this table, as I'd imaging few read it serially from left to right, or read it completely.—Bagumba (talk) 01:55, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Not only do I agree with this 100%, I've been thinking about this same thing for quite a while as well. I am one of the readers who have a hard time searching for links that should be readily available. I hate searching for links because as you said, not every team was ranked the first week and may have been ranked much later in the season. Therefore I'm all in favor of making this article easier to access rather than keeping it difficult. Obvious use of WP:IARJOJHutton02:10, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Well as you said Bagumba, OVERLINK has been interpreted to include only one link. IAR was just one argument to combat those who feel that only one link should be on an article. Actually I find that OVERLINK is widely misused across all of Wp, not just in tables and charts.--JOJHutton15:29, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
With 2 polls, 25 teams and 10 weeks already, that's about 500 entries (then there are the dropouts) to link. Is there a WP:WIKIGNOME among us? In the meantime, Zaqwert, who appears to be the most active editor of the page, might agree to at least start linking all of the new entires for the remaining weeks.—Bagumba (talk) 23:05, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Tracking new articles
Does anyone know of a tool that would allow us to track/monitor newly-created articles that fall within the scope of this project? Cbl62 (talk) 21:10, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. It's better than any other tool I was aware of. Anyone to extend it back more than the default of ~ 5 days. Cbl62 (talk) 22:55, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
If you look at the article history, can you see earlier runs of the report. Just to clarify, the articles under the "Assessed" subheadings could be old articles that were just tagged for the project. I find untagged articles more than a year old all the time. Jweiss11 (talk) 23:07, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
In 1951, the College Football Hall of Fame was established. At that time, an inaugural class of 53 coaches and players were inducted. In the eyes of the experts at the time, these were the 53 most significant individuals in the first 70 or so years of college football history. For a project like ours, these 53 persons are among our most important subjects. I pulled together the list today with the current article quality ratings and was surprised to find that only one of those 53 articles has reached FA status, and one other has reached GA status. Ten are rated "C" class, and the remaining 41 are either Stubs or Start class articles. Should anyone wish to adopt one of these pioneers and legends, the complete list with quality ratings can be found here: User:Cbl62/Early CFHOF Inductees. Cbl62 (talk) 23:05, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
@MisterCake: I can't take the credit for Muller. But can definitely add. Ill also expand Pop Warner. PS C class seems like enough info for an encyclopedia type entry, as in we need to get them up to C but not being above is not a problem in most cases. Or do you think we should still strive for higher? Rybkovich (talk) 23:28, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
Strive for FA of course; but I concur the biggest hump to get over is usually start to C, and that it would be nice for any big name to be at least a C. The stubs and starts need the most work. Cake (talk) 23:40, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
Bowl games as tenants
There is a discussion at Talk:Nissan Stadium#Tenants which may be of interest to group members here. At issue is the inclusion of bowl games as tenants but not, in this case, the CMA Music Festival, though it can also include things like the Super Bowl, WWE, conference championship games, conference tournaments, etc. Any additional perspectives and feedback would be welcome. --JonRidinger (talk) 14:57, 17 November 2015 (UTC)
Source inconsistency
Could someone give me some advice. I have been on a kick of improving Hayden Epstein's article over the last few days since uberring someone who seemed to be him last Friday. Today, I came accross inconsistent sources that I could use some help interpreting. One source says he missed his first two field goals before booting a school record 56-yarder. Another says he missed his final attempt of the season. A third source says he was 5-7 on the season.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 14:41, 17 November 2015 (UTC)
There is no presumption of notability for an assistant coach. The issue would be governed by WP:GNG. A quick google searches turns up (1) this claiming he was "Heralded as football's 'greatest line coach" and that he successfully sued Notre Dame for age discrimination, (2) this from CBS Sports indicating that he is the namesake of a new award for college football's best offensive line (starting in 2015), (3) this from the Chicago Tribune saying he was "a man who defined offensive line coaching in college football for two decades and was famous for the way he defied Notre Dame in the courtroom," and (4) this book written about his lawsuit against Notre Dame. Article needs improving, but I'd say he appears to be a GNG pass. Cbl62 (talk) 14:52, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
In NAIA play today, [1] #1 Morningside (Iowa) beat #16 Saint Xavier (Ill.) by a score of 75-69 in 4OT. Might be worth checking against scoring records to see if it fits anyplace.--Paul McDonald (talk) 01:45, 22 November 2015 (UTC)
Bluejay, yes, I think it should probably be redirected after the MAC conference table is moved to the main article, and the rather large table for all-time win-loss records vs. BCS conference teams is deleted -- why editors would even want to track those individual games given the abysmal 2–33 cumulative record is a bit of a mystery. Not quite sure what to do with the overtime game table; it's probably noteworthy given the relatively large number of overtime games the Bulls have played, but it could easily be summarized with a sentence or two in the text of the main article. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 06:55, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
Guys, someone created this article a couple of months ago, all of the content is originally from the main program article and was split off here. After seeing this a little while ago, my original intent was to try to re-purpose this as a "series records" article, a la Michigan Wolverines football series records, UMass Minutemen football series records, etc. Unfortunately, I've been rather busy in real life lately, and it has become one of those projects that has simply gotten back-burnered. I'll try to see if I can get to it over the Thanksgiving holiday, but, unfortunately, I can't make any promises. Ejgreen77 (talk) 14:29, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
I thought we agreed some time ago that we were not going to create these all-time records vs. all opponents lists such as these: Category:College football all-time series records . . . we seem increasingly determined to create CFB list articles that are obvious violations of WP:NOTSTATS. This really needs to be discussed at length. I'm not sure why we would even try to compete with and/or duplicate the efforts of accurate and well-researched CFB stats services like College Football Data Warehouse et al. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 15:14, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
Here is the discussion in question. What we have here ladies and gentlemen is not a competition with CFBDW but an outright exploitation of data, if not plagiarism. Sure this information can be found on other websites as well as media guides. However, some such as Texas A&M's follows the exact same format as CFBDW.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 17:05, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
A standalone list should meet WP:LISTN, which requires that the grouping is discussed by independent sources. Even if it is notable, WP:PAGEDECIDE advises: "There are other times when it is better to cover notable topics, that clearly should be included in Wikipedia, as part of a larger page about a broader topic, with more context." It's debatable to me if it meets LISTN. Rivalries would meet coverage for a series with an individual team, but non-rivaries usually just mention the overall record in passing, We could merge it into the team's main football article, but WP:UNDUE and WP:FANCRUFT become concerns if there is too much stats.—Bagumba (talk) 19:05, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
@Bagumba: Exactly right. And various CFB editors have continued to push the envelope of WP:NOTSTATS (a very bad idea, IMO), and as Jweiss11 predicted several months ago, we are now seeing the creation of more of these all-time win-loss records vs. all opponents stats lists for lesser programs, with an even-less-rational basis for creating and keeping them per WP:GNG. Sorry, guys, but we're lying to ourselves, and no one outside of WP:CFB is going to agree with us. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 19:19, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
@UCO2009bluejay: Thanks for finding and linking that recent discussion. I believe there have also been previous discussions regarding the same or similar types of CFB stats-based lists in the past. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 19:19, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
As far as NOTSTATS goes, please see this excellent comment from Cbl62 as to the accurate nature and interpretation of NOTSTATS. In general, I think that in alllist-class CFB articles, we need to do a better job of utilizing introductory and explanatory text, rather than just relying on large tables of data. Ejgreen77 (talk) 20:37, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
UCO2009bluejay mentioned Buffalo Bulls football statistical leaders. I don't think it needs to be a standalone, but maybe deserves a partial merge? If so, if we could get a style guide or even an existing article we could reference as a prototypical standard, it'd be much easier to just merge and redirect without having to go through overhead of AfD. Also, the style guide could be used as a reference for editors, and hopefully minimize whack-a-mole with snuffing these out. Problem is always that a reader sees an existing article, and figures they should represent and do the same for their favorite school.—Bagumba (talk) 20:05, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
Or, it could mean that that particular AfD discussion was completely dominated by CFB editors, without the acid test of outside participation by non-CFB sports editors and non-sports editors generally. If you want a different outcome, with nearly identical content, take a look at [[2]]. As I recall, there were several AfDs for NFL team records that resulted in "delete". The justification for lists of team stats has always been vulnerable to attack for failing to satisfy WP:GNG and WP:NLIST and for violating WP:NOTSTATS. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 15:19, 22 November 2015 (UTC)
I could envision LISTN going either way, depending on one's interpretation of "discussed as a group". Even if we concede that it is notable, a more relevant discussion involves WP:PAGEDECIDE and whether it's better to just include it in the team's article as opposed to needing a standalone list.—Bagumba (talk) 04:09, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
2016 Conference of the Month proposal
I had an idea and I don't know if this has been attempted before but I thought it would be cool to have a "conference of the month" campaign. I am not suggesting ignoring other articles or issues that may arise during this time period, but this could focus attention to the lack of certain articles/lists and other missing data we have. Also, I am not suggesting editors focus only on one conference. Participation is completely voluntary, and all in good spirited editing, and if an editor gets busy/finds another issue no hard feelings should be felt. But I believe with 12-14 teams in a conference the opportunity to focus on different programs may help with fatigue or writers block. My proposal consists of the following:
Creating and Auditing current articles of the program, its facilities, coaches, and players.
Creating and auditing the status of articles, including individual seasons articles, head coaches, and notable players, pertaining to all current and former teams (e.g. SEC-Sewanee pre-1940, University of Chicago pre-1939, but not GT because they would be covered under ACC, or Idaho when it covers the Pac 12 but when we cover the Sun Belt)
The inclusion of all-conference "honorable mention" honors in infoboxes, as here, strikes me as severe overkill. In the linked example, De'Veon Smith received "honorable mention" mention form the conference coaches. The All-Big Ten team includes first-, second- and third-team selections, which means that six running backs received All-Big Ten honors each year. In addition, the coaches then recognize others as "honorable mention." Not sure if other conferences have similarly deep systems. Where you have six backs receiving actual honors, the "honorable mentions" seem more like "participation" awards rather than a true honor worthy of highlighting in an infobox. Thoughts? Cbl62 (talk) 21:22, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
Cbl, I don't have a particular problem with "honorable mention" honors in the infobox if they are the highest all-conference honors received to date. For former CFB player articles that I maintain, if the subject was also a first-team all-conference selection and/or first-team All-American, I usually remove the second-team, third-team and honorable mention honors from the infobox as redundant, and only mention the lower tier honors in the article's main body text. As a further example, if a player receives both first-team and second-team honors in the same season, I only include the higher tier honors in the infobox. Infobox honors are supposed to be the highlights of a player's career, and it is not intended to be a comprehensive listing of every awards banquet certificate they ever received from Police Athletic League pee wee football to the NFL retired players association. Too many of our NFL player infoboxes are cluttered with relatively meaningless trivia (e.g., "Ranked No. 115 in 2013" or obscure team awards). The irony is that the overwhelming majority of the crufters who add this stuff can't be bothered to add a sentence of text about such honors (or a reliable source) to the article, but some of them will edit-war to the death over trivia in the infobox. Welcome to Wiki World. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:37, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
Cbl, just to repeat what I said above, "I don't have a particular problem with 'honorable mention' honors in the infobox if they are the highest all-conference honors received to date." In the case of De'Veon Smith, his honorable mention All-Big Ten honors are the most significant college honors received to date. Personally, if it were an article I was maintaining, I would keep the honorable mention All-Big Ten honors -- at least until he receives first- or second-team conference honors next year. It is the apparent highlight of his college career to date. Your mileage may vary. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 03:17, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
Oh, I misunderstood your position. I thought we were in agreement that honorable mention all-Big Ten "honors" (ranking a running back anywhere from seventh to tenth best in the Big Ten Conference) was so trivial as to not warrant inclusion in an infobox. I think there needs to be some lower bar at which we say "not important enough for an infobox" even it it is the player's highest level of achievement. For me, "honorable mention All-Big Ten" falls below that bar. Cbl62 (talk) 03:56, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
Well, Cbl, I don't feel that strongly about keeping the honorable mention all-conference honors if you want them out. My larger point is that it is silly to keep lower tier all-conference honors in the inbox (including the all-conference freshman stuff) after the player receives first-team all-conference honors. Also, if the player receives AP first-team honors and coaches second-team honors for the same season, it is not necessary to list the second-team selection separately. I do feel somewhat more strongly about that, again relying on the premise that the infobox is for highlights, and is not an A-Z comprehensive list. I also think it's kinda silly to list Parade high school All-American honors for All-Universe NFL players like Emmitt Smith, whose infobox is already overwhelmed with major national awards and honors at the pro and college levels. We would really do better if we programmed the infobox template to reject any infobox highlights after the 10th or 12th line of text and force editors to make qualitative choices. That's my theory of infobox honors. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:14, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
FYI, in recent years the SEC has only had first- and second-team honors, with AP adding honorable mentions that the Coaches omit. I would have to go back and look at some of the old newspaper clips, but I believe AP formerly recognized third-team All-SEC selections in the 1930s, '40s and '50s. So a present-day "honorable mention" may mean slightly more in the SEC than the Big Ten, if they are handing out third-team B10 honors. Either way, I'll trust your judgment regarding Mr. Smith, and the larger point about infobox highlights still stands. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:33, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
It's funny, I never add HM to infoboxes for basketball players, but somehow added to a few football players this year because others had it. In a recent case, Jordan Payton, he's never been all-conference otherwise, and Pac-12 only has two teams. It's not a big deal to me if it stays or goes, but since it's in the lead in Payton's case, I'd lean toward leaving it. IMO, infobox should mostly reflect what would be in an FA-class lead.—Bagumba (talk) 08:12, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
Whomever created this list made on oversight in 2007. Gameday has never been to a UMass vs New Hampshire game it was D3 Amherst at Williams.[4]. I tried to make a request there but it wasn't formatted correctly. (I never did this before).UCO2009bluejay (talk) 03:35, 6 December 2015 (UTC)
Not so sure. They are a Division III program. I'm not sure season articles for Division III teams would pass muster under WP:GNG. Not saying they don't, just not sure. And there are still a lot of Division I FBS schools that need season articles. Cbl62 (talk) 04:18, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
No doubt this is not highest in importance, but if anybody knows how to trim hedges while we replace the foundation, I will not turn them away. Digging tunnels by starting from both ends so to speak. Was hoping for a possible Wisconsite, say. Cake (talk) 01:07, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
For me, St. Norbert presents more than a question of priority. It's a question of "whether" rather than "when". There is an important question as to whether Division III teams like St. Norbert should have stand-alone articles for individual seasons. In my view, there is doubt as to whether teams below the Division I FBS level receive substantial, non-trivial, non-WP:ROUTINE coverage of their seasons in multiple, reliable, and independent sources so as to warrant the creation of single-season articles. Bear in mind that mere compilations of season results in statistical databases (e.g., SR/College Football or College Football Data Warehouse) or team media guides do not constitute the type of significant, independent coverage required to satisfy WP:GNG. Before anyone spends substantial energy creating season articles on Division III football programs, appropriate sources should be located and cited to demonstrate that such articles pass WP:GNG scrutiny. Cbl62 (talk) 18:06, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
There is currently a dispute between me and SeminoleNation (talk·contribs) on whether Dalvin Cook's arrest and suspension this past summer should be in the article or not. Judging by the users name it's clear there is bias here to why this user wouldn't want the info there, but I wanted to bring this here to see what others think. To me it seems like a no-brainer that it stays, but what do others think?--Yankees1007:35, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
IMO the space devoted to the incident in the current version of the article is WP:UNDUE. This is a 20-year old student athlete who was found not guilty of a criminal charge. Yet, the discussion of the incident occupies as much space in the article as everything else relating to his college football career. At a minimum, the discussion should be trimmed. Given the 'not guilty' outcome, I might even support dropping the discussion. Cbl62 (talk) 18:11, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
@Cbl62, SeminoleNation, and Yankees10: I concur with Cbl62's opinion per WP:UNDUE, and endorse his trimming of the previous description of the incident by substantially more than half. There is a peculiar kind of Wikipedia contributor who believes that our bio articles exist to list the college discipline and minor legal incidents in which athletes and other bio subjects are involved (e.g., "Controversy" sections). In reality, many notable people get speeding tickets, have their licenses suspended, etc., and it's usually not even noteworthy. What makes it arguably worth mentioning in Dalvin Cook's case is that he was suspended from the team while the court case was pending. Since he was acquitted (i.e. found not guilty), this really should be summarized as "charge with battery, suspended from the team, acquitted, and reinstated." Compare Cook's case to that of Jameis Winston, however, and you find that Winston's case has plenty of substance: felony investigation, team suspension, accusations of bungled handling of the investigation by FSU, Tallahassee cops and Leon County prosecutor, followed by a Title IX civil rights suit against the university and civil suit against the athlete. Winston's legal problems aren't going away, and FSU may have significant problems, too. We, as regular sports editors, really need to learn how to distinguish between minor and major legal problems, and how they should be treated in our athlete bios. Yankees10 was right to bring the discussion here for more input from his fellow editors. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:32, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
It's a tougher call determining what is UNDUE when dealing with other editors, as opposed to writing our own blog. Some will say "who cares, he's innocent", while others will counter that it is sourced and had some bit of continued coverage. I think Cbl62 went the right direction, and might prove to be an acceptable compromise to all. I'd also be fine mentioning that he was accused of hitting a woman, which is a bit distinguishing, but it should also balanced with the fact that it took less than 30 minutes for the jury to deliberate.—Bagumba (talk) 21:58, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
Sorry I haven't said anything. I'm studying for finals and I'm really busy. Winston's case definitely should be mentioned to its full extent but Dalvin Cook's case didn't affect him at all. I agree with the info being trimmed.--SeminoleNation (talk) 03:27, 8 December 2015 (UTC)
Cbl62, thanks for the update and for your leadership on this. Thanks also to Cake, Pvmoutside, and everyone else who has chipped in. Jweiss11 (talk) 20:26, 8 December 2015 (UTC)
The thanksy feelings are mutual. We might consider extending the reach in Texas, for all of Texas A&M, Baylor, TCU, and Texas Tech need work. Cake (talk) 20:48, 8 December 2015 (UTC)
Appreciate everyone's effort here as well. Can I suggest creating a subpage for this list? This seems to be the source of most of the recent activity on this page on my watchlist. At the same time, I don't want to discourage momentum if this has helped to recruit a larger base. The subpage could be transcluded here also if needed. Thanks for the consideration.—Bagumba (talk) 00:47, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
Transcluded subpage sounds ok. Unfortunately, I haven't a clue how to transclude. Anyone care to help with that? Cbl62 (talk) 01:29, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
FYI, transclusion comes with the slight caveat that there is sometimes a delay with seeing it here. See WP:PURGE if you need to manually update. If you just look at the subpage directly, there won't be an issue.—Bagumba (talk) 01:53, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I've also added the v-t-e navbar at the top of the section to save you from remembering the subpage name when editing.—Bagumba (talk) 02:11, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
Ahh yes... the full article is William Wurtenburg. I picked him up as one of the coaches at Navy. The article as it exists now looks so much better than what I had, which is a very good thing... it's nice to see what planted seeds can sprout!--Paul McDonald (talk) 21:06, 11 December 2015 (UTC)
Is this something we really want to keep? It's a poorly sourced article about a "rivalry" that has occurred but seven times. pbp18:14, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
@Purplebackpack89: As of 2015, it is now the "official" SEC inter-divisional rivalry for Arkansas and Missouri, but that does not necessarily make it notable as a traditional rivalry with significant coverage of the series as a "rivalry" in multiple, independent, reliable sources per GNG. Of course, whether it's notable or not now as a rivalry will be determined by the depth and quality of coverage as a rivalry. Given that Missouri has no presently active annual rivalry series because Mizzou left the Big XII, it is probably inevitable that this game will become a replacement for Kansas in the minds of players and fans. I'm not a big fan of rivalries that are artificially manufactured by the universities' public relations departments, but this one is probably inevitable, if not now, then in the not-distant future. I must also hate the cutesy name. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 22:42, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
"it is probably inevitable that this game will become a replacement for Kansas in the minds of players and fans. " Think this really has the regional relevance of the Kansas-Mizzou rivalry? I cannot imagine. Cake (talk) 23:02, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
I looked at the previous version, and G4 wouldn't apply because it is "not substantially identical to the deleted version." Try PROD or Afd.—Bagumba (talk) 19:51, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Team championships in header capitalization issue/clarification
When a team wins a championship or bowl the championship is added to the header information for their team article. The standard has always appeared to be full capitalization e.g. "ACC Champions" or "Rose Bowl Champions" As far as I can tell the vast, vast majority of team articles exist like this.
Recently some editors have begun reverting newer articles (2015 season mostly) to not capitalize the champions portion, e.g. "Big Ten champions" " or "Pac-12 South Division co-champions"
the reason given is that "champions" is not a proper noun.
To me, I think "champions" in this context is indeed a proper noun, as you are referring to that team specifically, e.g. "Big 12 Champions", 'Champions' is referring to the 2015 Oklahoma football team itself.
Furthermore, I think since it's sort of "header" information it just flat out looks better fully capitalized. You frequently see this convention with header info, throughout all Wikipedia.
"Champions" here is not a proper noun. I'm aware that it tends to be capitalized by convention in team articles, but the way is has been done historically, by a number of editors, including me, is wrong. In fact, I was just thinking about posting here to organize a small editing campaign to fix this capitalization issue. Jweiss11 (talk) 21:35, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Agree with Jweiss11. While we're at it, should it be plural or singular? For example, is the 2015 Michigan Wolverines football team the "Rose Bowl champion" or the "Rose Bowl champions"? IMO, it should be singular -- because a team is singular, it is the champion, not plural champions. However the convention here appears to be the grammatically questionable plural. Cbl62 (talk) 00:02, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
I'd say plural. Per MOS:PLURALS teams that are referred to with their plural nickname are treated as plural in American English. Without referring to their nickname, it would be singular. Since it is in the infobox, one could presume it is referring to article title, which has the team w/ its nickname.—Bagumba (talk) 01:36, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
If the article were "2015 Michigan Wolverines", it would be plural, but the article is "2015 Michigan Wolverines football team" which is singular. If we are going to be grammatical, it needs to be singular. Also, using the nickname (as suggested above) would mean that "1920 Harvard Crimson football team" and "1923 Cornell Big Red football team" should be referred to as "national champion" because the nickname is singular, but a team with a plural nickname should be "national champions". IMO that doesn't make a lot of sense. A team is a team and is a singular unit. Cbl62 (talk) 05:33, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
Plural makes sense to me, that's how everyone speaks it anyway. People refer to teams as "national champions", "NBA champions", "Super Bowl champions", etc. I think that's just because the team is many people. You typically only hear the singular if it's a singular person "Wimbledon champion", "champion of the Masters" etc. Zaqwert (talk) 07:02, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
But the New York Times also writes, "The Golden State Warriors are the N.B.A. champions." [5]. I'll leave it to the English experts to sort out. I can go either way on the banner.—Bagumba (talk) 18:27, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
That example is, I believe, a special case where the author is referring to the Warriors as a group of players (i.e., a plural construction), rather than as a team. Our college football/basketball articles are framed as articles about a team. In such instances, as indicated in the prior examples, the subject is a team (i.e., a singular construction). Cbl62 (talk) 19:33, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
I think it depends on whether you think of "champion" as an adjective or "champions" as a noun when a plural verb is used. Since it's inconclusive which one is "right", and if there is already an established convention (e.g. 1983 Miami Hurricanes football team uses "champions"), I would say to continue as is. But if people are going to do mass capitalization changes anyways, I guess it's fine to open this up, but I'd !vote to stick with the plural form.—Bagumba (talk) 20:00, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
Plural nicknames may be inconclusive, but "team" (as all of our college articles are formulated) is not inconclusive at all. A team is singular, and the correct formulation is to say that a team is a champion. And, as reflected in the LA Times examples, it remains singular whether the usage is as a noun or adjective. We've lived with the ungrammatical "champions" formulation for years; I just figured that while we're grammar-fixing team article banners from "Champions" to lower case, we might go all the way and fix the plural/singular issue as well. Cbl62 (talk) 20:50, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
Esrever has made recent edits to Template:USC Trojans football navbox to replace the ampersands in the group headings with "and" written out. The use of ampersands there is standard practice in use in hundreds of other college sports team navboxes of the sort. Esrever has argued that the use of ampersands there is problematic under MOS:AMP, which states that "In normal text and headings, the word and should be used instead of the ampersand (&); for example January 1 and 2, not January 1 & 2. Retain ampersands in titles of works or organizations, such as Up & Down or AT&T. Ampersands may be used with consistency and discretion in places where space is extremely limited (i.e., tables and infoboxes)." My interpretation is that navbox group headings do not fall under "normal text and headings" and that use "with consistency and discretion in places where space is extremely limited" is apt here. Pinging a number of others who have been involved the creation and maintenance of these sorts of navboxes. @Dirtlawyer1:, @Patriarca12:, @Jrcla2:, @Pvmoutside:, @Billcasey905: thoughts? Jweiss11 (talk) 18:21, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Yes, it's a minor formatting/style issue. Yes, MOS generally deprecates the use of the ampersand in article text and section headers (similar to the use of the number sign). That said, we generally permit the number sign (#) and ampersand (&) in space-limited tables, infoboxes and navboxes for common sense reasons: there is no substantive stylistic reason not to use the symbols when space is at a premium. FYI, it is a reasonable interpretation of MOS that "tables" includes infoboxes and navboxes, unless they are specifically distinguished. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:39, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
And my take on it is that space is not "extremely limited" here. But I will defer to the greater consensus, of course. Esrever(klaT)18:40, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
IMO, the "and" should be spelled out and not use "&". I believe that the navbox headings are considered a "heading", much like text section headings, table headings and Infobox headings. There's plenty of room for the extra two characters in the navboxes even on low-resolution monitors. I don't believe that the fact that '&' is used on hundreds of navboxes matters to the discussion. A bot can easily make the changes. — X96lee15 (talk) 18:42, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Ouch -- table headings, an extremely space-limited use, is one of the first places we should use commonly understood abbreviations and symbols. Using overly long table headers often leads to grossly deformed tables where the numerical data only require 3 to 5 character spaces but the table column headers are 3 to 5 times wider. That is not space efficient or aesthetically pleasing table design. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:46, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
I guess I opened myself up to that line of questioning :) I don't think that should be a focus of discussion though since we're not talking about tables here. — X96lee15 (talk) 18:51, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Recant your comment regarding table headers, and we will agree to disagree on Jweiss's point. Otherwise, there will a trial by combat to settle the issue, and I'm feeling like an awfully cocky sumo wrestler after the last four days. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:56, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
This notice serves as a full and frank retraction of my statement where I included "table headings" in the same group as "navbox headings". I have no knowledge that they should be considered equal. This has been attempted within the best of my ability to match the same size type and in substantially the same manner as the alleged original post in this thread. — X96lee15 (talk) 19:02, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
I think Dirtlawyer1 hit the nail on the head ("Yes,...distinguished.") A navbox is one of the reasonable exceptions to the general MOS rule of spelling out the word. Jrcla2 (talk) 20:28, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Let's keep things in perspective. The issue here is two characters ("and" vs "&"). I don't see the need to go against the primary intent of MOS:AMP (In normal text and headings, the word and should be used instead of the ampersand (&)). We are not "extremely limited" with space constraints here. — X96lee15 (talk) 15:14, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
So we agree that it's OK to change all the navboxes to use "and" instead of "&" since that's the primary focus of MOS:AMP and space is not an issue? — X96lee15 (talk) 01:42, 17 December 2015 (UTC)
X96lee15, space is indeed an issue in these navboxes. Granted, the different of two characters here isn't huge, but the wider the group headings become, the less room there is on each line of the body space of navbox. I'm in favor of leaving the navboxes as is with the ampersands. I think Dirtlawyer1 and Jrcla2 are with me there. Jweiss11 (talk) 01:52, 17 December 2015 (UTC)
TfD: Wisconsin–Whitewater Warhawks football coach navbox
There's a lot of discussion about the dab page at YPG (mostly involving Syria), and while investigating it I found that the abbreviation "ypg" is used in vast numbers of American football articles but neither it nor "Yards per game" is described or defined anywhere in the encyclopedia (so there's nowhere for a dab page entry to point to). I've see it defined in places like http://www.sportingcharts.com/dictionary/nfl/yards-per-game.aspx, but it's not in Glossary of American football. It might be useful for someone to define it in that glossary or somewhere else, with a source, and it could then be added to the dab page. PamD19:20, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
If a team loses the tiebreaker and is not in a conference championship game, they are still referred to as division co-champions. The winner of the tiebreaker is also a "co-champion". I assume there are multiple reliable sources that will call Utah (for example) co-champions. — X96lee15 (talk) 20:43, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
Here are two references that I added to the 2015 Utah and 2015 USC articles:
While the linked article does call USC the champion, it does not say anything one way or another about them being a "co-champion." It simply does not address this issue because that was not the point of the article. The author's point was that USC was advancing to the title game, which no one disputes.
I think they should follow Pac-12's official designation, which may or may not be consistent across conferences.—Bagumba (talk) 21:56, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
The SEC also recognizes divisional co-champions based on tied conference records. That said, if your team plays in a 12 or 14-team conference, there are also divisional tie-breakers because each division can only send one team to the conference championship game. Winning a divisional co-championship may be a big deal in Columbia, Missouri or Columbia, South Carolina, but in places like Baton Rouge, Gainesville or Tuscaloosa, a divisional co-championship that did not result in a berth in the conference championship game is an afterthought. The amount of coverage a divisional co-championship receives will (and should) depend on the program. If someone tried to list divisional championships or co-championships in the infobox for the main Florida Gators football article, I would slap their wrist. For perennial contenders, these co-championships are certainly worthy of a mention in the main body text, but they do not need to be highlighted in the lead or infobox. I would also suggest that for a single-season team article (e.g., 2005 Texas Longhorns football team), it is redundant to list "Big XXX South Division champions" in the infobox when the team was also the "Big XXX Conference champions". But to each their own: some editors like listing as many of those little gold banners on their favorite team's season articles as they possible can. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 22:25, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
IMHO, regardless of whatever elaborate tie-breaking procedures each conference uses (and, it's different for each conference), at the end of the day, if two teams finish the season with identical records, they're tied. Ejgreen77 (talk) 00:18, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
We should have some consistency. Either we list divisional co-championships or not (I am fine either way), but the same rule should apply for all schools, regardless of whether one school's alumni think they are too good or too elite to bother with a divisional co-championship banner in a seasonal infobox. Cbl62 (talk) 02:57, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines," although it must be noted that Emerson was a Harvard elitist. But back in the day, Harvard men still knew a little something-something about football. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:37, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
For the purposes of team season and coach bio infoboxes, co-championships are, by prevailing standard included. My assumption is that, generally, all conferences throughout college football recognize co-champions of the conference, in cases where the conference isn't divided, and by division, in cases where it is, based on overall conference or (in some cases of lesser note) division record. Things get a bit tricky in some of the lower divisions. The Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference of NCAA Division II has 16 football members divided into two divisions, but there is no championship game. The conference recognizes conference champions based on conference record and division champions based on division record. See Todd Hoffner for an example of how I've treated that. At any rate, whatever a given a conference's procedure is for recognizing champions, that procedure should inform how we treat the relevant material here. I can't tell you how many times in the past year I've had to revert changes at Nick Saban by editors who wanted remove Alabama's 2013 SEC West championship from the infobox. It was enough that I added a comment in the edit view, but at least one recent editor was undeterred even by that. Jweiss11 (talk) 05:39, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
Mostly copying this from the USC article. I'm not the one who started the edit war. I don't feel super strongly about this, but I'm going to disagree. The Pac-12 is very inconsistent when discussing this: http://pac-12.com/article/2015/11/28/pac-12-football-championship-game-set-usc-captures-south-division And I believe that's because a divisional title, at least in the Pac-12, isn't really a thing. There's no trophy, and the media guide does not include a section that says something like divisional titles per school (for instance the north would either be stanford 3, oregon 2, or 5 and 5 each, which could settle this. Rather, it Simply lists conference championships (USC - 38). And then it lists overall standings, the participants and results of the conference championship games. I can see the logic for saying that they are co-champions, since that was how conference champions were listed prior to the championship game. But if we're going to base this on record, we need to declare that USC is the 2011 South Division Champion, and not UCLA. USC had the superior record, and who played in the championship game apparently doesn't factor into things. The media guide shows USC as being in first place that year. USC declared itself the Southern Champion that year. The Pac-12 media guide does not declare UCLA a champion, it simply notes that they played in the Pac-12 championship game. It doesn't make sense to do this both ways. I think it's most clear to, unless the Pac-12 starts recording official records of divisional champions and starts handing out trophies, show who went to the game. Or who had the best record. But not a mix of both arbitrarily. And as another note to show the inconsistency, this (http://static.pac-12.com.s3.amazonaws.com/sports/football/fcg/2015/Pac-12_FCG_History_2015.pdf) in big bold text says "TIE-BREAK PROCEDURES TO DETERMINE DIVISION CHAMPIONS" and then talks about how the tiebreaker is used to pick the game representative. Embowaf (talk) 07:02, 2 December 2015 (UTC) Embowaf (talk) 07:26, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
Apart from my snark above, conference divisional championships are relatively trivial matters; they only have meaning in that they are necessary prerequisites to playing in the conference championships games. By analogy, we do not list divisional championships in MLB or NFL player or coach infoboxes, and we surely don't list "wild card champions" either (the equivalent of divisional co-champions who lose the tie-breaker). Heck, most of us strongly resist listing things like "Super Bowl participants" and "conference runners-up," too. These really are best omitted from infoboxes, and left to the main body text where they can better described in context. I'm pretty sure the SEC does not hand out trophies for divisional co-champions (but I could be wrong); at least I've never seen one on the front page of an SEC regional newspaper. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 07:52, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
This goes against some guideline that surely exists (or should) about "thou shalt not prevent me from hanging more banners on the infoboxes of my alma mater and/or closest thing I have to a local NFL team.—Bagumba (talk) 08:11, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
C'mon, Embowaf, you can embellish better than that: how about "Pacific-12 Conference California State Champion (with the small exception of Santa Clara County)". Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 09:00, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
Let's not leave Oregon State out of things. They are the Pac-12 Pacific Northwest Regional 4th Runner-Up. 4th because Portland State beat WSU. Embowaf (talk) 09:06, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
Whether the "co-champion" indication is put in the infobox or not, I still think that the "co-champion" label is correct in these cases and should be included in the body of the article. — X96lee15 (talk) 14:00, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
I will reiterate that I am not certain that such a thing is a real thing; the term is mostly used for convenience. There is no evidence that the Pac-12 keeps record of "Divisional Champions" like they do "Conference Champions." They do track standings. Embowaf (talk) 21:55, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
A link from the official Pac-12 site to the Utah football site regarding the Las Vegas bowl says "The 9-3 Utes were co-champions of the Pac-12 South Division with a 6-3 conference record and will play 9-3 BYU". I would guess the Pac-12 has some say in what can go on school sites.Cryofax (talk) 21:53, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
I doubt that. I would think most school post what they want, and the Pac-12 links to what they want. There's almost certainly no approval process or anything. Embowaf (talk) 02:42, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Just to be clear, I don't mean every article is approved by the Pac-12, I mean I don't think an official school athletics page would claim their team to be "division co-champions" unless they knew such a thing existed officially within the conference. A fan page, or even a local sports section perhaps, but I don't think the schools themselves want to step on any toes, especially a newcomer like Utah. Cryofax (talk) 22:49, 14 December 2015 (UTC)
The default position until shown otherwise should be they exist. The evidence easily points to this. Utah and USC's websites BOTH proclaim their teams division co-champions. Respected sports media outlets proclaim them division co-champions. And most importantly the official Pac-12 web site network reporters refer to Utah as a division co-champion, the Pac-12 Web show "The Drive" refers to Utah as Division co-champions. Can we please put to rest if this exists and stop mucking with the page (info box for a given team is still up for debate) Cryofax (talk) 07:28, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
Strongly disagree. It's useless information, and it make the box confusing and hard to read. And it's likely to continue to be that way. It takes far, far to long to decipher what's going on with stanford and oregon. Embowaf (talk) 10:55, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
Rationale for div co-champ in infobox
If we sidestep the WP:OTHERSTUFF argument that other articles already have division co-champs in their infobox, what is the rationale for wanting to list them there? Alumni and recentism aside, is this really a notable accomplishment that needs to be prominent in an infobox years from now? I'm thinking no, but would like to hear counter arguments.—Bagumba (talk) 22:42, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
The only thing I can really think of is that it's the same logic that makes a team a co-conference champion when there is no conference championship game. But that does seem a bit of a stretch considering that those are backed up by the media guide. Embowaf (talk) 21:04, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
Agree. If nothing else, co-champion is verifiable by independent sources and promoted by conferences themselves.—Bagumba (talk) 22:12, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
I think it's a notable accomplishment. A team tied for the best record in its conference or conference division. It's inaccurate to call the team the won the tiebreaker "division champion" (instead of co-champion) and therefore is inaccurate to not have all the co-champions indicate it in the infobox. In most cases, it's certainly a more notable accomplishment than participating in a bowl game (which will be included in the infobox), considering there will be ~80 bowl game participants and ~15 division co-champions. — X96lee15 (talk) 21:21, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
I don't think anyone is debating the inclusion of conference champions; the issue is the inclusion of "division champion". While years later, I can imagine source refer to a bowl game in a given season, I'm a bit more skeptical if "division champion" receives as much attention. And then there's the issue of whether division co-champion is even widely publicized, which make me ponder the need to mention a division champion in the infobox.—Bagumba (talk) 22:10, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
Division champion is included in what he's talking about "A team tied for the best record in its conference or conference division." I fully agree it's an accomplishment worth noting. Not only that, but it gives a broader picture of that season with a glance, and as a sports fan, more backstory and information is always better imo. Consider in college football too there are an awful lot of "also rans" so to flippantly decide division co-titles are meaningless because your school plays in the conference title game every other year is elitest (as others have pointed out). Cryofax (talk) 06:19, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
With 80 some odd bowl games, I think whatever bowl game a division co-champion undoubtedly will play in is typically a more enduring memory in reliable sources years later. Infoboxes, like the rest of article, should balance aspects based on their prevalence in sources, with less weight for entries that are seeming there merely because they are true. Every team season article has the conference navbox at the top right with the infobox, and the conference standings are already duly noted there. Otherwise, infoboxes become the equivalent of participation awards; I'm sure third-place is a big deal to some programs also, no? The line needs to be drawn somewhere, and the fallback should be the conference standings navbox already on top.—Bagumba (talk) 22:15, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
To counter Cryofax, I would say that it doesn't give a broader picture, it muddies things up. As has been noted, the standings are clear and already in the box. But you don't get anything for being a co-champion. No trophy or mention as champion in media guide or official records (which you DO get for being a Co-Conference Champion prior to the existence of the CCG) and you don't get to go to the CCG. Is utah going to remember 5 years from now they were co-division winner? No, they're going to remember, if anything, that they didn't get to go to the CCG. Embowaf (talk) 02:42, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Even if diehard fans remember it, I don't think reliable sources generally make much mention of it save for routine coverage leading up to the conference championship game. And we apply NPOV based on independent sources, not what fans want.—Bagumba (talk) 02:52, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Embowaf I'll admit I'm more in favor of it being noted on the page archiving conference/division champs than the infobox, however I don't think it muddles things up. Clearly there IS a point where too much info muddles up the infobox, I just don't think division co-champion (a somewhat rare occurence for any given team) is that point. I suppose that's a matter of opinion. To answer the question of would anyone remember or care, I guess that really depends on a team's overall success. If Utah gets to two conference championship games in the next 5 years then 2015 probably won't be remembered much. If they struggle they might look back on it as a recent highpoint. BagumbaI also don't see this as strictly a "fancruft" thing if it's been reported on official school websites and newspapers. I'd like to see some official stance on it from the Pac-12 though. Cryofax (talk) 22:44, 14 December 2015 (UTC)
Rivalry game "championships"
This is related to the discussion going on above, but a bit off-topic, so I'm going to open it up here. If there's one thing that I could snap my fingers and remove from the season infoboxes, it would be the listing of rivalry game wins as "championships" (example: I don't thing that "Apple Cup Champions" should be the first thing listed in the infobox for 2015 Washington Huskies football team). Now, if the Apple Cup were a season-long award, like, say, the Lambert Cup, I wouldn't have a problem with it, but it isn't. All winning the Apple Cup means is that Washington won one regular season football game against Washington State. And the same thing goes for the Iron "Bowl," the Egg "Bowl," etc. Ejgreen77 (talk) 16:54, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
I agree. All rivalry game "championships" should be removed from the season infoboxes. I also wonder about bowl game championships, considering the bowl game result is listed right there. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:00, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Oh, good grief. Delete, delete, delete. Winning a rivalry game is not a championship of any kind, any more than winning any other regular season game constitutes a championship. No little yellow-gold banners for rivalry "championships." I have mixed feeling about the bowl game "championship" banners, but they are no where near as much of an exaggeration as calling rivalry game wins "championships." Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:25, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Requesting help in finding J. C. Anderson of Cumberland's 1903 football team and J. J. Thompson of the 1902 and 1903 Transylvania (then Kentucky University) football team. While we're at it, can anybody find John Adams of 1891 Penn?
Also, I think we should move J. N. Stone to Stein Stone. The "J. N" is an artifact of his listing as Clemson coach, but it's quite difficult to find him called J. N. or James. He was known as Stein. Cake (talk) 06:44, 26 December 2015 (UTC)
The Higginbothams of Texas A&M
Roswell Gunby Higginbotham's page is under Grady Higginbotham. This seems likely in error. His brother was Grady (or Grailey). Grady was known as "Big Hig" and Roswell as "Lil Hig." Lil Hig was the FB on the 1919 team - Big Hig on the 1912 team, much too early for Roswell. Cake (talk) 18:18, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
The season articles campaign has now reached a total of more than 3,400 new season articles created in 2015, including stand-alone articles for every remaining season played by 23 programs (Arkansas, Army, Auburn, Carlisle Indians, Chicago, Clemson, Detroit, Florida State, Georgia, Illinois, LSU, Michigan State, Minnesota, Navy, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Penn State, Purdue, Texas, UCLA, USC, and Washington). If anyone wants to help continue the progress, visit the subpage at Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Season articles campaign. Cbl62 (talk) 18:57, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Malware at College Football Data Warehouse ... again
I received an urgent malware warning this evening while using the College Football Data Warehouse (CFDW) site. This has become a recurring problem with the CFDW site. These problems have been happening for more than a year (See, e.g., August 2014 virus incident) and suggest a serious security problem allowing the site to be repeatedly infected or highjacked. Given these problems, we may want to consider using more secure sites such as SR/College Football when the same information is available there. Cbl62 (talk) 05:45, 16 December 2015 (UTC)
Tonight's warning: "The site ahead contains malware. Attackers currently on www.poi-online.de might attempt to install dangerous programs on you computer that steal or delete your information (for example, photos, passwords, messages, and credit cards)." Cbl62 (talk) 06:06, 16 December 2015 (UTC)
There was an ANI thread before Christmas directly on point: [6]. As I said there, CFDW has consistently been the most comprehensive and most accurate listing of historic college football schedules, game results, head-to-head series results, and head coach records. It would be a damn shame of we had to remove all of our Wikipedia links to CFDW, but if the ongoing website security problems continue I don't see how we can continue to link to their site because of the potential detriment to our readers. I believe Jweiss and you have both had direct contact with the CFDW website owners and data managers in the past; I think it's time to deliver a politely phrased ultimatum letting them know we cannot continue to link or recommend their site if they are unable to address their security problems in a fairly timely manner. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 01:21, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
I have never communicated with anyone affiliated with the College Football Data Warehouse. However, and since the latest malware attack on the site, I have stopped using the site as a source. By directing readers to that site, we are potentially exposing them to harm. There are now other reliable sites that can be used for the data for which we have previously relied on CFDW. These sites include SR/College Football, published by Sports Reference LLC, a highly reliable enterprise that also publishes pro-football-reference.com and baseball-reference.com. I think it is time for us to start using these other sources. Cbl62 (talk) 01:03, 30 December 2015 (UTC)
I don't believe the rules changed; rather there were more bowls than there were teams worthy by a strict .500 criteria. Funny enough, the 5–7 teams have managed to go undefeated in the bowls. Cake (talk) 14:02, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Yeah, it's still 6 wins to become bowl eligible, but if there aren't enough teams with 6 wins then the NCAA will declare some other schools bowl eligible based on the Academic Progress Rate. The bowls then select among the teams that were made eligible. Chuy1530 (talk) 19:02, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
What's funny to me is that even after winning their bowl games they still finish the season with a losing record. Lizard (talk) 01:48, 30 December 2015 (UTC)
Draftee list at Nick Saban
The Nick Saban article has a list of all of the Alabama players he has coached that have been drafted by the NFL. There are also pending edits to add similar lists for his players at Michigan State and LSU. This seems like overkill for a biography article and could set a bad precedent. Thoughts? Jweiss11 (talk) 19:25, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
Fancruft - Remove it. Nick Saban is a very successful college football coach, not an NFL team's personnel manager or draft coordinator. The focus of our CFB coach bios needs to be their CFB coaching careers, not trivia about the NFL career history of the coach's former CFB players. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 20:39, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
Overkill. I think this is too much detail and not really relevant. A count of how many players a coach has in the NFL is probably relevant if it is something he's known for, but a list of each one is not. Chuy1530 (talk) 20:45, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
This —>Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Team articles is on the WikiProjects page, and I don't believe it to be redundant to the Master Team Table. However I find it in desperate need for updating and information. My biggest concern is with the basketball columns. While I figure this to be a remnant of the pre-College Basketball project days I think it is outdated in regards to naming schemata without "men's" for many team names. I believe this guide needs to be overhauled. Naturally, I would like to get some other opinions in regards to this matter before attempting to Boldly edit this page.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 03:06, 30 December 2015 (UTC)
The "Team articles" page does look largely redundant to the master team table. I think the best move would be to eliminate it. Jweiss11 (talk) 03:15, 30 December 2015 (UTC)
Okay, but what should be added to the Master Team Table out of this page, if anything. Forgive me for my ignorance on this topic, but on a related note I tried to add some relevant links to the FBS programs in the M.T.T.[7] and I am afraid I may have made that table too large. I keep getting an error notice if I try to add some more information to complete the FBS list. Is that simply my computer or the list itself?UCO2009bluejay (talk) 03:19, 30 December 2015 (UTC)
I don't recall the prior decision not to have these templates. If there was a discussion, perhaps someone can link to it. I kind of like the new templates and don't foresee a problem with season articles being overwhelmed with multiple templates, but I am open to hearing contrary arguments. Cbl62 (talk) 07:37, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
Forgive me for not being aware of any prior discussion. I will note it's not just for conference championship game winners. If the wall of text is bothersome, one can perhaps group the teams in various eras such as Template:Southern Conference football champions. A Power 5 conference championship and/or a national championship seem worthy of a navbox. It is also quite helpful for those who wish to tackle the history of a conference or region. Frankly, I think conference championships are so important historically if not currently that we should have a discussion about how to treat them in the regular team navbox. Say, italic years for conference championship years, like how the baseball navboxes deal with world series 'appearances,' I think would be helpful to a lay reader. Cake (talk) 17:51, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
I don't think we have ever had a discussion here before about the idea of navboxes such as these ones created in the past few days by Cake. We have had a discussion about conference championships team roster navboxes in the past. A few years back a series of them were created for Nebraska conference championship teams. The consensus was that they were overkill and clutter on bio articles, and they were deleted. This is a different matter here, but one that should be explored. Jweiss11 (talk) 03:45, 26 December 2015 (UTC)
Frankly I have mixed opinions on this matter. The pros of this would be that winning a conference championship is a significant accomplishment, would easily link the list of (your conf. acronym here) football champions and to link these teams appears appropriate. The Cons would be what kind of slippery slope will this lead. Will we begin to link conference title game participants, division (and co) champs. What about pro sports winners of the NL Wild Card? In short, I have no freaking clue, just throwing my thoughts out there.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 00:42, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
The unbroken wall of links (120 seasons, and close to 175 links because of multiple co-champions in almost 50 of those seasons) is hugely problematic. You can have 200+ links in a single navbox, but it needs to be internally segmented and better organized. That said, the easy solution here is convert this navbox to a list of conference football champions, and then link the list in the "see also" section of the individual season articles for the teams that won a conference championship. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 01:09, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
That's good. Then it should be an easy series of edits to add the links to the "see also" sections of the season articles and remove the navboxes. I think these navboxes are a step too far; we have avoided navboxes for most conference-level honors, and I think we should continue to do so. These season articles do not suffer from a lack of links, the navigational purpose can be easily solved with list articles and "see also" links, and at some point the conference-level navboxes become an exercise in banner-hanging. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 16:54, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
I tend to resist player banners, because bio articles quickly become overly burdened with banners. I don't see the same problem with team/season articles, which are not similarly burdened. And, like UC02009bluejay, I agree that a conference championship is a major accomplishment. If this were put to a vote (as it should be prior to any removal), I'd favor keeping the navboxes created by Cake with the type of segmenting suggested by Ejgreen77. However, I would draw the line with conference championships and not extend it to divisional championships, etc. Cbl62 (talk) 17:44, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
"The unbroken wall of links (120 seasons, and close to 175 links because of multiple co-champions in almost 50 of those seasons) is hugely problematic." Please see WP:OVERLINK and WP:Overlink crisis. Navboxes exist to provide useful navigational aids to our readers, not to recognize "major accomplishments" (i.e., not to engage in banner hanging); if we want to recognize a team's conference championship we do that graphically with our little gold infobox banners and with well-written text. Given the 120-year Big Ten history and large number of championship team links (roughly 175), it is far more efficient to employ "see also" links to a well-structured list of Big Ten conference football champions. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:01, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
I read what you linked but fail to see how/why it is "hugely problematic". WP:OVERLINK doesn't seem to apply at all, and the "crisis" essay is seven years old, densely written, and appears to have been completely ignored without dire consequence. There is simply no rule that I am aware of limiting navboxes to 100 or any set number of links. For other appropriate but large navboxes, compare Template:PulitzerPrize Fiction, Template:National League champions, and Template:Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. The purpose of the navbox is not to recognize "major accomplishments" but to facilitate ease of navigation between such major and related accomplishments. I think the best solution is to segment the navboxes in the manner suggested by Ejgreen77. Cbl62 (talk) 20:16, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
I've been adding champions before choosing how to label the eras before the Bowl Coalition, such as, say, the Dickinson era. Hoping perhaps vainly for someone else to add those before I am done. In other words, I was already resolved to grouping by era. If one also wishes to propose a stricter criteria for inclusion based on selectors, then so be it. Surely this navbox is superior to those it renders redundant, e. g. Template:Bowl Coalition Champion navbox. Any 'banner hanging' is in the champion parameter of the infobox. The point is to navigate to those teams making the same mark on history—that mark is not merely wooing the bowl coalition. Rather, what we have now forces banner hanging, such as 2014 Ohio State having a navbox of one. Cake (talk) 00:25, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
It may make sense to split it into multiple navboxes, each one limited to a different era, maybe (1) Early years - pre-AP Poll, (2) 1936-1975, and (3) 1976-present. Cbl62 (talk) 04:58, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
That seems very sensible. However, I would want to be able to put forth an argument for those cutoff dates over others. Cake (talk) 05:24, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
Of course. Merely making a suggestion, though when talking about national championships 1936 is a significant date since it marks the start of the poll era. Another possibility would be to have two navboxes: pre-poll era and pol era. Cbl62 (talk) 15:52, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
Before this conversation escapes us, I thought I would pose a relevant question. First, I am not for conference champion roster navboxes such as we have with national champions as a general rule; so do not think I wish to go there. However, there do seem non-national champions worthy of navboxes. I've made one for the 1899 Iron Men and say the Four Horsemen or Seven Blocks of Granite could probably use one. There are also some great teams of old with all the starters meeting general notability requirements on their own (e. g. 1920 Georgia Tech Golden Tornado), and something to facilitate linking between them could prove useful. Thoughts?
The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Texas Longhorns football series records until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.
Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Cbl62 (talk) 05:03, 2 January 2016 (UTC) on behalf of User:Dirtlawyer1.
On AFB game box
Can anyone provide some guidelines to avoid text wrapping issues, such as on 1928 Florida Gators football team#Week 9: at Tennessee? One can eschew the year which can be inferred from the article, or shorten Tennessee to Tenn or Vols or something. Sometimes you might need both - say shortening Washington & Lee to W&L. Including both the stadium and the city always makes for issues in the location. Also, is there any way to avoid the annoying bullet point when the winner is made bold? Thanks in advance to any in the know. Cake (talk) 15:12, 31 December 2015 (UTC)
Cake, I assume you're referring to the line-wrapping within the game summary infobox -- correct? This issue was raised on this talk page several months ago . . . we have two different template for game summary infoboxes: one that runs the entire width of the displayed article page, and a defined-width template (the one included in the 1928 Gators article) and causes the line-wrapping problem. As I mentioned in the prior discussion, the page-wide template is arguably too much, and the defined-width template routinely causes line-wrapping more than 3/4 of the time. The simple solution is to widen the defined-width template by the equivalent of 10 to 15 character, which would reduce the problem and eliminate line-wrapping in most cases. Given that the previous discussion simply petered out for lack of interest, there was no decision to impose one template or the other uniformly. I'll take a look at the smaller, defined-width template tomorrow and see if I can't widen it as described. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 05:14, 2 January 2016 (UTC)
Yes I am. I agree the page-wide templates are too much. E. g. 2014 Oregon Ducks is an eyesore. I seem to recall a day when there was no bullet point created by making the winner bold. Cake (talk) 16:36, 2 January 2016 (UTC)
Williams' records list a Dr. James Ogilvie as part of its Class of 1895. See here. Cbl62 (talk) 18:33, 3 January 2016 (UTC) See also this entry for recipients of the B.A. in 1895. Cbl62 (talk) 18:34, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
Personally, I hate the idea of navboxes for high school football coaches. I do think it is remarkable, however, that any high school football program would have a half dozen Wikipedia-notable head coaches. Almost unheard of, in fact. If we whack this navbox, this should be worked into the Everettt High School article. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 16:52, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
Well, you can leave it but I guarantee others will spring up as well. That's how Wikipedia works and why I personally wouldn't want them for basketball. Rikster2 (talk) 18:03, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
Delete - Per my comment and Rikster's above. NENAN: no navboxes for high school coaches. We do not need a precedent for the creation of a whole new class of high school coach navboxes. And yes, Cake, a category works just fine. None of these guys are notable because they were the head coach of the Everett High School football team, but because of their college coaching and pro sports careers. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:15, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
Query - Does anyone else know of any additional high school coach navboxes? If so, let's deal with them all now, before someone creates dozens of them, and we create a whole new class of marginal templates backed by their creators who will fight tooth and claw to keep them . . . . Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:45, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
The issue raised by 09er is one that comes up frequently in other guises where there is a large set of persons or things, of which 99% are non-notable. An article is validly created about someone or something that falls within the 1% that is notable, and someone shouts, "Oh, no! We can't allow that article or others will start creating a plague of 'fancruft' articles on the other 99%!" I've been guilty of buying into such logic myself, but we really ought to avoid such arguments, as that's not how Wikipedia's notability rules are supposed to work. If someone/something is notable, we should allow the article (or navbox) to remain. We ought not throw out babies with bathwater, and, in this case, Massillon is a baby. Sure, the individuals mentioned by 09er achieved their greatest fame elsewhere, but Massillon's role as a cradle of great coaches would IMO legitimately warrant a navbox. Cbl62 (talk) 15:29, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
Cbl, while I agree every potential navbox topic should be considered on its own merits, here are some fundamental circumstances your analysis above fails to consider:
Only two or three of the 27 Massillon head would pass the GNG notability threshold because of their tenures as Massillion coaches;
Well over half of all Massillon coaches do not satisfy the GNG notability criteria;
When a majority of included topics are not notable, then the overall subject is a poor candidate for a navbox;
Among those Massillon coaches who are notable, a strong majority are notable for their college and professional careers subsequent to their Massillon tenures;
When a majority of potentially linked subjects are not notable, the list is a far better candidate for a list article than a navbox;
And while not definitive, such a navbox fails WP:NAVBOX criteria nos. 3 and 5.
Finally, as outlined above, the suitability of navboxes is governed by more than notability of the navbox subject. Very few high school coach histories are going to satisfy those other points of evaluation which we take for granted for major college football programs and pro teams when we create navboxes for their coaching tenures. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:15, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
Somehow, I had a hunch that you'd disagree! If having a majority of the members be notable is important, then Everett High School high school football coaches pass muster by a long way. That school has had 11 coaches in its history, and eight of the 11 clearly pass notability standards. Seven have articles already, and based on my research John DiBiaso warrants one as well. See Template:Everett HS (MA) football coach navbox. I am no advocate of mass creation of high school coaching navboxes, but we need to analyze each separately. Cbl62 (talk)
As for your reliance on WP:NAVBOX points 3 and 5, they are not only "not defnitive", they are actually completely irrelevant to coaching and player navboxes. Let's look at them more closely:
5. "If not for the navigation template, an editor would be inclined to link many of these articles in the See also sections of the articles." Again, this is irrelevant to coaching navboxes where this would rarely if ever apply. See criteria 3 above. Cbl62 (talk) 18:07, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
Cbl, as I wrote above, there are more points of evaluation than just the notability of individual subjects. Returning full circle to where we started: "None of these guys [i.e., Everett coaches] are notable because they were the head coach of the Everett High School football team, but because of their college coaching and pro sports careers." While I will allow for the hypothetical high school coaching history that may pass muster, the WP:NAVBOX criteria and notability concerns present a formidable combination of hurdles for even truly exceptional high school programs such as Cincinnati Moeller, Masillon Washington and Valdosta. The Everett coaches navbox is less the baby in your metaphor than the placenta, and it still fails 3 of 5 WP:NAVBOX criteria. The lack of a supporting article or list is a major fail for which we routinely delete navboxes. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:19, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
Just because the other coaches do not have articles does not mean they do not meet the general notability guidelines. There are numerous books written about the history of Massillon football. I have not read them all but I wouldn’t be surprised if there is enough biographical information in them to write articles that meet the general notability guidelines.09er (talk) 20:38, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
If that is the case, and you want to write articles on the history of the Massillon high school football team and for those other coaches, then the argument for creating a navbox for the Massillon coaches would certainly be much stronger and clearer. That said, the idea of creating coach navboxes for 99.9% of all high schools is a horrible idea, contributes to bottom-of-the-page cruft for persons who are most often known for something else (i.e., college and pro playing careers and college and pro coaching). We hold high school athletes to a stricter notability standard than athletes generally because of the proliferation of routine local sports coverage for American high school athletes (see WP:NHSPHSATH), and we probably should include high school coaches in that guideline too. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:04, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
I agree. As stated in my first post on the subject, most high-schools should not have a nav box. I think your figure of 99.9% is a little low and should be 99.9999%. I also agree that we should hold high school coaches a strict standard. They must have more than routine coverage in local papers. The only point I am making is that coaches, nav boxes, players, etc. must stand on their own merit. In my opinion the possibility that others might spring up is not a valid reason to exclude. Massillon is just a special case. At one point in time (not any more) being head coach of Massillon would gain you more notability and was a better position than most college coaches in Ohio. Sure a lot of coaches went on to better things. If that the case to not have a nav box, then get rid of Miami (OH). Most the coaches there are known for coaching someplace else. 09er (talk) 15:54, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
Comment One should consider there are border cases. Gordon and Memphis University School were both places people prepped where one can find football media guides and such like. According to Roger Saylor, MUS was even a member of the SIAA. Further, nobody would dispute coach boxes for the Indian schools like Carlisle or Haskell, yet these were technically prep schools. There are some cases where there seem to be pipelines at places like Massillon, or Vandy players cutting their teeth at Montgomery Bell Academy Cake (talk) 21:33, 7 January 2016 (UTC)
Save the Orphans
I have noticed several CFB articles that are orphans, and I think it would be a worthwhile attempt to de orphan as many of these as possible. Here is the list. We have several orphaned articles that I believe aren't notable. Does anybody have thoughts on the following, several (but not all that I am listing) of which I assume may have been created by those in question:
With the obvious exception of Tony Reno almost certainly satisfying GNG, none of the others are entitled to a presumption of notability per WP:NCOLLATH or WP:NGRIDIRON, which means they are subject to a full GNG analysis. Based on a cursory review, I'm guessing more than half of the list above would be deleted after review at AfD. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:21, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
@UCO2009bluejay: Bluejay, let me know if you need help doing a WP:BEFORE analysis for these subjects. Youel may or may not be notable, but none of the presently linked references in the article are significant in coverage and independent sources. Remember: sources associated with the subject or the team of which he was a member cannot be used to establish notability of the subject; that "independent source" requirement usually excludes publications of the athletic department, university, alumni association, conference, NCAA, etc. The "reliable source" requirement excludes user-contributed sources such as fan sites. We usually exclude stats sites coverage as not meeting the "significant coverage" requirement, too. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:56, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
I know not every member of a powerhouse program or a national championship team is notable. But I figured someone like Cake would do like to do some digging to establish whether or not he does before I prod or afd that article.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 22:01, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
Fair enough, sir. And Cake will be a much more sympathetic notability reviewer than I am. Let me know if you want any help. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 22:08, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
I beefed up DeCoster's but hard to link anyone from WV State - maybe some Nevada or Lafayette article can manage. Fixed Youel and Verpaele (cannot pronounce either). Cake (talk) 21:39, 7 January 2016 (UTC)
I have doubt as to whether this newly-created article on a defunct series that was only played 14 times would withstand WP:GNG analysis as either a traditional rivalry or as a historically significant series. Cbl62 (talk) 01:02, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
I saw this article several days ago, and I reacted much the same way as Cbl. The series was only played 10 times as a Big XII game, and because the Longhorns and Huskers were in different Big XII divisions, the game was never played annually. Like so many conference games, it was a good, competitive series, but that does not mean that it was a traditional rivalry in any meaningful sense. We've created a lot of so-called "rivalry" articles of a similar character in the last 3 to 5 years, and a lot of them are simply not notable as rivalries per WP:GNG.
As for the navbox, I see no reason why we should be creating separate navboxes for team-specific rivalries -- it's more bottom-of-the page clutter. Most CFB teams not named Notre Dame only have two to four meaningful rivalries, and we already list them in the team navboxes. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 01:20, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
I don't know about the other templates, but only about half the links an the Michigan one are for football, meaning it has an independent navigational role. Thus, I don't know why it would be TFDed, but what do I know.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 03:05, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
As the creator of the article, I'll offer my view. IMO, it is not a current "rivalry", although a couple sources do refer to it as such. That said, it is one of the longest-running series for both programs. IMO, the Michigan-Illinois series is historically notable by any reasonable measure -- length of the series (dating back to 1898); regularity of the series (95 games making Michigan Illinois' third most frequent historic opponent); border state competition; legendary games in the Grange years; matches between Hall of Fame coaches Zuppke, Yost, and Crisler; the Elliott vs Elliott brotherly competition in the 1960s; numerous games in which both teams were ranked (1942, 1944, 1946, 1953, 1983, 1989-1991, 1995 and 2000); multiple upset matches of highly-ranked/undefeated opponents (e.g, 1928, 1939, 1955, 1963, and 1985), etc. I have suggested a framework for a guideline which I believe could be superior to the largely subjective and slippery question of what constitutes a "rivalry". The link to that post is at Proposed College Football Series Notability Guideline. I have not proposed this framework formally here, but would welcome input or suggestions. Cbl62 (talk) 06:55, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
Good question, and I'm not sure what the reason was (maybe just a routine gap). In any event, it resulted in both teams being undefeated and laying claims to the national championship. Cbl62 (talk) 00:27, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
Something for those knowledgeable about the history of the sport, perhaps @Cbl62:, @ParkH.Davis:. I long wondered "what the &@^# & is a "criss cross" play?" Presumably it happens in the backfield. Saw it referenced multiple times without explanation. Now have figured it out: e. g. here. Similarly, buck is not a term come across much today. So I am thinking, any more obscure plays or play-terms of which we might take note? Cake (talk) 18:26, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
For example, though these are positions, what was a "centre rush" or a forward, in the very old days of the sport? My guess is a center-rush is a center and a forward is a tackle. Then there and "rushers" as such-like to confuse things more. Cake (talk) 19:53, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
Congratulations: Rammer jammer, Yellowhammer!
Congratulations to a fine Alabama Crimson Tide football team on their 116th national championship! How about that onside kick, eh? And a hearty "well played" to the Clemson Tigers, who proved that the ACC still plays Division I FBS football. This public service announcement brought to you by an SEC fan in search of a starting quarterback, preferably one with no history of PED use. SEC Fan (talk) 05:19, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
"winningest"
The propriety of using the word "winningest", and a related effort to excise the word from Wikipedia, is the subject of a discussion here: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#"winningest" in sports articles. As the word is used in articles falling within the scope of this project, editors of this project may wish to participate either for or against the proposed removal. Cbl62 (talk) 20:40, 14 January 2016 (UTC)
Now that the season is coming to a close, we have about 300 Current and Future class articles cover the 2015 seasons that need to be re-rated on the assessment scale. Can we get a few people to chip in with that? Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 06:34, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
I've cleaned up the Future class articles, re-rating all of the 2015 season articles that were there. We still have 259 Current class articles that need to be re-rated. Can I get some help there? Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 05:26, 14 January 2016 (UTC)
Just curious: Do people actually make use of the Current/Future categorizations? Hopefully the project is benefiting from the annual overhead this requires.—Bagumba (talk) 06:31, 14 January 2016 (UTC)
Bagumba, that is a good question. I look at these categorizations a bit, but in large part just to facilitate their own management. I do wonder how useful it is to have separate Current and Future categorization. That requires work at the beginning of each season to update all the season articles from Future to Current. The bowl games tend to get rated as Future class upon creation and then go straight to a grade rating, because they're only current I suppose for the few hours the game is actually being played. It would probably be much more efficient to have one Current/Future class. Jweiss11 (talk) 03:57, 18 January 2016 (UTC)
Does anyone know of a variant of Template:Winning percentage that displays both the numerical win-loss record (e.g., "21–7") and the winning percentage in brackets (e.g., "(.750)") immediately following the win-loss record without having to enter the data twice? If such a variant of the template does not exist, does anyone have the coding skills to create one? All of the NFL head coach infoboxes use the winning percentage template, but you have to enter the wins and losses twice -- once as text, and again in the template -- to update the field. Seems kinda silly, and I assume creating the variant would be child's play for an experienced coder. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 06:16, 13 January 2016 (UTC)
Good addition. Aside from extra work, the old format was problematic in that sometimes only one part would be updated. Cbl62 (talk) 06:03, 14 January 2016 (UTC)
We need to discuss these before more of their type are created. My opinion is that these navboxes should be deleted. They denote rather obscure all-time team selections that do not have, nor do them seem to warrant, stand-alone articles. Furthermore, no mention of these all-time teams is made in the main article for the respective programs in question. Are the selections to these teams essential to the identity of the biographical subjects linked in these navboxes? I think not. This class of navboxes strikes me a fancruft and clutter.
Gotta go - Most, if not all, of these are based on a single selector (usually a single sports writer, editor or newspaper) with no criteria other than the subjective opinion of the selector. Admittedly, I am not as familiar with the "all-time" greats of these two programs as I am with others, but I assume they are not substantially different from those of programs with which I am most familiar. For the Florida Gators for instance, there have been more than a dozen "all-time" greats lists specific to the football program, most being products of The Gainesville Sun, The Miami Herald, or the university alumni magazine. Most are pretty ephemeral, earlier "all-time greats" lists being eclipsed by later lists from the same publication. When I started editing Wikipedia in mid-2009, I inherited a half dozen all-time greats lists in the Florida Gators football main article, and I have contemplated going in the exact opposite direction: pushing mention of the newspaper lists to the notable player articles, and deleting the lists from the main team article. Different strokes, I suppose.
In my opinion, these all-time greats lists do not rise to the level of being navbox noteworthy, and that's even before we begin to discuss the actual WP:NAVBOX criteria, which require a supporting list article (usually a stand-alone) for the navbox subject. I expect that many of these all-time lists are also going to have problems with NAVBOX criteria nos. 2, 3 and 5, too. If someone nominated these navboxes for deletion at TfD, I would not expect them to survive critical review by non-CFB editors. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 23:50, 27 December 2015 (UTC)
First, I am not against this discussion at all and such was most of the motivation for creating the new ones upon seeing Navy's new box. Please note the all-era Georgia Tech and all-time Sewanee teams are regularly placed in "official" publications like media guides and so forth, possibly to be distinguished from the lists of George Trevor or any particular writer per se, and less subject to change (for Tech's are rendered solid by the era, and Sewanee's by its contemporary irrelevance). Cake (talk) 01:13, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
@Jweiss11: I would be grateful if you would withdraw your TfD nomination of this template, and permit me to convert it to a stand-alone list article. While I agree that the nature of the honor does not rise to the level of meriting a navbox, the honors were kind of a big deal for Florida high school football, and the honorees are all players who achieved much bigger things at the college and pro levels. Most of the players listed are among the greatest ever to step on a football field for the Gators, Hurricanes and Seminoles . . . so, unless someone else objects can we move it to sandbox page in my user space, and I will take responsibility for making it into something else? Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 08:13, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
DL, why don't you just create the list and let the TfD proceed? This navbox has really got to go, whether or not there list exists. Why don't you just sandbox the list of the players in the navbox now? Jweiss11 (talk) 08:17, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
I commented at the TfD already, but Jweiss' had idea crossed my mind as well. I thought maybe DL wanted to retain attribution to the earlier editors, but WP:NOATT wouldnt require it for these simple lists.—Bagumba (talk) 08:51, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
Exactly: attribution. No harm in "DELETE AND USERFY"; the navbox will be deleted and will stay deleted. You can support the deletion of the template and userfying it to me. That said, the specific topic is notable, and it's noteworthy enough that it should be mentioned in the "early years/high school" section of each of the players' articles. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 10:13, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
BTW, while we're cleaning house, and subjecting high school football honors navboxes to scrutiny, I suggest the following honors are also not defining of the linked subjects' careers:
The templates also have various problems under the WP:NAVBOX criteria, including the absence of an article or list on the specific topic of the navbox in at least three cases. Two of the awards are for the best player in a metropolitan area. Three are for high school underclassmen. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 23:28, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
There goes the Chris Sailer Award nav I was going to create :-) General rule of principle is that any non-national honor will likely not be worthy of a navbox. The recipients are ultimately defined by their pro or at worst college career, so these would only add to navbox clutter. I dare say that even national HS awards don't need a navbox. Just click on the darn article, and enough already with the hard-ons staring at your navbox creation.—Bagumba (talk) 00:19, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
If there were a respected national award for the best high school football player (essentially a prep version of the Heisman), and I don't know that such an award exists, that might be an exception, but Bagumba's proposal makes sense as a general rule. Cbl62 (talk) 01:39, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
I'm not sure I would go as far as the two of you, but I certainly look at navboxes for high school honors -- even national high school honors -- with a jaundiced eye. Some of these clearly need to get whacked -- the local ones for Kansas City and Los Angeles -- and others are highly suspect, like the ESPN Rise honors for high school underclassmen, and fail to satisfy the NAVBOX criteria. All of these high school honors navboxes should be critically reviewed for (a) notability of the particular honor or award, (b) noteworthiness with regard to the individual players' careers, and (c) overall compliance with NAVBOX criteria, including existence of article on the specific topic. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 01:47, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
WP:NAVBOX has been insufficient to regulate sports navboxes. Few (if any) awards navs pass #3 ("The articles should refer to each other, to a reasonable extent.") or #5 ("If not for the navigation template, an editor would be inclined to link many of these articles in the See also sections of the articles."). We selectively apply NAVBOX at TFD to suit our own personal eye test. Can we do better? Can it be more objective? I've long believed and lightly advocated that only awards/honors that would generally be mentioned in the lead of an FA bio should be candidates for a navbox.—Bagumba (talk) 02:18, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Your Heisman example falls into my FA caveat, so that would not restrict a navbox for such a defining achievement. If a similar scenario was for a lesser award, I would argue that a navbox would be overkill. Your intent seems to be for a reader to be led to other recipients from the same school, but a navbox provides an entire list without designating the ones from the related school. See also's are a great tool for listing related articles, and are not meant to be avoided. Most of the links are integrated into the prose over time as the article quality improves.—Bagumba (talk) 04:31, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Your FA lead requirement for awards navboxes seems like an excellent guidelines to me. 23:05, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
NCAA Silver Anniversary Awards navboxes nominated for deletion
New Princeton football season articles: one AfD'd; other marked for notablity
New Princeton football season articles, for the years 2000 though 2010, have been created in recent days. A number of the them were initially PROD'd, and 2000 Princeton Tigers football team has been subsequently AfD'd here. Others have have been marked for questionable notability and need for attention. Can we get some input at the AfD and some attenton on these articles? @Cbl62: this may be up your alley. Jweiss11 (talk) 06:22, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
I added a bit, including articles from The New York Times on two of the games. If others have time, I am sure additional coverage could be found and added. Cbl62 (talk) 15:47, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
Corey Davis
Does Corey Davis meet our notability guidelines at WP:NGRIDIRON? It doesn't seem like it but I could use a second opinion with someone more familiar with the sport. I came across this article indirectly after responding to a different request. Mkdwtalk01:47, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
@Mkdw: Davis looks pretty "iffy" if a full and critical notability analysis were applied using WP:GNG and requiring significant coverage in multiple, independent, reliable secondary sources. That said, the subject purportedly played in one or more Arena Football League regular season games, and that imparts a presumption of notability to former Arena football players per the WP:NGRIDIRON specific notability guideline for American pro football players. Frankly, the language regarding Arena players was inserted in 2007 with virtually no discussion, and I think it was a huge mistake. Arena players received nowhere near the same level of consistent, significant coverage received by players in the NFL, old AFL or CFL. We really should discuss stripping the presumption of notability for Arena players. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 02:14, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
Is there a precedent for tightening standards to remove a class of athletes from NSPORTS that was previously presumed notable? If so, we should model a request after it. I know that the local AFL team where I am at pretty much had mostly paid advertisement made to looked like news coverage in the local paper.—Bagumba (talk) 10:00, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
None of which I am aware. WP:NSPORTS specific notability guidelines have been tweaked, and occasionally tightened at the margins when the efforts were led/supported by the WikiProject members whose SNG was involved. As you might expect, it's virtually impossible to tighten an SNG when opposed by the concerned WikiProject(s). In this case, there might actually be an opportunity to do so because I think a lot NFL/CFB recognize the practical differences in coverage between NFL and Arena players and the quality of play, and the fact that Arena Football was never a top-tier league talent-wise in the same way as the NFL. The convenient rationalization I've heard in the past was that Arena Football was the top-tier indoor football league, and the NFL was the top-tier outdoor football league. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 11:56, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
Regardless of its local popularity, the original Arena Football League was always a second-tier minor league, and its big name, first-tier players were the exception not the rule. This is borne out by a simple comparison of team payrolls and average player salaries, NFL vs. Arena league. Kurt Warner is a perfect example; he was an undrafted rookie out of Northern Iowa, who by virtue of three good years of playing Arena ball got a chance to prove himself in the NFL. The NFL always got first pick of talent via the NFL draft, and the Arena league never tried to compete head to head in terms of player salaries. The NFL rookie minimum was $310,000 when the average Arena salary was $81,000 and its rookie minimum was $31,000 in 2009. The last data I could find for Arena players (2013) indicates they were paid a minimum of several hundred dollars per game after the bankruptcy reorganization in 2009. The USFL did compete head to head in terms of salaries and running a separate draft; the USFL was largely staffed with newly drafted college rookies and NFL free agents. The USFL's salary competition for big-name talent was ultimately one of the reasons for the league's demise. As for the CFL, whatever else it may be, the CFL represents the top-tier of Canadian professional football, and it has always been staffed mostly with Canadian nationals and former CIS players, not Americans. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 20:20, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
The appropriate comparison is not Arena vs. NFL. Nobody argues that talent level is the same as the NFL. The correct comparison would be Arena (in its prime) vs. CFL/USFL. All three of the latter (Arena, CFL, USFL) have for nearly a decade, and without any significant degree of unrest, received a presumption of notability for their players under WP:NGRIDIRON. In order to argue persuasively that Arena (in its prime) should be dropped from WP:NGRIDIRON, there would need to be solid evidence that Arena had a significantly lower talent level. To the contrary, it's my hunch that the talent level was actually higher in Arena (in its prime) than CFL during the same time period. It makes little or no sense that a player in the CFL (with a lower talent level) would get a presumption of notability while players in Arena would not. Your statement that "the CFL represents the top-tier of Canadian professional football" is a red herring; as you know, we don't give a presumption of notability to players simply because they played "in the top tier" of their national leagues. Compare British American Football League, Belgian Football League, Austrian Football League, Irish American Football League, German Football League, European Football League, NFL Europe, Australian Gridiron League, etc. (none of which afford a presumption despite being top tier in their respective countries). What matters is whether the level of play is sufficiently elite. The European and Australian leagues fail this standard; the CFL and Arena (in its prime) do not. Further, and while not so relevant in any event, the salary data you provide is from the post-2008 Arena league (after its demise) which was a significantly different and inferior animal; for this reason, and as noted above, I would likely support a 2008 cutoff date for a presumption of notability on Arena players. Cbl62 (talk) 00:20, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
Admittedly, I am not an expert on indoor football, but from what I remember, I think Cbl62 is more or less right, what we have here is a case of two different leagues (pre-2008 and post-2008), both of them called the Arena Football League. And he's also right in saying that in it's heyday in the late 90's and early 2000's, the arena league probably was roughly on par with the CFL in terms of level of play. My area had an arena league team between 1999 and 2003, and, from what I can remember, while the level of coverage admittedly wasn't at an NFL-level, the team did get pretty solid coverage and exposure in the local media. In areas that didn't have an existing NFL franchise, it may have gotten even more coverage. As for the post-2008 Arena Football League, Cbl62 is also right in saying that league is a vastly inferior league. In fact there are several other indoor football leagues currently operating (Champions Indoor Football, American Indoor Football, Indoor Football Alliance, Indoor Football League, etc.) and I don't get the impression there's really all that much difference in level of play between those leagues (who get no presumption of notability at all) and the post-2008 AFL (where we're still giving out 1-game presumptive notability). FWIW, the current AFL does appear to have it's games broadcast nationally on the ESPN networks. One possible solution to this that no one's mentioned yet would be instead of maintaining the status quo or doing away with any presumption of notability altogether, simply raising the number of games from one (same as the NFL) to, say, 20 (or roughly a full season of arena league play), similar to what the ice hockey guys do for minor league players in their sport. Like I said, I'm not an expert on indoor football, and I haven't really paid much attention to it since 2003, but, from 1,000 miles away, that's my take on it. Are there any veteran editors out there that are actively editing arena football articles that we could ask to chime in on this? Ejgreen77 (talk) 03:15, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
Cbl62 wrote: "The appropriate comparison is not Arena vs. NFL. Nobody argues that talent level is the same as the NFL. The correct comparison would be Arena (in its prime) vs. CFL/USFL."
No, it's really not the "correct comparison". The correct comparison is how much significant coverage does the average Arena football player receive? Or, more to the point, do ninety percent or more of all Arena football players receive significant coverage in multiple, independent, reliable, secondary sources sufficient to satisfy the general notability guidelines per WP:GNG? If the answer is not an unequivocal "yes," than the specific notability guideline is over-inclusive as written (i.e., a big, fat FAIL). While I find the whole comparison of talent thing to be an interesting diversion -- and, yes, real talent follows the real dollars -- at the end of the day, it's about coverage. Wikipedia "notability" is based on significant coverage, not anyone's perception of the subject's importance (or talent level) -- and the overwhelming majority of players of American football in Australia, Austria, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, etc., simply do not receive anything approaching coverage sufficient to satisfy GNG. As for the CFL, football (not soccer) is the second-most popular sport in Canada after hockey, and the coverage of the average CFL player in the Canadian sports media is more than sufficient to satisfy GNG. If you want to argue that Arena football players got the same or greater coverage than USFL players, great, let's remove the presumption for both USFL and Arena players. Most USFL players will survive AfD because they also played in the NFL. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:09, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
I agree with you that coverage is what matters, thus my disagreement with your assertion that the CFL passes simply because it's "the top tier" league in Canada. Now to the matter at hand: If you want to reverse a policy that has been in place for nearly a decade, I suggest the burden is on you to show that the coverage of Arena players differs in a substantial way from the coverage of CFL or USFL players as to which the presumption is not seriously questioned. On the other hand, and as Ejgreen also notes, it's relatively clear that the Arena league after 2008 was a far less important league. If you want to propose a more incremental approach, such as limiting the Arena presumption to those playing in 2008 or earlier, I think that would be relatively uncontroversial and would receive my support. I'm also intrigued by Ejgreen's proposal to raise the "games played" limit, and that, too, is worth discussing (maybe increasing the limit for Arena, USFL, and CFL players by as much as 800% from one game to eight games [i.e., half a season], thereby eliminating the cup of coffee players who are far less likely to have received significant coverage). Cbl62 (talk) 06:00, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
If we're going to be honest, there is also real doubt as to whether 90% of NFL players with one game of experience would satisfy GNG standards. I'd be open to discussing a proposal an increase in the "games played" requirement for NFL player as well. It would be interesting to examine a list of NFL players with 1 game played and check a random subset to see what percent satisfy GNG; I'd bet that it's significantly less than 90%. Cbl62 (talk) 06:11, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
This doesnt affect it's notability one way or another, but I've removed most of the article's content as it was a copyvio.—Bagumba (talk) 09:32, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
UCO2009bluejay, thanks for kicking this off. Is there a reason you left out Notre Dame, the last remaining article of this sort? Jweiss11 (talk) 06:52, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
Gang, I just restored Tyson Summers and did some quick edits/sourcing--he is now a head coach at Georgia Southern... but the article needs work and I don't have time to address it in any detail. Please pitch in!--Paul McDonald (talk) 14:57, 6 February 2016 (UTC)
The "at/vs" parameter is used on schedule charts for most (maybe all?) other programs. I personally find it to be helpful. That said, some do believe it is redundant and, given space issues, have removed/omitted it from the Florida charts. The Florida charts also differ in that they use numeric date formats (compare Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Days). I am personally not a stickler for absolute consistency on these things, and so if there is a consensus among Florida editors to do it that way, so be it. Cbl62 (talk) 22:06, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
I think it may be just dirtlawyer, for I too find it helpful, but he will protest and so I leave it. Perhaps I find it helpful just out of habit. The date formats differing was not even something I had come across. Cake (talk) 22:33, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
As we have added more and more optional parameters to the season record table templates, we have contributed to the widening of the tables and worsened the tables' line-wrapping problems, especially on laptops and mobile devices. Many of the optional parameters -- spelling out "rivalry" game links, network and secondary broadcasters, game time, attendance, AP Poll rankings -- are of secondary importance, and they detract from the "at a glance" principle of emphasizing the primary data points, i.e., opponent, score and date. The "at" and "vs." abbreviations in our results tables were ill-considered carryovers from the old AP Style Guide, and they continue to be used as short-hand by the wire services when they report national scores in the "micro text" format on page 2 of your newspaper's sports section. The abbreviations were used in space-limited page 2 game schedules and results instead of listing the actual game locations, which were assumed to be known by fans based on whether the first-listed team was "home" or "away". Rarely does any professional news service list both the game location (stadium, city, state) and use the "at" symbol. The "vs." symbol for neutral sites has an ambiguous meaning at best, and is completely meaningless to most of our readers. Moreover, from a layout and design standpoint the combined use of "at" and the AP Poll rankings (e.g., "at #17") makes the opponent harder to discern among the table's data.
Bottom line: the purpose of our tables is not to cram as many data points into a single table as possible. As WP:IBX says about infoboxes, "When considering any aspect of infobox design, keep in mind the purpose of an infobox: to summarize (and not supplant) key facts that appear in the article (an article should remain complete with its summary infobox ignored). The less information it contains, the more effectively it serves that purpose, allowing readers to identify key facts at a glance." Good design means making choices, not simply adding more options. And when it comes to including options that are redundant, that choice is simple. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 01:05, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
Using "at" for road games is a pretty standard practice, even in the 2015 Gators Media Guide (p. 1), where the city/state of the stadium is also listed. At a glance, it seems the presence or absence of "at" is easier to determine if a game is at home or on the road than having to process and read the entire location. If it turns out most are OK with using "at", I don't see a compelling reason to have a special local consensus for Florida.—Bagumba (talk) 05:12, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
Thank you for pointing out that my alma mater's website uses "at"; it's also completely irrelevant. It's redundant, it clutters the table, makes it harder to discern core information, and contributes to line-wrapping. Most persons who attended the university know that Gators home games are played in Gainesville, Florida; it's also announced in the lead section of every Florida Gators article. The overwhelming majority of our readers understand that when the Florida Gators football team (linked) plays a game against the Georgia Bulldogs football team (linked) . . . in Sanford Stadium (linked) . . . in Athens, Georgia (linked) . . . it was not a home game for the Gators. It's flipping obvious to anyone with an IQ above room temperature. Frankly, I can't believe we even have to talk about this. Some people are too in love with filling out every f------ optional parameter in the templates to use their g--d--- brains. Oh, and there's a reason the parameters are "optional" and the template instructions provide that the columns may be turned off and excluded; unfortunately, we have users who do nothing but add every optional parameter to the tables of existing articles. If you want to add every template option to every CFB article you edit, feel free to do so. I will continue to delete such options for the perfectly valid reasons I've stated above. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 06:22, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
I have nominated a series of navboxes related to the ESPN RISE high school football awards for deletion. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 01:32, 24 January 2016 (UTC)
I've been working on the Big 12 Conference articles for some time in a sub-page. And I've run into an issue with the affiliate members. The infobox shows the number of conference members, the Big 12 states that they only have ten members however they also have ten affiliate members. I have the affiliates listed in the infobox with the membership number at twenty. Would this be appropriate with the conference only saying that the have ten members.--Dcheagle • talk • contribs07:45, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
I dont think either is wrong either way, personally. Out of the P5 the Big Ten lists the affiliate member in the infobox and the Pac-12 does not. SEC/ACC have no affiliates. Cheers, —dainomite16:11, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
List of Texas Longhorns football games
I just came across List of Texas Longhorns football games again—I've apparently made minor edits to it in the past. I feel like we may have had a similar list for Michigan some years back, created by Cbl62, but we decided to delete it, because it was difficult to have objective inclusion criteria. Am I recalling correctly about the Michigan list? Thoughts about the Texas list? Jweiss11 (talk) 02:54, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
These lists seem like a byproduct of WP:NSEASONS: "In cases where the individual season notability is insufficient for an article, multiple seasons may be grouped together in a single article." It seems that editors used to be over-conservative on creating individual season article, whereas now any and every season gets created irrespective of coverage.—Bagumba (talk) 03:22, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
The Georgia list is completely redundant to the Georgia season articles, and needs to be deleted or redirected to another appropriate Georgia Bulldogs football article. The Texas article is a list of purported "greatest-ever" games. I don't know what the current status of all the Longhorns season articles may be, but some of this material might-could be incorporated in the seasons. Sadly, it appears that little of the list of purported greatest-ever Longhorns games is sourced. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 16:55, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
Yes. Any "-est" list that is qualitative is always going to be a NPOV pain. How many and which sources need to say that something is -est this-and-that, e.g. greatest game or dirtiest player, to merit inclusion on the list. Those lists are fine with a single writer, but can never work with crowd-sourced editing.—Bagumba (talk) 18:26, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
Yup. Do we have anyone who works primarily on Texas Longhorns articles? If so, we may want to have them review the Longhorns list for anything that should be incorporated in the main or season articles before you nominate them for AfD. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 23:58, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
Everything seems to be based off one source which is now dead, but the archive is here (surprisingly with a domain like mackbrown-texasfootball.com, it looks to be CBS site and not some blog). I'd say just start from scratch in the season article with the original source if needed, as there seems to be a mix of copyvio with OR in the WP list.—Bagumba (talk) 00:15, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Is this navbox "consensus national championship" title appropriate: "2004 USC Trojans football—consensus national champions (BCS / Coaches Poll vacated)"? Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 21:56, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Too verbose for sure. I would change to "AP national champions", except that would invite copycats for more poll-specific champion navboxes.—Bagumba (talk) 22:01, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
I was vaguely alluding to the vacated titles. Personally, I think all reference to the "consensus," BCS, and Coaches Poll championships should be stripped from the exterior and only alluded to in a small text explanation inside the box. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 00:32, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
We've all seen the Sarah McLachlan adds making heartfelt pleas for suffering animals. ... cue music ... This is a heartfelt plea to help the many college football mascots that need your help. Through the efforts of generous volunteers, Wikipedia's "Save the Mascots" campaign was able in 2015 to save such beloved and cuddly creatures as the Golden Gophers, Bruins, Nittany Lions, Razorbacks (), and Bulldogs -- creating season articles for every one of their seasons. In recent weeks, through continuing generous support of volunteers like you, we have also now saved the following:
The 2016 CFP Championship page (specifically the game summary section) reads like it's been written by a dejected Clemson fan. I think the section could use a little more of an unbiased summary for neutral readers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mja9678 (talk • contribs) 21:38, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
James Ross III
Hello, I am writing you all inquiring about a Wikipedia page for James Ross III . I was wondering do you all provide pages for college athletes? There would be a lot of information since he first began playing football until now. (Ex. Jr high school, high school etc.) he has played linebacker as a starter for the University of Michigan for 4 years and is currently training for the 2016 NFL draft. I am working on marketing for him before he can hire a true marketing team. Also do you all charge for pages, if so how much?I look forward to hearing back from you soon.
@Omni26: Hello. If your interest is in creating a page for the athlete primarily for marketing purposes, it has a tendency to create conflict of interest. This type of editing is strongly discouraged. As for being paid to edit pages, the majority of us are volunteers and edit for free. I'm sure there's someone who would be willing to create an article for James Ross if he is notable enough. If he indeed was a 4-year starter at a big-time program such as Michigan (I'll admit I don't follow Michigan football much), then chances are he does merit an article, and I know we have quite a few Michigan football editors here. Lizard (talk) 20:14, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
A small project
Hey, guys, I know we have a few folks around here who are interested in lower division football, so I thought I'd throw this out here. While making some updates for new coaching hires, I added Mark Raymond to Template:Williams Ephs football coach navbox. The only "problem" here is that Template:Williams Ephs football coach navbox was formerly an entirely blue-linked template, and it kind of seems like a shame to have to add a redlink onto the end of it! The obvious solution here would be to create an article for coach Mark Raymond. Unfortunately, I don't have much free time available this week, so I thought I'd toss it out here. Anybody game? Ejgreen77 (talk) 01:03, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
We have a backlog of 186 articles from the 2015 season still rated as Current class; see Category:Current-Class college football articles. I've been chipping away at these, but could use some help re-rating these on the quality scale. Many of these articles also still have some or all of their leads written on the present tense, so those need to be revised as well. I'd love to get some help knocking this out in the near future. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 19:07, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
The 2016 articles are all rated as Future class. That's yet another layer of admin overhead that might be unnecessary. Would it be better to delete the Current and Future assessment classes, rather than not use them? It seems that WikiProject College Basketball has the same issue; see Category:College basketball articles by quality. Jweiss11 (talk) 05:48, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
No objection to delete on my end. I'm OK if people find them useful, but I don't see what we are gaining from it. Meanwhile, you seem stuck doing all the work :-)—Bagumba (talk) 03:21, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
Bagumba, I'm on the same page with you. And, yes, I do seem to stuck doing all this work! Is there a formal process for deleting a project assessment class? Jweiss11 (talk) 14:38, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
Template:NCAA Division I FCS National Champion navbox
Weird. Is their moniker the "Amcat," or something else? If it is, I'd say Anna Maria Ancats or Anna Maria College Amcats to comply with the norm. Lizard (talk) 01:47, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
They are listed as "Anna Maria" on the standings, etc on the Great Northeast Athletic Conference and NCAA websites; see here and here. This suggests they should be the "Anna Maria AMCATS", even though that's redundant since "AMCATS" stands for "Anna Maria College Athletic Team Sports". Jweiss11 (talk) 01:59, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
I have requested a move request here if anybody would like to participate. In addition to the main move request I have proposed, there are other options listed, and feel free to provide your own suggestions as well.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 02:46, 1 May 2016 (UTC)
Agree completely. The best one of these I've seen is 1943 Alabama Crimson Tide football team, and that's because someone put in the work to make it worth an article. Most people aren't willing to expand articles for seasons in which a team actually played, much less one it didn't play. Lizard (talk) 04:18, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
For starters, it depends on whether or not a "team" actually existed. Where no team existed, we should not create an article simply as a navigational aid. If a "team" actually existed, but played no intercollegiate game, notability needs to be considered on a case by case basis. In the case of the 1882 Michigan team, the article does identify some sources and a roster list, but it is borderline in its present condition, and given the lack of intercollegiate games played. I have been tied up on another project lately, but will undertake some further research and take a closer look when some time frees up. Cbl62 (talk) 14:53, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
So my main question:Should we begin to think about deleting these? I personally would like to see the 43 Bama moved from the general history (1943 continuity )but left in the see also sections of Alabama Crimson Tide football team, and 1942/44 Crimson Tide pages, and perhaps given their own place in the lore section of the navbox (under the Informals heading but keep the page name as 43 Bama). Tennessee should follow some of that same idea IMO. And the others, again IMO, should be deleted without prejudice.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 22:13, 22 April 2016 (UTC)
@Jweiss11: and others: Something needs to be done with navigation boxes like in the William McAvoy article. There is simply way too many to not be grouped together. Personally, I'd like to see them grouped like in this diff. No color is needed since the coaches are at various schools. I don't care if you want to leave the default name Links to related articles as the title or something like Name coaching positions, etc. This article is another example. ☔️ Corkythehornetfan 🌺 01:02, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
In the infobox for Tavon Austin, it has he was an All-Big 12 selection in 2012, but that he also was an All-Big East and Big East Special Teams Player of the Year in 2012. Obviously he couldn't have been an all-conference selection for 2 different conferences, right? WV football's page says the team joined the Big 12 in 2012. Anyone know what the deal is here? This is one of the problems with infoboxes, people just throw stuff in them that aren't cited anywhere in the body. Lizard (talk) 17:45, 17 May 2016 (UTC)
I know some editors have expressed interest in all conference teams and the 2010 Big East Conference season page lists him as a 2nd team All-Conf. so I would imagine it was a typo to mean 2010-11. So yes, somebody just threw things in there.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 21:35, 17 May 2016 (UTC)
Debate on Kansas Jayhawks football needing help from other editors
I am having a debate with @Kmanblue: on the Kansas Football page, specifically the Former Jayhawks in the pros section and regarding Wide Receiver for the Titans Andrew Turzilli and Dolphins Cornerback Tyler Patmon. Both players spent time at Kansas however did not finish their college careers at Kansas. Neither player is listed on the team roster with Kansas as their college. Kmanblue insists these players need to be listed in this section but I believe since neither lists Kansas as their college they should not be listed. I will mention this discussion on NFL project as well. And to answer your question, yes Kansas plays football too lol.--Rockchalk71709:01, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
According to the Tyler Patmon bio, he was a three-year starter at Kansas before transferring to OSU. If that is true, he should absolutely be included on the list of Kansas players in the pros. The logic is clear 1) he played three years of college football as a starter at Kansas, i.e., he is a former Jayhawk; 2) he now plays in the NFL; ==> ergo, 3) he is appropriately included on a list of former Kansas players who now play pro football. The same applies to Turzilli, who according to this was a two-year starter at Kansas before transferring to Rutgers. Cbl62 (talk) 14:30, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
I commented this in the KU discussion but I will condense it here. NFL draft pages are for which team the player was drafted as. But as far as Jayhawks in the pros, once a Jayhawk always a Jayhawk.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 14:38, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
I don't have a problem listing them as Kansas players. They could be footnoted as having transferred.—Bagumba (talk) 18:26, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
/\@Kmanblue: If your ok with this, I'm totally fine with noting they transferred and where they transferred to.--Rockchalk71718:47, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
I have no problem with inserting a footnote. A footnote is fine with me. I just didn't understand how they could no longer be considered former Jayhawks just because they transferred and especially since both only transferred for their last year of eligibility and both have diplomas with the University of Kansas on it. LOL But seriously, that's fine with me @Rockchalk717: to list them with a footnote. Kmanblue (talk) 07:55, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
My response to Lamar bowl game navbox
I know there is a prior discussions on this topic that claims no. Personally, I disagree and think there should be one but I would lose. However, I would propose a simple fix of allowing programs with less than 4 bowl game links a simple fix of linking it to the program navbox. But eventually larger navboxes for major programs such as Baylor, or TCU will eventually see this and add that information then heaven forbid elite programs such as Oklahoma, Ohio State, Alabama, and Notre Dame add them to the point these navboxes are coming redundant therefore later rouge Wikipedians and random IPs will get rid of all head coach navboxes, starting qb navboxes (which IMO should be deleted) to the point they start looking either of the following. PS- Sorry if doing this causes trouble I don't know how to collapse these and I do not endorse what I am presenting, in fact I am mocking it.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 23:43, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
I'm not sure how we should type this in the infobox. It's generally accepted that "champion" is not a proper noun (despite it being capitalized still in multiple articles) but this one is a head scratcher. I've seen "BCS National Champion," "BCS National champion," and "BCS national champion." I've been favoring the last one but it just doesn't look right. Lizard (talk) 15:14, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
Wow, what a waste of time. Why do people just impulsively put articles up for AfD without knowing what constitutes notability? And did he even look at why it was deleted the first time? Due to copyvio, over 10 years ago. Do we even do that anymore? Straight up delete articles for being copyvio. Lizard (talk) 02:01, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
Horace Butterworth – UChicago coach?
Was Horace Butterworth ever an official head coach of basketball or football at the University of Chicago? This edit made me aware that he was affiliated with the school, but I see no records of him in media guides or elsewhere as being an official coach in either sport. @Cbl62: do you have any sources to verify? Jrcla2 (talk) 18:05, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
Bingo! This 1895 article describes Butterworth as one of the early developers of the new game of basketball and notes that he had recently formed a team at U. Chicago. Cbl62 (talk) 18:52, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
Reminder: It's July 1st that means its time to update conference affiliations, if anybody has any idea on all of the lists/pages/cats that need to be updated. I know of a couple that I will be working on.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 21:37, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
If he was a quarterback and was moved to wide receiver, seems logical to include the reason for the move. An equal amount of text is dedicated to the names and ages of his parents and sisters. Lizard (talk) 23:15, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
Three thoughts on this article. First, I tend to agree with Lizard and @Edday1051: about the specific content. Second, and more broadly, this article illustrates the danger of allowing lengthy Wikipedia articles about youth athletes. The article was created when this kid was 13 years old and not yet even in high school. He was hyped at the time like a surefire NFL quarterback, but he fizzled as a college athlete at West Virginia and will now be playing for a junior college team in 2016. Per WP:NHSPHSATH, we ought to use extreme caution in creating and then expanding articles about high school athletes, let alone youth athletes. Third, the article in its present state is kind of a mish-mash of random facts; it could really use a rewrite to eliminate the abundant minor details (e.g., (1) an assertion that in 2011, when Sills was 14, there were "rumors" that Auburn was pursuing him, which rumors ultimately "turned out to be unfounded" -- unfounded rumors, wow; (2) an assertion that Sills flew from Delaware to California when he was 14 to watch USC practice -- a kid traveled to a college campus and watched a team in practice, wow again; and (3) an assertion that Sills, at age 13, watched NFL footage to learn quarterbacking skills -- a youth QB watching NFL footage, yet again, wow) and to provide greater coherency. Cbl62 (talk) 23:52, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
I agree with thoughts of Lizard, Edday1051, WikiOriginal-9, and Cbl62 here. Frankly, this Sills article is a museum of the sort of bad editing and terrible judgement that TonyTheTiger has littered across Wikipedia. Jweiss11 (talk) 04:53, 4 July 2016 (UTC)
C'mon guys it's not like we have dozens if not hundreds of stubs for College Football Hall of Fame members or anything. Surely this is a high importance article requiring meticulous consideration of every detail. Lizard (talk) 06:09, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
Tony, I don't think it's fair to summarize all 350,000+ of your edits that way. But there is a significant portion of your edits that can be summarized that way. This, this, this, and this come to mind. The running theme here is too much trivial/contrived content. Jweiss11 (talk) 05:07, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
There is no doubt that most debates about my content are about having higher level of detail than people seem to consider to be stylistically correct. I don't think that fact warrants the WP:PA especially when you are arguing to add trivia to an article.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 14:44, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
Tony, you can interpret this as a personal attack or as a critique of your editing and an attempt to nudge you in the right direction. Jweiss11 (talk) 14:54, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
And apologies for my snarky comment. That was mostly a culmination of my overall frustration that high importance articles have been neglected for so long, and continue to be. Lizard (talk) 21:19, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
Naming discussion at Cal State Los Angeles Golden Eagles
Please comment here in regards to navboxes in coaches articles. I pinged a few, but I'm sure I forgot many of you! Corkythehornetfan19:10, 18 July 2016 (UTC)
Hello, y'all at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2016 July 16#Template:Georgia State Panthers bowl game navbox@Corkythehornetfan: has IMO correctly advocated for the deletion of small bowl game navboxes in the past of former teams that unlikely will ever play in another bowl game and current teams that dont' have the numbers yet, but could potentially play in enough bowl games to warrant navboxes in the future. Would this Project stand behind a three bowl game exception to allow in the Bowls and Rivalries sections of the main program navboxes with the understanding that these will eventually be created, IF the program reaches a sufficient number to mandate its own navbox. An example of one that currently and partially includes this would be Boise State's, this would solve this issue if we set a hard cap. I doubt we will have a Michigan person attempt to include these in the program navbox. (Or just throwing this out there would anybody support merging these navboxes across the board, such as what I have heard of rumblings of merging season navboxes with franchise navboxes in NFL).UCO2009bluejay (talk) 21:13, 22 July 2016 (UTC)
Also I recognize it may be apples and oranges with the NFL analogy because the seasons are already included in the franchise navboxes.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 21:13, 22 July 2016 (UTC)
Aye, I'd support putting the bowl games in the main template if the team has less than 4. But why place them in the rivalries section? Lizard (talk) 02:38, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
The cutoff of three or four is reasonable to me. Lizard, that's just how we drew up the organize of the college football team navboxes when we standardized them in a few years back. If you have suggestions about a better way to organize them, please propose something. Jweiss11 (talk) 13:49, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
I'm strongly against the radical proposition here, merging the QB, coach, and bowl game (with 4+ bowls) navboxes with the team navboxes. That would set off a nuclear bomb and undo much of the good navbox management we've implanted across this and many other sports projects. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:32, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
It does seem that grouping "bowls and lore" would make more sense than "bowls and rivalries". Even more sense, I think, would be "rivalries and lore", but that might get a little lengthy for big-name schools. Lizard (talk) 17:47, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
Despite the few merits I found with the Arena League method, I am totally against my radical proposal as well @Jweiss11:. If anything that is a backdoor explanation as to why we need to strictly limit the amount of bowls before the separate navboxes. (and I did get bored) I support the rivalries and lore move proposed by Lizard.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 18:07, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
That is, should we move away from long-standing consensus of an alphabetized list of player names towards inclusion of unsourced jersey numbers and also break the last name alphabetical convention into two groups of numbers and last names, as is being done by the non-responisve IP editor. UW Dawgs (talk) 01:17, 17 August 2016 (UTC)
In an appeal to wiser editors, do you think one should separate out the decades, such as in the Big Eight or Big 12 conference champion navbox, or should we leave it be like with the Big Ten or SEC? Help appreciated. The groups for say the Pac 12 make perfect sense, but the lack of clutter might be being sacrificed for something arbitrary in the above cases.Cake (talk) 16:04, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
Not sure. That'd mean about 8–9 rows for the SEC and 11–12 rows for the Big Ten. If we want to prioritize space over readability, I'd say leave as is, but the navboxes would be collapsed most of the time, so I can't really see space being an issue. Lizard (talk) 17:30, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
Flatten, and group by conference where possible. Agree with Cake's edits which removed the explicit and arbitrary decade groupings. UW Dawgs (talk) 17:58, 17 August 2016 (UTC)
Delete a template?
Not sure where I got the idea that Parke H. Davis or someone else had Colgate as national champion in 1916, but I did, and so this should be deleted. Cake (talk) 02:37, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Any artistic folk perusing wikiproject college football? Only recently I realized the "uniform" parameter for season articles, in e. g. 1957 San Francisco 49ers season. Hopefully I am not only motivating its removal by attempting to provide such for the pre-1933 days of college football. Any help would be much appreciated. For example, there seem to be a few standard types of shirts: the friction stripes (see Grange) and the kind of padded circular wing thingies were popular in the 20s (see Wycoff). Before those the mere striped sleeves were popular (see Wade). There's also the stripe across the chest (see McMillin). People like Scott Sillcox will provide representations of certain teams (though he cannot always be trusted); such as these. Cards and programs might also provide color illustrations as guidelines. There are also a few types of pants. Socks seem even more a part of the uniform than the pants, and can be difficult to make out in black and white photographs. Lastly, the crude leather helmet leaves me with a crude drawing, but I wish a better draftsman would handle it. So, if you can draw, or if you know of photographs or color illustrations to help with any old major college program, let me know. Cake (talk) 20:10, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Louisiana (–Lafayette) Ragin' Cajuns We need to settle this once and for all, (unless ESPN and others change which method they use)
Live in Louisiana and have several friends that attend ULL, and I've never heard it referred to as anything besides Louisiana–Lafayette. To me, if someone said "Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns" I'd look at them like they were silly, but I know anecdotal accounts isn't how Wikipedia works. Lizard (talk) 03:56, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Honestly you'd have a better case for Louisiana–Lafayette → UL Lafayette than you would for Louisiana–Lafayette → Louisiana. Or even just ULL. By the way that NCAA link is to a blank page. Lizard (talk) 04:17, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
You could also lookup some local and AP stories, rather than just the team page headers, but the above and Talk page comments are enough to convince me the article is adhering to WP:COMMONNAME. UW Dawgs (talk) 07:17, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Louisiana–Lafayette, per longstanding prior previous consensus, and Remove all references to "Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns" from Wikipedia. I could support ONE "Team name" section on the main Louisiana–Lafayette Ragin' Cajuns article explaining the various names and branding initiatives the school has gone through over the years, but it must be neutrally worded, reliably sourced, and it must strictly adhere to NPOV. But, that's all, as, plain and simple, this has gone on for far too long. Ejgreen77 (talk) 11:34, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
It looks to me like Pncomeaux is a WP:SPA with an agenda. The username (Comeaux, a common Cajun surname) leads me to believe he attends ULL or might even work for the university. Would explain his persistence. But yes there should be a team name section explaining they used to be called the Southwest Louisiana Bulldogs. Lizard (talk) 14:19, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
and it looks to me like lizard, as an avid lsu fan, is a WP:SPA with an agenda.....
Here are the facts again:
1. 'Louisiana Ragin Cajuns' is the preferred branding method for the school. There is nothing whatsoever 'illegal' about that. All of the school's venues (football, baseball fields, basketball court, etc.) are marked that way, as are the uniforms. This has been the case for over 15 years.
2. The opposition from this in the state comes manly from two sources: lsu and LTU.
3. The anecdotal evidence that lizard supplied is extremely biased and should read in that context. In opposition, I can give a couple of observations:
Bottom line, if a school wants to rebrand itself, it is hard to believe that this would prohibited on Wikipedia. At the very least, there is zero reason from prohibiting the 'often referred to as.....' verbiage each time that 'Louisiana-Lafayette' is used. Can someone tell me how this is adversely impacting articles? What possible harm could that produce, other than for those who have an agenda to ensure the re-branding is not successful....based on their personal bias? It seems clear to me that this accomplishes both goals: it uses the more commonly used name, but also allows information that the school is trying to re-brand itself, which we know for a fact that they are. Where is the harm in that? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pncomeaux (talk • contribs) 17:19, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
With all due respect I'd like to think my contributions are a little bit broader than changing the name of my favorite team on every article I run across that includes it. Lizard (talk) 18:12, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Sorry, but I don't agree with the collapsing of these comments. Hiding them away as "spurious discussion" as if they hold little value isn't much different than just deleting them. Valid points were raised here. Lizard (talk) 20:16, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Maybe it's rebranding like the Cumberland Phoenix, but I've heard Southwestern Louisiana more times than I've heard "Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns'. If anything, that name is because "ragin cajuns" is so unique, rather than the university being called simply "Louisiana". Cake (talk) 20:28, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
I think that you have made comments similar to what Corky has raised in the past. I suppose that one person's facts can be construed as another's ad hominem argument. That being said his whole argument is in fact, paraphrasing, this is how the university wants it. The prevailing consensus at this point is: prove that mainstream sources utilize it then we'll discuss moving. On a similar note I remember when Okie State played the Cajuns a few years back that the local TV stations used either Louisiana-Lafayette and Louisiana, but my undocumented story isn't a credible source. Whereas, we can observe what major news outlets from outside the state call the program.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 20:34, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
Black college football national champion navboxes?
However, there is a related topic. See Black college football national championship and #Selectors as a useful primer for editors (like me) not remotely versed with the topic. Our CFB navbox cleanup resulted in a consistent row of links to the program's seasons with a footer row of "National championship seasons in bold." See FBS or FCS categories as helpful.
Previously, I thought the meaning of that footer text was clear, even for former FCS schools now in FBS -the "national champsionship" selector or playoff result was earned against the full scope of all teams competing in that level of FBS, FCS, Div II, or Div III for that year by whatever method (selector or playoff). However, HBCU national championships are different, awarded against a subset of all teams in that level for that year. ie, 2013 championships for Template:North Dakota State Bison football navbox (one team, via FCS playoffs) and Template:Tennessee State Tigers football navbox (one of three teams, via selectors) mean very different things, but use the same footer text. That seems wrong.
Could we address by modifying HBCU navbox footers to "HBCU national championship seasons in bold" if none of the programs have achieved an unqualified national championship? Trying to avoid recreating the visual confusion and clutter of the old CFB navboxes (italics for conference championships, underline for division champions, etc) and explicitly not make the navbox feel like as Scarlet A for these programs. UW Dawgs (talk) 06:30, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
This is without a doubt one of the most overlooked subjects of this WikiProject. Personally, I believe that we should include these championships before 1973 with a bold link. My rationale being that these schools often didn't play white schools on a regular basis and a black national championship has merit. After 1973 these teams were members of the NAIA/NCAA divisional structure with some teams e.g. 1978 Florida A&M Rattlers football team, 1995 Central State Marauders football team winning national championships within the current structure of college football. The MEAC and SWAC has automatic bids to the FCS playoffs, which they have previously participated but currently abstain. The CIAA and the SIAC sends teams to the Division II playoffs, therefore it should have an exception to not be as prominent IMO. Short answer before 73, stand alongside NC, after give it the same prominence as NCCAA (not a typo) national championships.UCO2009bluejay (talk) 12:44, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
Also note, the number of co-champions across the FCS/D-II (and then NAIA) spectrum, since 1990 there has only been 3 outright "champions".UCO2009bluejay (talk) 12:44, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
An editor has requested that {{subst:linked|Arkansas–Little Rock Trojans}} be moved to {{subst:#if:|{{subst:linked|{{{2}}}}}|another page}}{{subst:#switch: project |user | USER = . Since you had some involvement with 'Arkansas–Little Rock Trojans', you |#default = , which may be of interest to this WikiProject. You}} are invited to participate in [[{{subst:#if:|{{subst:#if:|#{{{section}}}|}}|{{subst:#if:|Talk:Arkansas–Little Rock Trojans#{{{section}}}|{{subst:TALKPAGENAME:Arkansas–Little Rock Trojans}}}}}}|the move discussion]].
Note: You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Charles Erickson#Merger proposal regarding the issue of whether or not the two subjects involved are the same person. Thanks! 🎄 Corkythehornetfan 🎄 03:54, 22 November 2015 (UTC)
Cbl62 (talk) 00:49, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
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: and again i forget the title is "team" and not "season".—Bagumba (talk) 20:59, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:56, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
), and Bulldogs -- creating season articles for every one of their seasons. In recent weeks, through continuing generous support of volunteers like you, we have also now saved the following:
)- kudos and thanks to @Billcasey905:
), Panthers, Cardinals, Terrapins (
), Horned Frogs, Buffaloes (
), Beavers, Gamecocks, Owls, Mustangs (
), and even though they may not be as cuddly, the Gators, Yellow Jackets, and Wolfpack. Won't you please help? Cbl62 (talk) 17:26, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
There is currently a discussion at the Talk:Cal State Los Angeles Golden Eagles article regarding the name. It is requested that members of this WikiProject comment for more opinions on what the actual name of the article should be. Thanks, Corkythehornetfan 03:43, 11 July 2016 (UTC)
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