Talk:Davis Tarwater/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Batard0 (talk · contribs) 07:23, 11 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'll take this one on. Having read through it once, I don't anticipate many issues. I noticed only a few minor things. I'll come back shortly with more detailed comments. --Batard0 (talk) 07:23, 11 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'll start with some observations on the prose.

Prose

Lead

The lead looks fine, but perhaps you could clarify "set three Big Ten conference and six school records en route to six conference titles". We're talking about Tarwater himself winning conference titles, not his college team, right? And are we talking about titles in specific events or overall titles? That's not entirely clear.

"as of 2012 holds two additional national records in relay events" : Can an individual hold a national record in a relay event? May be better to phrase this as "was part of two relay groups that held national records as of 2012" if that's the correct way to phrase it.

In "qualified for the Olympic Trials" you might say "U.S. Olympic trials", although it's fairly obvious he's competing for the U.S. Also, does "trials" need a capital "T"? It does seem to be capitalized on this official website.

Bartard, having spent the last three months working on bios for U.S. Olympic swimmers, I am going to interject a handful of comments. . . "U.S. Olympic Trials" is a proper noun (see United States Olympic Trials (swimming)). In other uses, United States may be abbreviated "U.S." when used as an adjective phrase (i.e. "He represented the United States"; but "He swam for the U.S. team.") Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:44, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Early life

Generally speaking, the section is good. It could use a few adjustments for encyclopedic tone, however. It comes off in places as overly detailed and has a couple quotes that I think would be better as paraphrases. Here are some specific suggestions:

Wikilink Attorney General of Alabama.

We have years formatted as "from 1963–1967" and "from 1969 to 1973" in the first para. Either of these is fine, but they should be consistent throughout the article. I suggest picking one and sticking with it.

Please use "from 1969 to 1973" in main body text; "1963-1967" is appropriate for a space-limited infobox, but not main body text. Dashes should not take the place of prepositions in main body text. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:44, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In the following: "At first, he was reluctant to enter the water and his swimming instructor suggested "He's not going to like this."", I recommend paraphrasing this quote, as it's simple and doesn't add much color. It could be "He was reluctant to enter the water, and his swimming instructor suggested he would not like it." You don't necessarily need the "at first" at the beginning, since it's clear this was his first lesson. Also in the previous sentence, "At age four, Tarwater had his first swimming lesson.", I recommend transposing the first clause to the end, i.e. "Tarwater had his first swimming lesson at age four." This flows a little more cleanly, I think.

In "after 15 minutes he was enjoying himself, swimming all over the pool" I recommend shortening it to "after 15 minutes he was swimming all over the pool" as more encyclopedic. This isn't critical, though.

I think the quote in the following could also be paraphrased: "As a congratulations, he got a personal letter from Olympic gold medalist Melvin Stewart. "I think that [letter] got Davis really excited about swimming", Tarwater's dad later remarked." His father's quote isn't critical here; it doesn't go far beyond a matter-of-fact statement. Thus I suggest: "As a congratulations, he got a personal letter from Olympic gold medalist Melvin Stewart. His father later said the letter got him excited about swimming."

Any wikilink for Junior Nationals or brief explanation of what this is?

This bit: "Phelps' coach, Bob Bowman, later recalled "I was very impressed and knew [Tarwater] would have a bright future."" I think could also be partially paraphrased for a more encyclopedic tone, perhaps as: "Phelps' coach, Bob Bowman, later recalled being impressed and said he knew Tarwater would have a "bright future". "

Successive paragraphs start "In 2001" and "In 2002" -- you might consider changing the second to "The following year" for variety's sake.

"swimming title, before graduating" -- no comma needed here.

"At the state finals, he broke the Tennessee 500-yard freestyle record by five seconds and also captured the 100-yard butterfly state record" -- just want to check that "yard" is correct here, not "meter".

FYI, the NCAA championship swimming distances have always been measured in yards, not meters, with the exception of two years: 2000 and 2004. This because the vast majority of American college swimming pools were built to specification in English, not metric distances.
I have never been able to find a publicly available NCAA record book for swimming that includes all NCAA individual event champions. Best source I have found to date is HickokSports.com (see link here). Unfortunately, Hickok does not include times.
Please also note that the American spelling is "meters." British and Commonwealth spelling is "metres"; please don't use it in article about American athletes. Olympic swimming event and FINA championship event articles are written in British/Commonwealth English, including their titles, which include the word "metres". If you want to link to an Olympic or FINA event article in this article, you will need to pipe-link so that the proper American spelling of meter will display. (see Mary Wayte for examples). Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:44, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Was the 2002 High School Swimmer of the Year a national award, a state-wide award or otherwise? Would be good to put this in the article for clarity's sake.

Is that the actual name of the award? If so, it is a proper noun and should be capitalized; if not, and it is merely a description of the award, then it should not be capitalized. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:44, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"he was added to the school's Hall of Fame" : should this be "inducted into"? "Added to" feels a little awkward.

Should be "inducted into the school's hall of fame"; don't capitalize HOF, unless it is used as part of a proper noun (e.g. International Swimming Hall of Fame). Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:44, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More to come later... --Batard0 (talk) 11:59, 11 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

College

There's no period at the end of the first sentence.

There's some mixing of yards and meters here, but I'm not too familiar with swimming, and it may well be that some events are in yards and others in meters.

Could NCAA Championships or U.S. Open be explained or wikilinked? Can you set a U.S. Open record at an NCAA event? I suppose it's simply not clear to me what the U.S. Open is in this context.

I'd consider removing the final sentence of the section ("At the end of his college career, Tarwater remarked "Being a Michigan athlete has meant so much to me. It's the most important and meaningful thing I've done in my life.""). It doesn't add much to an understanding of his career, and it is somewhat unencyclopedic in tone.

Roger that. This article uses unnecessary quotes too often, giving it the feel of a newspaper or magazine interview, rather than an encyclopedia biography. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:44, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More to come... --Batard0 (talk) 14:02, 11 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Post-college

"he later remarked" could simply be "he later said"

"to win the 4×200-meter freestyle trophy, beating second place by more than 6 seconds" could be rephrased more succinctly as "to win the 4×200-meter freestyle trophy by more than 6 seconds"

There's no period at the end of the first sentence of the second para.

"second fastest leg" --> "second-fastest leg" (compound adjectives take hyphens)

Michael Phelps is wikilinked in the third para, but it's been wikilinked previously. Remove here.

"the second place 4×100-medley relay" --> "second-place" (compound adjective)

2008 Olympic Trials

In the first sentence, which Vanderkaay is it? Peter and Alex are mentioned above.

"number four seed" --> "fourth seed" is more concise.

"new personal best time": remove "time" for conciseness.

"second fastest time" --> "second-fastest time" (compound adjective)

"he remarked about the swim" --> "he said of the swim" is more concise and conveys the same thing.

"He stayed near Phelps for 150-meters": no need for the hyphen here.

"he was passed by a surprising Gil Stovall": recommend removing "a surprising" for tone.

"he briefly considered calling it quits": a little colloquial. Might be better as "briefly considered retirement" or "briefly considered quitting the trials"

I recommend changing instances of "remarking" and "he explained" and "recalled" to "saying" and "he said" and "he said at the time." Readers won't get tired of the repetition of "said" and "saying." The variations of the simpler "said" might make the reader thing you're looking for synonyms just to avoid repeating "said."

This bit: "later remarking "It was the most empty feeling in the world." " could be more simply phrased as "later saying it was "the most empty feeling in the world". In any event, we should put a comma after "remarking" (or "saying," which I think is better here) if we want to start the quote with a capital letter as a complete sentence.

Wikilink Costa Rica in the third para.

The refs are out of numerical order at the end of the third para (just a quibble).

Retirement and return

Wikilink MVP or spell it out as most valuable player.

"new-found" --> "newfound" (it's a single word)

"remarked" --> "said" (as before)

"explained" --> "said" (as before)

"Tarwater remarked "Missing the Olympics" --> "Tarwater said, "Missing the Olympics" (adds a comma before introduction of sentence quote, replaces "remarked" with "said")

What is SwimMAC Carolina? Can we describe it in the text or wikilink it?

"Tarwater latyer remarked" --> "Tarwater later said" (spelling on "later" and change "remarked" to "said")

"the national title winning" --> "national title-winning" (compound adjective, appears twice)

"Tarwater finished second in event" --> "the event"

2012 Olympic Trials

"fall where they may." he said." --> change the period to a comma after "may".

In the second para, "second fastest time" --> "second-fastest time"

"the sixth spot in the 200-freestyle" --> should this be "200-meter freestyle"?

"To have this extra bout of joy is ... surreal." he explained." --> period after "surreal" should be a comma, and suggest changing "explained" to "said."

2012 Olympics

"second fastest leg" --> "second-fastest leg"

"third fastest among all" --> "third-fastest among all"

"Of his Olympic experience, Tarwater remarked "Even at 28" --> recommend changing "remarked" to "said" and putting a comma after it to introduce the complete-sentence quote.

"top two-qualifiers" --> "top two qualifiers" (this is a normal adverb/adjective/noun combination, and no hyphenation is necessary)

"saying "I'll make that decision" --> add a comma after "saying"

same with after "added" in the following sentence.

Sponsorship and personal life

"David Meske remarked "He is someone" --> "David Meske said he was "someone..."

Another instance of "remarked" in the following sentence.

"Later, he would remark that "the Olympics had become an idol in [his] life" --> "He later said the Olympics "had become an idol in [his] life"

Another "remark" later in the paragraph that could be "said".

General comments on prose

It's in good shape. Almost all of the above are minor quibbles on grammar and spelling and punctuation and such. From a broader perspective, I think it may benefit – and be more encyclopedic in tone (i.e. descriptive and neutral-sounding) – if you could take out a few of the quotes and instead simply explain what he or his father or his coach said. The abundance of quotes gives the article some life, but there are a few in there that would be fairly easy to summarize. In general, it's a little quote-heavy. I'll come back with a look at the other criteria in a bit, but it looks like a few easy fixes and we'll be there. Well done. --Batard0 (talk) 19:26, 11 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

GA criteria

1a) the prose is clear and concise, respects copyright laws, and the spelling and grammar are correct

We'll be there once the above minor fixes are made.

1b) it complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation

Good. Y

2a) it provides references to all sources of information in the section(s) dedicated to the attribution of these sources according to the guide to layout

Good. Y

2b) it provides in-line citations from reliable sources

Good. Y

2c) it contains no original research

No evidence of OR here. Y

3a) it addresses the main aspects of the topic

It does. Y

3b) it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail

It does, pending possible changes above to quotes, etc.

4) it represents viewpoints fairly and without bias, giving due weight to each

It's neutral, by and large. Y

5) it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute

No active edit warring Y

6a) images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content

Images are all fine Y

6b) images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions

Yes. Y

Looks like we're very close. Address the above concerns and I'll list it. --Batard0 (talk) 03:00, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Having seen no response from the nominator for about 12 days, I am planning to fail the article later today. I have tried to find someone else to respond to these minor concerns, but so far have not been successful. To the nominator: please contact me when you're back. I will be happy to pass the article if you address the concerns above and relist it. --Batard0 (talk) 05:04, 23 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Correction: I have an editor who's going to pick up the GA responses in the nominator's stead, and if all goes well we can get this listed. It may take a few more days. --Batard0 (talk) 05:10, 23 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Batard, as the back-up GA article editor for the original nominator, I have made all of the changes suggested by you above, as well as making a number of small formatting changes to make the article consistent with the other 600+ U.S. Olympic swimmer bio articles. In fact-checking the Big Ten championships mentioned in the lead, I discovered that the article includes several close paraphrases from an article on the University of Michigan's sports website, MGoBlue.com. I will make make whatever changes are necessary this evening, after I have run a comparison check on the Wikipedia article vs. the MGoBlue.com article.

Please advise if you have any additional comments or suggested changes. Regards, Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 20:17, 27 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, Batard, the ball is back in your court. I have made all of the suggested changes, cut several unnecessary quotes, made some minor formatting changes for consistency, and addressed the close paraphrases. It's probably still a little quote heavy . . . . Please let me know what you think of the revised article and what else needs to be done to drag this one across the goal line. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 23:25, 27 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, great stuff. I made a couple very minor copyedits (feel free to revert any of them if you disagree; they're not important at all in terms of the GA criteria) and I now think we're across the line. Well done. Am listing now. --Batard0 (talk) 17:58, 29 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]