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Besides the editor who already reverted hours of my work, why are season links being continuously reverted?--Jojhutton (talk) 19:21, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Some background on what links you are referring to would be helpful here. Spanneraol (talk) 21:36, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
Sorry. This revert is just one. I spent hours this morning adding relevant links to particular teams seasons, and they were all reverted in a matter of minutes using "Against Consensus" and WP:EGG as a premise.--Jojhutton (talk) 21:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
And they seem to go there. Pertinent and exact information is what this web-site should be striving for.--Jojhutton (talk) 21:57, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
They do not "seem to go there". When you link to an article, direct links are always preferred over redirects. — KV5 • Talk • 00:21, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Preferred, but its helpful to the readers to give them as much information and a chance to read those pages. With those links in place, readership on those pages should increase. Wikipedia is suppose to be an encyclopedia for people to read. Those articles deserve a chance to be linked to from those lists. Wouldn't that be better for the wikiproject to have the articles actually being read by more readers? Yet it seems the letter of EGG is being applied over the spirit of the guideline.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:30, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
What makes these articles "deserving", as you say? Since when it is our job to determine what readers should and should not read? The guideline on links specifically states that "The article linked to should correspond to the term showing as the link as closely as possible given the context". This means direct links whenever possible. "Always link to the article on the most specific topic appropriate to the context from which you link" - if the link is to a team, then the team article should come up. — KV5 • Talk • 00:34, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
(edit conflict)"Always link to the article on the most specific topic appropriate to the context from which you link" — to me that says a link to specific season may very well be appropriate. In this case, as a list of divisional champions, the link to that team's season article (such as the "Oakland Athletics" entry for 2003 linking to 2003 Oakland Athletics season) would be the most specific link. So that guideline actually supports their inclusion.
That says nothing of the appropriateness based on the EGG principle, though. So we have to figure out a way to account for that. oknazevad (talk) 00:53, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
And that's really where the rub is. A lot of readers link-hop; that is, they read from link to link without really "seeing" the prose in between. If I see a link that says "Oakland Athletics", and I click it, it should go the article Oakland Athletics. That's why the principle of least astonishment exists. — KV5 • Talk • 00:57, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
We can't tell anyone to read or not read an article, we can only give them the chance to, but apparently you decided that they shouldn't read it. The guideline appears to refer to malicious or confusing links. There appears to be nothing confusing in these links as the year sits directly in front of the teams link. Perfectly acceptable under that guideline.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:44, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Again, I've asked you previously not to cast blame. This is not of "my" doing. There's also nothing in those sections (WP:LINK#Link clarity and WP:LINK#Link specificity) that says this refers only "to malicious or confusing links", as per your claim. So the reasoning I gave is indeed sound. — KV5 • Talk • 00:46, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
So if not create malicious or confusing links, then why have this policy if not for that? Appears to be no other reason that I can think of. And as the years are provided first on each line of the list, it should not be confusing under WP:PIPE.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:56, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
What? Could you explain further what you meant by the above statement? — KV5 • Talk • 00:58, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Users on wikipedia don't create guidelines without reason, or in this case part of a guideline. What is the point of the part of the guideline known as WP:EGG? What is it preventing. I said it was to prevent the creation of malicious and confusing links, but you disagreed. What is the point of it then?--Jojhutton (talk) 01:06, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Ah, I see. "Why have this policy if not for that" was confusing. The quotes that I provided are not from WP:EGG; they are from the Manual of Style's article on linking (WP:LINK). The point of the policy is to prevent misleading links, including those to non-direct articles. WP:LINK#Piped links says "Think about what the reader will believe the link is about." As I said above, a link to "Oakland Athletics" should go to Oakland Athletics. — KV5 • Talk • 01:10, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Just a general comment, for what its worth. For reasons that absolutely escape me, linking of dates has been in the past few years one of the most contentious issues, from what I've seen, across the entire project. Passions have been strong on both sides. My sense is that the general notion with regard to linking of dates specifically has been to not link them at all. But that our project has had a different leaning, when it comes to linking dates to something other than the raw year. Killer, etc. -- please correct me if I am wrong. I don't have a strong considered view on the above. But it may well be helpful to get third viewpoints from outside the project -- specifically from the wikiprojects focusing on linking and dates. Best.--Epeefleche (talk) 01:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I can understand if you wanted to remove the "season links" from a paragraph style article, but this is a list of teams. Lisst generally should link to the most relevant article pertaining to them. In this case its the season in which the team played. Remember creating links only increases readership in these articles and more readers of baseball related articles should be the cornerstone of this wikiproject.--Jojhutton (talk) 02:04, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
"Lisst generally should link to the most relevant article pertaining to them" - Yes! They should! And the most relevant article that a team name should be linked to is the team article. Case closed. — KV5 • Talk • 02:08, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I can see the argument here.. It might be helpful to link to the season article somewhere in that table... perhaps the year should link to the team season rather than the year in baseball? If someone is curious about the 69 Twins they might want to get there from that table rather than having to go to the team page, then scrolling down to the box at the bottom to find the season. Also, we do link the standing templates to the season articles, so its not completely without precedence. Spanneraol (talk) 02:14, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
The standings templates are linked that way because they are used in conjunction with the game logs, and there was a clear consensus to link the team seasons in the game logs. I understand the argument and accept the validity of linking to the team season, but not just from the team name, because it's ambiguous, unclear, and policy-contrary. — KV5 • Talk • 02:22, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I hope we can all agree that directing the user to the most pertinent information based on the context should be our foremost concern. In this instance, all other considerations aside, linking to the team-season page serves this purpose best. Therefore, if linking to the team-season from the team name is ambiguous, unclear, and policy-contrary, then the answer is not to revert the link back to its original (misdirected) state, but to adjust the text being linked to make it as unambiguous, clear, and policy-compliant as possible while maintaining the integrity of the greater article. However, if there is no way to do that, then policy be damned, because providing the user with the best information takes precedence over and above anything else we do here. -Dewelar (talk) 03:29, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
(Edit Conflict)- In the case of the year in which a team won a World Series/Pennant/Division the most relevant article would be the season in which that team played. Anything else is worthless even linking at all. So as you say. Case Closed, or am I being too ostentatious--Jojhutton (talk) 02:21, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
"Anything else is worthless even linking at all." - that's pretty offensive to those of us who spend a lot of time working on and improving the team articles. For civility's sake, it should be retracted. — KV5 • Talk • 02:23, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
It wasn't meant to be an attack, but as long as your talking about articles that people work on, its pretty offensive to those who work on team season articles to have absolutely no links to those articles. Who weeps for them?--Jojhutton (talk) 02:28, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
People who work on team season articles... you mean like the 2008 and 2009 Philadelphia Phillies seasons? Our only two team-season GAs? You act as if I have no cognizance for the importance of these articles. Do you realize that every team-season article is linked from each team's main article, easily accessible by a link in the team's navbox? — KV5 • Talk • 02:31, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
You you mean the pain in the ass to find years, which are Easter Egged by the way, at thge bottom of the page in a drop box. I doubt very much that average JQ reader will be able to find any of those most of the time.--Jojhutton (talk) 02:37, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Templates are a specifically listed exception to the linking guidelines: "The exception is when it is clear from the context that links go to specific articles, as in template:2008 Summer Olympics calendar, where all links go to the article about these specific games." Again, I will ask you to refrain from the above incivility. — KV5 • Talk • 02:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I can understand the need to link to season articles when they are pertinent to the subject. For instance, when reading about Bob Gibson pitching a no-hitter in 1971 against the Pittsburgh Pirates, I would prefer a link going to the 1971 Pittsburgh Pirates season article so that I could see the batters he faced, rather than the main Pirate team article.Orsoni (talk) 04:57, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

It can be hard to find the season-by-season stuff. When I want to see details on seasons, I just pull up Retrosheet and look for it there. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:07, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Exactly, we should be making this as simple as possible.--Jojhutton (talk) 11:47, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
  • One interesting comparison (I just came across it because it's on the main page), the lead for 2010–2011 Middle East and North Africa protests links to each individual country protest article when listing the countries initially. "To date Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Yemen have all seen major protests, and minor incidents have occurred in Iraq, Kuwait, Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan and Syria." The 'major' protest countries link to the protests, the 'minor' ones (with no article, I assume) link to the general country article. Staxringold talkcontribs 21:33, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
    • I think that's even more confusing than what this proposal is currently trying to enact. — KV5 • Talk • 23:29, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
      • Rather pertinent information in the context of the article though. Just as yesterdays, or the days before depending on where you live, Featured article Joseph Johnson (publisher) has a couple of those pipe links. Most notably Religious Dissent in the "early life" section. It was approved as a feature article with that pipe link which is an EGG, so its not fair to characterize every EGG as not allowed.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:16, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
        • And it's not fair to characterize my position that no Easter egg links are allowed, because I never said that. Please don't misconstrue what I've said in this discussion. — KV5 • Talk • 00:30, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
          • Fine, you said Direct links are always preferred over redirects.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:40, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
            • Yes, I did. When a direct link is available, it should always be used instead of redirecting elsewhere. — KV5 • Talk • 00:44, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
              • The most pertinent and useful link should be provided and it would seem that other articles and other users agree, or else those links wouldn't have been placed in those other articles the way they were, especially a featured article.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:49, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
                • The example you provided isn't relevant to this discussion. Yes, it is an example of a proper Easter egg link: a piped link going somewhere other than its text says, going to the most closely related article to the text of the link. It is not, however, an example of what you inserted in the list of World Series champions (which is featured content as well) and the divisional lists: the most closely related article to the text "New York Mets" is the article New York Mets, not 1975 New York Mets season. — KV5 • Talk • 00:58, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
                  • Now you think those pipe links are proper easter eggs? Didn't you say earlier that: I think that's even more confusing than what this proposal is currently trying to enact? What are they then? Proper or confusing?--Jojhutton (talk) 01:03, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
                    • I think you are misunderstanding what I'm saying, or else you're applying it improperly. I think that the types of egg links that Staxringold mentioned ("One interesting comparison (I just came across it because it's on the main page), the lead for 2010–2011 Middle East and North Africa protests links to each individual country protest article when listing the countries initially. "To date Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Yemen have all seen major protests, and minor incidents have occurred in Iraq, Kuwait, Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan and Syria." The 'major' protest countries link to the protests, the 'minor' ones (with no article, I assume) link to the general country article." - from his comment above, where country names link not to the country but to an article on protests) are confusing. These are the types of links that you are attempting to introduce: a link that doesn't go where it purports to go. I appreciate the necessity and usefulness of our team-season articles. However, there's little to no utility to linking them just to the team name. If you say, for example, "The 1969 Yankees won the game" (and this is just an example), then linking to 1969 New York Yankees season is more than appropriate. But if you say "The Yankees beat the Cubs", then a link to "Yankees" and a link to "Cubs" should go to New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs. I am in no way conducting some sort of vendetta against piped links. They are part of the software and we should use them appropriately. I don't believe that your method constitutes an appropriate use. — KV5 • Talk • 01:08, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
First they are confusing, then they are proper, now they are confusing again. The links to the various protests through the Easter Egged countries are obviously proper or the wikipedia big brass (Honestly I have no idea who makes these decisions), would not have a link on the main page going to a poorly written article. This is a very good example of this policy either being ignored or being used properly. --Jojhutton (talk) 01:19, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Because you continue to misconstrue my remarks, I'm recusing myself from the remainder of this discussion. I see nothing further productive to be gained after explaining my viewpoint in detail and having it misrepresented by spurious remarks. Anyone else who cares to take up the mantle of propriety, feel free to explain what's wrong with this picture. — KV5 • Talk • 01:23, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Personally, what I really like about Wikipedia is the ability to follow links wherever they may go. You can go from the French Revolution, to the Apollo Space program to Machu Pichu in a matter of minutes. I favor the policy be damned approach and would prefer going with the pertinent link. Having to navigate the main team article to find the season article seems contrary to what makes Wikipedia enjoyable to me.Orsoni (talk) 04:55, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

A few issues with a link that has non-obvious link text. First, not everyone can hover to see what a link points to, and so it is not discoverable by all users (someone using a screen reader, for example, may have no idea that the link will take them to something other than an explanation of the link text). Second, to take an extreme position for a moment, if all links pointed to subjects that differed (to some degree) from the link text, although it might (big if: if there is a clear choice for an alternate link, which is not always the case) offer some advantage for an individual link, collectively, they would all degrade the usability of Wikipedia. Users would be forced to look closely at every link before clicking to decide if that was the link they wanted to visit. Now of course the extreme position is not being sought here, but there is a line beyond which this degradation becomes significant, and I believe the line hews pretty close to keeping links as obvious as possible. Surfing through from topic to topic works because it's pretty obvious where you're ending up when you follow a link, without having to think to much about it. If you end up at unexpected places a few times, you quickly start to mistrust clicking through. isaacl (talk) 05:12, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Some very fair points, and I fully understand the first point on links being discoverable. I regularly edit and read wikipedia from my iphone and have to click on a link to see what it says. Yet, there's no guideline, that I am aware of, that says that we have to take into account the type of browser someone reading an article from.
Keeping links as obvious as possible is the key to the point of not confusing the reader or redirecting them to some malicious link. Yet somehow this guideline is being used to prevent the articles, and the entire baseball wikiproject for that matter, from being improved upon. I'm all for following the guidelines and policies as they are written, but if a policy or guideline gets in the way of improving the article there is precedent for improvement over policy.--Jojhutton (talk) 16:41, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Various persons have quoted "ignore all rules" as if it is a given that the specific proposals being made are improvements. I believe the crux of the disagreement is that some believe the changes are not improvements. (Personally, I'm not sure about the specific proposed changes to the American League West article, and so have not expressed a specific view on this yet.) Regarding guidelines, there are guidelines on accessibility that must be kept in mind. isaacl (talk) 16:58, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
I am not aware that any one has alleged that the changes were not improving the article, only that the links violated a guideline, but if anyone thinks that the articles were not improved by the links, please say so, so we can get to the meat of that problem.
The way I see those types of links is two fold.
1. They give specific information about a particular team that played a particular season. This is good.
2. The pipe links are like free money to the reader. Like finding a $20.00 bill in the back pocket of a pair of jeans you hadn't worn in a while. Whoo Hoo. Yes, the reader may be clicking the link that says 1969 - New York Mets, and feel that they are going to see the a page on the Mets. But imagine their surprise when they see New York Mets, and discover that each team has an article on each season. A general reader may not have known that. Not only will that increase article views on that article, but may peak their curiosity and they may want to read about more seasons, which will also increase article views on those pages. Increasing views, along with maintaing good articles, should be the main focus of this project.--Jojhutton (talk) 17:21, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Again, I haven't formed a full opinion on the American League West article. If you have another example then I can look at the specifics. The concerns I expressed were not related to following a guideline blindly; I would have to evaluate the context of each case carefully to see if the best balance has been struck to ensure the links are as obvious as can be while still integrated with the prose. Regarding the comparison to free money, the link could also be a free tax, if the reader was prepared to go one place, and ended up in an unexpected location. isaacl (talk) 17:42, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
True on the "free tax" example, but obviously we are both speculating. As far as examples of other articles, I made changes to each divisions' article, that had not already been changed. (The NL West, NL Central, and AL Central already had these piped links). So I only really made large changes to AL West, AL East, and NL East. Fair to say that I wouldn't have expected those changes to be reverted, given the precedent of the other articles. It wasn't until I made this edit at List of World Series champions, that I began to be reverted on all of the articles, in which I had edited that morning. (Several hours worth of work I might add). My point however is that since these articles are lists, they should link to the appropriate article, especially given two factors. The first is that since these are lists, the year for the season is already given in front of the team's name, so the context is already given. (ie: 1969 New York Mets. Having it written like this: 1969 1969 New York Mets season, would be redundant, given the context of the list. Second, any collateral damage, (ie: looking for New York Mets but getting 1969 New York Mets season is quickly negated as New York Mets is clearly linked in the first sentence of the season article, and very easy to find for even the casual reader. Yet if a casual reader was looking for the 1969 season and found just the link to the New York Mets, it would much more difficult to navigate the article to find the article that they are looking for, and that reader and may get frustrated (again we speculate).--Jojhutton (talk) 18:27, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Speaking of which, where is the Mets season-by-season stuff? In the time I took to not find it, I could have looked it up straightaway from Retrosheet, going from here[1] to here[2] in 4 mouse clicks. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:08, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
For tables of year-by-year results, here's one suggestion for comments: a note could be added to the header for the two teams, saying that the team name links to the per-season article for the team. isaacl (talk) 19:37, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Or what about posting a link to year-by-year results somewhere near the top of the team article, instead of being buried who-knows-where deep in the body of the article. Then you could still link to the team, and could then immediately click on the year-by-year. Problem solved! ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:44, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
I believe the per-season pages are in the same place for all teams: at the bottom of the page, under the collapsed template for the team. Due to the size of the season-by-season template, it would be tricky to relocate it, I think. isaacl (talk) 20:07, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
I couldn't find it, so I went with Retrosheet, which has better information in any case. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:14, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Are we still talking about the list? Or is this pertaining to the main team articles. If so, the main article templates are fine as a tool for readers, but like BaseballBugs said, they are hard to find, and I agree.--Jojhutton (talk) 20:17, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
I finally found it. I expected it to be visible up front, but you have to open another template first, to get to it. They may look nice once you know where they are, but it's like Rube Goldberg to get there. Contrast that with Chicago Bears, for example, which has a link to the seasons summary at the top of the first section after the intro. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:22, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
So I'm open to Isaacl's suggestion of maybe adding a diclaimer of some sort at the top of each articles header, (At least I think that is what he meant), such as *Note: Team names link to the season in which the teams played..--Jojhutton (talk) 20:26, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
I was thinking in the table header cells, but perhaps an explanatory sentence before the table would be better. Let's see what others think. Regarding your response three paragraphs up, "and I agree," do you mean you agree that Retrosheet has better info? isaacl (talk) 20:49, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Heck no, nothing betters than the information you can find at wikipedia, but thats my biased opinion. I had no idea that Retrosheet even existed before Baseballbugs mentioned it yesterday. Actually I was agreeing that the information on each teams main page is difficult to navigate, especially for casual readers.--Jojhutton (talk) 21:58, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Normally I hate misleading links, but given that the article 1998 Boston Red Sox season links to the article Boston Red Sox right in the first sentence, the inconvenience to someone who arrived to the former but actually want to read the latter is quite minimal. 137.43.105.17 (talk) 19:08, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

After thinking this out more, i really feel that more the season links are more appropriate in this situation. Spanneraol (talk) 19:52, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

And looking at this collaterally, its easier for someone who might be looking for the Detroit Tigers to find Detroit Tigers when they click on 1984 Detroit Tigers season, because there is a direct link within the first sentence of the season page. Contrasty, someone who wanted 1984 Detroit Tigers season, but is directed to Detroit Tigers would find it much more difficult to navigate the already confusing layout of the team page to find what they are looking for.--Jojhutton (talk) 22:09, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Arbitrary break for KV5

I avoided the above discussion because it was obviously spinning out of control. Yes, I agree that KV5's positions were being misrepresented, but as is often the case, while the messenger may have presented his message poorly, that does not make the message itself worthless. Now that things seem a bit more reeled in, I want to address something that KV5 said in his explanation of his position:

However, there's little to no utility to linking them just to the team name. If you say, for example, "The 1969 Yankees won the game" (and this is just an example), then linking to 1969 New York Yankees season is more than appropriate. But if you say "The Yankees beat the Cubs", then a link to "Yankees" and a link to "Cubs" should go to New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs.

The problem here is with context. In terms of the articles under discussion, as I said above the best case would be to somehow fix the text. The articles, after all, are talking about the 1969 Yankees, and not just the Yankees. The problem is that there's that little column to the left that already says "1969". Having that year column there means that it looks awfully silly to have "1969" in one column and then "1969 New York Yankees" in the next column. It's pretty much not fixable in a way that would satisfy policy (or, more precisely, that would satisfy KV5's interpretation of policy).

That's what's at issue for these season links. As another example: if you're writing an article about something that happened in 1969, it's superfluous to include the year as a modifier to the team name. If the title of the article is "1969 in baseball", and there's a game where the Yankees beat the Cubs, of course you're not going to say "the 1969 Yankees beat the 1969 Cubs", because it's redundant.

If it's obvious from context that we're talking about 1969, I would expect it would really be frustrating to the reader to see "1969" repeated over and over in the text. A paper encyclopedia sure as heck wouldn't (intentionally) write something like that. However, KV5's interpretation of policy would force us to write in just that sort of stilted manner, because it would be the only allowable way to get the reader to the 1969 New York Yankees season article, and other similar articles, that contain the information pertinent to the article. Sometimes, we need to allow usability to trump policy -Dewelar (talk) 06:30, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Now lets take WP:EGG a step further. WP:EGG is a small part of the section titled Piped Links, which in turn, is a small section in the guideline MOS:LINKS. There is another section in MOS:LINKS titled Link specificity. This section says: Always link to the article on the most specific topic appropriate to the context from which you link. In this case the team season links are the most specific topic.
Now lets isolate and take a good look at WP:EGG, as its the main guideline being used as a reason to not have these links. WP:EGG says: Keep piped links as intuitive as possible. Per the Wikipedia:Principle of least astonishment, make sure that the reader knows what to expect when clicking on a link. On the surface that sure does look like these piped links shouldn't be allowed, but when you actually look at what WP:ASTONISH actually says (remembering that WP:ASTONISH is being used to justify WP:EGG), you find that it doesn't say that the links have to be obvious to the reader, or that the reader has to know what to expect. In fact it says: If a link takes readers to somewhere other than where they thought it would, it should at least take them somewhere that makes sense. (This is the only part of WP:ASTONISH that covers links). This is a completely different understanding of WP:EGG, as far as I can tell. So it can be argued that we don't need to ignore all rules after all, but embrace the guideline as it is written without prejudice.--Jojhutton (talk) 23:51, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
FYI, I began a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (linking)#WP:EGG.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:00, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Straw poll

Just vote yay or nay on using WP:EGG style links as Jojhutton has added here (keep the discussion in the above section):

YAY

  1. I'm in favor of giving users the best and most appropriate information in context, even if policy tells us we shouldn't. This is exactly the kind of thing WP:IAR was meant to address. -Dewelar (talk) 23:44, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
  2. I agree with Dewelar... this makes the most sense in practical terms. Spanneraol (talk) 23:49, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
  3. WP:MOSLINK is a guideline, not a policy; it can be ignored with discretion and judgment. This are the most specific, appropriate links. oknazevad (talk) 00:22, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
  4. I was under the impression that this was already resolved. Not to spew sour grapes, but I'm getting a bit ticked off at having edits I take along time formatting continue to get reverted.--Jojhutton (talk) 00:40, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
  5. I'm in favor of using most pertinent link, feeling that it best embodies the spirit of Wikipedia, linking pertinent articles to one another. Limiting link direction reduces the scope of our editorial powers. As Baseball Bugs has stated, finding a team's year-by-year buried in a template is not user friendly.Orsoni (talk) 04:45, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
  6. I feel WP:EGG is being misinterpreted. – X96lee15 (talk) 00:05, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
  7. Seems more practical and helpful to readers. --  StarScream1007  ►Talk  03:07, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
  8. Yes, I agree on the narrow point. I believe it pertains equally to the links in column one --1876 in baseball | 1876 (actually expressed by the "by" templayte)-- and those in column two --1876 Chicago White Stockings season | Chicago White Stockings. I also agree almost entirely with the two substantial contributions to above discussion by Dewelar. Further for instance, I believe context may support in-text links such as: 1876 | 1876 Chicago White Stockings season. Probably the context would be some in-text list such as this, whose prose I do not recommend.--P64 (talk) 19:19, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
Adrian "Cap" Anson played for six Chicago White Stockings champions including the inaugural 1876 team. 1876 team. He was captain, the role closest to a modern manager, of the 1880, 1881, 1882, 1885, and 1886 renditions.

NAY

  1. Staxringold talkcontribs 23:25, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
  2. Though I have recused myself from this discussion, I'm an emphatic and unchanging NAY on this circumvention of policy as explained above. Out again. — KV5 • Talk • 23:33, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

SO-SO

  1. Something should be done to make things more user-friendly than it currently is. I shouldn't have to go to another website due to not being able to find the info quickly in wikipedia. Specifically, I'd like to see the team's year-by-year linked at the top of the team's page, rather than buried in a template-inside-a-template at the bottom of the page. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:32, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
  2. There are times where it's appropriate and times where it's overkill. We should be using them, but as long as we don't overlink we're fine. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 03:13, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Generally this discussion is about how to link team names that are already linked in these lists. Since each individual link will go to a seperate and specific article, this should satisfy the conditions of WP:OVERLINK.--Jojhutton (talk) 12:36, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Request for clarification

Some of the comments above seem to indicate support or lack of support for the general concept of linking to a season-specific article, rather than the specific example given of a table whose rows correspond to years. Is the straw poll on this specific type of usage, or for the general concept? isaacl (talk) 05:57, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

I think that we are generally discussing only the Baseball project articles, but using other articles as examples from other articles would get us into WP:OTHERSTUFF from either side, although it could be used to establish precedent.--Jojhutton (talk) 12:21, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks and hopefully we can get past this and work on other projects together, more specifically a new project that I have been running around in my head for a week now. Hopefully, if all goes well, my suggestion will revolutionize the way we maintain the articles under this wiki-project.--Jojhutton (talk) 16:33, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
As I stated earlier, I don't agree with a blanket use of linking to season-specific articles. For the specific example cited, particularly since the article already had a key that could be updated to indicate where the team name was linked to, it seemed a reasonable choice. The context is the key aspect that must be evaluated. isaacl (talk) 18:22, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
Never was advocating general use, only within the context of lists, where the year is listed next to the team name anyway. As WP:ASTONISH says: If a link takes readers to somewhere other than where they thought it would, it should at least take them somewhere that makes sense.. In list format, it obviously makes sense.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:37, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
That's why I requested the clarification, as some of the comments above seem to be discussing a broader scenario. In that case, I assume the straw poll only establishes a consensus within the context of lists such as those in the List of National League pennant winners article. isaacl (talk) 19:46, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
Thats reasonable, as that was the only edits I was making. But you may want to get clarification from Staxringold, as he was the one who requested the straw poll. I can only vouch for what I was thinking.Jojhutton (talk) 20:00, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
(edit conflict)I agree that the straw poll is meant to address only this specific issue. I do support using such links in more places than they are at present, but certainly agree that it must make sense in context. I hope that I explained the basis for that position in the above section marked "Arbitrary break for KV5". -Dewelar (talk) 20:06, 7 March 2011 (UTC)


A Note about the previous consensus

In the above discussion, by my count, 10 separate accounts took part. (9 logged in, 1 ip). Of those 10 accounts 6 gave clear unambiguous wording that they favored the links. 2 accounts made it clear that they were not in favor of the links. 2 more accounts gave no clear impression, but I surmised that they may have been split anyway, but I didn't include them because they didn't say one way or the other. Yet somehow a 6-2 split is no clear consensus.--Jojhutton (talk) 01:14, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Exactly. No sense poisoning the well, what? -Dewelar (talk) 02:32, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Page move requests

These are kind of tied together... ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:12, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Montreal Expos --> Washington Nationals merge proposal

A proposal has been made to merge Montreal Expos into the Washington Nationals article. Parties interested in commenting are invited to at Talk:Washington Nationals. Beyond My Ken (talk) 07:35, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Seattle Pilots --> Milwaukee Brewers merge proposal

A proposal has also been made to merge Seattle Pilots into the Milwaukee Brewers article. Parties interested in commenting are invited to at Talk:Milwaukee Brewers.--Jojhutton (talk) 13:56, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

I didn't even know the Pilots had their own article... the Expos/Nationals thing will never die. Spanneraol (talk) 15:34, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
As per the ongoing discussion on WP:ANI, the obvious thing to do with both the Expos->Nats and Pilots->Brewers situations would be to have one main "franchise summary" article while having detailed "history" articles for their respective cities... as is being done for the Dodgers, Giants, etc. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:12, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
Per Baseball Bugs's suggestion, when you type "Brooklyn Dodgers", you are re-directed to "History of the Brooklyn Dodgers". Eagle4000 (talk) 18:41, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

I know that the "History of..." nomenclature in general predates Wknight94's efforts, but in recognition of his tenacious and determined work at building a consensus that was followed for the Giants and Dodgers, and which he intended to be followed for other teams such as the Expos, I think it would be nice to credit Wknight94 with this compromise strategy. isaacl (talk) 18:52, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Personally I think that way of naming creates awkward titles and since we are going to redirect the name of the team at the time to those History articles as is already done anyways, then I don't see why the article name couldn't just be the name of the team at the time to begin with. But I am long since tired of arguing this case. -DJSasso (talk) 12:35, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • We really need an overall standard on these. There's the Expos/Nats and Pilots/Brewers model of separate articles for teams of different names and cities. Then there's the "History of" model for the different city Dodgers and Giants. Then Milwaukee Braves just redirects to Atlanta Braves. And Philadelphia Athletics redirects to History of the Oakland Athletics (oddly it redirects generally while Kansas City Athletics redirects to the subsection). And Washington Senators only exists as a disambig, both versions of the team are included in the respective sections of Minnesota Twins and Texas Rangers. That's 4 (the Senators model is the same as the Braves redirect) different ways of dealing with this: Separate team articles, separate team history articles, redirect to a shared general team history article, or redirect to the general team article (with further information in a split off history article). Personally I like the Braves/Senators model best. It gets you to a team page (avoiding the oddity of getting dumped into a history page as with the Giants/Dodgers) that covers that older version of the team somewhat while avoiding the separate-article-for-things-that-aren't-really-separate issue of Pilots/Brewers and Expos/Nats. Staxringold talkcontribs 14:53, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Aye, there's the rub. How does this project (baseball) deal with all of the inconsistencies? Most of what was mentioned above shouldn't be to difficult to remedy, but oh those Expos. What to do there, if the Canada project won't be willing to compromise, even a little. Consistency is the key. Jojhutton (talk) 15:08, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
    • As I recall, the reasons for creating the 2 Giants and 2 Dodgers history articles were: (1) size-of-article considerations; and (2) placating some who were insisting that somehow the New York and California teams were somehow separate entities. That second point is essentially the same argument that the keep-the-Expos-article advocates have made, in defiance of the facts. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:13, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
    • It's not just people at the Canada project who object. A great number people commenting in that discussion aren't from the Canada project. Every other subject on the wiki split out into seperate articles for different eras of a subject so that all eras can be covered in the detail they deserve. To be honest its some of these sports teams that aren't split that are out of consistency with most every other subject on the wiki. -DJSasso (talk) 15:22, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
      • What would be the point in having TWO separate main articles for the Dodgers, when they are ONE entity with a history going back to the 1880s? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:25, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
        • It wouldn't be two seperate main articles, it would be an article for their time in Los Angeles and an article for their time in Brooklyn. We don't throw all of World War II into a single article because its one war. We seperate it out into multiple articles so that specific attention can be paid to the subject matter that is covered during its era. This is no different. Someone that wants to find out about the Expo's don't necessarily care about the nationals info and people who care about the Nationals history don't necessarily care about the Expos history. If you try to shoove them on the same page you have the issue of undue weight come up because you would have to cut out most of the Nationals content so that the page could mostly be about the expos because 90% of their history was as the Expos. How does that help the reader? You can help the reader much more by having them as seperate pages. Basically it is the whole point of WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. -DJSasso (talk) 15:29, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
            • So you're saying it WOULD BE TWO separate main articles. We already have that covered, with TWO History of... articles, and ONE main or "umbrella" article on the Dodgers, and the same deal with the Giants and some others. So there is not and cannot be one consistent rule across the MLB team articles, if the Expos and Nats are kept separate. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:35, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
              • Not at all the Los Angeles page is the main page (ie umbrella) and the Brooklyn page would be a subpage. Exactly what you suggest. What you are having issues with really is the naming, which is silly because the most concise accurate name for that chunk of history is the team name at that time. -DJSasso (talk) 15:39, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
          • Except that we do. World War II. Yes there are sub-articles splitting off stuff with more detailed coverage, but that's why I like the Braves/Senators model. There is the broad controlling article of the overall franchise, and then with sub-articles for things like history that go into greater detail. That's how virtually every other area of Wikipedia is structured. Broad, general article with "See also"s and "Main article"s at the tops of sections linking to splits. Staxringold talkcontribs 15:33, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

And there was one Los Angeles Dogers and one Brooklyn Dodgers. You make it clear that the franchise is the same in the lead (as is done in the expos example) and in the summary in the history section on the LA page. But the Los Angeles and Brooklyn teams from a historical standpoint were seperate parts of a whole, in other words the LA Dodgers aren't the Brooklyn Dodgers. But they are both the Dodgers. Naming the article Brooklyn Dodgers does not indicate they were seperate in any way. Especially when you say right the lead that they weren't. -DJSasso (talk) 15:46, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  • So, is it your opinion that there should be TWO umbrella articles, one on the Brooklyn years and one on the L.A. years? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:52, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
    • If that is how you want to think of it I suppose. I look at it as the current team page is the Umbrella/Main page, and the older team page is just a sub-article of the history section of the main article which is the current team. But I could see how you could call it two umbrella's I suppose. But that isn't really how I see it. -DJSasso (talk) 15:55, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • (Jesus Christ, triple conflict) But there wasn't. The Brooklyn Dodgers are the Los Angeles Dodgers. By separating them out you impede that general knowledge and general accessibility that general articles are supposed to aid. Learning about a subsection of the historical past of that overarching franchise should be the thing that requires the additional click, not the vice versa. The big broad shared topic should be the main target. By having an article called Brooklyn Dodgers then every link to that page will miss that shared topic. It'd be like if every article relating to an Eastern Front topic which linked to World War II actually linked to Eastern Front (World War II). If you want to talk about that topic specifically, fine, link that subarticle (in the same way you could link to a History of the Brooklyn Dodgers if the purpose of the link was really about that history). But if it's just generally discussing the team then Brooklyn Dodgers should point to the overarching topic article, Los Angeles Dodgers. Staxringold talkcontribs 15:56, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • By that logic then the main article should not be called Los Angeles Dodgers as it was only that name for part of the time. It should be something along the lines of MLB Dogers Franchise. I actually feel you impede the knowledge of the topic by forcing the link to go to the current team instead of to information that is more about the topic that the person actually searched for. They searched for the Brooklyn Dodgers for example, not the LA Dodgers. If someone takes the time to specifically search for that older name they probably want the specific information about that time period, not the general history. And again the linkage between the two will/is clearly explained in both articles, so it doesn't really hide the linkage as you suggest. Its mentioned in a couple locations on both pages in the case of the expos. -DJSasso (talk) 15:59, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • All that is the same is the franchise slot and part of the name. The two have very seperate histories in different locations. Every team the moves does. They just happen to use the same franchise for access to play in MLB. The are two different teams that use the same franchise. Unfortunately the meaning of franchise often gets confused in sports. Franchise and Team don't mean the same thing even through they are often treated like they do. -DJSasso (talk) 16:08, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

I really hate edit conflicts. It should be called (and listed under) Los Angeles Dodgers because that is the current name. If Wikipedia existed at the time (to continue the war analogy) we might've originally had an article called The Great War, but it came to be known as World War I more commonly, so the article is there now. The fact that Brooklyn Dodgers notes that it's now the LA Dodgers is just a messy and unnecessary way of doing what I'm suggesting. (1) Both Brooklyn and LA point to Los Angeles Dodgers (2) General historical summary of the Dodgers in Brooklyn listed under "History" as with Atlanta Braves and (3) Hatlinks to a History article that goes in deeper. Again, World War II discusses deep topics like the Eastern Front generally, but then breaks off those subtopics for deeper discussion. But all links to World War II point to World War II. Staxringold talkcontribs 16:10, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  • Precisely. They are ONE team, not two. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:12, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • But they aren't, they are two seperate teams that used the same franchise to play in major league baseball. This is where obviously the disconnect is between people who think they should be split and those who don't. Fully 100% agree they are the same franchise. No doubt about it. But the LA Dodgers were a seperate entity from the Brooklyn Dodgers under the same franchise. Just like the US and Great Britain were both the Allied Forces, but weren't the same countries to continue the WWII example. The baseball project very much needs to understand team is seperate from franchise. They are the same franchise, but they aren't the same team. -DJSasso (talk) 16:15, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Yes, they are. The franchise is the players, the owners, the money, the right to play the games, etc, etc. The difference between the Brooklyn and LA Dodgers is purely a name and location. Yes they had a storied history in Brooklyn that deserves coverage, but the general topic all falls under the same umbrella. Again, we don't have two articles for Cassius Clay and Muhammad Ali, despite his having a prodigious boxing career under both names. Staxringold talkcontribs 16:18, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • It's becoming clear that Djsasso has a basic misunderstanding of how these leagues operate. The Dodgers are ONE team, not two. They have a continuum of history. They did not cease to exist in 1957 and magicially regenerate in 1958. They simply moved. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:20, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • I didn't say they didn't have a continuum of history. I agree. The Franchise has a continuum of history. The teams are seperate. You wouldn't say a player who played for the Brooklyn Dodgers played for the Los Angeles Dodgers for example. But you could say that he played for Dodgers franchise. -DJSasso (talk) 16:25, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
(ec)They are one franchise. Again a team and franchise are two different things, a franchise is the right to field a team. Technically an arguement could be made that its a different team every year. But it would be rediculous to have a page for every year (other that the normal season pages). The company/individual that owns the Dodgers franchise owns the name Brooklyn Dodgers, yes. Doesn't change anything. -DJSasso (talk) 16:36, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • So even though it was the same owner of the same players under the same contracts playing in the same league (MLB and NL) and all within the same franchise the team was "different" because it was in a new city?? What is a team then? Literally everything about the Brooklyn Dodgers of 1957 was the same as the Los Angeles Dodgers of 1958 other than their city (and the usual offseason player moves). Staxringold talkcontribs 16:30, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • The Dodgers are a business, we wouldn't create a new article for GE if it relocated to another city.. this is a silly argument. Spanneraol (talk) 16:34, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • This is why I asked DJSasso what a "team" is in his view, because I don't understand this separation he's drawing between franchise and team. That's why I make the connection to Clay/Ali. History under a separate name does not warrant a separate article, they are a common entity (as evidenced by it being the same owner staying in the same league moving the same players with no down time in between). I'm especially confused because Sasso said he's fine with the Oilers thing. That makes it even stranger, somehow purely moving their home town changed things. What about the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and their many names/uncertain home city, how many articles should they have? Staxringold talkcontribs 16:38, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • It's mostly due to being a logical place to split an article. Lots of things change when you move, old fans tend to no longer be fans of the new team. And fans in the new city tend to not care about what happened in the old city. Stadiums change. Sometimes names/logos change as well. The biggest reason, is that of ease of search and navigation for people looking for information. Anyone searching for the old team name is likely doing so on purpose because they want the specific information on the specific incarnation of the franchise. We shouldn't have to force them to sift through current information to find the link to the page they really want to be at. That is the whole point behind how article naming is supposed to happen, link to the most specific in context information you can. With a simple name change but staying in the same location, all that has changed is the name. Pretty much everything else stays the same, with a move usually pretty much everything changes except personnel and sometimes the name moves as well. (As for businesses see Wal-mart and Walmart Canada. By the logic of redirect we should link Walmart Canada to Wal-mart and then have some other link somewhere in the article linking to an article about Walmart Canada) -DJSasso (talk) 16:45, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Oh and for the Angels thing, I would just consider that a name change since they haven't actually moved anywhere.... But they are of course a rediculous case. -DJSasso (talk) 16:49, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

You're misstating the Walmart analogy. There Walmart Canada is a different and separate entity that is just under a broader control. That is more like a minor league team. Yes it's still ultimately owned by the common franchise, but it is a separate body. The GE moving analogy Spanneraol made is an apt one. When a company or organization changes it's headquarters we do not just create a new article for it. It's a metaphysical question, you only get a separate article when you have a new entity, and the exact same Dodgers' personnel and team just moving to a new city does not do that (you also get new articles when you split off content, what you seem to imply at the start of your big paragraph here, but that would be History of the Brooklyn Dodgers, not the umbrella Brooklyn Dodgers article). Staxringold talkcontribs 16:54, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, all I am saying is that you should split off content. However, I fail to see the difference between naming the article History of the Brooklyn Dodgers and just naming it Brooklyn Dodgers. Any average reader is going to equate those as the exact same meaning which renders the "History of the" part of the title redundant. Arguing about whether or not Brooklyn version or the LA version are the same is in all actuality irrelevant. Pages should be named their most relevent concise title, in this case Brooklyn Dodgers. -DJSasso (talk) 16:59, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • The issue is that all of the pre-move articles link to Brooklyn Dodgers (just as all pre-name change instances of Ali link to Cassius Clay). By pointing that link to a wholly separate article you are implying a greater level of separation than actuall exists. Cassius Clay is the same person as Muhammad Ali, so Clay points to Ali. The Brooklyn Dodgers are the Los Angeles Dodgers, same owner, same players, same league, same license, etc, etc, so Brooklyn Dodgers should similarly point to Los Angeles Dodgers. Any discussion of the history while in Brooklyn is a wholly subsidiary topic that should only exist in a clearly subsidiary article (like the "Eastern Front" WWII analogy). Staxringold talkcontribs 17:05, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • We'll have to agree to disagree. I feel those pre-move articles should link to the history page of the relevant time period. And for those that shouldn't, you fix via a pipe link. -DJSasso (talk) 17:10, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
It's more like a movie series. There's an overall article for the Star Wars franchise, and when breaking down the franchise, you might choose to have one parent article for the first trilogy, and a second one for the second trilogy, which was created within a whole different context. isaacl (talk) 19:09, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Again, no. Different movies are separate events. World War II and World War I are both wars, but are separate events that merit their own articles. But the point that I and Baseballbugs are making is that the Dodgers did not become some new magic entity, where there is such a difference between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back. Those two movies had different casts, different shooting locations, different plots, different stories, different funding, different releases, etc, etc. They were wholly different films, the "franchise" of Star Wars is a far looser relationship than here. That's my point with AI. That's the metaphysical question. And I still don't see much of an answer to that question from Sasso. What happened in the 57-58 offseason that essentially "created" a new team even though it was the same owners of the same players under the same contracts playing the same sport in the same league with absolutely no downtime. History under an old name is not the same as a separate entity. Staxringold talkcontribs 19:21, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
It's a continuum: the Dodgers of 1957 were mostly the same as 1958, but are entirely different than the Dodgers of 2011. For marketing purposes, clubs like to sell the illusion of continuity. That being said, I don't accept the premise that linking the term "Brooklyn Dodgers", when used in a context that is specific to the team's sojourn in Brooklyn, to its own article implies there is a greater level of separation. The disambiguation note makes the relationship clear. (In a context where the term might be expected to link to information on the overall franchise, it would be appropriate to link to the Los Angeles Dodgers article.) isaacl (talk) 19:48, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, I was responding to the particular sub-thread on where the term "Brooklyn Dodgers" should link to; it might be easier to follow this overall discussion if we avoid jumping between arguments. However, since you asked, regarding having separate articles: well, if the point of a summary article is to summarize, that implies there are other articles in which the details are expanded upon. If there is sufficient information to warrant spinning out a child article, then in accordance with summary style, it is appropriate to have a child article. (If possible, can you limit any followup in this chain to one of the two sub-threads? We can discuss the other one in another chain.) isaacl (talk) 21:40, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Move Montreal Expos to History of the Montreal Expos & move Seattle Pilots to History of the Seattle Pilots (I'm sure there's more to'em then just the 1 season). Also, make Montreal Expos & Seattle Pilots re-directs to those History pages. It's much easier then trying to merge 4 articles as 2. GoodDay (talk) 22:03, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

I really don't think the Pilots need their own "history of..." article.. we should just merge whatever is in their article to the 1969 Seattle Pilots season article. 22:25, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
I don't think we should merge Seattle Pilots with 1969 Seattle Pilots season. The two articles cover two different perspectives. On one hand, "1969 Seattle Pilots season" discusses one season of a baseball team (and thus appears in Category:Milwaukee Brewers seasons). "Seattle Pilots", on the other hand, is about an MLB franchise in its first incarnation (location). It's similar to (albeit a lot shorter than) the "History of the Brooklyn Dodgers" article. Eagle4000 (talk) 04:37, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
There was only one season in Seattle... having two articles in just plain silly. Spanneraol (talk) 04:41, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

"Records" break created by Stax to keep discussions clear

  • The thing I really hate about the Nationals/Expos thing is that they have separate navboxes... the Nationals box only lists the seasons from their time as the Nationals and vice versa.... it's almost as if the past period didnt happen and it makes it much more difficult for someone who wants to explore the ENTIRE history of the franchise to navigate through. Spanneraol (talk) 16:29, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Depends on the team/franchise. Unless something has happened recently. The National's don't acknowledge any Expos records. Other teams do honor past records. -DJSasso (talk) 16:37, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
I went to MLB.COM to look for Andre Dawson.[3] Of course it lists MON next to his name. Guess where it takes you when you click on the MON? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 17:13, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
I said records not stats. Unless something has changed (and it may well have) for the first number of years the Nationals press book under franchise records only listed records by nationals players. And had returned all expos retired numbers to circulation and the like. All I am saying is different franchises treat their past differently. -DJSasso (talk) 17:15, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • The Expos/Nats are one circumstance where I can buy the argument for two articles, although I don't like it. I say this because the Expos were (nearly) actually destroyed as a team, the franchise was sold, etc, etc. However still the fact that the same players in the same league just moved along to the new name makes me feel it's still the same situation. Staxringold talkcontribs 17:27, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • The team history section of the Washington Nationals website contains lots of information about the Expos and the main picture on that page is of Gary Carter, who only played for the team in Montreal. Spanneraol (talk) 17:50, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
This 2006 Washington Post article gives some insight on how the Nationals have grappled with the issue of records. The 2006 Washington Nationals media guide had three sections: one for records across all teams in Washington, one for franchise history (Expos + Nationals), and one for Nationals only. isaacl (talk) 00:18, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
I can understand the Expos navbox excluding Nationals information. But the Nationals navbox should include the Expos. Rlendog (talk) 20:40, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

All-Star

There is an editor out there who keeps changing "All-Star" to "All-Star Selection" in different players' infoboxes. Jason Thompson (first baseman, born 1954) for example. Has there ever been a consensus on this?

I personally prefer "All-Star," and I've never seen it listed as "All-Star Selection" anywhere but Wikipedia. It's also technically incorrect in a lot of cases. For example, Albert Pujols is not an All-Star selection, he was ELECTED to the All-Star team. Might seem like a small distinction, but it is a distinction nonetheless. For what it's worth, this editor also has a tendency to unnecessarily change other information in infoboxes that seems a little unwarranted to me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.22.197 (talk) 19:17, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree it appears to be an unnecessary edit, although technically not inaccurate in Thompson's case since, reserves are "selected" by the All-Star team manager.Orsoni (talk) 07:33, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
Again, I must state that the editor to whom I am referring is pretty insistent that it gets done his way. I think just about every baseball article out there says "All-Star Selection." Someone needs to tell him to cut it out. He also has a tendency to double link items in the infobox. There was a consensus a while back that we were not to do that. He also keeps removing Topps Rookie All-Star team from Thompson's infobox. Why? I really don't feel like getting into an edit way with this guy, but he's got a strong "My way or the highway" attitude.
I agree "All-Star" is sufficient. I suppose "selection" may provide some information in a couple of cases, such as when the player was injured and missed the all-star game despite being selected, or when the game to which the player was (s)elected hasn't been played yet. But reliable sources seem to just use "All-Star" for the first case, and it seems appropriate for the 2nd case as well, i.e., once (s)elected, the player qualifies as an "All-Star". Rlendog (talk) 20:37, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
I agree that just saying "All-Star" is fine. If there's a situation where the player was selected later by a manager, that can alwasys be mentioned in the prose. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 04:25, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
The guy might be thinking that just calling someone an "All-Star" is somehow an editorial statement. But it's not really puffery, it's just common usage, short for "member of the All-Star team", as with other abbreviated terms like "Hall of Famer". ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 04:37, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
It's really just semeantics... both ways are correct.... players are selected to all-star teams, either by the fans, the manager, the players.. whatever.. all-star selection is accurate... and so is just plain all-star... either works for me and I have no personal preference on he issue. Spanneraol (talk) 04:54, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
All things being equal, I prefer conciseness—so "All-Star" over other forms. isaacl (talk) 05:14, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
Short, sweet,and to the point.--Jojhutton (talk) 05:22, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
Yep. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:34, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
I pretty much agree with Rlendog's comments above. There are certain conditions where using "selection" might be appropriate, but it's essentially superfluous. -Dewelar (talk) 06:23, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

So since selection seems to be an issue all of the sudden after 3 or 4 years. Who wants to volunteer and go around and remove selection from the hundreds of articles that have it.--Yankees10 15:31, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I started to.

Infobox awards and highlights field

By the way, in the case of World Series Champions, I believe I recall a consensus that this should be the first item listed in an infobox's highlights. Is there a standard order on this?

It's not so much of an issue that it's worth seeking out and fixing. However, as of now, if I see it on an article I'm already editing, I'll remove it, as I do with several other minor issues when I see them (adding infoboxes, adding the baseballstats template, de-capitalizing "Major League" when it's not followed by "Baseball", fixing awkward constructions in the lead paragraph like "He would play for...", fixing the link to win-loss record, etc.).
To the above IP address editor: to which infobox do you refer? If you mean player infoboxes, I'm not certain there's a consensus to have it at all, much less at the top of the list of highlights. -Dewelar (talk) 20:35, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
So it's a matter of personal preference? My own personal preference is to list World Championships first. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.22.197 (talk) 20:53, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
I don't think personal preference is allowed on Wikipedia ;-) . Seriously, though, I know there has been a discussion about this, I just don't know the results nor could I find them in a quick archive search. I generally don't touch the highlights section unless I'm creating the page myself, because changing stuff like that tends to start edit wars. -Dewelar (talk) 21:10, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
I missed the previous discussion on Infoboxes. What is the reason for not including season home run crowns and season batting championships in the infobox? It seems to me that Tony Gwynn's 8 batting championships would be more of a "career highlight" than a Hutch Award, which I'd never even heard of before I began using Wikipedia.Orsoni (talk) 04:58, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
I still can't find it in the archives, but I do not recall a discussion on omitting batting titles and the like. I certainly think they should be included. -Dewelar (talk) 05:15, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
Orsoni, I absolutely agree with your point on Tony Gwynn. I've added several times in Dave Kingman's infobox that he led the league in home runs only to see it removed shortly afterwards, and I'm not sure why. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.22.197 (talk) 10:40, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

RBI(s)

This discussion re a requested move may interest some who hang out at this page.--Epeefleche (talk) 13:18, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

MLB players by team

See Category:Major League Baseball players by team.

  • Alphabetical order. We have handled the "St. Louis" teams in three ways, by coding briefly "Saint", by coding fully (for example) "Saint Louis Browns", and by default "St. L". The first two types precede the Sans and the last follows the Sans. I suppose this problem appears elsewhere too.
By the way, I don't understand the approach revealed at Category:St._Louis_Cardinals, for example. Players under the Browns nickname in one cat under "B", players under the Perfectos nickname in one cat under "P", all other letters of the alphabet for the timespan under the Cardinals nickname. (only partly a matter of alphabetization) --P64
  • Contestable major leagues. NAPBBP players by team precede the alphabetical listing (I am responsible). Federal League players have a category listed under "F". Players League players have a category listed above as a sibling of MLB players rather than a child. Union Association have no distinct category.

--P64 (talk) 17:14, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

On your first point, it should obviously be "Saint (x)" everywhere. I will fix this.
(interjection) Good. So the pipe should be "|Saint Louis nextword"
Right (and in one case, "|Saint Paul Saints". -Dewelar (talk) 21:51, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
I'm not sure I understand your second point, so I'll just ask for clarification as to what you think should be done. As for the third, I don't believe that the FL or PL should be split off into child categories at all, since they're already included in the alphabetical listing, and having them in both places violates categorization rules. The NAPBBP perhaps shouldn't be categorized under this category at all, and should only be in the more global Category:Baseball players by team. The UA, at least for now, could probably stay as it is. -Dewelar (talk) 18:04, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
(3) If I understand correctly, the categories Players League players and Federal League players, if any, should be in Category: Players' League and Category:Federal League only, neither siblings nor children of MLB players by team. (sorry to bother)
Actually, assuming we keep those categories, there's no reason they can't be subcategorized into both, since they're in different branches of the category tree. What we aren't supposed to be doing is subcategorizing into categories at different levels within the same branch. -Dewelar (talk) 21:51, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
(2) Perhaps nothing should be done because the dual classification systems have been implemented consistently (it seems to me quickly) and they make sense in a way.
The St. Louis Cardinals players subcategories intrigued me more than their alphabetization at Category:St. Louis Cardinals. Upon examination I see that a lot of work has been done to make categories specific to the nicknames used by other web encyclopedias, while lists cover entire club histories. So the List of St. Louis Cardinals owners and executives includes pre-1901 owner Chris von der Ahe and the list St. Louis Cardinals all-time roster includes pre-1901 player Bob Caruthers, while they are not (because of change/s in the conventional nickname) in Category:St. Louis Cardinals owners and Category:St. Louis Cardinals players. (See the preface to that players category for more about that.) Referring to Category:Atlanta Braves and Category:Brooklyn Dodgers and poking around, I see what looks like consistent application of that dual classification. --P64 (talk) 17:26, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
That follows with what I have observed within the project, yes. It's a bit odd on its face, though, so I'm not sure why it was done that way, but at least it's been done that way consistently. -Dewelar (talk) 21:51, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Checking all-time rosters

Would someone be able to go through all 30 All-time rosters and make sure players that played in 2010 were added? Thanks, Wizardman Operation Big Bear 18:40, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Poke. I could take a look through them myself this week but don;'t have time to do all that myself. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 17:05, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I've been keeping the Dodgers list up to date.. dont know about the others though. Spanneraol (talk) 17:30, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I can start on this today. If we have multiple people doing this, we should have a checklist somewhere so we don't repeat the work. -Dewelar (talk) 18:25, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Twins are done. -Dewelar (talk) 19:37, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Mariners are done. -Dewelar (talk) 23:41, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Phillies are done because of my huge off-season project. — KV5 • Talk • 23:44, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Devil Rays are done. -Dewelar (talk) 00:47, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Indians done, will hit some more over wknd. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 23:43, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
Red Sox done. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 15:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Heads up because the Tony Gwynn page has been moved without duscussion

Some one just moved and renamed Tony Gwynn as Tony Gwynn, Sr. without discussion or a RM, and I can't move it back because the user now made Tony Gwynn a disambiguation page.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:01, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the "best" approach to this kind of situation is, but at the moment I would be inclined to follow the same pattern as was done with Sr. and Jr. Griffey, where the father gets the redirect from Ken Griffey. Perhaps there's a better way, which the group here can propose and discuss? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:36, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
I note that Earl Averill is handled the same way as Ken Griffey, but Roy Smalley is handled with a disambiguation page. Maybe there needs to be some discussion about a uniform approach? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:39, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
Per WP:COMMONNAME and his official SDSU biography, the page title should be returned.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:43, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
I've never heard the elder Gwynn referred to as "Senior", unlike the elder Griffey. I'm requesting it moved back. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:46, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
Another one Joj pointed out is Cal Ripken, which takes you to Cal Jr's page. Gwynn is obviously the more notable of the two, at least at this point. Ironically, Griffey is a tougher call, and maybe they couldn't decide about the Smalleys, neither of whom was Hall of Fame material. Sandy Alomar takes you to a disambig page, which is another tough call, as Roberto Alomar was the Hall of Famer of the family. But Gwynn should be the primary at this point in time. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:51, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
I have changed Tony Gwynn back to a redirect to Tony Gwynn, Sr.. That's consistent with the approach used for Earl Averill, Ken Griffey and Cal Ripken. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:54, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
Ken Griffey, I think, should be a disambiguation page between Junior and Senior, as they are both referred to by their suffix. Tony Gwynn should go to the elder, because he is clearly more notable, and is never referred to as "Senior". The others are tougher cases. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:57, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
When Griffey Jr. and Ripkin Jr. started playing ball, their fathers were automatically referred to in the media as Seniors. This never happend in Tony Gwynns case. The media continued to refer to the father as Tony Gwynn and the son as TG Jr.--Jojhutton (talk) 20:01, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
At the very least, it needs to be a redirect instead of a disambig, as I have done. If Jr. Gwynn gets into the Hall of Fame, it might be a different story. But that's a ways off. I would think it's possible to move it back from Sr. to the no-suffix version. If consensus says to do that, and it won't work, we can ask an admin to take care of it. I'm thinking we need to rope the mover into the discussion, so that we don't foment a move-war. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:04, 19 March 2011 (UTC)
Looks like it's been moved back, so hopefully all is peachy. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 23:39, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

A solution on how this project deals with edit warring

It is plain by now that this project needs a new jolt of energy. A new birth, so to speak. A few weeks ago I had an epiphany. An idea that may work in the long run.

This project has a great number of articles under its scope and its fair to say that it becomes difficult for these articles to maintain a great deal of continuity and symmetry. This talk page has 24 archives full of discussions and proposals that are usually quickly forgotten soon after being archived, so its plain to see that a system needs to be established to help alleviate some of the problems that frequently turn up on this talk page.

First, there are serious problems with recentism as with a MLB articles such as Boston Red Sox and Atlanta Braves where teams with 110+ years of history have half of their history section dedicated to the last few years with each year having its own section. Then there is San Diego Padres which dedicates an entire section to The Jed Hoyer Era, and he just took over last year. Good examples of how to do this better are Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals, which balance the entire history of the ball club.

Then there is the problem with teams that change cities. We have Washington Nationals and Montreal Expos, and then we have Los Angeles Dodgers and History of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and then there is Oakland Athletics and Philadelphia Athletics, finally there is Baltimore Orioles and St. Louis Browns. This is four separate ways dealing with the same sort of information.

This project also covers more than just MLB teams. There is Nippon Professional Baseball, Negro league baseball, Minor league baseball, Little league baseball, College baseball, and various other leagues too numerous to mention. There is no scope on how to deal with this massive amount of information.

So without written instructions to help with writing these articles, editors usually take it upon themselves to develop how the articles should look, usually leading to some edit warring and several years of archived discussions here. No wonder there has been so much debate all the time. Yet debate hasn't settled anything.

So I propose a new MOS guideline specific to this baseball wikiproject called MOS:BASEBALL.

There is precedent for doing this as many other wikiprojects have created their own MOS guidelines, such as MOS:FILM and MOS:TV, both part of Wikiproject film. and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (military history) which was created by the Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history. And I'm sure there are others.

Hopefully, if this works, MOS:Baseball should help us to have a specific MOS guideline to look at when there are disputes, rather than continuing to debate every little detail. (Like is a player an All-Star, or an All-Star Selection).

I figure that it may take a few months, perhaps throughout the 2011 baseball season, to finalize this MOS guideline. Hopefully finishing it up by playoff time.--Jojhutton (talk) 22:46, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

In concept that sounds like a good idea, but getting all of us to agree on something tends to be difficult since the things you mentioned, like the Expos/Nationals thing has been the subject of much animosity over the years. Spanneraol (talk) 23:05, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
Well aware of the problems, thats why I figured it might take us a few months to finalize the guideline, but I'm pretty sure there's quite a bit we can agree on, and in most cases, the consensus has already been established and applied in many articles. This is just a chance for us to get all of the various consensuses in one easy to find and easy to read format, like an MOS guideline. Of course there will be some difficult issues to iron out, but most of the work is done, all we have to do is put it all together.--Jojhutton (talk) 23:12, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
I think it's at least worth trying. The worst thing that happens is that we get to loggerheads so often that it gets scrapped -- i.e., status quo. I'd be willing to contribute. -Dewelar (talk) 23:28, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
Even if it only hammers out three or four standards, I think it would be worthwhile.Orsoni (talk) 05:07, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
Hopefully we can get through more than just four, but in the end, it may be a very useful tool in consensus debates and bring continuity to the project overall, at least in theory.
As I've never started an MOS guideline before, I have to admit, I'm a bit naive about where to start. I've started a few other articles though and what I usually do is begin with a stub and build from there. Over time the articles i have started have grown as other editors come forward with new information. This, however, is a guideline, and needs cooperation from multiple editors, so if any one is familiar with creating MOS guidelines, don't be shy about getting this one started. I like how MOS:FILM is written. They way that deal with films (teams in baseball) and how they deal with actors (players in baseball), could be similar to how MOS:BASEBALL could begin. Of course thats just a blueprint, and I expect that the baseball MOS will be more elaborate as there is more to cover than just teams and players.--Jojhutton (talk) 16:57, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
The manual of style pages in the sidebar of WP:HOCKEY may be instructive. I am interested in trying to create an outline, but to be honest I'm not sure when I'll be able to get to it, so I can't promise anything at this time. isaacl (talk) 17:16, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
If this new MoS, means that the MLB team articles will finally be consistant (noting the Expos problem), then it's a good thing. 'Cuz I'm peeved that the Montreal Expos are getting special treatment, when you compare them to the Brooklyn Dodgers, Philadelphia Athletics, New York Giants etc ( team incarnations that wone the WS)GoodDay (talk) 17:34, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
Well, yes. That will one of the issues that should be dealt with. But there are other issues as well. The idea is that there will finally be a guideline that we or anyone else can use to help in dispute resolutions. But there are multiple parts to this proposed guideline, so its scope will be broader than just naming conventions.--Jojhutton (talk) 18:19, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

I've created a starting page: Wikipedia:WikiProject Baseball/Style guidelines – it is roughly based on the style pages for WP:HOCKEY and WP:FOOTBALL. Lots of previous consensus to look up and codify, so please go ahead and add info. I am happy to polish up the language as needed. isaacl (talk) 02:35, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Most viewed list

Didn't we get a list similar to this generated for articles tagged under our Wikiproject? Anyone have that link, I can't seem to find it. All I can find are the Wikipedia 1.0 tools that let you sort by Importance/Quality/Score/etc. Staxringold talkcontribs 18:36, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I think you mean this. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:24, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Fritz Peterson is number 12 on the list?? LOL.Orsoni (talk) 05:29, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
And Kekich is pretty high on the list too. Maybe because of the pending movie? We should probably work on both of those. – Muboshgu (talk) 14:00, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
We should bookmark it in the toolbar, if it's not already. I remembered the discussion involving Rupert Murdoch so I searched the archives for him. – Muboshgu (talk) 14:01, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

New template Template:Student athlete

Feel free to help fill in Template:Student athlete by adding new articles or creating articles for redlinks.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:46, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Justin Nicolow

The article Justin Nicolow has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Both this author and his book fail WP:GNG in this WP:AUTOBIOGRAPHY

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Pburka (talk) 17:52, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

guide or history?

(quoting BaseballBugs from the Expos section) Maybe the basic issue is not so much about specific teams, but more about how the articles should read. Do we want New York Yankees to read like a Baseball Guide entry, or like a Baseball History entry?

Hear, hear! This is an important theme and bigger than teams/ballclubs/franchises. --P64 (talk) 20:54, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
Perhaps literary criticism can be used as a model, where everything is spoken of in the present tense. For example: The Montreal Expos are a team that played in Montreal from 1969 to 2004. (Even now, they still are a team that played in Montreal during those years.) isaacl (talk) 03:09, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

WikiProject Baseball style guidelines

A couple of notes: I suggest that WikiProject Baseball first codify its consensus agreements and prove out the guidelines as a set of WikiProject-specific guidelines. This will test out the strength of the guidelines before possibly subjecting them to the full proposal process that is required to make the guidelines part of the manual of style, which requires a broader consensus to be obtained. Accordingly, I propose removing the header on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Baseball/Style guidelines to avoid confusion.

Second, I had suggested on the WikiProject Baseball style guidelines page that discussion be held on the WikiProject Baseball discussion page, as the style guidelines are broken out onto multiple pages, and most consensus will originate from the WikiProject Baseball discussion page anyway. What do you think? isaacl (talk) 02:55, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

That sound like a good plan. Sorry I haven't been a big help on this as yet. I spent that last couple of weekends working other projects, but as with most MOS style guideline proposals, it should take us a while to get this MOS guideline perfected, or at least satisfactory for most of us. So far you've done a bang up job.--JOJ Hutton 03:10, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
There's no rush; even if it just gets used at first to capture new consensus agreements that are reached, it will be useful. isaacl (talk) 03:13, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Expos the former name of the Nationals

Looking at the Montreal Expos article, it occurred to me that the way it was written, seemed to infer that the franchise no longer exists, which of course is not true. Although they changed their name and moved cities, the Washington Nationals retain the rights to the Expos name, history, colors, and records. So in fact the team still does exist. I made this edit, and guess who didn't like it? Saying the Expos no longer exist. The franchise no longer uses the name, but they certainly do still exist under a different name. Any thoughts or questions?--Jojhutton (talk) 18:16, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

I tried looking for a guideline in the project about naming conventions for franchises, but didn't find one.
Wikipedia:Article titles#Treatment of alternative names seems to imply that there shouldn't be any article titled "Montreal Expos", since the Expos and Nationals are one and the same. It seems to me that most of the information in the Expos article should be in a separate article entitled "History of the Washington Nationals", and that "Montreal Expos should redirect to Nationals. I'm not claiming that this is the only answer, or even the most appropriate answer, but the example given about the change in name of cities over time seems to be apt to this (and similar) situations). LonelyBeacon (talk) 18:37, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
Look in this page's archives and you'll see it's been beaten to death. What it comes down to is simply that the Montreal Expos fans won't allow it. Hence the status quo. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 18:40, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
You aren't kidding! I guess consensus and guidelines don't apply to all corners of Wikipedia. I didn't realize how much that had been hashed and rehashed.LonelyBeacon (talk) 18:49, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
I'm not saying they're totally wrong. But it's kind of a turf battle, not just with Expos fans as such, but with Canadian projects as well. To me, the obvious thing is to have one umbrella article that covers a franchise in general, and have separate spinoff articles that cover specific cities. That was done for the Giants and Dodgers, for example, although in a somewhat different way. Unfortunately, there don't seem to be any firm guidelines for how to handle sports teams that city-hop. The Hartford Whalers and Carolina Hurricanes have fully separate articles, as with the Expos. However, Chicago Cardinals redirects to History of the Arizona Cardinals, which is more like the Giants/Dodgers approach, except that St. Louis Cardinals (NFL) redirects to Arizona Cardinals. St. Louis Browns redirects to Baltimore Orioles. Boston Braves is a disambig page which includes Boston Braves (baseball) which goes directly to Atlanta Braves. As a matter of some amusement, the Braves, Giants and Dodgers, despite their half-century in other cities, still have more years of history in their original homes - as do the Expos, of course. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:01, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
(edit conflict)(edit conflict)
Both this report and your recent revision of the article mix the terms 'franchise' and 'team' (not to say that any other editor uses those terms and cousins consistently).
I disagree with the main point that the current lead sentence is likely to be confusing. It does not imply that "the team" no longer exists; it states that the team "was moved ... and became" (which I'll revise to "was moved and renamed"). Terminology is too inconsistent to say what if anything it implies about the club or the franchise. --P64 (talk) 18:50, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
"Team" is kind of a colloquial term for the more formal term, which is "club", which refers to the organizational entity. "Franchise" is also often used interchangeably. It refers more to the slot in the league's lineup. Technically, "team" refers to the players. Rule 1.01: "Baseball is a game between two teams of nine players each..." You could say a league awards a franchise to a city, which then forms an organization called a club, which in turn fields a team. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:08, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • With respect to this area they are exactly the same thing. The difference between team and franchise is related to other things like minor league teams under the franchise umbrella. Both the Montreal Expos team and Montreal Expos franchise are in Washington now, and we take a truly idiotic approach to the arbitrary separation now. Staxringold talkcontribs 19:09, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Comment I'm in no way inferring that I want to rehash that whole rename chestnut again. That was ugly and even though those opposed to the merge seem to be doing so for emotional reasons, we have no choice but to respect consensus on that matter. As far as whether or not the Expos are the former name of the Nationals, thats verifiable and true, but referring to the Expos in the past tense as if they are defunct appears to be a POV wording and is not verifiable through the sources.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:15, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
    • The first sentence of the Whalers article says "The Hartford Whalers WERE..." as if there is no trace of them. Obviously there still is a trace of them, as they hosted the NHL All-Star Game this year, under their more recent name, Carolina Hurricanes. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:18, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Very, Very well said. My sentiments exactly. I have a tear in my eye. Hopefully the new MOS guideline will at least allow this project to speak in one voice when it comes to debates like this. I haven't had a good chance to work on it,but it looks as if Isacl began a working model for us to begin with.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:24, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • I think this debate arose soon after the club moved from Montreal to DC, and every time it's the same result: Nothing changes. Part of the reason is that there is no agreement on an appropriate alternative. There was a similar lengthy debate last year about the Giants and Dodgers. Maybe the basic issue is not so much about specific teams, but more about how the articles should read. Do we want New York Yankees to read like a Baseball Guide entry, or like a Baseball History entry? To me, the obvious thing to do is have a general (and relatively small) article about the club, with spinoffs to various history segments. You could even take it a step further, as is implicitly done with many minor league teams, which have a tendency to appear and disappear like shooting stars. Namely, a "Baseball in [city name]]" article, which could then spin off into different histories. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:29, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • I'm fine with sub-articles for histories to allow lengthy development of the subject whilst the main, current article remains a summary piece. But there still needs to be a central basis article for the central topic. Staxringold talkcontribs 19:33, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Perhaps we should decide the best alternative here first, then make a proposal to either merge, rename, or do nothing on the articles talk page. That way we won't be opposing each other based on another proposed name, against all of the other oppose comments.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:40, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Well I'm also not a fan of the Dodgers model of Brooklyn Dodgers linking to the history article (Senators history is in and points to Minnesota Twins, you browse from there to get to History of the Minnesota Twins) but at least there's an argument for that model. As it current is, with Montreal Expos written like it's it's own defunct franchise, is misleading and completely different from every single other similar article. Staxringold talkcontribs 19:41, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • In some sense the Pilots article is worse, because their fate is not mentioned until the final sentence of the intro. Truth to tell, their notability centers on still being an active major league club, based in Milwaukee. It should be worded more like the Expos first sentence or two is worded now. But I agree it would be a good model to use for a precedent, since nobody much cares about the Pilots (or certainly didn't at the time, else they might still be there). ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:56, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Well thats sort of like what I was trying to do. I'm not married to the wording that I created, I just wanted to clarify to the reader that the franchise still exists, even if under another name. I know that it says that they moved to Washington, but it still a tad ambiguous, when the reader reads the word "were" in the first sentence. It implies that they are no longer a team that plays.--Jojhutton (talk) 20:18, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Where things get tricky is distinguishing a club from its trademarks. There's no current club called the Montreal Expos, so it could be a "was". Yet the club still exists as the Nationals, so could be an "is". There's no more "Houston Colt .45s", either, but they still exist as a club. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:25, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
  • But that is the point, the Montreal Expos aren't a team that plays anymore, their franchise still plays as the Washington Nationals. But there is no entity called the Montreal Expos that currently plays. To say "is", is incorrect english. -DJSasso (talk) 20:34, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

> [quoting Baseballbugs] In some sense the (Seattle) Pilots article is worse, because their fate is not mentioned until the final sentence of the intro. Truth to tell, their notability centers on still being an active major league club, based in Milwaukee. It should be worded more like the Expos first sentence or two is worded now.

  • That is(was) easy to remedy and providing a capsule first paragraph doesn't interfere with anything yall have in mind. (Done!)
  • variable usage. "American professional baseball team" (with two links) doesn't please me but I have retained it. The New York Yankees are simply a "professional baseball team", the Montreal Expos a "Major League Baseball team", and 1891-99 Washington NL a "19th century baseball team". By the way, usage varies regarding "East Division" and "Eastern Division". --P64 (talk) 20:46, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

More interesting to me than the tense in the first sentence (trying to figure out what people will assume is fairly subjective in any case) is the category of defunct team. I proposed replacing it with the category "Relocated MLB teams"; I would appreciate further feedback at Talk:Montreal Expos#Categories_for_defunct_teams_and_disestablished_clubs. isaacl (talk) 03:54, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Also, I proposed removing the "disestablished" category; I would appreciate comments on this so a consensus can be reached. isaacl (talk) 04:00, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
disestablished. Something was established, probably in 1968 rather than 1969, and disestablished 2002 or 2004. Evidently the establishments/disestablishments categories and the births/deaths categories are parallel by rationale. Establishments include sports clubs (explained as "sports clubs or sports teams") but also companies and many others, not all organizations of any kind.
AOL is in categories established 1983 and established 2009 (two establishments), never disestablished.
Peanuts is in 1950 establishments and 2000 comic strip disestablishments (wow).
Regarding defunct I say "attend to the nouns and the adjectives will take care of themselves". (nouns: team, (ball)club, franchise, corporation, organization ...?) I am inclined to say the same about disestablishment but I don't know how. --P64 (talk) 17:12, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
As mentioned, please continue the discussion at Talk:Montreal Expos#Categories_for_defunct_teams_and_disestablished_clubs, so it will be in one place. isaacl (talk) 17:57, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Updates to roster templates

This morning, I made the change from an asterisk to the injury icon as our DL symbol. To activate it, if a player is put on the DL, all you need to do is add "|DL" before the end brackets of Template:MLBplayer, such as 

{{MLBplayer| 3|[[Babe Ruth]]|DL}}

.

Also, based on what they did at the Louis template, I decided to add parameters for the #'s of active, inactive and NRI's in camp. It looks bad without the updates in the other 29 templates, and I don't have the time to update them right now because I have a meeting on the hour to prepare for, so can anyone help me? Otherwise I'll fill in those numbers tonight. Also, we can think about whether or not we want to add them to the regular season roster templates (as just active vs. inactive) later. – Muboshgu (talk) 17:14, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

One thing about the DL thing... I wouldn't add it to guys on the 60-day DL like you did with the Red Sox cause it's a bit redundant and your legend says that symbol goes with 15-day. Spanneraol (talk) 17:50, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
Good point. I'll take them out of the 60 day DL folks. Note that this also works for minor league 7 day DL's. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:22, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

The Baseball Cube has moved its pages around

It looks like we may need to manually change every entry in all the instances of Template:Baseballstats that include the cube. The pages have been moved under a new naming system and there are no redirects. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:39, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

MLB Info Box

Just throwing this out there to see what others might think. would it be possible to make Template:MLB infobox, only for current MLB franchises? Or ,maybe create a separate one for teams that no longer exist?--JOJ Hutton 23:59, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Lets take a look at MOS:FLAG.

To start off, this is one of the reasons why I suggested a Baseball MOS, so we wouldn't need to discuss every little change on every little page. But as the MOS is still in its infancy, I decided to bring this here for some quick discussion (or we can take a week, who knows).

Currently the page Major League Baseball has a problem with MOS:FLAG. The MOS guideline says that flags should not be in the info boxes. I know that they are cool to have, but the guideline is correct, they do seem to draw attention away from the other parts of the info box. Take a look at the page with with the flags, and without the flags. There is a striking difference. I know that they look cool, but its not neutral and undue weight to draw attention to that part of the article when there is no justification for it. So should they be removed or not? I took them out, but it seems that others (usually those who spill over from the NHL page when I changed that one too), seem to just put them back in.--JOJ Hutton 18:13, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

You need to reread the MOS. It does not say you can't have them in an infobox, it says as a general rule of thumb you shouldn't. What this means is that there are cases where they are completely valid. The MLB one for example is one of those places. If you notice in in parts of the MOS it specifically says do not. But in this sections it says avoid. Very big difference. You say it isn't neutral, but stating where a league is and using the flags to do it is in no way non-neutral. Neither is it undue weight. You changed them on all 4 major sports leagues, the fact that there was uniformity through all the leagues should have pointed you to standard. Anytime you make a change to multiple articles like that when the thing you are changing has been around for many years you should generally see if there is a reason for it first. And don't try to pull a cop out saying its people who spilled over from the NHL page. Flags are used to indicate where leagues are in pretty much every sport, not just the the 4 majors in North America. They are also used in the major soccer leagues in Europe etc as well such as the Premier League. This is why you were pointed to having the discussion on WP:SPORT since the change you desire affects all sports leagues. -DJSasso (talk) 19:29, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
Good Grief, just about every guideline says as a rule of thumb, and of course there will be exceptions. So far there seems to be no reason given for an exception in this case. One example of a valid exception of MOS:FLAG is Battle of Stalingrad. This is an article where national flags are not only valid, but very much needed. They are not needed in sports articles. They add no real value to the article, are not needed, and actually detract from the rest of the info box.--JOJ Hutton 20:15, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
And I disagree, they are very much needed in a league article, possibly one of the most important aspects of a league if not the most important aspect is where the league operates. And flags are a very fast visual way to give that very important piece of information. They are of high value in a league article. -DJSasso (talk) 20:23, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
The league(s) operates in the United States and Canada. It says that already. Don't need a flag to tell people that.--JOJ Hutton 20:49, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
I agree that having the flags in the infobox is silly and unnecessary. What does the picture of the US flag tell the reader that the words "United States" don't? Nothing. --TorsodogTalk 22:18, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
It does seem redundant to have both the country name spelled out and its flag. -Dewelar (talk) 02:32, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

A new discussion on Flags in the info boxes has begun at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#MOS:FLAG--JOJ Hutton 18:18, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

  • Comment - I think the only reason flags should go into infoboxes is of it is necessary but not possible to include a nationality. I think putting them in player boxes can be extremely misleading (is the flag POB? nation of citizenship? current nation where they work? all the time? lately?) If you are listing winners of an international tournament, simply list the nation, not the flag. I am sure that there are times in some articles when flags in the infobox are fine, but I can't think of any in baseball ... I find them raising more questions in my mind than answers. LonelyBeacon (talk) 20:06, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

As this particular discussion on this page can only cover baseball related articles, the only article that so far have the flags is Major League Baseball and a few other league articles. They should be removed from those articles per WP:FLAG because there is nothing that  United States says that United States does not.--JOJ Hutton 20:23, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

International Association

Help me, baseball historians. This is the same org, right?

If so, can we (basically) blank the second and redirect it? Less than a handful of links to correct. Woodshed (talk) 00:20, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, sir. Bolder than I. Woodshed (talk) 00:34, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
I've merged some of the new information from Alex's article, and streamlined the article a bit. -Dewelar (talk) 02:30, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

NPB rosters are really out of date

Does anyone speak Japanese? Or know of reliable up-to-date sources for NPB rosters in English? Those rosters need updating. – Muboshgu (talk) 17:03, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

The NBP website has all the rosters. For example, here's the Fighters' roster. The problem is that team rosters are broken into first and second squads, but sources generally don't like those categories for whatever reason, so that leaves us with about 70 players on each team only sorted by position. --TorsodogTalk 18:16, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
Well, that is a bit of a pickle for us. Do we just go with a 70 man roster, maybe broken up by positions in the navbox template as well as the regular roster template? – Muboshgu (talk) 20:53, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Taiwanese Baseball UBLPs. Can you help?

There are 27 Taiwanese baseball players in the UBLP category. Many seem to have been created by the same user back in 2007. Most have links through the zh.wikipedia page to the player's stats page at the Chinese Professional Baseball League website and to a non-RS but informative page at Wikipedia Taiwan Baseball, both of which are useful as the transliteration of the Chinese names varies a bit. If anyone here would like to take an interest, make a decision on notability and provide at least one reliable source that would be a great help to the reduction of the URBLP backlog.--CharlieDelta (talk) 21:57, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

And they're off.

The season has officially begun. I think it would be a good idea keep an eye on most of these team articles, to make sure that the 2011 season info gets placed into the 2011 season articles, rather than continue to increase the already massive and overly recent history sections of the team articles.--JOJ Hutton 23:43, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi guys, took a long time off, but I'm tempted to come back and spend more time here. I'll probably just keep the Pirates' current stuff up to date to start, but it's good to be back. :) blackngold29 17:53, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

team, club, franchise

Beside those nouns, this selection of lead sentences also demonstrates variety in adjectives American, professional, Major League Baseball, and so on.

  • The Boston Reds (called the Boston Unions in some sources) of 1884 were a member of the short-lived Union Association. — no mention of baseball, even
  • The Altoona Mountain Citys were a professional baseball franchise that played in Altoona, Pennsylvania in 1884.
  • The Cuban Giants were the first African-American professional baseball club.
  • The Cleveland Spiders were a Major League Baseball team which played between 1887 and 1899 in Cleveland, Ohio.
  • The Chicago Unions was a professional, black baseball team that played prior to the formation of the Negro Leagues.
  • The St. Louis Terriers were a baseball club that played in the short-lived Federal League in 1914 and 1915.
  • The Baltimore Elite Giants were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro Leagues ...
  • The Seattle Pilots were an American professional baseball team based in Seattle, Washington for one season, 1969.
  • The Milwaukee Brewers are a professional baseball team based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin ...
  • The Atlanta Braves are a professional baseball club based in Atlanta, Georgia.
  • The Buffalo Bisons are a minor league baseball team based in Buffalo, New York ...

I suppose that "African-American" and "American" aim to fit wikipedia guidelines or policies more general than baseball or sports.

Buffalo Bisons tries with mixed success to be more careful.

Buffalo Bisons
This article is about the minor league baseball franchise, for other teams named Buffalo Bisons see Buffalo Bisons (disambiguation).
This article covers all modern incarnations but focuses on the Double-A team founded in 1979 and the Triple-A team that moved from Wichita, Kansas in 1984.
(quoting the article body) The Bisons name was revived when a Double-A Eastern League franchise moved to Buffalo in 1979. That team assumed the previous Bisons team history. After six seasons in the Eastern League, the Bisons rejoined the Triple-A ranks in 1985, joining the American Association when the Wichita Aeros' franchise rights were transferred to Buffalo.

--P64 (talk) 01:35, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Not sure what point you are trying to discuss; can you clarify? In common North American parlance, the term "team" refers to the contestants on one side of a competitive game, "club" refers to the entire organization for a team (including the team), but can also be used to refer to the team, and "franchise" refers to an organization with the right, within an exclusive territory, to participate in a league. All these terms can be valid in the lead of a baseball article. isaacl (talk) 02:47, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Editors needed

I've boosted the Hack Wilson and Pepper Martin articles to "B" status however, I lack the writing chops to boost them to the next level so, I welcome any editors willing to tackle them.Orsoni (talk) 06:07, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Files_for_deletion/2011_April_9#File:LA_11333.png

Concerning a pre-WWI Brooklyn Dodgers logo. All opinions welcome. Thank you. walk victor falk talk 21:33, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

naming conventions question

Anyone have a thought on how to differentiate these two players [4] and [5]? They seem to slip through all the naming conventions, both are active pitchers born in the same year. I was thinking of going to the month (pitcher, born August 1987)... I know they are still in the minors but I might add one of them to the minor league players page. Spanneraol (talk) 18:58, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Since they both played collegiate baseball in their native states, I suggest Justin Miller (Kansas pitcher) and " " (California pitcher). --P64 (talk) 19:41, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
For the time being, I think P64's suggestion is better than using the months. Eventually a better disambiguator will likely present itself unless they play their entire major league careers (assuming they get there) with the same teams for the same times. — KV5 • Talk • 20:47, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
A common way to deal with this is middle names if either of them is known. -DJSasso (talk) 13:46, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Common, but not advised by the MOS and contrary to the disambiguation guidelines, for those who care about such things. -Dewelar (talk) 16:21, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Actually the MOS gives this as an example of an option when it becomes impossible to do it another way so that you can avoid excessively long disambiguators. -DJSasso (talk) 16:32, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
And yet, on the very same page, we are told "(a)dding middle names, or their abbreviations, merely for disambiguation purposes (if that format of the name is not commonly used to refer to the person) is not advised." -Dewelar (talk) 17:01, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Depends on how you look at it. I take "not advised" to mean that you shouldn't do it it unless absolutely necessary. Otherwise they would outright say "never use" or something along those lines. Either way I was just pointing out an option if people couldn't come to a reasonably short option. But there probably will be one in this case. -DJSasso (talk) 17:14, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
It also depends on your level of creativity and, secondarily, your definition of "overly long". But yes, in this case, middle names are unlikely to be necessary. -Dewelar (talk) 18:45, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Template:Mlbumpire

Can someone with more template expertise than I add disambiguation capabilities to {{mlbumpire}}? Thanks. — KV5 • Talk • 20:46, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Can you be a little more specific? Where does there need to be diambiguation? – Muboshgu (talk) 21:38, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
The umpire names should be able to be disambiguated. For example, Gerry Davis can't currently be linked properly. — KV5 • Talk • 21:45, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
That what you were looking for? – Muboshgu (talk) 22:05, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
I can't see a change. — KV5 • Talk • 00:47, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
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