Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive 3

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Issue with article

List of NCAA Division I-A football seasons is a very useless article (right now). All this information can be contained in the succession boxes of the season or by simply going to one article and replacing the year with the year desired or going to Category: College football seasons. Either is needs to be deleted or expanded. I have started an expansion on it and will continue to work on it if everybody agrees it should be kept. My expansion work is located here: List of NCAA Division I-A football seasons/Sandbox. Much of the info is redundant (located elsewhere) but at least it provides some substance to the article.↔NMajdan•talk 16:54, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Canadian Football Hall of Fame

I am sure many of the wiki football pages have alist or table showing their team players that are in the college and pro football hall of fame. People may also want to included players who have been enshired in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame as well Smith03 00:13, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Chris McFoy

Does anyone have an issue if Chris McFoy is taken to AfD or speedily deleted? He never had more than 21 catches or 272 yards in any of his 4 seasons and only 57 for his entire career. He is definitely not a top prospect for the draft and, I would think, is unlikely to be drafted at all. Your thoughts?--Thomas.macmillan 00:48, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Going off just those stats and the actual article, this is an AfD I could see supporting. However, I'd like to look him up online myself at a later time.↔NMajdan•talk 00:50, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I'd say keep until after the draft. His college record isn't anything to write home about, but if he's drafted he'll likely play in the NFL. Then again, deleting this we won't be losing anything that can't be recreated. But, he could be notable in the NFL, so, eh. --MECU≈talk 01:00, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with MECU. He listed here as a posible Draft pick

09er 01:11, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

That is a wikipedia site with no real documentation, mostly just POV. Also consider Ryan Powdrell in the same vain as McFoy. He had all of 3 carries and 4 receptions in a 2 game career at USC. Also, neither player was invited to the combine [1] nor is either listed as a Top 150 prospect on the same site. --Thomas.macmillan 01:28, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't go so far as saying the 2007 NFL Draft page is just a Wikipedia article with no documentation and mostly POV. I believe that article lists just about every person who has declared for the draft. It has many ELs which is were I'm guessing most of the info in those lists come from. Also, each NFL draft page since 2003 is a WP:FL so I would say the information in that article is pretty reliable.↔NMajdan•talk 21:29, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

• Only if people keep a decent list will the article be very useful. The list was originally all original research (top prosects according to whom?) but I have been trying to cut it down. I am switching the players list from Draft prospects to combine invitees, since they are basically one and the same. And, to get back on point, there are a lot of players with wikipedia articles that were not invited to the combine. Those players, short of a Timmy Chang type of notability, should not be on Wikipedia, IMHO.--Thomas.macmillan 21:47, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Is there harm in waiting until the draft to see if they are drafted? I agree Powdrell shouldn't have been created, but if, and only if, he is a "top fullback prospect" (fullbacks often have lower stats, would you complain about an All-American lineman who has no yards, catches, touchdowns? stats are deceiving in importance) then he might get drafted. When is the draft? Let's review it afterwards. --MECU≈talk 23:38, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree that stats can be very deceiving in importance for a non-skill player, but shouldn't accolades count? The draft is at the end of April. Honestly, I am just tired of editors seeing all these articles and taking them to AfD, especially actually notable players like Greg Olsen, Victor Abaimiri, Jamaal Anderson among many others. Another question: Should these players have the college football stub anymore? They have no more eligibilty and most aren't even enrolled in school anymore.--Thomas.macmillan 02:19, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

New data source

I just found http://cfreference.net/cfr/ which has stats which can be sorted by coach, team, season, vs. opponent, etc, etc. I think we should add this as a second source to the college coach infobox template to the college football data warehouse, but also use as a second source to many other claims (it has Outland trophy award history for example). There is some player info on there, but it's the weakest part of the website. Just thought I'd share. --MECU≈talk 19:26, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

All-disctrict performer

Does anyone have a good source to define "All-district performer"? I can find plenty of links saying so-and-so was an all-district performer, but I can't find any definition of the criteria, whether they are consistent across the nation, etc. Naturally I will also need a citable source. This is to answer an objection made when Vince Young was demoted from GA. Thanks! Johntex\^talk 23:53, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like a sketchy distinction anyways. Vince Young is quite a notable football player and has numerous other distinctions, any article about him is quite adequate without even mentioning this point, ESPECIALLY if it is an unreferenced (and indeed, nebulous to say the least) distinction. Look, he may have won a dance contest and been named "Best Hairdo" by his high school year book, but neither distiction would be vital. The distinction "All-district performer" sounds like the sort of thing that a local paper bestows on good high school athletes, like an athlete of the week award. Again, if you CAN find a solid reference (such as XXX publication named Vince Young "all district performer" in 1999) then it might be worthy of inclusion. Otherwise, the article really loses nothing by omitting it, and if that is all that is keeping it from GA status, just omit it and resubmit it (hey, I sound like Johnny Cochrane. Heh heh. Anyways...) for GA consideration. --Jayron32 01:17, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

It should be possible to find a reference that says "so-and-so named Vince Young to the 1999 99AAAAA all-district team." Whether that then presents the issue of still needing to define "all-district" or even the concept of a UIL or high school district, I don't know. *Mishatx*-In\Out 03:15, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

It is very easy to find a source saying that Vince Young was an "all district" performer. For instance, this fact is mentioned in his official bios with both the Tennessee Titans[2] and the Texas Longhorns[3]. That is not the issue. The issue is finding a source that explains what it really means. I suppose I could take it out, but I find it interesting that he was an all-district performer in basketball. Hence, it makes for a non-football fact to help round out his biography. Johntex\^talk 14:55, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a reference to help you Johntex, but as an assistant football coach at a high school, I can tell you how we selected our all-conference first and second team members: We were given 2 "slots" for first team and 5 "slots" for second team by the conference. This is despite being #4 in a league of 7 (some leagues scale the numbers, so the #1 in a league of 7 would get 5 first team "slots", #2 would get 4 "slots", etc). Then, all the coaches on the staff sat around the discussed it. We picked the players we wanted for each slot. So it's not really all that special, in my opinion. As a disclaimer, this is how our team/league did it here in Colorado, it may be different in other states. --MECU≈talk 16:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Very interesting, thank you. I also posted this question at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Miscellaneous#All-district_performer_in_US_high_school_sports_.28football.29. Mishatx's post there makes it sound like "all-district" is something decided on by the school district. If that is the case then it would not usually be that big of a deal since a school district does not usually include more than a handful of schools. It looks like we could really use an article like US High school athletics honors. If we could find sources for it, that is. Johntex\^talk 17:17, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

New solution for multiple WikiProject banners

Some of you may have been aware of the ongoing drive to figure out a way to compress all the WikiProject banners on an article's talk page. {{WikiProjectBanners}} was the first solution. Many people were for this solution, but many were against. Well, another solution has arisen. {{WikiProjectBannerShell}}. The difference here is that the names of the WikiProjects are not hidden, just the details. WikiProjectBanners hid all WikiProject banners until the <show> button was clicked. However, unlike WikiProjectBanners, WikiProjectBannerShell requires a change to the code similar to the small option. I'd like to start making the necessary changes to this WikiProject's banner soon but I thought it might be wise to hear some feedback first. You can see the template in action at Talk:Timothy R. McVeigh. If you have any comments/question/concerns, please leave them on the template's talk page. Thank you.↔NMajdan•talk 17:40, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

A.J. Suggs

Hi there everyone,

I nominated A.J. Suggs for deletion. As knowledgable college football fans, I hope you can all agree that a player such as Suggs should not pass WP:BIO, as he served primarily as a college back up and never played professionally. Thanks--Thomas.macmillan 18:57, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Notability of per-year team entries

I have a question - I've noticed there are a lot of entries for specific teams for 2006 [4] [5] [6]. For at least a few teams, it makes a lot of sense to have their own articles (like Florida and Ohio State). For teams with breakout years I can see that it makes sense too (Rutgers, Wake Forest). But does every major program need a seperate entry for this year and presumably every year to come (Tennessee, Georgia, Florida State)? Cogswobble 20:22, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

(P.S., I'm asking the question to see what people here think, I'm not saying that I think the answer is definitely "No") Cogswobble 20:24, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

(I moved the above from the WP:CFB project page). --MECU≈talk 19:05, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

We've had discussion about this before at the project, and the result was overwhelmingly that since most of these pages are created before the season and maintained throughout, that as long as they are well written/sourced/maintained, there is no sense in deleting them. It's hard to predict what the usefulness of the pages/how well the teams will do, so to encourage people to write season articles about the team from the start, we're saying if you do a good job, the success of the team is not relevant. Someone who writes a great Troy Trojans 2007 article, and because maybe in the end they don't even make a bowl game (an arbitrary standard I'm putting here) we delete it wouldn't want to write a 2008 article, where maybe the Troy team wins a BCS bowl game (crazier things can happen, see 2006 Boise State). Also, an article written as things progress during the season will be better, better sourced, and the end result better than an article written entirely after the fact. For example, I started the 2006 Colorado page and they had a miserable season, but I did an okay job with the article (I think) and they actually did set a school record: Most consecutive losses (not one to write home about, but "notable" nonetheless). If the article were to get deleted now, I wouldn't really want to write a 2007 article since there's a 50/50 (depending on the standard, but playing in a bowl game is about 50/50) chance it will get deleted. However, we also decided that going back and creating article about teams that weren't all that great isn't a good idea. It's preferable to combine seasons under head coaches or other groupings. So, instead of going back and creating articles about each season under Gary Barnett, it would be better to create one article titled "Colorado Buffaloes football under Gary Barnett" where I can use the 2005 article page (as bad as that is) to help write it, but the 2005 article shouldn't be deleted either once the new article is created. This was mainly done for all the seasons prior to 2000 where an article about each season would likely be short, a stub that contains little information. A good example to look at is Oklahoma. See Oklahoma Sooners football. I hope I've explained everything well enough to answer your question why. --MECU≈talk 19:05, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

That's a great explanation! Thanks. Cogswobble 22:46, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Reference for games in schedule

On the 2007 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets basketball team, I wrote it so that there's a column for one or more references per game. Is there any easy way to do that for a football article using {{CFB Schedule Entry}}? Would that be a good feature to work into the CFB Schedule templates? —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 00:50, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

It's definitely possible, whether it's a good idea is another issue. Is someone really going to complain that the games and results aren't sourced? I guess with the whole WP:Attribution policy it's a good idea, but it seems a little over-the-top. --MECU≈talk 00:58, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Nobody is going to complain. You could always place those references in the References section. And, no, I don't believe we can modify the template. You can't use refs inside of a template. I know, I've tried.↔NMajdan•talk 17:58, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, I don't think Disavian's asking about adding the <ref>{{cite web | ... }}</ref> within the template itself, but rather just adding a column for references that can be added by the editor. Regardless, I think those refs could be added elsewhere in the schedule table (see my earlier comment below). — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 18:34, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

It could be done, but wouldn't it also suffice to add the reference as part of the "score" parameter? — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 01:00, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that can be done. I really don't think it is necessary though. But as PSUMark states, you could just add it to the score. So something like this:

| score = 34-12

Would that work? I'm real hesitant to add a column for this.↔NMajdan•talk 18:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

That's what I meant, sorry if I was confusing by saying to add it "as part of the "score" parameter". — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 21:53, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

AFD of List of Division I schools that have never sponsored football

List of Division I schools that have never sponsored football has been listed for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Division I schools that have never sponsored football. --MECU≈talk 17:07, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

And why would this list be noteable? It used to be known as Division I-AAA. -- KelleyCook 15:24, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

That's a discussion for the AFD page. There is no need to comment here as well. --MECU≈talk 15:46, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

The Wikipedia College Football project needs a policy about Fanboy sites

• Another AFD is at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/HornFans. This one is about a fan site for Texas sports teams (primarily football, as you might imagine). Johntex\^talk 05:43, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I was the one who AFD them. This page was recently created, but I think having any football fanboy sites is a track that Wikipedia should not go down. If HornFans is allowed, the basketball sites will be next. And you think puffery and edit waring on the Univerisity football pages is bad. Wait until people realize there are entries for their rival Fanboy sites. EDSBS and a stub soonerfans also have just popped up. I left EDSBS until the result of this AFD, but this needs to be debated here -- KelleyCook 15:24, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
    • I think all three of those sites should stay as I believe we could find verifiable sources that speak of their popularity. But man, the soonerfans article is in poor shape. Apparently, one of our editors made a post there saying he is wanting to improve our coverage of Sooner sports so I bet that article was created by that. There is even a link in the article to the post. I agree with the speedy tag on it until something better can be created. Soonerfans is known throughout the online-sports-messageboard world for their farks (photoshopping of images).↔NMajdan•talk 15:43, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Linking to team pages that might not exist

One of the slightly annoying problems with team year pages is that some of them don't exist. So when we make a schedule section for the 2006 Virginia Tech Hokies football team and the Hokies play Duke, Duke doesn't have an article right now. But at some point in the future they might. A similar problem might occur if we want to refer to the Southern Methodist Mustangs football program. Right now, there is neither an article about their football team nor even about their athletics department. So I would have to link to the school and at some point when one of the articles gets written, we have to go through the annoying process of fixing the link.

Well, I've created a new template that will solve this issue: {{alternate links}}.

If I want to link to the SMU football team, I would use this line:

{{alternate links|Southern Methodist Mustangs football|Southern Methodist Mustangs|Southern Methodist University|title=SMU}}

The resulting link would be: SMU

The same would work for team year pages. The 2007 Florida State Seminoles football team page doesn't exist yet, but it will at some point:

{{alternate links|2007 Florida State Seminoles football team|Florida State Seminoles football|Florida State Seminoles|Florida State University|title=Florida State}}
{{alternate links|2006 Florida State Seminoles football team|Florida State Seminoles football|Florida State Seminoles|Florida State University|title=Florida State}}

This would give us: Florida State (2007) or Florida State (2006).

So anywhere that we have a table of opponents, we can use this template and it will always generate a blue link and will always have the best available link available. Any thoughts? --BigDT 06:27, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

There's one other thing that I thought of that we could do with this. We could make a {{cfb link}} that would accept "2006", "Florida State Seminoles", and "Florida State University". It would then go through the same logic of which link to show, but it would give us the added flexibility of in the future changing our display to something like this - Virginia Tech (team, school). (I'm not saying we would - I'm just throwing that out there as a potential reason for making your code generic.) --BigDT 15:07, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Awesome. I tried to create something like this months ago but failed. I think it's important to note that we should only use this when trying to link to a season page, or football page when we know it doesn't exist. There's no sense in replacing all the current links with this. It's also important to trying and incorporate all the possible links you can (without overlinking!) to help build the web of WP. So, if you're linking to the 2007 page, and you know it exists, then don't use this. --MECU≈talk 15:14, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I went on and put together {{cfb link}}. Check it out. I think this one will work even better. --BigDT 19:16, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Changes made to coaches template

I've made all the changes to the coach templates. I've also standardized where the title links to, as there were many variations. They all now link to the "<school> <nickname> football" page, whether it exists or not. As such, it's time to go through all the templates and add DEFAULTSORT to the pages (it's now even in the handy edit box for ease!). You can then remove the coach categories that are included by the template, which are only the ones the person was a head coach for. If any other coach categories exist for his assistant coaching positions, you need to leave those. But sure to make a comment in the edit summary that you are removing these categories because they are now included by template, so hopefully you won't get accused of vandalism. Also, you could help out and verify if the article is a stub and if it has the project banner on the talk page. If you don't feel comfortable rating the article, that's fine, but putting at least {{WikiProject College football}} on the talk page will be a great help! So pick your favorite schools and run through them! I appreciate the help. (I've already done Wyoming BTW).

Also, we should try and get the NFL and MLB projects to use our navbox so it matches a little better with the surrounding ones and they can have the VDE capability too. And if the capability ever arrives of colorizing the hide/show, we can add all them instantly with one change. --MECU≈talk 21:02, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Assistant coaches category?

Lastly, I came across Category:LSU assistant football coaches. Do we really need a category for assistants off Category:LSU Tigers football coaches? I think it's an okay idea. If folks agree, then while we're going through all the pages for the above reasons, we could convert any remaining football categories to the assistant varieties. Any thoughts? --MECU≈talk 21:02, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I really don't think an assistant coach category is necessary. I'd even go so far as recommending that for WP:CFD. Too much overcategorization.↔NMajdan•talk 21:09, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Preface: I didn't create the category. When I saw this category I really liked it because it gave us the ability to differentiate assistant coaches from head coaches. For example, one time a long time ago I clicked on the Category:LSU Tigers football coaches link and saw that it had Mack Brown in it. Now, I knew Mack Brown was never the head coach of LSU, but even though I'm a super-huge LSU fan, I never knew he was an assistant coach at LSU prior to that day. At first I thought it was a mistake, but then I read Mack Brown's article and saw it mention his time at LSU. The assistant coach category helps clear up that confusion. The assistant coach category is nicely populated with coaches that are now or have been head coaches at other schools, or are expected to get head coaching jobs in the future (Bo Pelini and Jimbo Fisher). I think it would be great for other schools to have the same thing. For example, I'm sure major programs like Nebraska, Oklahoma, Florida, etc. have had some assistant coaches go on to do some great things. And as much as I know about college football, I still learn new stuff all the time. And Wikipedia allows that because of categories like this one in question. I vote to keep the category and to create similar categories for schools that have enough coaching stars to justify it. Seancp 22:45, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

To be honest I was considering creating one of these for Oregon State. There are 20 or so people in the coach category, 5 of which were only assistants. I think it could be useful if there are enough people in the category that were not head coaches. I think if they should be allowed, we should have Category:x head football coaches as well as a subcategory of Category:x football coaches, and no articles should be in the parent category. If someone was an assistant before (or after) they became head coach of the same school, should they only be in the head coach category, or both? If we did this we would have to come up with a consensus for that. VegaDark 22:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Stadiums and attendance

Doe we have something like List of college football stadiums by atttendance? Johntex\^talk 15:41, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Not yet, but maybe List of college football stadiums would be more appropriate: have it sorted by attendance, location, most recent expansion, length of usage, etc. Thoughts? — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 15:46, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

That sounds good. I would like to start the article but I wanted to make sure we didn't have one by a different name (our search feature being less than 100% reliable about these things). What else should be included? Home team(s)? Date of first game? Date of record attendance? Should there by two attendance columns, one for official capacity and one for record capacity (which is usually bigger)? Johntex\^talk 15:53, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Definitely home teams, either date of first game or year of completion, and record attendance (with date and/or game information if we can find it). I do think making the distinction between listed capacity and record attendance would be helpful as well. Something like this, perhaps. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 16:01, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

That looks like a good start. I think maybe we should seperate out City/State to make it easier to find stadiums within one state.

We might be able to get by without "Conference" since that is given by the school, but on the other hand it may be handy to skim the list and easily look for a given conference.

Also, should we include or exclude venues like Reliant Stadium that are pro stadiums that happen to host college games from time to time? Put them in a seperate portion of the article? Include them in the main table but with a symbol indicating they don't have a regular college home team?

Should we include defunct stadiums? Johntex\^talk 16:05, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Separating city/state makes sense to me. I based having the conference column on how this site lists stadiums, which may be helpful for some. However, we do run the risk of making the table excessively wide. It could be helpful to also include a section for bowl stadiums, "all-star game" stadiums, and the like, but in a separate section from "regular season" stadiums maybe? Defunct stadiums as well - if they were used in the regular season, they may be suitable for in the "main" table with some sort of a symbol. I can help out a bit more tonight when I get back from class. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 16:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good. Do you mind if I play in your sandbox if I have time while you are in class? (That sounds sort of K-6, doesn't it?) Johntex\^talk 16:12, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea and looks like a great start! Featured List here we come!↔NMajdan•talk 16:18, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

To make the list manageable, perhaps we should restrict it to only the home fields of Division I-Bowl Subdivision. This way, there would be a concrete criteria for inclusion, and the list would be much easier to maintain. It could also help keep the width down since we would not need a column to explain what type of stadium it is. Johntex\^talk 16:29, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Be my guest! I agree that we should keep it to I-FBS only to make it definite, but we could still include defunct stadiums, no? — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 16:39, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

(re-set) I think we should keep conference because it allows for better sorting (quickly find out who has the largest stadium in each conference, for example). It does look like a good start. z4ns4tsu\^talk 16:43, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, so that would mean we include any stadium that has ever been the home stadium for a team that is or ever was in I-FBS (or its predecesor I-A I guess). That sounds good. I agree keeping the Conference column makes sense for sorting. Johntex\^talk 16:53, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Also, be sure to check the List of stadiums article to make sure we're being consistent. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 16:58, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the defunt stadiums might be a problem with respect to filling in the table. I don't know if we will be able to even find all the stadiums, much less their attendance records. Perhaps we should save the defunct stadiums for a seperate list to be made later? Johntex\^talk 16:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm certainly fine with focusing on active stadiums for now in the interest of making sure we have a complete list of them to start. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 17:01, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I moved this to List of Division I-FBS college football stadiums since we now have several stadiums listed and several people working on it. I will also copy this conversation to Talk:List of Division I-FBS college football stadiums so we can continue discussion there. Johntex\^talk 19:03, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Assist WPP:BIO

In an effort to assist the Biography WikiProject, I've been trying to add our biography articles to the Sports and Games task force. To me, it makes perfect sense to try to get our articles exposed to as many groups as possible. So, if you come across a talk page of a biographical article in our project, please add it the Biography WikiProject. If the article is not apart of the Biography WP at all, add {{WikiProject Biography|living=|class=|sports-work-group=yes}} and if it already has the WPBiography banner, just add |sports-work-group=yes to it. Thanks for the help!↔NMajdan•talk 14:50, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

On a related note, I would really appreciate any help in knocking out the list of the unassessed college football articles.↔NMajdan•talk 18:21, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I'll chip in later tonight. Thanks for letting us know of the need! — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 18:30, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I think I got all the biographical articles finished. We're down to less than 100 compared to 300+ as we were a couple days ago. I'll try to finish the rest of these off soon unless somebody beats me to it.↔NMajdan•talk 20:42, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Yearly page formats

• "Post-season" vs "After the season": I Think that the "Post-season" section could better be renamed to something like "After the season". A conversation on this point has started on an article talk page. Please come by and participate. Thanks! Johntex\^talk 15:44, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Help Name a new page

Please take a look at the LSU Tigers football page and look at the sections titled "Rankings" & "Results vs. AP Top 10 Opponents". I think that information is great information but I don't think it belongs in the LSU Tigers football article. I don't want to get rid of it, though, so I'm thinking of creating a new article and I need help naming it. The best I could come up with was LSU Tigers football statistics but that's not really accurate because this info isn't statistics. What would be a good article title for information of this variety? I don't think it should be too narrow, like LSU Tigers football rankings or LSU Tigers football results versus AP top 10 opponents because that limits it too much. I'd like a title that is welcoming of the typical information you'd find in the school's football media guide. You know....all those tidbits of information that are great but really don't fit into specific category. So, anyone have any suggestions? Thanks for your help! Seancp 21:19, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

LSU Tigers football history? It could include poll history among other things in that article as well, and it wouldn't be too narrow. VegaDark 21:49, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

That almost sounds to overly broad to me. If I stumbled upon that article, I would expect to see an actual history of LSU Tigers football, not just random statistics. You want your article title to sum up exactly what is in the article so if that is all the article will ever contain, then a limiting title may be necessary. Now, if you plan on writing a history of the football program at LSU, then that title would be ok.↔NMajdan•talk 21:59, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

I think that is almost too discriminate, with a positive bias for the team's history (in other words, it's not NPOV IMHO). I'll venture a guess that the record is fairly good? Anyways, anything short of Colorado Buffaloes football year-by-year results (or broken down further, like, "Colorado Buffaloes football results since 2000") would be too arbitrary a cutoff point. The only way I can see to make it balanced is to include all ranked opponents, not just top 10. Be sure to include a tid-bit about this in the main LSU football article and use Template:main to link to this one so you can claim it's more of a sub-page than a separate article. --MECU≈talk 22:30, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, I actually went and looked at it and don't think it's POV pushing, but in general, that article needs way more citations: there are 2 for the whole article. Especially the section on "Prominent players": Who says? There are players listed there that aren't listed as being an All-American ever, so it doesn't make sense to me. If you can show to me another media guide that presents the same information, I'd clearly say it's welcome. I don't think the current top-10 section is that long, but I could see it getting very long. Perhaps that information could just go on the LSU Tigers under Nick Saban types? The rankings info could as well. Also, you are overlinking items. You don't need to link every instance a coach's name appears or every single-year date. See Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context. Once per section is acceptable. You can look at the top-ten results section after I cleaned up this aspect of it for an example. Also, sorry for claiming you were POV pushing. --MECU≈talk 14:36, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Knute Rockne on WP:AID

I nominated Knute Rockne, one of the top college football articles for Wikipedia Article Improvement Drive. Thanks Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 01:44, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Feedback requested on scoring summary templates

I'd like some feedback on this template system I put together before I move it to Template space. Also, if you have a better name for it I'd appreciate that as well. See User:Mecu/AmFootballScoreSummaryStart. I also think it could be jazzed up a little, color-wise if someone has any ideas. Feel free to edit it in the current location too. --MECU≈talk 14:21, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

• After looking at User:Mecu/AmFootballScoreSummaryEntry, I'm not sure it's necessary to have to be so discrete with the parameters. I'm all for standardization but this might end up being too confusing/difficult to implement. Why not just have a "description" param to describe the type of score, instead of having to piece together a bunch of different params based on what kind of scoring drive it was? I can certainly appreciate the amount of effort put into this, though! In terms of overall appearance, though, I like it. How about an additional column for scoring drive length/time? — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 14:35, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I like it. I agree with PSUMark. I'd like to see a drive length/time/# of plays column or something similar.↔NMajdan•talk 14:37, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
    • (edit conflict)I standardized the description entry so that it would be standardized for all pages. Otherwise, some may put "<Player> scored a touchdown, 85-yards from a pass from <QB>, kick was good from <Kicker>"... whereas I believe the standard way I did it was more in lines with the official scoring summaries they are done from schools and other sites. But I do see your point about being almost too complex to use. Scoring drive length/time is a good idea. Thanks for the feedback. --MECU≈talk 14:41, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
      • How about leaving the standardization options that you implemented but also having some sort of a "default description" param that can be used in the interest of quickly getting the information online and that would override the rest of the params? That way especially in the interest of getting summaries up quickly after a game we could use a less "formal" description and then later go in and tweak it so that it utilizes the more standardized stuff? My only fear is that having so many params would scare away casual users - if there was a way to include a comment that outlined the "official" format for editors to follow so that they can do so without having to break it down into pieces for the template, that might be a safe compromise (there aren't too many casual readers of WP that will notice if it's not "official", so if we don't get around to reformatting it as such right away it won't be a big deal but it'll encourage others to contribute in a method they feel comfortable with). — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 15:16, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
        • Brilliant idea. Done. --MECU≈talk 16:39, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
          • OH MY GOD!!! I will have to put arsenic in all your soup. If you folks keep coming up with great ideas like this I will never be able to stop twiddling with football articles. Now I am going to have to go back and edit them all to put in this table. Jeez. It's enough to make me go watch basketball or slit my wrists or something. Johntex\^talk 17:22, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
            • Good. It'll give you and the rest of us something to do in the seemingly endless offseason. :-) (Now I'm going to have to hire someone to taste all of my food from now on...) — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 23:11, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I've "published" to template space for use. Template:AmFootballScoreSummaryStart. Does anyone think this would be good or bad to use in the season articles under the weekly summaries? Or should it only be used in articles wholly about a game, such as a bowl game? --MECU≈talk 15:53, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

My initial thinking is that if there was a way to have a parameter to auto-collapse the summary (like {{Dynamic navigation box}}), it would be a useful addition to the game summaries on season articles. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 17:44, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Done. The forced-width 70% I don't like, so if someone encounters a problem with this, I can quickly add a field to allow controlling the width. --MECU≈talk 12:57, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Very cool! — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 14:08, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Assessment statistics

I added a historical table to the assessment page. Let me know what you think.↔NMajdan•talk 15:31, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

It looks very good! Very interesting data. Thanks for doing this.

If I click on the "unassessed" link in Feb 2007, it takes me to Category:Unassessed-Class articles which is a page listing categories of unaccessed articles. However, there is no subcategory listed for Category:Unassessed college football articles. Is this because the category is currently empty? Johntex\^talk 07:43, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. The category parameter was "college football articles" as opposed to "College football articles" so it was being categorized under a lower case c which came after all the upper case A-Z. I changed it and now its right there with College basketball.↔NMajdan•talk 14:23, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

2007 College Football Hall of Fame ballot

I just created the 2007 College Football Hall of Fame ballot article. There are actually articles for most of the men on the ballot, but there are still quite a few red links. If they're good enough to be on the CFB HOF ballot, they should probably have an article about them. Of course, if you have ideas for the list as well, please feel free to edit. I'm thinking this is more of a list, so I'd like to push this to a featured list, once the selections are announced in May. --MECU≈talk 15:40, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Wow, looks great. I'm working on de-red linking Clendon Thomas. Its his last chance to get inducted.↔NMajdan•talk 16:41, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

De-red linking is so tedious, you know? I've been working on List of Georgia Institute of Technology alumni#American football, and let me tell you, it isn't fun. Perhaps I'll kill two birds with one stone and do the one guy that's on both lists next. That article looks great, by the way. —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 16:23, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Need opinion on a couple templates

There are a couple templates I worked on a few weeks ago that I'd like to get this project's opinion on. One was requested by the College basketball WikiProject. It was to create a basketball equivalent to {{NCAATeamFootballSeason}}. Instead of creating a near duplicate of this template, I was able to modify it to handle both sports. You can view it at User:Nmajdan/Test. I have had one complaint that combining these two was not a good idea. I wanted to get other opinions before I moved my version to template-space and renamed the template. Since it would now handle football and basketball, the name would have to change (but the current name would still redirect to the new name so nothing would break).

Another new template was created that looked identical to {{Infobox college athletics}} so I suggested that it may be possible to combine these templates into one. This template can be viewed at User:Nmajdan/Template1. Right now, it combines the general athletic infobox, a wrestling team infobox, and a basketball team infobox. It was well received by one editor but, again, I wanted to get a wider opinion before proceeding.

Any advice would be appreciated.↔NMajdan•talk 14:22, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I know I'm impressed. Then again, I'm the one that requested in the first place, so of course I'm happy :) —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 16:20, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

There's no reason why these essentially redundant templates shouldn't be consolidated. Infobox standardization is always a good thing in my book. Great work as usual. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 17:18, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

That's exactly my thoughts. If we can get one infobox customizable enough to do exactly what individual templates would do, except standardizes everything, that is a big improvement. Could be expanded for baseball and other sports as well. VegaDark 20:02, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Got the first one done. I'll update {{Infobox college athletics}} tomorrow.↔NMajdan•talk 21:34, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Adding more Bowl Information to Yearly History Template

There was a discussion here[7] about the Yearly History Template. One of the suggestions which was carried out was to remove the three seperate columns for the Bowls (Bowl Name, Bowl Outcome, Bowl Opponent) that had existed in the old Coaching History Template.

I had been unaware that the Coaching History Template had been deprecated, and so I had added it to a number of pages (Bear Bryant, Steve Spurrier, etc...), I had also included all of the extra Bowl information.

So, my question is - is anyone opposed if those columns get added back (as optional) to the Yearly History Template? I'm planning on transitioning some of these coaches pages to use the new template, and I'd like to see that information stay there. Obviously, I spent a bit of time tracking down all this info for six or seven different coaches throughout their careers at different schools, so partly I'd just like my work to stay around :-P But on a more impartial note, given that Bowls are the postseason for college football, I do think that listing the opponent adds something to the tables beyond simply taking up extra space. Compare [8] with [9]. I like being able to see at a glance that Pete Carroll has beaten Michigan twice in the Rose Bowl, as opposed to just seeing that he's 2-1 in three Rose Bowl appearances.

Thoughts? Cogswobble 17:16, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

What is this user doing?

I see this user moving lots of articles out of the American Football category. The user is relatively new, and is not using an edit summary. Some of the changes might be OK, but others baffle me. For instance, why change the category of a photo of Ralphie from "American Football" to "Photos in the United States". I have tried to contact the user but I think he/she may no longer be online. I am tempted to revert all these changes but I would like a second opinion first, please. Johntex\^talk 01:22, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I randomly clicked on a few. They appear to be in good faith ... and most of them seem to be good ideas ... although the Ralphie one [10] doesn't make any sense. I wouldn't suggest reverting all of them ... but some of the strange ones could be. Ralphie should be in Category:Colorado Buffaloes football, not American football or US photos. --BigDT 01:35, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

This user might need a polite reminder to use edit summaries and talk pages, but it certainly appears that they are doing good faith edits. As BigDT implies, I may disagree with the results of some of his moves, but this does not to be, on the whole, a vandlism or disruption problem. He's being WP:BOLD, but isn't that what we want. If there are questionable moves, bring it up on the users talk page and on the article talk page. In general, categorization should always be moved down to the lowest level category, and it appears that he is simply doing that. Really, Category:American Football is quite a high-level category, and should have very few articles directly assigned to it. This doesn't appear to be a problem upon further investigation. He SHOULD be encouraged to always use edit summaries, since seeing MANY changes made in a short time does send up red flags, but that's about it... --Jayron32|talk|contribs 03:22, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks to both of you for your feedback. I never meant to imply these edits were vandalism. If I thought that, I would have reverted them on sight. Personally, I think WP:BOLD is quite over-rated though. When one person makes a lot of bad-bold changes, someone else has to do a lot of work to undo them. In this case a few edits I looked at look to me like bad moves. He is NOT universally moving things inot lower down categories. Moving something from Americna Football >> US photos is moving the wrong way, or laterally at best. That is why I wanted a second opinion. If the changes are to be undone, it is easier when they are the most recent changes to the article so that the undo button can be used. Johntex\^talk 04:33, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing the questionable moves. Just be careful when dealing with new users, though. Remember to treat them well and help rather than correct. Look at this guys contribs list, he seems to be doing a lot of categorization work, and such mundane tasks are some of the most thankless work at Wikipedia. We need to be careful that while we are helping him become a better editor, we don't discourage him from helping out with this much needed job. I notice that you left some notes on fixes you have made to his questionable moves. Thanks and please continue to do so, as well as letting him know how to properly categorize articles. Thanks again, and happy editing! --Jayron32|talk|contribs 05:38, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Of course. I left him a polite message before I ever posted here. The fact that he did not reply, coupled with the fact that his contributions record showed no recent edits, is what motivated me to come here to seek added input. Johntex\^talk 07:00, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Discussion about modifying {{College coach infobox}}

An editor is proposing changes to the above template. Please review his changes and comment on them on the template talk page.↔NMajdan•talk 15:50, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Help with the CFB Yearly Record templates

I am trying to use the {{CFB Yearly Record Entry}} template on the Coach-Team page for OU and Bob Stoops. I've had a bit of trouble getting it to show up right, though. For some reason, there is an extra column at the end of the table. I didn't change any of the default options since there was a warning about that, so I don't know what's not working.

Also, the whole "name" field is really kind of bugging me. I don't need it to be about either the coach or the team since the whole article is only about their combination, but the column is (understandably) required. Could we add a fourth "type" option that doesn't use it or possibly make it so you can turn it off like the other fields? Anyway, any help would be appreciated on getting it to look right. z4ns4tsu\^talk 17:53, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Fixed it for you. You needed to add "ranking2 = no" to all of the rows so that the {{CFB Yearly Record Entry}} template didn't insert a column for the second ranking. Both the first and second rankings are used on a number of pages (AP and Coaches) so it's default on. I've updated the docs for {{CFB Yearly Record Entry}} so that this is more clear. -- Billma 00:51, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! z4ns4tsu\^talk 15:40, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

AfD notice

2005 Texas vs. Ohio State football game is up for deletion. (This notice is not intended to violate WP:CANVASS, it is merely informing a group of Wikipedians on the matter).↔NMajdan•talk 13:20, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Individual game articles

As a result of the above AfD, there is now a broader discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Notability#Notability_of_individual_athletic_competitions_.28games.29. I have urged that the discussion should take place here, but either way I think that members of this project may want to be involved in the discussion. Johntex\^talk 14:14, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Template Overuse/abuse

I think we need a solution for the head coach banners, particularly when a coach has been with multipule teams; the different head coach banners should combine into a single banner that takes up less space, or have the contents of each collapsed by default. Case in point: Frank Dobson (football). On that article, the templates are as long, if not longer than, the article itself. —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 20:26, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing a couple months ago but I never did anything about it. It would probably require a code change to every template but I would almost like to see something like {{WikiProjectBannerShell}} applied to all of these.↔NMajdan•talk 20:29, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

I concur. Could we use/modify the code from WP:Bannershell? I'd be glad to help change coaching templates. Вasil | talk 00:38, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

PS - If so, let't try to make it generic so we can use it on the WP:CBB coaching templates as well. Вasil | talk 00:39, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

It's currently not technically possible to have collapseable because the show/hide doesn't display well on the multi-colored backgrounds. So, we could switch to a standard color background which would allow this, but I like the colored backgrounds. So, I think the shell idea is better. MECU≈talk 12:27, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Observe: {{Chicago Bulls 1995-96 NBA champions}} —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 23:12, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Sure, blue on red works (some may disagree), but what about blue on blue, or blue on black, or other background colors? This was a problem we discovered when I attempted to add the show/hide/collapse feature to the coach templates, you can see the discussion above or in the archives. MECU≈talk 01:44, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Ribbon for today's events

FYI, if anyone would like to add a ribbon to their user page in memory of those who lost their lives today, you can use {{Virginia Tech ribbon}} to place a small orange and maroon ribbon in the top right corner of your user page (similar to the {{administrator}} icon) or you can add Image:Orange and maroon ribbon.svg anywhere you would like. --BigDT 03:41, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

• Thanks for letting us know about this - great idea. Johntex\^talk 07:01, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Guidelines for individual game articles

OK, so it looks like we need to discuss some recommendations around "notability" for articles on individual games.

I personally think that we should allow an article on any individual game if and only if it is well-written and well referenced. Contrary to popular fears, this would not result in loads of "Rice vs. Harvard" articles anytime soon. People are by and large going to write about what they find interesting, and that is by and large going to be the more important games. If the odd one did appear and it was well-written and referenced, what would be the harm, anyway?

However, it looks like that may not currently be the majority viewpoint, so I would like to get us started thinking about some guidelines. I would like to propose a two part standard. I propose that an individual game article is to be kept if it meets either

A - it is being created because the individual season article exists, is getting too long, and is being split out in WP:SUMMARY style. To my mind, this is why WP:SUMMARY exists. There is an active proposal similar to this at Wikipedia:Television episodes. The basic idea is that they will usually try to build good articles on a season first, but then can create articles on individual episodes if length suggests they should. Good sourcing is stressed.

B - some games are notable by themselves. I propose that an individual game be considered notable for an article if it meets one or more of the following (several of these seemed to specifically get support at AfD):

1. It was a bowl game
2. It was a conference championship
3. It was a meeting of a rivalry series which already has a Wikipedia article
4. It set a major record for the game itself (most points scored, longest game, biggest-come from behind victory, ...)
5. Something truly whacky happened (E.g. Fifth Down)
6. At least 3 major national media declared it "The game of the century"
7. It was the first meeting between 2 teams
8. It was the first game in a brand new stadium
9. A skill player had a stand-out game AND at least 3 major national media said that game was instrumental to propelling the player to win one of the top individual awards.
10. The underdog won by 21 or more points.
11. A team came from 21 or more points behind.
12. It set a network broadcast record for viewership

Please remember that this proposal (or whatever we end up deciding upon) does not mean that anyone is under an obligation to go out and create all the possible articles. It only means we would support their existence IF they were well done. I look forward to feedback on this methodology. Is this basic format a good start? Johntex\^talk 07:00, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Another thing we could consider adding is if the game had the national Pontiac game changing performance play of the week in it. Also I'm not so sure about the "first meeting between two teams" stipulation. That would imply that every team could have an article back in 1890 when they first played an otherwise non-notable team. Also, let's say Duke has never played Idaho. If say next season they had a regular season game, that would be deserving of an article? Not in my opinion. VegaDark 10:00, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Vega. The teams involved have a lot to do with the notability. Thus, items 7-12 could be a terrible article if they involve perennial losers. I especially don't like the "underdog" item. What's that mean? The bookies were wrong or a team got lucky? That's notable? Perhaps "National level game" would summarize it? If a game is so important that it's national-level, it's clearly notable. Division II championship, bowl games, USC vs. Notre Dame in 2005. Games whose story transcends the actual play. I also support WP:SUMMARY breakouts. MECU≈talk 12:28, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is getting a little out of control with the whole notability thing. I think it should just be common sense. How good are the teams? How are they ranked? What is their record? How much publicity did the game receive? etc. But, this isn't easy to put it words and set as a hard guideline so some editors would overlook common sense since there isn't a guideline. But as far as actually setting criteria, I definitely agree with 1-6, don't agree with 7 and 8 and I'm on the fence on the rest.↔NMajdan•talk 13:27, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Conference Championship Games

User: BigDT changed the name of the ACC Championship Game article to ACC football championship game. I don't like the new title but if there's concensus to have all Conference Championship articles like that I wouldn't fight it. Just thought I'd bring it up here because if the ACC's article has that title format then the rest should. Seancp 21:31, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I like the new name, it's more precise. Especially when there's a basketball championship, a volleyball championship, and so on.... The page should be a disambig then. MECU≈talk 00:38, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with making a disambig page. The football championship game differs from other conference championships in that it is only 1 game, while the others are tournaments. For an example: SEC Tournament is a disambig page for all the various SEC tournaments, including basketball. If within a group of sports fans someone says, "Florida won the SEC championship game" people are not going to think basketball. They'll automatically think football. If someone says, "Florida won the SEC tournament" then they'll automatically think basketball. So I think a disambig of SEC Championship Game to the various tournaments would not be helpful to the average reader. Seancp 13:38, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

He does have a point. Sure it may be the biggest but we can't assume the other sports don't have a championship game as well. Until there are three or more sport championship games (like Mecu said; football, basketball, baseball, etc) then I think the ACC Championship Game article (and other conferences) should redirect to the football article. If there are two sports, then it should redirect to football with one of the {{otheruses templates}} at the top. If three or more, then a disambig page.↔NMajdan•talk 13:40, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Request for reassessment

I just gave the article for Mitch Mustain, the poster-child of Arkansas' incredibly dramatic late-2006 off-the-field shenanigans, a significant overhaul (particularly the college section). Is it possible to get a reassessment? --Bobak 17:47, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Well done. I have upgraded the assessment to B quality. I hope you continue your work and get this article GA quality.↔NMajdan•talk 17:52, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt update. I'm not sure I can take it to GA (that now famous book in the references would be a start), I hope for more good articles as the transfer story progresses. --Bobak 18:36, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Portal notice

I have selected the Selected Content for the CFB Portal for May. I selected an image that I think is of good quality but one that did not go through the nomination process. I have selected Image:2006 Clemson at Virginia Tech celebration.jpg in honor of the VT tragedy of last week. If anybody has any issues with me selecting an image that didn't go through the process or an issue with this image in particular, please let me know and I will either select a different image from the VT football category or from among the approved nominations.↔NMajdan•talk 18:15, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• It looks great NMajdan - good idea, thanks. Johntex\^talk 18:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

More on notability

There is some discussion 2 sections up about notability guidelines for individual games. I have re-activated the page Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Notability which was started by BigDT. I have added the information about individual games to that page (I took out any criteria that were not supported in the above discussion).

I marked this page as a "guideline" because I think it captures how we are currently working. I am relisting this here to get some more eyeballs on it and so we can have more discussion as neccessary. Johntex\^talk 19:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Assessment help

I'd like to keep our unassessed articles category empty so I would appreciate any help is assessing these articles. Thanks in advance.↔NMajdan•talk 13:55, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Question on game template

There is some discussion here about whether the "box score" template for individual games should reflect the record of the teams coming into the game, or as a result of playing the game. Please join in the discussion if you would like. Johntex\^talk 21:16, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Peer review request

I have placed 2006 Oklahoma Sooners football team up for WP:PR and would appreciate any feedback. Wikipedia:Peer review/2006 Oklahoma Sooners football team. Thanks.↔NMajdan•talk 18:17, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Anybody?↔NMajdan•talk 19:42, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Questions on how to handle coach pages

Hi - I've been working on adding records boxes to the pages for coaches of the University of Minnesota and am now to the point where I'm going to be creating new articles for coaches who don't yet have pages. However, this brings up the question of how to handle two special cases. First, in 1899, the Gophers had co-coaches and I have very little information on each of them individually. Should I make one page for both of them, or should I keep them on separate pages. Then, in 1889, the Gophers played 4 games and had a different coach for each of those games. The only information I have about the 4 coaches are their names - I don't even know who coached which game. Should I combine the four of them onto a single page? How would you handle this? Is there an example of something similar already out there I could look at? Gopherguy 03:17, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

For the first case, I would make a page for each of them, not one page for both. If some of your info has to be redundant for each page, so be it. In the second case I would be hesitant to even create a page on that. With only their names, you would be best off just mentioning this on the main Minnesota football page. VegaDark (talk) 03:38, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

You have a good point - while I want to "complete" our coaching history, it seems wasteful to create pages for all four of them with no more information than the fact that they coached a single game. Maybe I'll create a team page for the football team for that season and create redirect pages for the coaches which send you to the 1889 team page. Gopherguy 14:07, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea. I think that having a season where each game is coached by a different person is unique enough that, if you can find enough sources for good citations, you could make a really good article out of that. z4ns4tsu\^talk 18:29, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

List of 100 point games introduction

I tried to wikify the introduction. See if it seems more fitting. John 17:33, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Comments appreciated at Template talk:NCAATeamSeason#Image

...regarding the use of team logos on year-specific articles (such as 2005 Texas Longhorns football team).↔NMajdan•talk 20:44, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Discussion moved to Wikipedia talk:Non-free content#Logos.↔NMajdan•talk 12:48, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Be aware of logos with no fair use rationale

I've noticed some fair use logos getting tagged with no FU rationale. We need to be aware of this and add appropriate rationale to prevent them from being deleted. One that was recently tagged is Image:CFBHOFlogo.jpg. I will add rationale to it as soon as I can unless somebody beats me to it (I probably won't get to it until Monday or so).↔NMajdan•talk 15:04, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

I've added the FU rationale for Image:CFBHOFlogo.jpg. Вasil | talk 15:46, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Keith Jackson

Although this project has rated the Keith Jackson article as a top importance, it has been blanked by an editor(not me!) do to the fact that it is not sourced. XinJeisan 14:47, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, I'm not completely against deleting unsourced info from BLP articles but that seemed a little overboard. I mean, he even deleted all the categories (even the Living people category)! I say you could restore the categories (birth year, living people, etc).↔NMajdan•talk 16:56, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

It was definitely far too extreme of an action by that editor, who I have a suspiciion is not a fan of Keith Jackson. He tagged the article unsourced and then 6 weeks later blanks it; many article are tagged for far longer than that without any type of action like that. He should have marked specific items with {{fact}} that he had an issue with. I think the bulk of the article should be restored with some puffery removed or more granularly tagged for cites.

Alternately, many Wikiprojects have a weekly article chosen for improvement. Perhaps WP:CFB should do so as well, at least in the off-season (we all know how busy it gets in fall). If KJ is truly a Top Importance subject for this project, then his article would be a good choice with which to kick off a weekly article improvement drive. AUTiger ʃ ^talk/_work 17:58, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I've downrated to mid. No way is he Top. He's a fairly central person to CFB which is why I did mid. I don't recognize the user who rated him as Top, so it might have been a fan rating. MECU≈talk 17:15, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

2006 Oklahoma Sooners football team under GA review

Any help would be appreciated.↔NMajdan•talk 13:41, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Rutgers Football Article

I believe that the Rutgers Scarlet Knights should have a separate article for their football team seeing as how they hav become a nationally ranked team and are becoming a national powerhouse. Sekuloguy 21:44, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Definitely agree. I don't think anyone would have a problem with someone creating an article for a Division I-A football team. Or Division I-FBS, whatever its called nowadays. Go ahead and create it! Seancp 21:46, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

However, for a little good natured ribbing, I don't think one good year makes a national powerhouse! Heh... Seancp 21:48, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Well i'll start it but don't expect it to be any good i'm relatively new here, but im sure i could get some help along the way. Sekuloguy 23:11, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely. No question about it. You didn't even need to ask! MECU≈talk 23:25, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I just started it really quick it's going to need a lot of help. Sekuloguy 23:43, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

It's not going so hot. I have to go somewhere until tomorrow so I won't be able to do anything till then, but i just wanted to start it so it's there.

Charles Melick

Hi there, Charles Melick has been tagged as insufficiently asserting the importance of the subject since Sepetember 2006. I have replaced the Importance tag with a notability tag, which get's it off the radar for Wikipedia:WikiProject Notability for the immediate future.

In doing so, I came to notice all the coaches mentioned on this template. Most of them I have also flagged as insufficiently establishing notability.

When creating stubs, could every effort be made to at the time a stub is created, clearly meet notability criteria as mentioned somewhere. This would usually be done through providing references for everything which is included in the article: that they were a coach, the years they coached at a given team, and what type of result they achieved.Garrie 01:51, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

By default, a head coach of a Division I football team is notable. Anyone listed in any of the 119 (I think) coach templates we have as a project are therefore notable. Some more so than others, but all are still worthy of an article. MECU≈talk 02:41, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Claiming National Championships

There needs to be a better way to explain the national championship situation. On the right hand of the USC Trojans Football page there is a stat claiming 7 national championships for the school. The school, as well as much of the country sees USC as a team with 11 national championships. Can someone fix the template to allow both ap national championships and over all national championships otherwise there is going to be a constant battle back and forth even though "both sides" are right. The school should be given credit for the full 11, otherwise a large truth is missing from the page. (Padsquad19 07:38, 18 June 2007 (UTC))

There already has been a battle. Look at the archive of this talk page and at Talk:NCAA Division I-A national football championship for more info.↔NMajdan•talk 13:36, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Template:BCSChamps

I put this on the talk page of this template, but since it probably isn't watched much I added it here to see if I could get anyone's opinion. This template is for National Championships in the BCS Era and links to the BCS national championship game. I think that should mean BCS National Champions and as such the 2003 split shouldn't be called a split and USC shouldn't be mentioned on it. USC won a national championship that year, but it wasn't the BCS and unless it is supposed to list all national champions since the BCS began (as if the BCS started a new era in football) it doesn't need to be mentioned on the template. Related to this, has anyone thought of creating a template that lists AP National Champs? It could be used on the main team pages of those who have won one, or on the yearly pages if they are created. Any thoughts on both of these? Phydend 17:25, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I also didn't think 2003 USC belonged on that template, but I didn't bring it up because I'm an LSU fan and I was afraid of the backlash that LSU fans experience whenever they bring up USC and the 2003 split title. Instead of a separate template, how about we rename the BCSChamps template to something like NCAAFootballChamps and list the teams and the major selectors. I don't know if that would even be a good idea though because the national championship issue has always been the source of much debate here on Wikipedia. I don't really know what a good solution would be. Hell, maybe we should just leave it alone. I don't know. I'll wait and see how the discussion develops before I give more input. Seancp 17:33, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I just took a look at the template, it makes total sense as "BCS Era National Champions" rather than "BCS National Champions". I don't think there's any debate that a new era began with the introduction of the BCS system, despite the fact that it botched 2003 and semi-botched a few others. --Bobak 17:39, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I changed my mind...I'll comment some more. Right now we have articles on 23 national championship teams. See: Category:NCAA Football National Champions. I think a template that replaces the BCSChamps template with an NCAAFootballChamps template would be good because it would provide links to all currently written national championship team articles and it would also encourage other to start new articles on other, older national championship teams. As we all know, Wikipedia is biased towards current events. But hell, I want to learn about some of the older national championship teams. Maybe we could limit it to Poll Era national champs and only include AP and Coaches champions in it. Anyone else think this is a good idea? Seancp 17:40, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

That seems like a decent (and ambitious) idea... The only concern would be how to handle various teams claiming pre-AP/Coaches/UPI championships. --Bobak 17:43, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

As always, the College Football Data Warehouse has a good source for info in their national championship section. --Bobak 17:46, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it's definitely ambitious, but I wouldn't expect that creating a template would mean we'd have articles on all teams. It would take years before that became a reality. But with a template listing all teams with links, perhaps some Minnesota fan would be perusing Wikipedia, come across the template and say, "Hey, I'll create articles for the NC's Minnesota won all those years ago!" I'd suggest if this idea ever came to fruition that we start it with the first AP poll (I think it was 1936) and then add in the coaches poll (I think that start around 1950) and leave it to those two polls. But I think more discussion is necessary before I do anything. Seancp 18:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

That idea is much better in my opinion. I just thought it seemed pretty confusing since there is no article about the BCS era (although I do agree it is definitely a new era in college football). I was going to suggest that an AP championship template be created and then just change this template to say BCS champs instead, but another template is definitely preferable with the information on the college football data warehouse used as a basis. Phydend 18:08, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm all for "National Champions in the BCS Era", and then we can create others for the other eras as well. I don't think "BCS Champs" is a good idea because of the split title. Then we'd have to have "AP champs in the BCS Era" and so on, which would be too redundant. MECU≈talk 19:15, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Well there is already a Bowl Alliance era championship template so maybe that would be better. There still is a problem with shared titles in each era, but that might be able to be dealt with somehow. Phydend 23:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

XXXXX football under Coach XXXXX

I asked a question a while ago and got some answers ("Questions on how to handle coach pages" from the May archive for this talk page) about how I might handle making pages for team coaches from a long time ago. Specifically, I was asking about a season of Gopher football where we had a different coach for each of the four games we played that season. I asked because I want to create pages for all Gopher football coaches, but in this case, I don't have much at all for information on these four. Well, I looked back at the March archive and saw the section "Notability of per-year team entries" and it made me rethink my strategy. It was talking about creating pages such as "Minnesota Golden Gopher football under Lou Holtz" and then having a page with a quick summary of each individual season that the team played under that coach. My thought was that instead of creating an individual page for all 15 men who coached the team prior to 1900 I could create a "Minnesota Golden Gopher football before 1900" page which would have a section for each coach and a quick rundown of the individual seasons. My question then is whether that would fit in well with the direction we're trying to take.Gopherguy 21:34, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I think that would be good. If any section then gets too big it can then be broken out. You could even go by an "era" of the team, something like "Minn Gopher football early era" or something of the sorts, so you don't have to cut-off at 1900 if it's not convenient. Or maybe "Birth of Minn Gopher football" which has the first 20-25 years or so until something more exciting happens. MECU≈talk 21:39, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I'd definitely want to avoid picking an arbitrary cut-off date - it just happens that after having 15 coaches in our first 19 seasons that Henry L. Williams took the team over in 1900 and coached for 22 years, so 1900 is actually an important date for us. I think I'll start writing the article and depending on how long it gets either keep it a single page or break it up into a couple of pages.Gopherguy 21:46, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I think that would be a good approach. Auburn has a similar issue with a couple of early seasons with two different coaches and a couple of single season coaches as well. Even though AU currently has separate articles for those early years, they could probably be consolidated into a single article. Probably many schools have that sort of early history in their programs and should take the same approach you propose. AUTiger » talk 23:38, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

College Baseball

I don't want to spam, so if this is considered spam then I apologize and please delete this. Anyway, I'm a member of the college football wikiproject, and I'm also a fan of college sports all around. One of my favorites is baseball. I just started a college baseball wikiproject and I'd like to see if anyone would like to join us. We're just starting right now and we could use all the help we could get. I modeled the project after this project because it seems to run so well. You can find us at: Wikipedia:WikiProject College baseball. I'd also like to be considering a sister project...please let me know if that would be ok. Thanks again, and sorry if this is inappropriate. Seancp 00:21, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Rose Bowl content dispute

Over at Talk:Rose Bowl Game there's a dispute over inclusion of a statement that Arizona is the only Big10 or Pac10 school to never have played in the Rose. Thankfully, the dispute moved to the talk page because it had been a slow revert war for a while; however, some more unbiased (i.e. non UA or ASU) voices might help the discussion. Feel free to weigh in if interested. Thanks, AUTiger » talk 19:35, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

CFB Yearly templates vs. CFB Coaching templates

Hi again - I come with another question. The CFB Coaching templates have been deprecated in favor of the CFB Yearly templates. Should I therefore convert any of them that I find to the CFB Yearly format? Normally, I'd think it would be obvious, but since some information is lost by doing that (bowl opponent in particular) I thought I'd see if there's a general opinion before I make a lot of changes which someone else will just change back.Gopherguy 17:58, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

I say yes. The bowl opponent information can either be added to that template system (why it wasn't I dunno, maybe to keep the size down?) or into the text. Orphaning the template is a good idea and once done, remove it to prevent usage. MECU≈talk 15:56, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

OK - I'm going ahead with that then. I just converted the template on the Lou Holtz page and will keep my eyes open for other templates that need to be converted.Gopherguy 15:36, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Florida-Florida State Rivalry

Trying to get the Florida-Florida State rivalry page going. Any older Gators or Seminoles would definetly be appreciated to add to the history of the rivalry. In addition, anyone who has any memorable photos or games, please add.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by PaxonGator (talk • contribs) 03:30, 14 June 2007 (UTC).

College Gameday (football)

As seems to happen around about right now, everyone in the country seems to think Gameday is going to be headed their way. I have commented out two claims about Gameday [11]. The ONLY game that is locked in right now is week one - ECU@VT. There had been a claim up there that Gameday would be at the Labor Day game between FSU and Clemson ... I guess that's possible ... but the link cited mentions nothing of it. also, someone had added today a claim that Gameday would be at PSU-ND for week two. I'd say there's about a 99% chance that's where they go, but until something is official, it needs to be kept off. Please add College GameDay (football) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) to your watchlist and help keep the speculation off or commented out. Thanks. --BigΔT 14:31, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for the headsup.↔NMajdan•talk 13:44, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

{{portalwarning}}

After seeing a ton of portals not updated today, I have created a template called {{portalwarning}}. If you fill it out for the portal that interests you, you can get an automatic warning that a portal page doesn't exist. It will warn you if either this month's article or next month's article is missing. For example, I have put these warnings at the top of our page:

{{portalwarning|portal=College football|page=Selected article}}
{{portalwarning|portal=College football|page=Selected picture}}
{{portalwarning|portal=American football|page=Selected article}}
{{portalwarning|portal=American football|page=Selected picture}}

Enjoy! --BigΔT 00:02, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Anyway to only have it display after a certain date? Like right now it says that the article for August doesn't exist, but its July 1st and there is plenty of time to add it. Any way to only have it display after a certain day, like the 15th? I can think of a way to do this and may experiment with it tomorrow. Glad I created the CFB Portal stuff for July early. A couple of the other Portals I update haven't been updated yet for July so thats something I have to do tomorrow.↔NMajdan•talk 00:35, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

You may want to check closely who fixed the CFB article+picture this month. ;) Anyway, yes, it could very easily be changed:

{{switch|{{#expr: {{{day|{{CURRENTDAY}}}}} < 15}}|case: 1=Put code here that should be run after the 15th}}

... I'm torn on whether that's a good idea ... maybe make it an optional parameter. I think having the warning up there if it isn't ready a month early would be a good idea. --BigΔT 00:48, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Hey, it wasn't me! Thanks for doing that. I've been real busy at work lately and my Wikipedia time is way down. Yes, I had every intention of making it an optional parameter and I do think it is a good idea. I don't think that warning banner at the top should be visible until the latter half of a month. Who cares if the next month's article hasn't been selected a month in advance. It should be a warning like, "Hey, the next month is almost here and the article hasn't been selected." Any other opinions on this?↔NMajdan•talk 13:39, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

If it's changed, it needs to be an option that defaults to the whole month. Keep in mind that some WikiProjects aren't as active and it might not get noticed if it's just there for two weeks. --BigΔT 14:13, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

By the way, I declare it to be Virginia Tech month for abandoned portals. --BigΔT 14:47, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

University Bands under WP:CFB?

Should marching bands like Michigan State University Spartan Marching Band be under the WP:CFB? While I see the relationship, I don't think they should because we're more football related than just general school related. Then again, mascots are like Ralphie so I'm slightly torn. Any ideas? MECU≈talk 15:57, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmmmm; bands are related to college football in a similar way as mascots; it's all part of the pageantry that makes college football what it is. Aubie is also marked as part of WP:CFB and yet ranges far beyond football in his presence and prominence. If it makes any difference, a member of this project, Littledrummrboy just started WikiProject Marching band. AUTiger » talk 17:19, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the plug, Autiger. As a fan of both college football and marching bands, my take is that marching bands do fit here (and I specify marching bands because a large amount of their purpose is typically college football based; the same can't be said for pep, concert, or other university bands) because as Autiger said, they are part of the pageantry that makes college football unlike any other institution. But of course, they've certainly got a home over at WikiProject Marching band! --Littledrummrboy 19:56, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Team Logo

I propose that we add the winning team's logo to the page of each year's bowl and season page, seeing as the way the site is set up now as a separate season and bowl page, to add more color and formality to the page. As you can see from the World Cup 2006 page, I implemented showing the flag of the winning country sort of as a badge/award for winning the cup. For example it will look something like this...

2006 NCAA Football Champion
Florida Gators 2nd Title

I'm also thinkin about doing the same for the conference champions, for those individual pages only as well as individual BCS bowl year pages, ie 2007 Sugar Bowl. Let me know if you guys approve/disapprove or have any suggestions. Thanks!! Squadoosh 12:04, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

(I removed the logo from above.) There's a big difference between flags and logos: Flags are free. Just adding the logo of the winner isn't a good idea and wouldn't really pass our fair use criteria, because it would be decorative. We tried before having both logos on articles about a specific game and I think we eventually lost that battle. It's built into the template I created for a game header, but we can't use it because of the un-freeness of logos. Really, I think we'd all support this idea and more liberal use of logos, but the fair use policy here prevents it. MECU≈talk 12:58, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Actually, logos to represent teams in specific games are being used in certain circumstances. Please see 2005 Texas vs. Ohio State football game, for instance. However, that is different than just being a logo in a table, which has been disallowed. Many of us, myself included, think that Wikipedia has become too restrictive of fair use. We need to work to change the policy to one that makes more sense. We can start by voting for Foundation board members who support expansion of fair use. Johntex\^talk 23:37, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

{{Bowl Games}}

I added this to the talk page (actually agreed to a suggestion on it) but no one has replied in awhile. But anyway, this template has been changed every year without substituting it on pages, thus articles like NCAA football bowl games, 2005-06 has a template on it that gives dates for the 2006-07 games. It was suggested that this template be turned into a generic template for bowl games with no dates or anything, and then a new template {{2006 Bowl Games}} be created for the information here. I've worked on in here and have a generic template (of the current games I believe, they need to be in some sort of order though) and two templates for the 2004 season and 2005 season. These two can probably be just put onto pages that should have it (there are probably only a few), but the 2006 one can probably go on at least 10 pages so I was going to create that template. Any suggestions about this? Phydend 03:51, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I think a yearly one would be just fine. I agree that it would be better to have yearly which then remains and a generic one for the generic pages. MECU≈talk 01:17, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Well I did it. I made {{2005 Bowl Games}}, {{2006 Bowl Games}}, made {{Bowl Games}} generic (I think defunct games could be included on it, but I didn't right now), and added a like template to the 04 season bowl game page and 2 games, but I didn't make it its own template. Phydend 04:39, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Historic bowl logos deleted

In case no one else noticed, User:ESkog just did semi-automated deletion of all galleries on bowl game articles using WP:AWB claiming violation of WP:NFCC #8. I believe it was a invalid interpretation of the policy particularly since some galleries had commentary on the logos. It is also clearly he searched blindly and did not check to see the usage because he deleted an empty gallery[12] in Holiday Bowl.

To prevent another unthinking vigilante action such as this, if bowl logos are added back they should not be done with a <gallery> tag and more importantly, should have commentary on the logo incorporated or have the historical logo incorporated into the history section, e.g. change of sponser, style, etc.

Furthermore, it appears the user taking this action also has a history deleting NFL team logos, so be warned to validate your fair-use rationales, in case he decides to go after those. Admins, is there recourse for inappropriate use of automated tools like AWB? AUTiger » talk 21:57, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Oklahoma damage control

The NCAA handed down the punishment to Oklahoma today and of course, many OU articles are being edited. I ask that everybody watch these for blatant vandalism and factual errors/misunderstandings. The NCAA forced OU to vacate the 2005 season, not forfeit. Here is a good article describing the difference that is not related to the OU situation. OU was forced to no longer recognize their wins in 2005. So, rather than being 8-4, they are 0-4. Opponents, must continue to claim a loss to OU as a loss (this would be different if it was forfeited). Bob Stoops' record will be adjusted to not count those 8 wins. So the losses in his record remain the same. Anyway, please help maintain the quality of these OU articles. Thank you.↔NMajdan•talk 20:36, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

That's interesting - I remember looking into this issue a number of years ago (being a Gopher fan, our basketball program has a lot of vacated games) and I thought that the entire season would be considered to have not been played at all from the offending school's standpoint, making the team 0-0. I know that the University of Minnesota basketball media guides list records of 0-0 for all of the seasons affected by the academic scandal.Gopherguy 21:12, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

EL templates

Hi people, I don't suspect I'll check in here much as I'm not joining this project (yet), but.. i did create {{cfbhof}} and {{heisman}}. I suspect they should get a lot of use here and they are now listed on your template page. Be well. Jmfangio 10:52, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Templates for Deletion

I'd like to make a potentially controversial suggestion. Per WP:TFD, "Templates are used to insert blocks of common material into multiple pages, often for standardization purposes." I was looking at Category:American college football templates and noticed a handful of single season roster templates. This is not common material and does not really promote standardization. I would recommend that this information be incorporated into the relevant articles and the templates be deleted. From a practical perspective, it's going to be awfully difficult to maintain these templates if every single college football team starts getting a roster template for every season of play. Additionally, the vast majority of college players do not meet notability standards. Having a template for them seems somewhat counterintuitive. Jmfangio ► Talk 19:57, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

I was actually looking at this before and these being used as templates are definitely not needed. I think the historical ones should just be substituted and deleted. A current roster could be used for some teams (I think the NFL pages have current rosters) and could be on each team page and updated each year while also being substituted on that particular season page. Phydend 20:26, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

• I already said go back and make the changes for now. I'm not going to be the one to do it, but i pointed you to the section on where to go about getting that done. Jmfangio| ►Chat  16:05, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Major problem with naming conventions

Many individual college football team pages have serious problems with the naming conventions. First and foremost - the pages should say american football as many individual schools have notable football programs (aka Soccer). Secondly, some pages (Like that for BYU) used the abbreviated name of the university. I will fix these as I come across them, but i felt people here might want to know as well. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:03, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

The only problem I see is shouldn't it be American football, with the A capitalized? I noticed you moved some of them without capitalizing the A, but I don't want to change unless I'm right. Anyone know? But also, if the schools have a notable football (soccer) team, since the manual of style says (I think) that American spelling should be used on articles about American things and what not, they'd use soccer anyway. So is this really a problem? Phydend 05:28, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

• I wasn't sure about the "american" versus "American" myself. I'm inclined to say it "should be" American. That being said, every other example i found made me feel that others would use a capital a. I'm open to this part. Unfortunately, using "Soccer" instead of "Football" fails NPOV and shows bias toward the US even though "Soccer" is far more popular around the world than it is here. Jmfangio| ►Chat  06:25, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

• Ok, I was just looking at examples at the time and had found this. Should it be moved to Brigham Young University Cougars football then? I'm just not exactly sure about it, but actually think it may be confusing (I understand the difference and the POV problem just wondering). Does the manual of style say anything about this? Phydend 14:20, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. Calling the sport "soccer" in reference to the sport as played in the United States is the only proper way to refer to it and does not fail NPOV. Referring to a U.S. soccer team as a "football team" would be incorrect and any such references should be changed to "soccer team". And "American football" is how our game of football is referred to outside the United States, but articles about the sport should call it simply "football" unless the article is about a team based in another country that plays using our rules.Gopherguy 14:28, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

• I also strongly disagree. The current system makes total sense in context of the articles. It's college football (or, for our Canadian viewers, university football), not "college American football". --Bobak 15:06, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

(e.c.)I agree with Gopherguy and Bobak here. Since these articles were created by people who's native language is American English, American English standards apply to spelling, grammar and jargon. Since the sport is called "soccer" in the U.S. and "football" refers to a completely separate sport, it should remain "soccer" in these articles. z4ns4tsu\^talk 15:11, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Except that Wikipedia as an online encyclopedia exists outside the confines of one article, and out of 6+ billion people on the planet, nearly 5.7 of them call what Americans refer to as soccer, 'football'. Whatever happens inside the article(s) is one thing; Soccer works as long as it has a DAB link where appropriate. But in the opposite direction, any disambiguation linking College football, needs to bear precedent in mind, and be clear in distinguishing. This means that any (and every) such link, must be mindful that American football is a separate category than football, as it is overwhelmingly outnumbered. I grew up in the US, I follow the Buckeyes religiously, but I also understand the need to be diplomatic and Wikipedia protocol demands certain things. Otherwise the entire system is bunk. Know what I mean? Ryecatcher773 18:38, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Except that the Manual of Style already has addressed the issue. See Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English, especially the second and third points. z4ns4tsu\^talk 19:23, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, most of the world uses "football" to refer to what we call "soccer". However, using the example given above, it would be ridiculous to call an article about BYU's soccer team "Brigham Young University Cougars football" because the vast majority of people who are the target audience (Americans) will assume that the article talks about the American football team at BYU. It isn't ambiguous because BYU is located in the United States, so the language in the article (and the name of the article itself) should use American English. Furthermore, if you go to BYU's website, you can see that they use "soccer" to refer to their soccer team, so the school itself does not refer to it as "football". On the other hand, something generic, such as the main article on the sport itself, should be (and is) called American football. BTW - there are not 5.7 billion people who call it "football" - only English speaking countries call it that.Gopherguy 20:37, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

The A in American is always capitalized. It's a proper noun, and even in an adjectival sense like Irish coffee, Scotch whisky, or English breakfast (even though Scotch isn't the proper name of a person from Scotland, and no I didn't misspell Whiskey... there is no 'e' in the Scottish version...) the rule remains the same. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either a silly anarchist, or shouldn't have been allowed to finish the sixth grade. Butterscotch, incidentally, may seem to contradict the aforementioned rule, but the origin of the word Scotch in that context is foggy at best, and for that reason has its very own naming convention, which of course I haven't the time nor the energy to extrapolate on... Ryecatcher773 07:23, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

• I don't know too many people who don't know that A should be capitalized. My point was with regards to how the contention had been established. Just use capital a and move on. Jmfangio| ►Chat  07:39, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I also strongly disagree with adding the word "American" to college football team pages. How can we resolve this issue? Can we put it to a vote of WikiProject College football members? Jweiss11 04:03, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Per WP:STRAW, I think we should wait a bit before conducting a poll. It seems as if you are willing to focus on the issue and not let this stray. The issue is should an article about a college's football team be titled "football" or "American football". I have a list of all of the articles i "moved" so we can easily undo the work that has been done if we need to. For now, I say leave it status quo. Onto the topic, from my reading of WP:MOS and WP:NC, It would appear that American should be used in the title. With regards to abbreviations of the Universities and such, i have looked at WP:NCA and it seems to say it should be spelled out in full. Then again, I've also looked at WP:NCON. Now maybe I am not considering the information properly, but that too seemed to support a move to "american football" instead of "football". Jmfangio| ►Chat  04:11, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

There is no logic to putting 'American' in the article titles for college football teams. Any argument for it can be completely squashed.►Chris Nelson 04:19, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Your recent comments are getting outside of the context. It is absolutely logical to raise the issue and have the discussion. I'm sorry you don't like it, but the discussion is worth having. Jmfangio| ►Chat  04:24, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Only in the opinion of those with faulty logic.►Chris Nelson 04:25, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I think the matter comes down to this: when the Michigan Wolverines play "football" they are without a doubt playing American football which they simply call "football". If the U of Oxford fielded a football (soccer) team they would also likely call their game "football". So University of Oxford Oxes football would be a football (soccer) team. But we wouldn't have to call that article "University of Oxford Oxes football (soccer)" because "University of Oxford Oxes" would sufficienty define the topic as football (soccer). Jweiss11 04:33, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• But a person isn't forced to view Michigan Wolverines in order to view Michigan Wolverines American football. So how is that context established? I'm reading the convention pages and it would seem that the way to go is to use Am. football and then use the lead section to clarify that the team is commonly reffered to as the "football" team. Jmfangio| ►Chat  04:37, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• The lead sentences of Michigan Wolverines football and other college football team pages should, and do, define their sport as American football via wiki link or as college football, which in turn should and is defined as American football in its lead." Jweiss11 04:41, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Here is another example that (as i'm reading it) supports the move. The University of Cambridge plays "soccer" The link to their "soccer" page, or the closest thing to it - is Cambridge University Association Football League. Now while the Assoc. Football League is the "proper title" for the league (as the National Football League is for professional american football - it seems consistent to actually title the article Michigan Wolverines American football. Jmfangio| ►Chat  04:47, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Great example, but I think they key difference is in exactly what you describe. "Association Football League" is the "proper title" i.e. that it was that body calls itself and is best known as. The Michigan Wolverines do not call themselves "American football", nor are they best known as such. Jweiss11 04:53, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
• Yeah good point. I think this is a tough issue. Do me a huge favor, would you mind looking some of those convention pages i pointed out. As I read them, they support the naming of the page as American football because of the confusion with football to most people. That being said, even if you agree with me on that point - it does not mean that this discussion should be considered complete. This is a very tough call for me. Personally, I have no problem with the "football" use, but I am trying to think of this from the perspective of the guidelines/policies and the entire wiki community. Jmfangio| ►Chat  04:56, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I just can't agree with this. The page you are talking about should be named Michigan Wolverines football and not have "American" in the title. I don't even understand why you'd bring up an English University as an example of how pages about an American University should be named. I don't necessarily agree with all of the points you are bringing up about the MOS, but even if you are 100% right that the guidelines would indicate that it should include American, it clearly says that "these are conventions, not rules carved in stone". Are you forgetting the convention that you should use the common name? There is NO ambiguity about what kind of sport Michigan Wolverines football is about. We can keep chatting about this if you want, but sometime soon we should hold a vote and I can't imagine that there's any way it won't be an overwhelming vote in favor of leaving "American" out of the title.Gopherguy 05:03, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• No "rule" on here is set in stone. This is why there is discussion. You have already asserted your own allegiance to certain sides of the issue. There is ambiguity issues with that title, whether you want to acknowledge them is up to you. That doesn't necessarily mean that disambiguity (as it is called here) trumps everything else, but it certainly warrants a discussion. There are others who have been inclined to agree with the alternative and have done so here. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:06, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Jmfangio, I think that since this seems to be somewhat contraversial issue and since an early count of weigh-ins are not in favor of including "American" in the college team page names, you should revert back the handful of changes that you have made thus far. Then we can continue to debate, but at least the pages in question will be consistent in the meantime. I tried to move back the Michigan Wolverines football page, but I could not do so. I got the following message:

"The page could not be moved: a page of that name already exists, or the name you have chosen is not valid. Please choose another name, or use Requested moves to ask an administrator to help you with the move. Do not manually move the article by copying and pasting it; the page history must be moved along with the article text."

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jweiss11 (talk • contribs)

• I don't think an "early count" says that at all. For example, the very first person who chimmed in supported the move. In order to undo the moves, we can tag the pages in the interm. I'll dig up the tag and post it here for you. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:18, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Jmfangio: you, Phydend, and Ryecatcher773 seem to support the move, but Gopherguy, Bobak, Z4ns4tsu, and Chris Nelson and I are against it. That's 5-3 against based on the discussion thus far. Jweiss11

Just as an aside; it's about consensus, not majority. AUTiger » talk 05:40, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the policy in question:

Generally, article naming should prefer what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature.

First, the policy is qualified with "Generally" so it is not always required, especialy with good reason. In this case, the additional clauses in the policy are violated with your proposed moves to "American football" as it will increase ambiguity, confusing the most notable/popular sport of US colleges with one which is much less notable, and make linking to these articles more difficult and hardly second nature. Additionally, as other have pointed out, the organizations in question do not name or refer to themselves as Auburn Tigers American football, but rather Auburn Football (in the case of that university's published media guide). Finally, practically no verifiable or reliable source will ever refer to these organizations as Michigan Wolverines American football. With the "generally" policy qualifier and these good reasons, this set of articles is the perfect occasion to follow the policy to ignore all rules.AUTiger » talk 05:40, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• I am confused Autiger - are you saying that WP:IAR results in status quo? That being said, there are many more people who speak English that would be more inclined to call it American football than just plain football. Nobody is arguing that colleges in the united states simply call it football. What I am saying is that most people do not. Your claim that "practically" no source would ever refer to the sport as a American football is not true. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:48, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• As a follow up, here are just a few examples of news sources that classify it as American football. It's a cursory glance simply used to show that these sites do exist in droves: how stuff works (a US company i might add), bbc, [13], and [14]. You can also might want to try using search engines to do some copmarative searches - for example: how many sites exist if you do a simple search for american football? football? how about football excluding when excluding the word soccer? or just soccer alone. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:54, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Hi all, in my opinion, the part of an article explaining which sport a team plays should be aimed at those who do not know this information. Informing them that a team plays the American version of football would seem, by this logic, a good idea. If it is clear that the article is discussing an American team, many non Americans would be able to figure it out (I am not sure that this is really a major problem). However shouldn't we be making the information clear enough that people don't have to figure it out? Thehalfone 08:23, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

OK, so you took the time to find four examples of pages referring to it as “American football”, three of which are based outside the U.S. and one which is obviously aimed at a non-American audience – few Americans would need that basic of a rundown of the game. Even people who aren’t fans of the game know what a touchdown is. If you doubt the intended audience, the line that explains that English units of measure are used gives it away. You’d never say that when speaking to an American audience - it's something you'd say to a group that uses another system of measurement normally. “Michigan Wolverines football” is a brand name, and throwing “American” in there is confusing and misleading.Gopherguy 14:35, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• As I said, it was a cursory search. Although my post came six minutes after yours, I did not spend even that much time searching for it. Michigan Wolverines football is not a brand name. Unless it is trademarked (which it isn't), that claim could not be substantiated. It is not confusing, and in absolutely no way misleads the reader, to call it American football. Who would read the title "American football" and mistake it for another sport? Most English speaking people call the sport "American" football. From my reading, the move is supported by wiki documentation. Jmfangio| ►Chat  14:43, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't think anyone here (sorry if I'm overgeneralizing) are saying that it is not called American football anywhere, but those examples you give aren't specific. If you search for, example, "Michigan Wolverines American football" on google you get about 69 hits, two of which are the wikipedia article you moved, many of the others are ebay.co.uk links. However, if you search "Michigan Wolverines football" there are about 287,000 hits, including Michigan's own athletic site. I think though, the important part is what they call it themselves. On most of the articles, early in the lead, it is said "college football", and the college football article itself says that it is a form of American football. Maybe the leads could be changed slightly, but I actually think it is enough right now and they don't need to be changed. Phydend 14:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, you missed my point regarding sources; Phydend got it. Searches for the construction "University Mascot American football" vs. "University Mascot football" show an overwhelmingly preferred usage of the latter. This is directly related to the issue of what is the most likely term under which these subjects will be searched. That goes to issue of the increased confusion that the move would create based on that usage (regardless of the 117 new redirects that would be created under your proposed move). You also continue to ignore the issue of what these teams call themselves. And yes, my assertion of IAR (with good reason) would maintain the current naming convention. AUTiger » talk 19:00, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Jmfangio, the examples, e.g. the BBC, that you bring up use "American" to define the sport in the generic, not a specific mention of a team. I agree that the page on American football should be named as it is, but you seem to missing the point that a qualifier of "Michigan Wolverines" uniquely defines the article as such. It seems that if we follow your logic to the extreme we would end up with a name for the Michigan Wolverines football page on the order or something like "Michigan (U.S. state) Wolverines (not the furry, yet fierce animal) American (technically North American, non Canadian) football"? Jweiss11 14:47, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• "Michigan Wolverines" does not establish context in and of itself. It does establish context for people familiar with American football and the intercollegiate athletic system that is in place in the US. However, the onus is not on the reader, it is on the article, to establish context. This is clearly asserted with Michigan Wolverines American football. That being said, I'm trying to find a compromise between how the articles really should be titled (based on wiki documentation) and the greater goals. It wouldn't surprise me for someone to make the argument that the articles should be "University Name" + Team name + American football team. But first things first. Short of that, i have seen one person site "grammar" for the basis of their argument and another use a portion of the naming convention that clearly says it should consider what the "majority of english speaking people" are familiar with. I don't have any confusion when i read "Indiana Hoosiers football". But what if i told you there were Indiana Hoosiers teams that had nothing to do with the sports of American football and nothing to do with the university. Jmfangio| ►Chat  15:02, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

The naming conventions policy also says generally, not always in regards to the "majority of English speaking people". Also, you are confusing what the majority calls the game with what the majority calls these teams. As Google searches indicate, they are not the same. AUTiger » talk 19:00, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Updated summary of opinions:

Support move:

Jmfangio

Ryecatcher773

Against move:

Gopherguy

Bobak

Z4ns4tsu

Chris Nelson

Jweiss11

Phydend

AUTiger

MECU

On the fence:

Thehalfone

Tally: 7-2-1 against move

Jweiss11 15:07, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Jmfangio, to address your last post: first off, there must be some onus on the reader to establish context. Doesn't the reader have to be familiar with the English language, basic syntax, and logic? Otherwise, what we've written here would just be meaningless curves, lines, and dots, right? Within the scope of Wikipedia (en), the word "American" is ambigious; American is a disambiguation page. The word "football" is also ambiguous to some degree, though probably on a lesser order than "American". But when you put "American" and "football" together to form American football, you have defined a unique concept. The same thing happens when you put "Michigan" + "Wolverines" + "football" together. Jweiss11 15:20, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I haven't commented yet in this thread, but I have followed it, and you can count me as one in the "Against move" column. Seancp 15:21, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Seancp, thanks for chiming in; 8-2-1 against the move now. Jweiss11 15:22, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• First off, Thehalfone doesn't appear to be on the fence at all. Second of all, this isn't a straw poll, so stop trying to turn it into one. Further more, if it were a straw poll, then that would only be PART of the determination. Third, Wikipedia is not a democracy. The way to get through this is discussion. So far, very few people here have taken the time to read through wiki articles to better understand how to approach a discussion like this. I'm giving this time in the event that someone comes up with something that relies on the guidelines and policies in place to support a status quo. Citing "grammar" doesn't cut it and "selectively" reading and citing others (and poorly at that), isn't going to cut it. With the proliferation of sports nicknames throughout the world, the various terminologies in place, and the existence of the disambiguation on wikipedia, it is the duty of the editors to provide context - not on the readers. It is much harder to go to every article and rewrite the lead sections so that American football is firmly establish. People can offer up opinions, that's what makes for discussion. But I don't know how to argue this any further when context is assumed rather than provided. Jmfangio| ►Chat  15:25, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

My intent on the tally was just to keep things organized and summarize where everyone stands in the discussion. It is certainly not a vote, because for some people its far more my interpretation of their comments than a discrete ballot. Jweiss11 15:33, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

That maybe, but it gives the appearance that this is now a poll. Which it isn't. Moving on, context is not established by the ability to comprehend. Understanding of syntax and grammar allows one to understand the communication. Beyond that, there is no onus on the reader. People read to learn, people write to educate. The word football is ambiguous, the word American is ambiguous, the words "American football", when used together, are not ambiguous. The same thing does not happen when you put together Michigan Wolverines football. I hesitate to use the example i'm about to state, for fear that people will "take it out of context". Certainly you cannot create policy on expceptions, but I will use this to perhaps show you how the system, as is currently in place - fails. Let's assume that NYU changed from the Bobcats to the Giants. (universities do change mascots/nicknames - see Stanford University and Syracuse University) Under the current "convention" that has been established here - the name for the article would be New York Giants football. See any problems with that? The nicknames do not establish context. A partial use of the institutions name does not establish context. The sport, listed by itself, does not establish context. You must rely on the entire title to help establish context. Jmfangio| ►Chat  15:36, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Ok, well it seems that the discussion is still very open. In the meantime, can we keep things where they are, and revert back the changes that you've made, to keep things consistent across the subject area? Can you provide a list of pages to which you added "American" both in the title and in key links, e.g. on Michigan Wolverines? Jweiss11 15:59, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree the naming conventions were good before Jmfangio changed them for many reasons all listed above. I've added my support above. I would be fine with links on each to help clarify for the non-American audience, like on Colorado Buffaloes football is a link/line that says "This is about American football. For football (soccer), see Colorado Buffaloes soccer." (not that CU has soccer, but that's besides the point.) I think the moves were ill-formed in large part as well and were against the current MOS conventions as well. MECU≈talk 16:30, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I was able to move back the following pages to their old names without "American":

• Air Force Falcons football
• Brigham Young University Cougars football
• Georgia Bulldogs football
• Houston Cougars football
• Miami Hurricanes football
• North Carolina Tar Heels football
• Northwestern Wildcats football
• Notre Dame Fighting Irish football rivalries
• Pittsburgh Panthers football
• Purdue Boilermakers football
• Texas Longhorns football
• Virginia Cavaliers football
• Washington State Cougars football

However, I could not move back these three:

• Michigan Wolverines football (repaired --Bobak 18:42, 23 July 2007 (UTC))
• Notre Dame Fighting Irish football(repaired --Bobak 18:42, 23 July 2007 (UTC))
• University of Southern California Trojans football(repaired --Bobak 18:42, 23 July 2007 (UTC))

No worries, just three of most historically important teams :). I did add move requests to their talk pages.

Jweiss11 16:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Sorry for not getting back in here. I'm dealing with someone on another issue. In the meantime: that's all of them (at least - that i have written down - i'll see if i moved anything else but I don't think so). In the meantime, exactly what I feared happening is happening. People are using your "summary" as a way to "vote" and not providing any real "reasons" other than I like or I don't like. Again, we need input based on documentation here on wikipedia. I would suggest you strike through the poll so it does not further cloud the discussion. Jmfangio| ►Chat  16:55, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Fixed all the damage that wasn't fixable by Jweiss11. --Bobak 18:42, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Arbitrary section break

This is the wrong stage for this discussion. Of course, all the members of WPCFB will agree that it should just be called "football" and not "American football." So any poll located here will be strongly biased and skewed.↔NMajdan•talk 17:32, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• I don't disagree with that point at all! Jmfangio| ►Chat  17:34, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Good point, although this is where you'll get people who understand college football into your discussion. And that's also important... someone who looks for the article American football is likely to be looking for basic information about the game, but someone who looks for Michigan Wolverines football will usually be familiar with the game of American football and wants specific team information. If I wanted to suggest that the spelling of the "theatre" article be changed to "theater", I would want to solicit opinions on discussion pages of people who are knowledgeable about the topic.Gopherguy 17:42, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• But that's the problem, you are looking at it from "your point of view". Again, we haven't even really broached the other problem with this naming convention - but forwarding the user from Michigan Wolverines football to Michigan Wolverines American football is a function of wiki for just this reason. Wikipedia assumes that the reader knows nothing of the topic. Jmfangio| ►Chat  18:08, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Your argument doesn't work: If Wikipedia assumes the reader knows nothing of the topic, then Wikipedia also assumes the reader can read and see the universal reference to college football at the top of each and every article on these teams. It is not our responsibility to contort titles to make sure they don't accidentally click on what is officially called a football team instead of what is officially called a soccer team by (1) the team's themselves, (2) the NCAA, (3) hundreds of millions of people. At best, leave all these newly created "_____ American football" pages as redirects. --Bobak 18:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• Please read what I have written over the course of this discussion. My argument is based on the readings of the guidelines. What I have been doing is reading wiki guidelines and policies to help determine how these things should be dealt with. If you think that the majority of english speaking people refer to football as "soccer" I would like to see support for that claim. Jmfangio| ►Chat  18:58, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I think your readings of the guidelines are incorrect. We use the common name and stick with the variation of English most appropriate for the articles and that means that these are not to be titled "X American football". I wouldn't mind if you created redirects (but I don't think they'd ever be used or encountered). --ElKevbo 05:56, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Just my own little rant here, ignore if you like... It's crap like this that makes being an active Wikipedia editor not fun at all. Look at all the time and effort that has been put into this argument, all because one anal retentive person interpreted the Wikipedia rules/standards/manual/etc one way and felt he needed to make drastic changes to a long established naming standard. We've had college football articles with these names for almost two years now, maybe longer for some articles, and this is the first time I've heard anyone claim that they are ambiguous. Personally I don't think its ambiguous at all. But that's not my point here. My point is that this is a gigantic waste of time...time that could be spent adding informative data to Wikipedia. But no, we're bogged down in a pissing match over a naming standard. I hate every time someone nominates a legitimate article for deletion. We here in WP:CFB have seen it happen numerous times. It's annoying and discouraging. This is no different. Jmfangio's actions remind me of a government bureaucracy, like the DMV or something, where the system is so bogged down in red-tape that its difficult to ever get anything accomplished. Seancp 19:43, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I'm willing to state that the consensus here has been established that the "XXX football" and not "XXX American football" is the naming convention. Without wider support (2 people seems to agree to this, despite the ~100 WP:CFB members that have joined and agreed with the system) I think this should be a closed topic. MECU≈talk 19:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

• SeacnCP - Don't attack me because you don't like what I have to say. Many wiki projects take it upon themselves to be the end-all-be-all with regards to content. This is an unfortunate downside to wiki projects. Because you guys have done a poor job with things doesn't make me anal and doesn't my argument any more or any less valid. If you don't like it - then don't comment. The red tape here is not me, it's this project. What this group fails to recognize is that there are many more people out there that do not call "american football" just football. Mecu - as said before, wikipedia is not a democracy. That aside, the fact that this project has established it's own "naming conventions" does not mean that naming conventions of wikipedia as a whole should take a back seat. Everyone on here continues to say: I like this, or Americans think that, or context is established by the name of things like "Florida Gators". Yet nobody has established any precedent for this amongst the greater community. I have. If you have a problem with the consensus of the community, then perhaps you should raise those concerns at WP:CON. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:32, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Please don't accuse others of having "done a poor job" because they disagree with you. That's quite impolite and unhelpful. --ElKevbo 05:58, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

This is ludicrous. We use American spelling in American topics and international spelling in international topics. Virginia Tech doesn't have American football and football teams - we have football and soccer teams. --B 06:02, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• ElKevbo - They have done a poor job. I have had people disagree with me before who have done an excellent job of articulating their perspectives using well based explanations. Wiki is not about "what i like" or "what you like". I don't see how your comment is constructive in anyway shape or form. B I'm not arguing about soccer, that is an entirely different aspect to this topic. Soccer does not create disambiguity, football does. It's not about "We" as noone owns these pages. It's about communicating the proper information to readers. Jmfangio| ►Chat  06:06, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• Pick any American college. Google "football" + that college name. See how many of the results are soccer vs American football. Google "college football" and see how many of the results are soccer. To go around changing articles about American universities to specify American football would be silly. --B 06:14, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I did not realize that google search results are the overall factor in defining naming conventions. Again, in reading polices and guidelines in place here at wiki, the move is supported, and far from "silly". Google is just one of the factors involved. If you are in the US, your search results will differ (drastically i might add) than if you were in say: England, China, Germany, or any other country. For that matter, where you are in the US affects your results. Football is an ambiguous term, soccer is not. Jmfangio| ►Chat  06:25, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Given the design of Google's algorithms, counting search results is not a bad proxy when the desired outcome is the "common name". --ElKevbo 11:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• Google's algorithms are not public information, so that is not applicable. Wikipedia is not google. Counting search results at times can be beneficial, and it is in fact, something I have mentioned previously in the discussion. That being said, Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask, or whatever else should not be the sole determination. This is as much an issue about WP:D as it is about anything else. Again, it gets back to a very simple fact: Factually, football (in regards to a sport) is ambiguous. Jmfangio| ►Chat  12:21, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, when taken out of context "football" is ambiguous. But we've given it sufficient context for most readers.

I'm sorry but unless you have some new arguments to present then I'm afraid that I still disagree with you. If you don't have any novel arguments then I'm not sure what continued discussion will do for us. I admire your initiative but unless something radically changes you're going to need to concede that in this particular instance you are on the wrong side of the debate and allows us all to move on. It happens to the best of us. --ElKevbo 13:24, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• Football in an article title is an ambiguous statement. That is why articles like [[The Catch {american football)]] are titled as such. I don't need to provide any "new" information when what i've said is supported by guidelines and policies. Conversations don't end simply because you want them to end. This project doesn't own these articles. Jmfangio| ►Chat  13:39, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I am asking Jmfangio to stop. You are now only causing disruption. The consensus has been established before, and confirmed by this discussion that the naming convention adopted by WP:CFB is valid and conforms to Wikipedia's MOS regarding naming. Further discussion on this is merely being disruptive to make a point as would making any moves (article name changes) that does not conform to WP:CFB naming standards. If you want to try and include greater input to this discussion, that would be fine (ie, seeking input from the village pump, not contacting individual users on their talk page which would be targeted and perhaps biased), but further discussion doesn't seem to be fruitful as the same arguments are being discussed over and over... Anyone who endorses my statement as a resolution to end this discussion please state so. I am including this as a formal measure that if Jmfangio continues to be disruptive to WP or this project, an RFC may occur. You are right, we are not a democracy. We also don't let those who yell loudest get their way. The consensus has been established and confirmed. Please respect it. MECU≈talk 13:46, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I endorse Mecu's statement. Seancp 13:52, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I also endorse the statement. Gopherguy 14:43, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Pending any novel arguments, shifts in policy, or new information, I concur. I don't want to stifle discussion and debate but the consensus appears to be very clear among the group currently addressing the issue and further discussion doesn't appear at all likely to change that. --ElKevbo 14:46, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Come on guys, this isn't how consensus works and you know it. You all know what side I am on. But getting a consensus regarding a CFB topic on this WikiProject is a huge difference from getting a consensus from Wikipedia as a whole. If Jmfangio is truly serious about this issue, then it is my suggestion he files a request for comment and open this issue up to people with no bias. We can all engage in the discussion there but it will also be visible to people not familiar with this debate.↔NMajdan•talk 18:35, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

There have been issues with actions on both sides of the debate. Jmfangio has in fact already solicited opinions from a wider audience, that of Wikipedia:WikiProject Universities, which developed a small thread rather than driving additional participants here creating a WP:MULTI issue. It would have been appropriate and polite to have informed those involved in the discussion here that he had done so. I believe an answer there was supplied such that he won't seek an RFC, but if he does, I trust he would inform the participants here of that action. AUTiger » talk 19:17, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• You have got to be kidding me - I clearly asked for more input on the discussion. I wasn't soliciting for people to support me - I said "perhaps some more input would be appreciated." I also informed them that the discussion had not gone well. WP:MULTI is NOT applicable. I posted there and asked for comment here, that's not splintering a topic. The fact that some people responded there does not mean that the discussion has been splintered. It's simply means i asked for more people to look at the discussion. You guys needs to do a better job of communicating circumstances. I am quite serious about this discussion and will pursue it further as the circumstances change. Jmfangio| ►Chat  19:30, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

You have misread what I said; I did not say that you solicited support, I said solicited opinions referring to all opinions, which is fine. However, there is indeed an issue (though relatively minor and, I will assume, unintentional) with MULTI because a parallel discussion was taking place at that page of which interested and involved parties here were not aware. I'm not sure what change in circumstances you are referring to, but once again, I trust if you raise an RFC, you will inform the parties already involved in the discussion.

Please clarify though; at the discussion at Universities, you seemed somewhat satisfied when WP:ENGVAR was raised (the reasoning and arguments of which have been raised in this thread multiple times, admittedly without naming that section specifically). Are you now saying you dismiss it? AUTiger » talk 20:54, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

An RFC would be most welcome if someone would like wider participation in this discussion. --ElKevbo 19:39, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• I understood exactly what you said. You said i was fractioning the conversation. WP:MULTI says "Avoid posting the same thread in multiple forums." I did not do that. I pointed others to this discussion and asked them to discuss it HERE. Jmfangio| ►Chat  21:33, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Here is the bottom line for many of us: (1) we can reasonably expect a reader to understand from the introduction to any football page that they are about college football and not college soccer (and we do not need to cater to the most ignorant readers on earth, just competent people who may not be familiar but can be brought up to speed from a good introduction); (2) universities often officially call their teams "____ Football"[15]. That's all there really is to know. --Bobak 22:50, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Teams outside the US

Looking at this from an outside perspective, can I suggest that for teams outside the US (and there are some) the term "American football" should be used in place of "football" in article titles. ("College football" isn't much use as college is a much looser term.) Currently almost none of the teams in Category:British Collegiate American Football League teams have the sport in the name at all and "Kent Falcons" means nothing when looking at Category:Canterbury Christ Church University (and not much more when looking at Category:University of Kent).

The other one where the naming convention doesn't quite work for some teams is "<School> <Nickname> football" - several of the British teams take in more than one university (and "school" is never used for a university here, but that's minor) and some might be using the city/town or county name instead * - e.g. the Kent Falcons cover both the University of Kent and Canterbury Christ Church University (both in Canterbury in Kent), the Leicester Longhorns cover both the University of Leicester and De Montfort University, the Nottingham Outlaws cover both the University of Nottingham and Nottingham Trent University, the Oxford Cavaliers cover both the University of Oxford and Oxford Brookes University, the Southampton Stags for both the University of Southampton and Southampton Solent University and the Surrey Stingers for both the University of Surrey and Kingston University (both in the historic county of Surrey).

(* It's not easy to tell at a glance as some appear to derive a name from one of the universities - e.g. the Caledonian Roughriders cover Glasgow Caledonian University but also the University of Strathclyde, and the ARU Phantoms cover both Anglia Ruskin University - a name which is newer than the team - but also the University of Cambridge.)

Timrollpickering 07:15, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• Interesting point about the naming of the schools. In the absence of a conflict then - couldn't the convention be <School> <"proper" name of institution> <nickname> American football team unless the <school> name creates a conflict. In which case, we create a conditional convention. Jmfangio| ►Chat  07:25, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

This could be a lot trickier than it sounds because it's not always clear if the teams are using "nicknames" as would be recognised in the US - some of these names seem to be the formal name of the teams rather than a construction combining a nickname with a university or place name. It's also not clear if they have any formal recognition by the institutions themselves - remember that university sport is not followed much by the public at large in the UK - see British Universities Sports Association (BUSA). Currently BCAFL is outside BUSA and it's quite possible some of the individual teams are not formally affiliated to the university Athletic Union or students' union, especially if they're taking in players from more than one institution. A few teams have websites located on university/union servers (e.g. Bath Killer Bees) but a lot don't. (And I'd be surprised if Napier University had sanctioned a team called Edinburgh Timberwolves, which isn't shared with the University of Edinburgh.) So should the university names be included and if so, what form? (UK "short form" conventions are not universal with acronyms, the university name minus "university of"/"university", "Foo University" in place of "the University of Foo" and even keeping the long form all in use and with institutions either encouraging wildly differing practices or deploring using any short form at all.)

And what's to be done about the teams that represent more than one institution, especially those that use just one's name or those that use a name that could refer to either the institution or the area? Any attempt to list in the article title all the institutions a team is currently made up of will absolutely shatter with the Staffordshire Stallions - Staffordshire University, Keele University, Burton College, Cannock Chase Technical College, City of Stoke on Trent Sixth Form College, Newcastle-under-Lyme College, Walford and North Shropshire College, Rodbaston College, Shrewsbury College of Arts and Technology, Stafford College, Stoke-on-Trent College and Tamworth & Lichfield College. Timrollpickering 09:57, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• That is why I think a convention that relies on conditions would be appropriate. First, let me preface this with something: I may not always use the "best" terminology. I'm clearly uninformed with regards to the University/College/Higher Education system throughout the world, so hopefully we can keep that in mind when discussing this. In the case of the Staffordshire Stallions - I'm not sure any changes are necessary. There are no ambiguity issues (as far as i can tell) because they are only team that plays (AF). Am I incorrect in that assumption? I am not sure how the system in Great Britain works when creating a "team name" for an organization that represents multiple institutions. With all this taken into consideration, I want to try something using the University of Impat (mascot: the Packrats) and Projur University (mascot: the Jelly Beans) (totally made up - so as to keep these as neutral as possible) I'm thinking we could do something like this (first ever try at something like this) Although this needs to be address on other project pages, it is directly applicable here, so if we can can get some semblance of consensus here -

When creating an article to discuss an athletic program for a "educational institution", article names should follow this format:

1. Identify the institution in question utilizing their "proper name" - In this case University of Impat or Projur University, not simply Impat or Projur

• Exceptions - Certain athletic organizations may represent a group of institutions. In that case, simply use the "most" acceptable organization identifier (so in the real world example of the Staffordshire Stallions - use Staffordshire)

1. Identify the nickname/mascot of said institution. If the article is about the entire athletic department, nothing further needs to be added. In the event that the article is focus on a specific athletic department within that institution, proceed accordingly.
2. If the institution is home to teams in multiple athletic disciplines, allow for disambiguation in accordance with WP:D. Thus, the article for the baseball team at Projur University would be identified as Projur University Packrats (baseball team).

• In the event that sport in question is somewhat ambiguous, please elaborate on. Thus, the American football team at the University of Impat would be identified as University of Impat Packrats (American football team). Their association football/soccer team would be identified as University of Impat Packrats (association football team) or University of Impat Packrats (soccer team).

• Now i'm not sure if team is necessary, but i threw it in there in case it was. Does this satisfy WP:NPOV, WP:Naming conventions#Sports teams, and WP:D. Jmfangio| ►Chat  10:41, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Yeah - I think I see some of the very big differences in US and UK practice (and terminology) here. I'm not terribly familiar with the way sports are done in US institutions but from what little I can see (and College football: "Many [College athletes] do receive scholarships and financial assistance from the university") the approach taken is very different from how it's done in the United Kingdom.

Although sweeping generalisations about UK universities must always be taken with caution (as there is so much diversity), in general sport isn't directly supported by the institution itself but by the Athletic Union or students' union, an autonomous body usually run by the students for the students. Whilst taking part is popular with many students, following it is rare amongst the non-sport (many will hear far more about the activities of the Rugby Club off the field rather than on it) and has very litte profile with the public at large - the Cambridge-Oxford boat race is the main exception (televised on national network television). Consequently there is far less institutionalisation of sport and few sports scholarships here than in the US. (Loughborough University is very much an exception that demonstrates the point - they've won the BUSA championship every year for over twenty years, and not had much overall competition for it.)

Similarly "sports nicknames" have very limited meaning in the UK. Certainly there's no habit of each team in a particular sport being identified by a particular nickname common to the institution. Also because some universities have multiple teams in popular sports, particularly football (soccer), rugby, (field) hocky, it'd be common to group them under something like "Rugby Club" or "Men's Rugby Club"/"Women's Rugby Club" as clubs are the normal method of organisation. One would talk of playing the "Queen Mary Football 1st Team" or the "Kent Hockey 2nd Team" rather than talk of a hockey team playing the "Kent Falcons (Hockey)".

With the BCAFL teams it's not clear if even the teams representing a single institution (e.g. Birmingham Lions) are following a "short university name + nickname" format or just taking it as a formal title. Certainly the Birmingham Lions website seems to do the latter, whilst the new Durham team appears to be affiliated to the Durham AU as "Durham Saints American Football Club" (with "Durham Saints" as the short form for competitions).

If as I suspect the UK practice is for teams to come up with their own formal title rather than a common construct (as appears to be the the US form) then the naming convention will need to cover this, especially as some teams can't go at just the individual name alone - Plymouth Blitz is an article about the city being bombed during the war and the current team article location is Plymouth Blitz (BCAFL) which means nothing to the uninitiated. So for example should an article on the Durham team be at:

• Durham Saints
• Durham Saints American Football Club
• Durham Saints American football team
• Durham Saints (American football team)
• Durham University American Football Club

The last isn't quite the official name but reflects the common rendering (in so far as there's a distinction, the club rather than the team is the unit of interest in most UK sports - again a point where two traditions clash). Timrollpickering 13:57, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• These are all excellent points. So here's a question, do you see the word Club/team as interchangable? From what I know - they are. In which case, it seems WP:NC encourages the "colloquial" term - UK organizations will use club and us will use team. That being said, in my reading of this stuff, it appears that team may not be necessary. I think it *should* be included, but I the move for conciseness is not to be overlooked. That is also expressed in the guidelines. The naming convention for sports teams addresses nicknames and that's what i tried to use in the above section. Unless part of a formal title football need not be capitalized (ex: National Football League is capitalized because that's a proper name). ( and ) are used in disambiguation cases. If there is no ambiguity - then there isn't any need to mention it in the title. That's why Atlanta Braves doesn't have (baseball) after it. As for Durham Saints vs Durham university, that's dictated by the circumstances. If Durham Saints is a collection of "college" teams rolled into one - then the convention would say use that instead of Durham University. The only reason institutions in the US require some disambiguation is because otherwise you wouldn't know what they were talking about. Simply putting University of Michigan Wolverines would imply that the article addresses their athletic department as a whole. If the article is addressing only one sport team then that needs to be asserted. Jmfangio| ►Chat  15:06, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

When there's only a single team (or a non team sport such as Caving) then the distinction can be trivial, although for what it's worth I've heard "club" used far more to describe the group doing the sport than "team", at least off pitch.

When there are multiple teams the distinction becomes clearer - the "club" is the overall organisation for people playing the sport (or not actually playing it) whilst individual teams are just groups for playing. One would talk of the "Women's Rugby 1st Team" or "Men's Rugby 2nd Team" (or even just the "Firsts" and "Seconds") when discussing how a team is doing, but the "Rugby Club Ball", "Rugby Club initiation ceremony" or "Rugby Club drinking games" (the latter two are rather noticable features of university sports here) and there are people who join the sports clubs for the social atmosphere rather than to play the game. I'd have to check but I think trophy results are recorded by club rather than team.

If Durham Saints is a collection of "college" teams rolled into one - then the convention would say use that instead of Durham University. Well it's not - it's a Durham only team. However if we start having one standard for the teams that cover one university and another for those that don't then we're going to get some inconsistencies, especially when it comes to disambiguation (which needs to be consistent for the Nottingham Outlaws and Plymouth Blitz). Should the "Birmingham Lions" be at "University of Birmingham Lions"? Would one talk of the "Michigan Wolverines" or "University of Michigan Wolverines"? Timrollpickering 20:21, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• • Silly question, what college sports teams outside the US are notable enough that they should have separate per-sport articles? Is this an academic (bad pun intended) question or is there actually an article that someone would like to create? --B 17:13, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

There are quite a number already. To start with some of the more famous in the UK the Cambridge University Boat Club (of The Boat Race fame) and many of the Cambridge college clubs have articles, then there's the Oxford University RFC (rugby) which is prominent in The Varsity Match, there's the Queens University Belfast A.F.C. in the (Northern) Irish Second Division and so forth. Category:Student sport in the United Kingdom has some of them either there or in sub-categories but it's not the best arranged set of categories and there are other articles. Timrollpickering 20:21, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

• This is definitely not an easy issue. I think it's important to have some sort of "guideline" in place to help people with this issue. As you can see, many people have very different opinions and this has led to a great deal of inconsistency. The NC for sports teams is somewhat sparse right now. It does give special attention to circumstances (North American vs Other) - so how do we expand on them so that the consensus that is establish is properly represented? Jmfangio| ►Chat  20:37, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

For what it's worth the Huddersfield Hawks has been proposed for deleted. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Huddersfield Hawks (I did not nominate.) Timrollpickering 00:19, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Welcome Western Kentucky!

Western Kentucky University officially joins D I-A (FBS) tomorrow, July 24th, 2007. They are in a "transition" period for 2 years and not eligible for conference (Sun Belt) or bowl games until their 2-year transition is over, starting with the 2009-2010 season. Anyone wanting to work on changing all the things that need to be changed because of this, please do so (category, the master team table, the number 119->120 everywhere, all the graphics, etc). MECU≈talk 19:43, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Let's say welcome to the 120th D-IA team! (and there are many sports writers who aren't even following the new naming convention). Big Red was always ready for the big time (wasn't it the only D-IAA mascot used in those Capital One Mascot Challenge commercials?) --Bobak 20:00, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

There was a year when YoUDee was featured as well. --Littledrummrboy 21:08, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

If the football transition is anything like the basketball transition, the NCAA will not list them a member of Division I-A until the transition period is over. Games against them won't count towards Div I-A wins. For the next two years will basically be in limbo. Moreover there are still only 119 Div I teams. So don't go changing articles quite yet. -- KelleyCook 03:26, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't know how it works now, but I know that when we (VT) played Florida A&M in 2004, that counted as a 1-A win for us because when we scheduled them, FAMU was planning to move to 1-A and they aborted the move during the spring of 2004. VT and Illinois got special exemptions from the NCAA to count the game as 1-A. As it was, it didn't matter - Illinois wasn't going bowling anyway and we needed to be 7-5 because of our pre-season game to go bowling anyway ... then the next year, the rule only allowing one 1-AA team every four years was done away with. --B 06:00, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, there was a rule change where D-IA schools are allowed to count a certain, limited number of wins over D-IAA schools as a bowl qualifying win. It wasn't one per season, but it allowed schools like The Citadel to get some extra paydays. As for WKU, I agree that they're not full-fledged until the end of their pledge season (heh). Now they get to be paddled by the major programs looking for a free "W". --Bobak 14:14, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

The old rule (pre-2005) was that you could count one I-A win towards bowl eligibility every four years. The new rule (2005 and on) is that you can count a I-A win every year. When VT scheduled FAMU for 2004, they were originally planning to move to I-A (2004 would have been their first transition year), but due to some internal mismanagement, they decided that spring to abort the move. The NCAA gave VT and Illinois credit for a I-A win because when we scheduled them, they were supposed to be I-A and it was too late to change. --B 17:10, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Scope

Ok, I've been thinking about the scope of this project and I think we should exclude some things from the project. In light of the recent discussion about naming conventions, I'm beginning to question whether any non-American university should be in scope. I think the only universities that should be in scope should be NCAA universities. Also, I'm beginning to think we should not include marching bands in the college football wikiproject. Short of half-time shows, what correlation does a marching band have to a college football program? Thoughts?↔NMajdan•talk 18:56, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Good point, explains a lot of the recent confusion. Since "college football" is much more developed in the US (there isn't anything in the world close to the giant machine, good or bad, that surrounds the NCAA and related inter-institution college football), I'd recommend that the international equivalent be "university football" (esp. since the word "college" in many countries connotes a different sort of school than some of the major universities calling themselves college in the US). Of course, the Canadians call inter-university Canadian football "university football". As for marching bands, many of them only perform (in full size) at college football games, rallies or graduation ceremonies due to size limits. I agree they could be moved into a different category. --Bobak 20:41, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

With the creation of Wikipedia:WikiProject Marching band, I don't think there is a need to keep them under our umbrella when they are MUCH better suited under there. I'll wait for more input before I take any action.↔NMajdan•talk 21:15, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

How about if NCAA is under WP:CFB, and if someone wants to work on Canadian "college football", they can be a sub-project off of us, same for Europe and elsewhere as well. Since we have generally been NCAA focused, it makes sense, but these other topics should (eventually will) get covered, so whynot just have them a sub part of our project? They can use what we've got developed as a starting point and just contribute or adapt as needed to their specific needs (naming, portal, master team table, etc). I agree that the marching bands, since they have their own wikiproject, shouldn't be under us. MECU≈talk 22:23, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

• I think these are all excellent points. Just remember though, that this doesn't solve the naming conventions problem. Jmfangio| ►Chat  22:54, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

What problem? Why don't we change all instances of National Football League to National American Football League? Don't mean to sound hostile but this shouldn't be discussed on this page anymore. That is, unless you are informing us of an RFC or some other form of mediation.↔NMajdan•talk 23:55, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

• As for the NFL vs NAFL, the league name is the National Football League. It's a proper name and thus, does not fall under the WP:D issue. In regards to, "In light of the recent discussion about naming conventions, I'm beginning to question whether any non-American university should be in scope"; removing non-US institutions does not mean that the WP:D issue is resolved. I was just clarifying that point in case there was some "assumption" based on that statement. Jmfangio| ►Chat  00:55, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

And "Michigan Wolverines football" team is the name of the American football team that is sponsored by the University of Michigan.Gopherguy 01:29, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

• Please stop making personal pov claims, I am agreeing with what is said above. But the University of Michigan football team team is NOT officially named "Michigan Wolverines Football". Jmfangio| ►Chat  01:33, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Why don't you define for me what would constitute them "officially" being called anything. I'd argue that the fact that they choose to call themselves that (check their website or media guide or just call their athletic department and ask) makes them "officially" the "Michigan Wolverines football" team. It's not a personal POV. It's the University of Michigan's POV and since it's their team, I don't think anyone else's POV matters.Gopherguy 04:01, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Sorry to get off-topic in this section, but Jmfangio, please read Wikipedia:Naming_conflict#Proper_nouns, Wikipedia:Naming_conflict#Dealing_with_self-identifying_terms and WP:D#Primary_topic. Thanks, AUTiger » talk 05:19, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

• Thanks AU - will hop on that right now! Definitely something for me to reread. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:21, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

• This is exactly why it's good for people to use wiki documentation. This will help move the discussion forward. Now one point on the proper nouns article is "If the common name conflicts with the official name, use the common name ..." That would support status quo if we were talking about a proper noun; but we aren't. This is a descriptive name (that points to the appropriate section). It says "Choose a descriptive name for an article that does not carry POV implications." I would contend that using football as opposed to American football is POV. The dealing with self-identifying terms section says "Where self-identifying names are in use, they should be used within articles." I would absolutely, without hesitation say that the section points to using football vs. American football within the article content. However, that does not appear to extend to the article title. It goes on to say "Where there are two self-identifying names in use and both are descriptive, then the uncontroversial name should be used. " Now from what i can tell, the projects contention is not that American football is ambiguous, rather it is simply "unnecessary". Whereas, the name football is ambiguous. I know people will argue that football is not ambiguous, but that is only within the context of the article. These are a function of a policy, which seem to supersede guidelines (WP:D. It stars off with "When there is a well known primary meaning for a term or phrase ...then that topic may be used for the title of the main article". That absolutely supports status quo, however, I think that's not 100% applicable here. Remember that the point is conditional (ie - it says "may" not "must"), but technically the article title is used to disambiguate between the various teams within an institutions athletic department (let's move away from specific ones). If said university had only one athletic team, you could leave out the term "football" or "basketball" etc... from the article title. I think while the various documentation pages show some support for the status quo, they (as best I can tell) overtly support a different way of naming these articles. Note, the quotations are not to patronize or antagonize anyone, they are inserted to assure that in case those pages change, the context of this discussion is relative to how they currently. Jmfangio| ►Chat  05:45, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Are we really going to go through this all over again? Seriously? Either inform us of an RFC or some other form of mediation or drop the issue. Seancp 11:50, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I regret, Jmfangio, that you still remain unconvincing when (1) usage (googled for quick example), (2) economics (college football is a very, very rich "industry") --as well as the very definition of the word college football vs. college soccer; and the use of the term by NCAA and college teams. If this were a trademark, "college football" --as used here-- would trounce whatever is held in the rest of the world, because college sports in the rest of the world do not come close to the (good or bad) size that they've reached in the US. I know you won't argue those points, because this is the third time the latter two have been brought up and there still isn't any adequate response. Please move on and bother another wikiproject, because you're becoming a gadfly. --Bobak 15:02, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I think you are misunderstanding and misapplying the concept of NPOV. As to the sections I pointed you to, one of the key points I hope you'd see was: Bear in mind that Wikipedia is descriptive, not prescriptive. We cannot declare what a name should be, only what it is. Beyond that, I'm not going to go into detail (to avoid the appearance of wikilawyering) but suffice it to say, I do not agree with your interpretation and application of the guidelines. And once again, that's what we're debating over, guidelines, which are not black and white or absolute rules. All this debate time is taking away from improving and maintaining content. AUTiger » talk 22:16, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Back on topic, would anybody object if I began removing marching bands and non-NCAA teams from the project?↔NMajdan•talk 15:58, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Sorry that I was part of hijacking your topic... I think your proposed changes are the right way to go.Gopherguy 16:25, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

• Nobody objects, I'd say go for it. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  16:52, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I think I got rid of all the marching bands.↔NMajdan•talk 22:08, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I also got rid of all the BCAFL articles.↔NMajdan•talk 21:31, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

I wonder if we should clarify the name of the project to Wikiproject NCAA college football? I did notice you added text to clarify/focus the project scope in the description which is helpful. AUTiger » talk 21:43, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

We need an FA

So, this project has been going on for a little over a year and we still do not have one Featured Article. We have two Featured Lists, but we need a featured article. What Good articles are the closest to FA quality?↔NMajdan•talk 00:50, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Did you nominate Oklahoma Sooners football for FA and were rejected for not having enough "bad" (aka NPOV) parts and more references, etc? I would think that would then be the closest. Vince Young was an FA for a short time, but then fell back to a B last I saw. There are probably lots of B articles with a little polishing that could be GA's as well. MECU≈talk 21:02, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Oklahoma Sooners football failed for POV issues.14:19, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Vince Young never actually made FA, only GA. Then it got demoted primarily because the NFL portion of the article is poor (although there are issues with the college section also). I have helped get several football articles to GA recently. I think 2005 Texas Longhorn football team is very close to FA because the GA nomination was very thorough and also because it has had a Peer Review. I have been hoping to give it another thorough pass and then FA nom this summer, but I've been off-wiki more than expected. I may get to it in August, actually. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Johntex\^talk 02:16, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

If anybody has time, please go through the WPCFB log and see what B articles are close to GA. Then go to the article's comments page (go to talk page, and click Comments in the WPCFB banner; see this example) and add what needs to be done to get the article to GA/FA. I just did two or three.↔NMajdan•talk 19:23, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Another issue with "American football"

I noticed that Jmfangio has been changing page titles today using American football such as renaming Calvin Johnson (football player) to Calvin Johnson (American football). While I was a bit annoyed at first, I have to admit that after thinking about it, in the case of disambiguation, it does make a lot of sense to me to specify "American football" because even if there is no "soccer" player by that name, it would reduce confusion by those who see the disambiguation page to spell it out completely. Also, I like dropping "player" out of the page title because often times a player goes on to do other things (such as coach) within the sport. Anyway, I wanted to mention this here so it can be discussed, but personally, unless someone has a strong argument against it, I support this change.Gopherguy 20:11, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I think that for players, that's probably a better naming convention, particularly for the common names where there are plenty of soccer and football players with that name. But there is one move that I just noticed that I think is more annoying than anything else. Everything in Category:American football positions has been moved to have (American football) after it. I think that's a really bad idea. Only football has quarterbacks, long snappers, etc. Those pages don't need to be disambiguated and if this were any other topic area, it wouldn't even be an issue. Do we rename United States of America to United States of America (country) I moved running back back to the correct article name before I realized how widespread this was. After I saw that the entire category was moved, I posted a message at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject American football to find out whether there is actually a reason for the move. --B 20:44, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I think you'll find that he made the change to support an assumption of that format in his {{Infobox NFLactive}}. His solution to a particular template feature required that all positions that would be used in that templates position field be formatted that way. AUTiger » talk 22:00, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok ... I read and replied to the discussion there. This is NOT an acceptable solution. We disambiguate because we have no other choice, not because it's convenient for a template. Either the template can link to a redirect page, users of the template can type four brackets, or the template can use parser functions for the 3 or 4 positions that actually are ambiguous. Renaming 30 articles for this is not acceptable. --B 00:28, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I support that change. 100% correct in my book. But changing school names to American football is ridiculous. Having, for instance, "Oklahoma Sooners American football" is a bad idea. Obviously, if you see that it is a team in Oklahoma, the American part is assumed. Just like we call our soccer team the United States men's national soccer team and not the United States men's national football team. With United States in the article title, having soccer is ok because we can assume what it means. Same thing for having Oklahoma or Michigan or any US State in the article title, American football is assumed.↔NMajdan•talk 20:56, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually I was about to bring up that team as well. I think Category:North_American_national_football_teams is particularly telling, showing the varying usage in the article name per the country-specific common-usage. See also Category:European_national_football_teams where XXX national football team is not disambiguated when there could in fact be confusion since there is an International Federation of American Football and IFAF World Cup. Suppose an American wanted to find out about the defending IFAF World Cup champ Japan and typed in Japan national football team? They'd end up reading about an association football team! (not obviously dabbed in the lede, btw) Oh, the HORRORS!! Someone should run over to Wikipedia:WikiProject Football and straighten them out. AUTiger » talk 22:00, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I support the person format when needed as well. AUTiger » talk 22:00, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

• I'm not sure why you insist on making off-color remarks. The position change referenced earlier was not done to solve a "problem" with a template. So please don't make assumptions on my actions. As per the rest of the stuff, I'm going to stay out of this until you people can discuss things without making personally motivated points. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  19:53, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

I have nothing personal against you, I am just responding to your actions. Are we to assume that you making a series of over 20 moves starting with Center[16] and ending with Placekicker[17] followed immediately by an edit to embed (American football)[18] in the {{Infobox NFLactive/sandbox}} template and finally a declaration that position "now works"[19] was all just a coincidence? AUTiger » talk 22:45, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

• Your recent edit summary was completely uncalled for. And yes, your assumption is incorrect. The decision to move the articles did not allow me to hard code the template. The hard coding was done however to reflect those changes. I really don't see any reason to discuss anything else with you until you stop making agitating comments toward me. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  22:59, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

• We should really stick with the simplest possible names. Virtually no one in the US says "football" when they mean "soccer". These teams in question are in the US and they call themselves "football" teams or "college football" teams, not "college American football" teams. Likewise, unless there is an American football player and a soccer player sharing the same name, we should stick to the simplest unambiguous name. In most cases, saying "football player" will accomplish this. Johntex\^talk 02:08, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

There is ongoing discussion at Talk:Wade Wilson (football) related to this issue after a move request was brought to Wikipedia:Requested moves. Dekimasuよ! 14:43, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I have no problem using (American football) to disambig a player. Looking at a name, there is no way to tell if the player is an American football player or a football/soccer player. However, when it comes to schools, I am against using American football. The name of the US State is in the title so the American football is assumed.↔NMajdan•talk 18:26, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Not every college or university with a football team is a public institution or a "University of <state>." --ElKevbo 18:42, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Question: What about guy like Milt Stegall who just broke the CFL touchdown record. He is American who is best known for playing Canadian Football. He is from Ohio played at Miami University and a few years for the Cincinnati Bengals. He is kind of stuck in the middle. If there is another person with his name, how would you designate him? Milt Stegall (Canadian football) or Milt Stegall (American football) or Milt Stegall (football) or Milt Stegall (Football player) … 09er 21:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Need comments regarding Colt McCoy

We have some disagreements over the coverage of the A&M game on the Colt McCoy page and would like some opionions on how much coverage should be given to a particular incident. Please leave your comments at Talk:Colt_McCoy#Section_Break. Thanks! Corpx 01:38, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Club football

I can't find anything on Wikipedia, other than articles mentioning that this exists. Am I (a total non-jock) looking in the wrong places, or what? --Orange Mike 19:42, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I dont think club-level sports have the notability to be mentioned here. Corpx 19:53, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Shouldn't there be a paragraph somewhere (maybe in College football) telling non-athletes what "My boy plays club football at UW-Milwaukee" signifies, compared to saying, "My boy plays football at Oklahoma"? The distinction may be clear to some folks, but to many others (especially non-Americans) it is totally opaque. --Orange Mike 20:03, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it definitely doesn't meet the notability for Wikipedia. See Wikipedia:Notability (people), but extrapolating, it's a minor part of this sport. It's why we barely cover DI-AA (FCS) and lower (also because of the lack of interest, but...). I would think a line in college football that explains the levels and says that club level is had a many places, but isn't prestigious and more of a thing for some to do other than a thing for serious, talented competitors (except maybe ones that can't qualify because of grades?). MECU≈talk 23:38, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Your statements strike me as incredibly elitist and insulting to the many thousands of people who regularly participate in club and intramural sports not out of a lack of talent or desire for prestige.

I'd imagine there are more than enough sources for one to write an article about club sports and intramurals although it might better fit or at least start its life as a section in an article about amateur sports. On the collegiate level, NIRSA probably has many excellent resources that would be a good starting point for research. In the meantime, a brief mention of club and intramural sports, including lightweight and flag football, would definitely be a great addition to the college football article if they're not already mentioned. --ElKevbo 23:45, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think club sports deserve their own articles. I ran intramural cross country in college and there was no criteria needed. As an example, at Notre Dame a large majority of students participate in a club or intramural sport, however many of those don't need or deserve to be mentioned at all. I think, if a school is big on intramurals or club sports and there are sources, maybe a small section in the athletics section (or student life section) of that school could talk about it, but otherwise I don't think they are notable enough to warrant anything more. Phydend 00:32, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

IM stuff should be considered on the same level as student organizations. There's just no notability beyond a small scope. Corpx 06:32, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry - I was not clear in my original statements. I meant that we should have an article about "Club sports and intramurals" in general, not that we should have an article about each club sport or intramural at each institution. I agree that very few club sports or intramurals at a particular institution would be notable enough for an article dedicated solely to that team. --ElKevbo 11:30, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

A couple peer reviews

I have a couple peer review requests up at WP:CFB/PR. I would appreciate if anybody took a look at them.↔NMajdan•talk 19:34, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Input requested

Please see Talk:2007 BCS computer rankings and provide input to the issue. MECU≈talk 15:51, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

WP:CFB Archive clean up

I've cleaned up the archive files

• Moved from the dead Werdnabot to MiszaBot for autoarchiving.
• They are all now in the nice monthly format (previously 2 were just numbers and the rest were monthly)
• Manually moved some threads back to the month of the thread start date (the shadowbot clone of the dead werdnabot apparently didn't get that aspect quite right)
• Turned on the Indexerbot (which should run sometime in the near future); this is a nice feature for finding old discussions.
• Reformatted the archive box and the overall placement on this page.

All in all, a nice pre-season cleaning -- KelleyCook 20:03, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Kelley!↔NMajdan•talk 20:08, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:NCAAFootballSchool

I was looking at some of the soccer sites today. In their tournament pages, they have the current year's tournament built into the info box. I know we have some teams with current season pages, so I added a line into the infobox. Check it out at TCU Horned Frogs football General125 17:01, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

You need to fix or change the image (it's a soccer ball) associated with that parameter. Otherwise, not a bad idea. But why isn't the division included in the template (or that particular instance of the template on that article)? --ElKevbo 17:06, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind about the soccer-ball image. It appears to be in widespread use for all sports. I don't particularly care for that but I understand the practice. --ElKevbo 17:07, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Yea, I thought the samething about the stupid soccer ball. If someone has a nice cartoon football, maybe we could come up with our own? What do you mean by division in the template? General125 00:40, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Is the team in one of the Division I subdivisions, Division II, or Division III? --ElKevbo 01:21, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Bleh, I kinda disagree on this. Even though the article exists, I think it gets too much into the covering current events thing (WP:NOT#NEWS) Corpx 04:53, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

We could probably put something in there called League and it would link to NCAA Div I, II, or even NAIA, etc. General125 02:34, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Why would we name it "League" and not "Division"? --ElKevbo 02:39, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Lou Holtz priority

Someone has recently changed the priority level of Lou Holtz's page to high. It had been rated as low priority before that. I believe he should be rated mid priority. If you have any input to give, please give it on Lou Holtz's talk page. Thanks! Gopherguy 20:41, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I have never done any work on prioritizing so I don't really know what the criteria are, but as much as I hate Holtz and ND, the man did win a national championship. I've got to believe that deserves no lower than mid, and perhaps even a high priority. Seancp 22:00, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

See here for the definitions on priority.↔NMajdan•talk 22:04, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Does it really matter? Corpx 23:22, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, since they were asking what priority the article should have AND we, as a project, have defined priorities, I thought I'd let them know where those definitions were. Do priorities matter in the grand scheme of things? No. Matter of fact, when I rate articles, I typically leave priority blank. Also, on the Univ of Oklahoma project page I created, I didn't even use the priority field.↔NMajdan•talk 01:16, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Removal of college stats based on WP:EL

Comments needed @ Talk:Vince_Young#Statistics where an editor thinks these stats can be removed from articles based on WP:EL. Thanks. Corpx 06:10, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Expert review: Gary Cismesia

As part of the Notability wikiproject, I am trying to sort out whether Gary Cismesia is notable enough for an own article. I would appreciate an expert opinion. For details, see the article's talk page. If you can spare some time, please add your comments there. Thanks! --B. Wolterding 14:45, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Change to {{WikiProject College football}}

I'd like to add a dropdown to our banner that included the assessment comments for easy viewing. {{College-baseball-WikiProject}} has exactly what I'm referring to. Look at that template - I'm trying to add the "Assessment comments" part to our template but have ran into some issues. I'm going to keep looking into this, but if anybody else wants to take a stab at it, feel free. I've been adding some comments to some B rated articles on what needs to be done to get it to GA. This makes it easily visible from the Talk page of the article itself.↔NMajdan•talk 22:08, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind, think I got it.↔NMajdan•talk 18:40, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

• Nice job, if you have any more template ?s, I'll be glad to help out - just hit me up with a note on my talk page about where the discussion is. If i can't do it, i know a few people who are uber-awesome at editing templates. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  23:01, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Penn State

hi, just thought i'd mention that Penn State football, for such a storied program (far as i can tell), appears to be badly underdeveloped compared to say, Texas Longhorns football. maybe knowledgable folks here would be willing to give it some attention. Mct mht 00:08, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

One problem with Wikipedia its limited by (1) the number of editors working on a general topic (like college football) and (2) the interests of those people who happen to be working in that area (i.e. Texas or USC vs. Penn State). The good thing is that anyone, including yourself, who thinks more should be written in an area can go out and start adding (correct, preferably cited) information! --Bobak 23:08, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Peer review requested for Birth of Minnesota Golden Gophers football

I've just listed my new page Birth of Minnesota Golden Gophers football for peer review at WP:CFB/PR. I'm interested in getting the article rated and getting ideas on how to improve it. Thanks! Gopherguy | Talk 20:37, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

• I'll be glad to jump in if i'm still around in a bit, but one question - the content looks like it's heading in the right direction, but I'm not sure the article title meets WP:NAME. Why would this not be something like "History of Minnesota Golden Gophers football"? Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  21:32, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree. The article title should be History of Minnesota Golden Gophers football.↔NMajdan•talk 21:35, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks - I'd appreciate hearing what others think. I named it "Birth of" instead of "History of" because this article only covers the timeframe of the start of the sport in 1882 through the 1899 season, so it only covers a small part of our history. I was originally going to call it "19th century Minnesota Golden Gophers football" or "Minnesota Golden Gophers football from 1882 through 1899" but I didn't think either title captured the fact that we were dealing with the very beginnings of the program. It was also pointed out to me here that a title like that will seem artificial because I picked a nice, round year like 1900 as the time boundary when, in fact, 1900 is a very significant year for our program as it represented the start of our first long-term coach. My gut says that "Birth of" is the best way to name the page, but it's not written in stone or anything. Gopherguy | Talk 21:44, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

• How's Early history of Minnesota Golden Gophers football? Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  21:51, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

OK - that makes a lot of sense. I'll rename the page after the peer review process and DYK nominations have finished just so I don't cause confusion about where the page is. Gopherguy | Talk 22:52, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

• Sounds good, I'm trying to deal with a pretty intense situation right now, but i'll be glad to throw in my two cents shortly. You've definitely started in the right direction - i just haven't read any of the content. I am hoping to have my situation dealt with today and then to finish up my massive edits to Joe Montana that i've bene working on for a few weeks. Once that's done, I'll be available to look at this if needed. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  23:00, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
• Does this still need some attention? Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  03:42, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, the page was listed in the DYK items last night, so once I've gotten some comments about the page through the peer review process I'll go ahead and rename the page, updating links as appropriate. Gopherguy | Talk 15:35, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Standings template?

Unless I've missed it, we don't seem to have a template for standings. Whenever I see them on pages, they always seem to be done by hand with wikitable. I think one should be developed for general use. Does anyone care to take a stab? I'm willing to give it a try, but I've never created a template, so I'd have to learn the language before I could dive in. Gopherguy | Talk 19:27, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

• Great idea. I'm in the middle of doing something on another template, but as soon as i'm done (hopefully with in the next 30 min.) I'll be glad to help you out with this. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  06:07, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• I'm starting to work on it User:Jmfangio/standings template. I'm going to finish the table layout and then convert it into a template of sorts. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  09:11, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for taking a look - I've left some of my thoughts on how it could work on your user talk page. Gopherguy | Talk 14:52, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• Quick note - i left a message there for you so lmk your thoughts and then i'll respond. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  17:41, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

{{NotreDameFootballSeasons}}

I recently changed this template to make it more like {{NittanyLionsFootballTeams}} and {{LSUFootballSeasons}} (on a side note, is there a naming convention for these types of templates? they seem to be all over the place with some combination of School or Mascot, Football, and Teams or Seasons) with every season listed, and perfect seasons and national championships listed in a table below it. My reasoning and such are on the talk page Template talk:NotreDameFootballSeasons and I was hoping people could weigh in on their opinions there about the new format (I don't know if anyone actually watches the template, no one replied the first time). Also, it seems like there is a problem putting this template above others, which puts the others inside this template. I temporarily fixed the problem by putting it below other templates on the pages it is on, but I was hoping someone in this project might know more and be able to fix it. Just wanted to try and get some feedback. Phydend 03:31, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

We decided before that we shouldn't create individual season pages for non-notable (ie, non national championship) seasons in the past. It's okay to do so going forward with the present, but to go create 1900-1989 for Colorado wouldn't be of value. These are then lumped together by the head coach, so "Colorado Buffaloes football under Gary Barnett" instead of a page for each of his seasons. The by-season template could reflect that as well. There isn't a naming standard. We just track these on the master team table for ease. If anyone wants to standardize the names, go ahead, and then put it on the naming standards page as well. MECU≈talk 16:48, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I definitely wasn't planning on making the individual season pages except possibly for national championships (if I, or someone else, ever gets around to it). I think there was an AfD in the past about individual seasons that was withdrawn, but when it was over I know at least the LSU pages were all merged to pages like LSU Tigers football, 1900-1909. So like I said, if I get around to it I might create articles like the LSU one and then lump the non-notable ones under coaches (like your example of "Colorado Buffaloes football under Gary Barnett"). When that happens I'll change the template to point to those pages. Phydend 17:30, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Manual of Style Discussion

I would like to call people to join in an imortant discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Dates ranges in infoboxes/templates. This project has a number of infoboxes where this discussion is applicable. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  02:42, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

2007 Mountain West football season

I just discovered 2007 Mountain West football season which doesn't follow our standard formats because it's a conference and not individual teams. But, these teams won't likely get covered otherwise, (sans TCU & BYU which already has a page) so it may be a good idea to bulk these less-covered teams into pages like this for starters, and split out teams if it gets to big later. Just including schedules though may make this single page rather large though. Any ideas? MECU≈talk 18:46, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: IMHO, the article should be moved to 2007 Mountain West Conference football season. Eliminates any possible ambiguity for people who don't regularly follow college sports. — Dale Arnett 14:46, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

2007 Preseason polls

2007 preseason polls (AP and USA TODAY) are up! Here's a direct link. BlueAg09 (Talk) 03:58, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I've created a simple table to keep track of both polls. The rankings are extended beyond 25 — many teams not in the Top 25 still receive votes. Currently there are 53 teams that received votes in either poll (47 in AP and 49 in USA TODAY). I did not think it would be appropriate to create a page for this, so the table is on my user page. I will try to update the table as often as possible. If anyone knows of an article in which the table might be useful, let me know. Iowa13 18:26, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Sound like you might not be aware of the 2007 NCAA Division I FBS football rankings article where the project already tracks the big polls (and the 2006 version). Also, I've seen one (or both) of the AP and Coach's polls caution against using the "Others receiving votes" as a ranking; they don't support the idea that those represent #26, #27, etc. AUTiger » talk 22:45, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I found the 2007 NCAA Division I FBS football rankings article several minutes after posting. I was not aware that the polls do not encourage rankings extension. Thanks for that piece of information. Iowa13 21:31, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Looking for things to do?

I went through the first 20 2007 season pages listed on 2007 NCAA Division I FBS football season and mostly fixed the use of the schedule template (or lack thereof). Please use the schedule template instead of creating a table for standardization purposes (see {{CFB Schedule Start}}). Also, please do not use TBA for time/tv information. This was heavily discussed before and nearly unanimously decided against using it. Please help me get all these standardized by finishing them off from Miami Redhawks on down the list. Also, the LSU and Miami Hurricanes recruits need to be put into the template system.

For anyone that is new, we have many templates developed to make your job of keeping these pages up to date easier, just see Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Templates. Also, please see the standard season page format we developed at Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Yearly team pages format which was developed amid much discussion.

Lastly, if you need help with anything, just ask for it here! I and the others that have been around awhile thing using these template systems are easy (we created them), but if you need help, we'd be glad to help you. If you have questions, ask away. MECU≈talk 15:23, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I noticed on one of the season pages you changed the date from (ex.) 8/30/2007 to August 30. Is that preferable? On the {{CFB Schedule Entry}} it says date and the examples are all of the 8/30/2007 kind, while the Yearly team pages format gives the August 30 kind. Like you said, for standardization purposes, which one should it be? Phydend 15:36, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The standard on the season page was the 8/30/07, but putting 07 is redundant and so I changed it to just August 30. I'll go update the examples on the template pages. So if it's the 8/30 way, it isn't wrong, but it should be changed, especially since linking the date like August 30 will allow users' preference date setting to be used (in other parts of the world it will get displayed as 30 August). MECU≈talk 16:34, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Alright, that makes a lot of sense. Thanks for clearing it up. Phydend 16:43, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Will that look right for January Bowls? While I assume readers aren't stupid, I think some Wikipedians do and it might inevitably come up --might have the answer ready to go now. --Bobak 18:43, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I've kept the years and updated the all USC season page schedules to the correct format. Thanks again for the tip. The only confusing issue was that, if you don't have the times, you need to turn it off (no) on each entry or it automatically throws in a blank (at least when I did it). --Bobak 23:38, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by if it will look right for January Bowls? I guess you mean because it's 2008 (for example) and since none of the other dates have years it will look funny? I doubt it. Throw the 2008 in on the end as well. It should be a mark of pride that it looks funny since they got to a Jan bowl. I'm fine with adding the 2007s, but perhaps just add them if it needs a 2008 for clarity? MECU≈talk 00:49, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Two things: (1) I was concerned the boxes might resize funny if only one box had the the additional 6 character/spaces for year and (2) without the new year clarified I could see someone complaining that it might be misconstrued as January of the same year as the rest of the game (silly, I agree, but not something I would put past happening). With that said, I just tried out your suggestion on dates on one of the article I was working on (2004 Trojans) and it worked well. --Bobak 15:42, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Article For Deletion - Opinions Please

OK, well, something I've been planning to do for a while and just started today has been nominated for deletion. I think the main LSU Tigers football page should be mostly prose, like Oklahoma Sooners football is. There was a ton of tables and other non-prose like information in the article, so to remedy that I created LSU Tigers football supplemental information. I had brought this idea up here a few months ago, asking for naming suggestions. So anyway, I created it today and moved the tables from LSU Tigers football to LSU Tigers football supplemental information and just a few minutes ago it got AfD'd! See: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/LSU Tigers football supplemental information So here the thing...if it really doesn't belong on Wikipedia then fine....we'll delete the article. But I feel like it does have a place on Wikipedia, especially since this information existed for a couple years on the LSU Tigers football article without anyone complaining about it ever. I would appreciate your comments on the AfD page. Thanks. Seancp 20:06, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

• That's stuff you usually find in a media guide, along with lots of other trivial information. I say put it at WikiSource Corpx 19:18, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

AFD for Robert Marve

Please see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert Marve and comment there. MECU≈talk 13:25, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

• I really do not think articles should be created for recruits/players who havent played a down of football, let alone start for their respective team(s). This stuff belongs on rivals.com/scout. Corpx 19:17, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

FA Nom

I have nominated 2005 Texas Longhorn football team as a featured article candidate. All feedback is very welcome. Johntex\^talk 23:24, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

• Two editors have really dug into the FAC and made a lot of comments. As a result, I've made a lot of changes. Additional reviews would be greatly appreciated. Johntex\^talk 03:21, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

AFD for Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jeff Wickersham

• Also see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Herb Tyler

Corpx 04:52, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

List of achievements by ____

We need 3rd party opinions on whether List of career achievements by Vince Young should exist or be merged back into Vince Young. Please leave comments at User_talk:Corpx#Vince_Young. Thanks! Corpx 08:58, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

YOU are Wikipedia's best photographers (Take pics this season)

Yes, fellow WikiProjectionists(?), the strength of this entire project is the giant army of citizen editors and the long lens of their cameras. Are you going to a game? Take pictures! They can be of the game (great for season pages for both teams), the stadium (cheap seats are great for stadium photos, let me tell you...), the school (esp. if they don't have much), the traditions, and even players and coaches if you can get close enough. Are you near your team's practice? While they may not be cool with you visiting the actual practice (some are), you can always try and get photos as they leave or enter --a lot of players love that attention. If you'd rather not ask for just their picture, get your picture with them and simply crop a version of just them for here (that's how I've contributed some celebrity photos). Do you know someone who's taken photos and would be willing to give them to Wikipedia under a friendly license? (CC "free with attribution" are a good lure) Then offer to help upload and credit them. So remember to go out there and shoot someone this season! --Bobak 16:35, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

It shouldn't be hard to get photos. Most people on message boards who take pics will gladly (at least in my experience) license it out under cc2.5. Its kinda hard to get good pics unless you have a uber leet camera though :( Corpx 16:51, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

2007 season

Just to let you guys know, over half the BCS schools do not have a 2007 season article. Here's all the teams without one: CardinalHawkeye17's sandbox. I will get to work on the Big Ten schools included and I also might start one for Iowa State. The season's only a few days away so I guess the sooner we start them the better. I realize they might not all get created but there are a few notable teams like Rutgers that need one. Thanks. CardinalHawkeye17 20:30, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think we should create a page just because they are a "BCS school". If they are top25 then they should be created and everyone in WP:CFB should help keep it updated, otherwise (ala, Colorado, my team) they should only be created if someone is willing to keep it updated and put the effort into it. What we decided before was that any season can be created and kept if it's updated and well-maintained because it could be useful in the end and we don't know at the start and to encourage more coverage without the fear that in the end it will be deleted. But, creating these without support is kind of meaningless. Unless we're willing to say as a project that we'll at least cover the schedule and some other minimums we adopt? We could decide what the minimum for a page is (schedule, coaches, players/roster, etc)? MECU≈talk 02:50, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

The minimum idea is a good one. Honestly, I think an intro and schedule along with the team template that goes at the top right should be the bare minimum. I've seen pages relating to seasons in the 1800s and early 1900s and that seems to be the norm among individual seasons. Rosters and players for teams way back could be very hard to find unless you have some good sources. CardinalHawkeye17 22:25, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Stadiums as part of this project?

See Category:Unassessed college football articles where most of the 191 articles there are stadiums. I think we weren't including stadiums under the project and would like to continue that way, but is there a Stadiums WikiProject that we can send all these to instead? Anyone have a problem with this? MECU≈talk 12:30, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

• Just annex it :) Nothing wrong with being under the scope of multiple wikiprojects (if another one exists) Corpx 15:27, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I think stadiums should be apart of the project. The stadium is a very important part of a college football team. You've got The Big House, The Swamp, The 'Shoe....↔NMajdan•talk 16:16, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

• I am the one that tagged most of the stadiums. Category:College football venues is listed on the College Football project page under “Wikipedia articles on College football.” Under the Scope section of the project, stadiums fall into “Anything else relating to college football.” Most of the stadiums are primarily used for college football. If there is better project for these articles I have no objections to moving them, but I did not see one when I was tagging them. If the articles were tied to a project it was mainly associated with at geographic area or state project. 09er 21:09, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Metric measurements

In the article Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the Northwest, someone added "(16 m)" to a phrase, making it read "stopped at Minnesota's ten-yard (16 m) line". Ignoring the fact that it should be 9 meters (the person who put it in was thinking km to miles when he did the conversion), how does everyone feel about this? For the time being, since the actual measurement was wrong, I removed it from the article.

Personally, I think that the "ten yard line" is more than a distance measurement - it's essentially the name of a specific place on the field and putting a metric measurement in with it obscures that fact. If we were talking about the distance a home run was hit or a javelin was thrown then I would absolutely agree with tacking on the metric equivalent (although you could probably argue that the javelin throw should feature the metric measurement as the primary one). Or if the article said that "Northwestern was stopped 10 yards from the goal line" I think that it could be argued that a metric equivalent made sense. I'd like to know what others think. Gopherguy | Talk 18:13, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Interesting thought. I mean, when you say a running back had a 1,537 yard season, you don't really think how far that is in feet let alone meters. It's more of the special "football" measurement. I'd love to hear other opinions. --Bobak 18:15, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

That is an interesting thought, but I agree that the 10-yard line is a specific place, not exactly a measurement on the field. I can see the metric equivalent being added to yards in a season or a game, but I really do think the specific yard lines shouldn't have it. Phydend 18:32, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Without sounding too biased, I do not believe the metrics have a place in CFB Corpx 15:06, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Corpx. Although if somebody really made a push, I would probably agree to allowing metric measures on statistics but definitely not on field placements.↔NMajdan•talk 16:56, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It is an interesting argument. I noticed it yesterday on a read-through of one of the CFB articles as well (I think it was actually on College football, but I could be mistaken). I agree that the phrase "10 yard line" has a specific meaning that is only slightly related to the measurement of distance, however, saying that metric doesn't belong in CFB articles at all is a bit too much. Yes, we've had recent discussions about internationalization of CFB articles and the consensus was that since CFB is a primarily American subject, American English standards should apply. That doesn't mean that we can completely ignore international norms (like the SI system of measurement). I'd say add metric equivalents where distance is being discussed and leave it out of field placements. After all, even in the CFL it's a "10 yard line" not a "9 metre line." z4ns4tsu\^talk 17:14, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I think it was that way for NFL Europe too. MECU≈talk 19:00, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Teams under coaches articles

I was told that it had been discussed before and non-notable past seasons for teams should be placed in articles grouped by the head coach (like <School name><Mascot name>football under<Coach name>. So I created a page (Notre Dame Fighting Irish football under Tyrone Willingham) of three pretty non-notable seasons (no national championships, no BCS games). But now, someone suggested the article be split because it is POV to have an article like this and not other coaches. I can't find where this was discussed to say that the seasons should be grouped under coaches, because I want to cite it to oppose the split. Does someone know where this is and could point it out to me? Also if anyone wants to add to the discussion please see here. Thanks. Phydend 00:32, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind, it's been resolved. I would still like to see where this consensus was decided upon (I think it's a great idea, it's much easier this way), but no one needs to weigh in on the discussion anymore.Phydend 01:01, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It's in the archives of this page somewhere. If I had to guess, it'd be in May. Use your search feature on your browser to help you. The links to all the archives are at the top right of the page. MECU≈talk 12:39, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Wouldnt it be a rehash of the 2002, 03, 04 Notre Dame Football seasons? I personally see it as unnecessary Corpx 13:21, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It appears they have started covering the history by having everything at Notre_Dame_Fighting_Irish_football#History but then have season pages 2002 (which just has a schedule) and every year since, so yes, a Notre Dame under Ty could be redundant, but since the 2002-2004 pages are just a schedule, they should be deleted and the Ty article be developed. See Template:NotreDameFootballSeasons. MECU≈talk 14:32, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I've looked at it this way - if the season articles are very small, I'd prefer them to be grouped under a "under coach" page, but if the individual seasons have a significant amount of information, then I'd rather leave them separate and an "under coach" page is unnecessary. That's why I haven't created a Minnesota Golden Gophers football under Glen Mason page even though there is a Minnesota Golden Gophers football under Jim Wacker page - I will eventually add enough information to the individual seasons under Mason (and will add the two that don't have pages yet) to make them good enough to stand on their own, but I don't think that the seasons under Wacker will ever be as fleshed out enough to justify individual pages. Gopherguy | Talk 14:48, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I was planning to bring up to redirect the 2002, 2003, and 2004 to the Ty article. I made the 2002 and 2003 pages redirects after I made the Ty article, but someone decided to take the schedules from the article to make templates, remove the redirect from those pages, and put the templates on the pages. I was going to bring up the discussion on those pages soon, just haven't had much time (I'd already brought up the discussion on the 2004 page). The old discussion on this is on the March archive, but it is pretty short, so if anyone wants to bring up problems, now would be just as good a time as any. There are already examples of grouping like this (see most of the Penn State articles, like Penn State Nittany Lions football under Joe Paterno (as an Independent) and Penn State Nittany Lions football under Rip Engle) and I don't think the page goes against any of wikipedia's guidelines. The page isn't just stats or schedules, and I think it's much better to group them like this instead of having the individual articles for pretty non-notable seasons that probably won't get expanded much. Phydend 14:52, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

That seems ideal - to redirect the seasons articles to <School> under <Coach> Corpx 14:56, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

The redirect solution is what I used when I created Oklahoma Sooners football under Bob Stoops to cover the 1999 and 2001-2005 seasons. z4ns4tsu\^talk 17:18, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

User:Jaranda/Notabilty (sports)

Hi, I strongly recommed this project to give your notabilty guidelines for a new notabilty proposal that I'm creating on my userpage, once it is completed, I will move to wikipedia namespace for the community to decide. Note I do have some concerns about your notabilty guidelines, (I don't agree with the notabilty of certain college football players and seasons) but we could always discuss on the talk once its moved to wikipedia namespace. Again the community decides this. Thanks Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 22:59, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Hasn't this issue been beaten to death already? And then Johnny-Come-Lately here comes around and nominates a plethora of articles for AfD. It's just so frustrating the amount of time spent defending legitimate articles on AfD pages. Jaranda, please accept already established standards and let the work of making Wikipedia the BEST college football resource on the internet get done. Seancp 23:09, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It's notabilty for all sports, which is obviously needed Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 23:19, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Why? The same rule should apply everywhere. If there is interest that transcends mere reporting of the person's existence, they are notable. The same goes for teams, rivalries, etc. As with all things, if it meets our general content requirements (NOR, V, etc), we shouldn't be overly anxious to get rid of it. That said, a lot of these team pages are totally uncited and that needs to be fixed. --B 23:46, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

• I agree 100% that this needs to be addressed. A universal notability standard is not possible or practical for sportspersons. For example open wheel racing and stock car racing are two very different sports. What constitutes a notable athlete in association football is likely to be very different than an athlete in the National Basketball Association. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  00:18, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Yea I went to all the wikiprojects I could find that have some activity (with the exception of baseball and american football ones, which I will write), if WP:MUSIC exists, this clearly needs to exist as well, and it needs to include all different types of major sports to counter bias, dealing with certain articles, and such. Notabilty of certain College Football articles are a subject that are sometimes discussed to death, a notabilty guideline on them will be helpful. And the community decides all changes per consensus, not me of course. Thanks Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 00:34, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

• I will mark that page for watching and I am happy to help discuss the creation of standards, while I'm sure there will be a number of opinions, i am well versed on a number of sports that are not "common to america" and that might help! Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  00:36, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Need third opinion

Under the football sub header of Texas Longhorns, the disagreement is about this line. Specific part is bolded.

The Longhorn football program experienced its greatest sustained success under the guidance of legendary head coach Darrell Royal, former Oklahoma Sooner safety and quarterback, who led Texas to three National Championships (in 1963, 1969, and 1970) during his twenty-year career with the Longhorns (1957-1976).

The disagreement is whether the highlighted part deserves to be mentioned there. Please leave comments at Talk:Texas_Longhorns#DKR.2FFormer_OU_safety Thanks! Corpx 18:50, 30 August 2007 (UTC)