Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive 7

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Request help editing college football infobox

Hi everyone, I'm trying to add a section in the infobox to include a diagram of the current team uniform, similar to those found on any NFL franchise article. I've added the template from the NFL franchise infobox to the college football infobox, currently as invisible text, and have been tinkering with it, but can't seem to make it work. If anyone can help me out, I'd appreciate it.CH52584 (talk) 02:07, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I responded on the talk page of the template. Cardsplayer4life (talk) 05:41, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

GA review: Talk:Crab_Bowl#Factually_accurate_and_verifiable

I need further clarification regarding this article title. Everyone from this project is invited to comment. Thanks. Viriditas (talk) 00:08, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Template:College Football All-America Teams

We've made a lot of progress in filling in the historic All-America Teams dating back to the 19th Century. Still a few more to go. The lists for each year show a number of consensus All-American players who do not even have stubs. I've been creating articles on some as time permits, and encourage anyone else with time available to work on this as well. Template below.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Cbl62 (talk • contribs)

• Great job, Cbl62. I've noticed your excellent ongoing work at DYK and on these articles a while back. If you could do us one favor, I think it would make things easier for the project; Do you think you can add the {{WikiProject College Football}} project template to the talk pages of the new articles you create that are related to college football? This alerts us to their existence and helps us find, read, sort, and, if something drastic happens, like a prod or AFD, let's us all know. Strikehold (talk) 23:14, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

• Will do. I've generally done that with my college football bio articles. But I've been cranking out the AA team articles pretty fast and overlooked it. Cbl62 (talk) 07:28, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

• Here's a sampling of consensus All-American players who still need articles: Johnny Treadwell (1962, Texas), Danny LaRose (1960, Missouri), Dan Lanphear (1959, Wisconsin), John Guzik (1958, Pittsburgh), George Deiderich (1958, Vanderbilt), Al Ecuyer (1957, Notre Dame), John Witte (1956, Oregon State), Bo Bolinger (1955, Oklahoma), Jack Ellena (1954, UCLA), Don Dohoney (1953, Michigan State), Crawford Mims (1953, Mississippi), Bernie Flowers (1952, Purdue), Elmer Wilhoite (1952, Southern California), Dick Hightower (1951, Southern Methodist), Johnny Karras (1951, Illinois), Dan Foldberg (1950, Army), Burr Baldwin (1946, UCLA), Holt Rast (1941, Alabama), Ray Frankowski (1941, Washington), Esco Sarkkinen (1939, Ohio State), John Schiechl (1939, Santa Clara), Chuck Sweeney (1937, Notre Dame), Andy Bershak (1937, North Carolina), Tony Matisi (1937, Pittsburgh), Leroy Monsky (1937, Alabama), Averell Daniell (1936, Pittsburgh), Larry Lutz (1935, California), J.C. Wetsel (1935, Southern Methodist).

• I wonder if all of the relevant yearly All-American articles should be cross-linked with the same year's football season? (perhaps as a new section added to the relevant articles or something?) Cardsplayer4life (talk) 05:31, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

• They should, and I've been doing on some, but irregularly. I'll work at conforming them so that they all cross-reference each other. Cbl62 (talk) 16:00, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Template:Rivals (coach)

Any input into this template? Contemplating expanding it to teams or players, depending on feedback. –  LATICS  talk  07:53, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Jim Brandstatter

Hi where can I find old player statistics? The guy in my article played for Michigan from 1969-1971. Is there a site with his stats? Please help me improve this article. Thanks. TomCat4680 (talk) 06:17, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

You should be able to find Brandstatter's college stats here: http://stats.ath.umich.edu/football/footstart.php Cbl62 (talk) 21:08, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Great. Thanks. That only says 1971 stats though, he played from 1969-71 didn't he? Detroit Free Press from November interview said so. TomCat4680 (talk) 23:37, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Brandstatter only played as a starter in 1971. Not sure he had any stats in prior years. Cbl62 (talk) 01:45, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Please verify the above and add any and all stats from his playing career (I only found them for 1 game vs Indiana in 1971 with the above link, there must be more than that, he said he played in the Michigan State game in 1971 in his Detroit Free Press interview from Novemember '07), and possibly a college football player infobox (is there one for players that didn't go pro?). I think his high school stats are notable too since he was heavily recruited by Michigan (he said so himself in the same article). Thanks. P.S. I also put in an expert in college football attention request, please help if you can. Thanks. TomCat4680 (talk) 21:26, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

• There's no reason to believe the school's database is inaccurate. Bear in mind that Brandstatter was an offensive tackle. Offensive tackles aren't likely to accumulate a lot of tackles, sacks, rushing yards, receiving yards, or any of the other stats that are logged in the database. Cbl62 (talk) 08:12, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Well I found a site that says he made the all Big Ten team in his senior year. and another of the Michigan yearbook with his picture during a game (class of 1972, image number 325: here) but it wants me to buy a subscription. I don't have a credit card though. Help? TomCat4680 (talk) 10:59, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

P.S. can someone fix Template:Infobox CollegeFootballPlayer so it doesn't show gobly goop next to his position? TomCat4680 (talk) 12:40, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Streamlining reassments

Currently, there is a list of articles to be reassessed at Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Assessment#Requesting an assessment. This system requires that an editor put the article in this list, and that somebody else assess the article and modify the list to reflect the reassessment. In my opinion, there is a better way to do this.

Over at WP:UTSH, we have a hook/note in the project banner that allows you to flag an article for reassessment, simply by setting a parameter on the talk page "reassess=yes". This puts the article in a category. For example, on WP:UTSH, that category is Category:U.S. Roads project articles needing reassessment. We could do something similar here, like Category:College football articles needing reassessment. Then, to request an assessment, simply set "reassess=yes" to flag it, and then an editor can assess the article, leave a comment, and clear the reassessment flag. Might be an easier way to keep the list clean, and would only require a minor edit to the banner template. What do you guys think?

PS: I've demoed a version of the updated banner and a test case in the sandbox. DeFaultRyan 15:51, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Request help on format of Georgia Bulldogs football

I am not sure if this is the right place to ask for help, since it doesn't deal with content, but since it is a college football page, I will ask here. On Georgia Bulldogs football I have noticed two formatting problems. The first is that the main infobox is overlapping some of the introduction. The other is that the infobox and/or images has created a large gap in the first section (History). I thought about tinkering with it, but I would just be wasting my time. If anyone could help, please do. If you think I should take this request to a more general help page, let me know. Thanks! Brinkley32 (talk) 15:05, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

It appears to be fine for me. It may either be your screen/browser or it may have already been fixed. –  LATICS  talk  08:37, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/DYK

I've created a project sub-page showing college football related hooks that have been featured on the Main Page as part of the "Did you know..." feature. It's at: Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/DYK. Any thoughts on how to improve it or link it to other project pages/templates? Cbl62 (talk) 06:34, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I went ahead and updated the DYK feature on Portal:College football/Did you know with new content and linked it to the full archive. Other suggestions? Cbl62 (talk) 21:25, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Expert quotes on player articles

There is an ongoing dispute between User:Yankees10 and me, so I'm asking you guys for some additional opionions. Do you think it is useful to have certain quotes (by renowned football experts) highlighted via Template:Cquote in players' articles, like here or here? I definitely think it is, but Yankees10 dissents. So what do you think? --bender235 (talk) 21:15, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

You should probably leave this at WP:NFL because Curry is in the NFL now and we could get more opinions if it is two places.--Yankees10 21:24, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Meaningless quote, and Jim Schwartz is no football expert.--Giants27 ^T/C 23:42, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Jim Schwartz isn't a football expert? I guess the 2008 Titans going 13-3 was a fluke then? TomCat4680 (talk) 08:56, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Just because your team goes 13-3 doesnt mean your an expert, but he is def. credible.--Yankees10 13:42, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

A 17-year NFL coaching career is usually tantamount to a certain level of football expertise, wouldn't you say? --bender235 (talk) 21:52, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

It's not about that particular quote (and that one is definitely not meaningsless, btw), but anyway if a coach with a 17-year NFL career isn't considered an "expert" in football, who is? --bender235 (talk) 00:27, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Quotes of this type make an article much more interesting, in my opinion.Cbl62 (talk) 00:45, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree, leave them in. TomCat4680 (talk) 09:01, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I put a quote from Herm Edwards in Brodie Croyle's article, mainly because it foreshadowed how much of a failure he was for the Chiefs organization. The quote is something like "Croyle is going to be a great player in our organization." I know this is unreleated, but I think putting quotes in the article make them better, even if Jim Schwartz passed on drafting Aaron Curry, he can still have an opinion. conman33 (. . .talk) 19:28, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

What exactly makes this quote any more important than any other quote? And again you should leave this at WP:NFL considering Aaron Curry is no longer a college football player--Yankees10 13:39, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

He had a notable college football career, and is thus within the area of concern for this project as well as the NFL, North Carolina, Biography, or whatever else project determines that he is within their jurisdiction. It is up to the individual projects to determine their own criteria. Strikehold (talk) 14:29, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

If a long time NFL coach is considering drafting you with a top 10 pick in the first round, that's pretty notable. Leave it in! TomCat4680 (talk) 07:45, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

disruptive IP editor

Could an admin do something to halt disruptive edits by an IP user, starting 157.182.224.###. The editor has repeatedly edited articles that link to WVU Mountaineers football articles – see the following links with final IP #s included: here (.216), here (.125), here (.120), and here (.88). The edits change proper formatting and wikilinking & references to WVU-related articles into ones that this user apparently prefers. I've had to revert them increasingly on Pitt articles in the last few weeks. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 16:20, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

You should likely report it at the Administrator intervention against vandalism. At least, that is the best I can come up with reading over the Wikipedia vandalism page. Cardsplayer4life (talk) 05:18, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Merge discussion of Michigan stat lists

See Talk:Lists of Michigan Wolverines football passing leaders. Dabomb87 (talk) 00:01, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Duplicate Ivy League templates

I've just found Template:The Ivy League which duplicates the older Template:Ivy League Dougweller (talk) 08:06, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the good catch. I'm cleaning it up. DeFaultRyan 14:24, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

 Done Fixed the one reference to it, faux-redirected to the original, and marked for speedy deletion. DeFaultRyan 14:31, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I considered deleting it myself, but besides thinking that it might be useful to check here, I've been mildly involved with the editor (removing a fake unblocked template he added with a sock), so thought it best to let someone else do this bit of dirty work. :-) Dougweller (talk) 19:36, 1 May 2009 (UTC) (an Ivy Leaguer myself)

Does your WikiProject care about talk pages of redirects?

Does your project care about what happens to the talk pages of articles that have been replaced with redirects? If so, please provide your input at User:Mikaey/Request for Input/ListasBot 3. Thanks, Matt (talk) 01:39, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Posted a respone. Some redirects (typos, capitalizations, etc) we don't care about. Go ahead and redirect them. Others are more substantial, and get turned into real articles (e.g. 1980 Alabama Crimson Tide football team) and should be left tagged. Just my $.02. DeFaultRyan 14:52, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Assessment drive?

Over the last two or so weeks I was able to assess little over two hundred articles. In the process I was able to find one GA, Germany Schulz, and one FA, Gerald Ford. Since it is the off season I wonder if anyone is interested in stating a drive to get rid of back log of unassessed college football articles? Right now we have about 1400. I figured if we can get 14 people to do 100 articles in the next month. 09er (talk) 15:29, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I could possibly help out a bit, just a matter of getting a good opportunity to sit down and focus on it. –  LATICS  talk  22:10, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I've been tagging/rating/cleaning like mad for a little while now. Just that new, unassessed articles keep popping up faster than I can do them. I'll continue, of course. DeFaultRyan 06:20, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

So far so good - nearly have the unassessed backlog down below 1000! Keep up the good work everybody. This will be a lot easier to mantain once we finally clear the backlog. DeFaultRyan 19:46, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

997! We are in 3 digits. 09er (talk) 18:02, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

I've got an bot request to automatically scan the whole unassessed category, looking for articles that have already been assessed by other projects, and assess them to match the other assessments. I imagine it should go through tonight or tomorrow and it should be able to check a bunch off the list automatically. For now, try to focus on articles that are unlikely to be rated in another project. DeFaultRyan 18:50, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

IT'S ALIIIIIVE... Bot is currently approved and running. Backlog is currently down to 819 and dropping fast. In a few hours the automatic should be done, and we should have a much smaller list to finish off. I'll bet that this auto-assess should prune at least half the list for us. DeFaultRyan 18:40, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I think the bot is done now. Final tally is it got the backlog down to 483. Nice! Now it won't take too long at all to finish off the rest. DeFaultRyan 21:34, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

It is a 1/3 of what it was at the start of April. 09er (talk) 14:37, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Now under 300. Wheeee! DeFaultRyan 20:42, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

We are now at 96! 09er (talk) 03:42, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

ZERO! 09er (talk) 15:26, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

WOOHOO! Should be pretty easy to stay on top of it now! DeFaultRyan 15:28, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Collaboration for J. C. Watts

Hi! I want to ask for someone from the Wikiproject to collaborate with me on the article about J. C. Watts by helping with football content. It is is pretty close to GA, but an ardent football fan quickfailed it recently for not having enough football coverage. The article falls in the scope of this Wikiproject and I would be very glad if someone contribued. Thank you! Hekerui (talk) 00:50, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Which player infobox template?

I mentioned a year ago that there are two player infobox templates ({{Infobox NCAA Athlete}} and {{Infobox CollegeFootballPlayer}}) but not a single recommendation which one to use. Could we please decide that one here? I'm prefering the latter, since it looks similar to {{Infobox NFLactive}}, which is only helpful to Wikipedia users. --bender235 (talk) 20:14, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

The CollegeFootballPlayer is a nice looking template, but I tend to lean towards the older one (NCAA Athlete) because it has spots for bowl games and other awards. Also, if a player is one of the rare superstars at the FCS or lower level (think an Armanti Edwards), it also has the space for tournament information. If someone could alter the other template to allow that, it would be better. --Bobak (talk) 19:12, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

How about adding a spot for bowl games to {{Infobox CollegeFootballPlayer}}? --bender235 (talk) 18:51, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I added the parameter. It is optional and only shows up if the bowl game parameter has something in it for the player. Cardsplayer4life (talk) 03:01, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Uniforms and Template:NCAAFootballSchool

With the recent changes to Template:NCAAFootballSchool to allow for the uniform images to be displayed, the uniform field (and some stray raw code) will still show up if there isn't anything entered for it (see, for example, George Washington Colonials football). Any chance someone with better template knowledge than me can fix this problem by making the uniform field conditional? Strikehold (talk) 12:59, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

 Done Try it now. DeFaultRyan 14:38, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

That did it. Thanks. Strikehold (talk) 14:49, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you as well. I'm working as quickly as possible to get the Div 1 football uniforms on each wiki-page. I'm extremely pleased someone found a way to hide the code until it is replaced with a pic. Awesome job!!! JohnnySeoul^Talk/_Contribs 03:04, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Lists of Michigan Wolverines football passing leaders

I have nominated Lists of Michigan Wolverines football passing leaders for featured list removal here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets the featured list criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks; editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. -- Scorpion⁰⁴²² 15:53, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

2009 FCS rankings

Since there is already a page for rankings of FBS teams for the upcoming season, I was wondering if we should add a rankings page for the FCS teams as well?Music+mas (talk) 16:04, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

College football on television

This article only lists what conferences television networks are affiliated with through television contracts. I was wondering if it would be better to change this. For example, have sections for each conference and within these sections give more specific and detailed information about the television contracts these conferences have. There's more specific and detailed information would include something like the number of games a certain television network is contracted to broadcast. Or if there is not a set number, the details of the contract could be written down in the sections. I think this would improve the quality of the article. Music+mas (talk) 15:54, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Articles need project tag

I've noticed there are a lot of articles out there that are within the scope of this project, but aren't tagged with the project banner and therefore are off the radar for assessment, improvement, etc. This is especially true for articles on players. I just went through the Category:Boise State Broncos football players and found that a full 33% (15 of 45) of articles weren't tagged.

A partial solution I can think of is to write a script for a bot to search for articles within certain categories (e.g. Category:Boston College Eagles football players) and tag their talk pages with the CFB banner if necessary. I've noticed ListasBot has been doing something similar to a lot of articles lately; taking lifetime information from the mainspace and tagging the talk space with it.

I don't know how to actually write the script to do that, but thought I'd bring it up if someone with the knowhow wanted to give it a shot. Strikehold (talk) 22:46, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't yet know how to do Wikipedia scripting either, but there is a pretty active bot community here, especially when it comes to tasks related to project tagging. I was able to get a bunch of articles auto-assessed a little while back by making a request on the bot request page. My auto-assessment request is archived archived here. Banner tagging requests are pretty common, so you should be able to combine the two into one task. Basically give them a list of categories to sweep and auto-assess. DeFaultRyan 03:53, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll put together a list and submit a request. It actually looks like all the categories I can think of that might be relevant are nested under Category:College football, so it should be a pretty simple request... Strikehold (talk) 04:05, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Just watch out for that warning on the request page about recursing subcategories. :) DeFaultRyan 06:13, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

I went through all the categories nested in Category:College football, and the only ones I see that need to be excluded are Category:NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision conferences and Category:NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision conferences. Did you have something else in mind? Strikehold (talk) 08:20, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Nope, not specifically. Just mentioning it. DeFaultRyan 15:04, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Copyright concern, help?

Hi. The article Ole Miss Rebels football has been identified as a copyright problem and will likely need to be reverted quite some ways if it is not cleaned (or if it cannot be verified that the source text is free for reuse). I am not a good candidate for revising football related articles, I'm afraid, as I am extremely unfamiliar with the sport. Might any of the participants of your project be available to help out? The article has been blanked per process and listed under today's WP:CP listings, which means it does not come ripe for admin closure for 7+1 days. Your assistance would be vastly appreciated. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 15:12, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Sweet! User:Allstarecho cleaned it up and saved the article. Three cheers! DeFaultRyan 22:31, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

TCF Bank Stadium GA Sweeps: On Hold

I have reviewed TCF Bank Stadium for GA Sweeps to determine if it still qualifies as a Good Article. In reviewing the article I have found several issues, which I have detailed here. Since the article falls under the scope of this project, I figured you would be interested in contributing to further improve the article. Please comment there to help the article maintain its GA status. If you have any questions, let me know on my talk page and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 02:40, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Matt Barkley

This player passed notability already, based off an exception high school career, so that part isn't in question. The problem now is a user, not from the college football project, feels that information on the three-way quarterback battle at USC (national news in the spring) as well as information about the player's personal life (well sourced) should be deleted. I've seen a half-dozen arguments cited, but they aren't strong and it just seems to be a classic case of Wikipedia:IDONTLIKEIT, which isn't relevant and assumes no good faith on my part (despite the fact that I've put together GA and FA articles in this topic and plan to keep developing the article). He's now started a discussion on BLP which is not pointing out that CFB has produced GAs like Mark Sanchez, Calvin Johnson and Darren McFadden --and those three either use "early years" or "personal" to address stuff that isn't necessarily football related. I would like to ask any interested WP:CFB participants to voice their opinion either on the Talk page or the BLP page, as this could set an unfortunate precedent for future player-of-note articles. --Bobak (talk) 20:40, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

2010 & other future CFB season articles

An article titled 2010 Auburn Tigers football team has been created. I nominated it for deletion, but the template was removed. I'd like to bring it up here, though, in order to get a greater sampling of thought. These types of future season articles have been shot down in other sports wikiprojects. In WP:WikiProject Football and WP:WikiProject Ice Hockey, it is inappropriate to create a team season article until the previous season for all teams involved in the league/competetion has ended. Isn't that the policy here as well? Would it be more appropriate to create something such as Colorado Buffaloes football (future schedule), although I think this may not be encyclopedic in its current form and need deleted. See WP:INDISCRIMINATE, specifically point #4. I believe that it would be more encyclopedic to delete the 2010 Auburn article and create something such as Future of Auburn Tigers football, where information about coaches' contracts, future scheduling contracts, and other such information could be collected and presented as a proper article, but I'm still not sure if it passes WP:Notability. Thoughts? Knowledge? Ideas? JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 12:01, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Why not add a section in the already existing Auburn Tigers football page entitled "Future Schedules". You could list all upcoming opponents for the next four years or so. You could also add information such as coaching contracts to the Auburn Tigers football page. This way you don't have to create a new article.Music+mas (talk) 14:15, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. This discussion has already occurred here, and while I don't remember the link to it offhand, the conclusion was exactly what you said. Don't create a season page until the previous season has ended, or at the very least, is significantly underway. A 2010 article would be premature at this point. I like Music+mas's idea - move it to the future schedule section of Auburn Tigers football and delete the 2010 article. In the meantime, I'll try to dig up the precedent. DeFaultRyan 14:50, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Found it. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2011 Kansas State Wildcats football team. 2010 is definitely a bit premature at this point. All we have is a schedule, which has a lot of potential for change this far out. Merge the info into the main team page, and delete. DeFaultRyan 14:58, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Merged and listed for deletion (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2010 Auburn Tigers football team). DeFaultRyan 15:28, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

You can find some ideas and discussion at WP:CFBSEASON that might help.--Paul McDonald (talk) 16:37, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

College Baseball/MLB

Not quite CFB, but would like thoughts on whether or not to add a "College" field to the MLB Player infobox Corpx (talk) 03:29, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Just a thought (and I'm not super-knowledgable about baseball) I'd think it would be okay, but not all pro baseball players go to college--don't most go right to the minors?--Paul McDonald (talk) 16:36, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

2005 Oklahoma vs. Texas football game GA Sweeps: On Hold

I have reviewed 2005 Oklahoma vs. Texas football game for GA Sweeps to determine if it still qualifies as a Good Article. In reviewing the article I have found several issues, which I have detailed here. Since the article falls under the scope of this project, I figured you would be interested in contributing to further improve the article. Please comment there to help the article maintain its GA status. If you have any questions, let me know on my talk page and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 06:19, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

"West Precedent" Update

Hey gang, rember about 9 months ago when we got nailed with all kind of AFDs on head coach articles under something people called the West Precedent? Wanted to post an update--right now, 47% of those deleted have been restored, many have gone through multiple processes and reviews by outside editors and all have been reviewed by the deleting admins!

Want to help with the rest? Check out my user page listing User:Paulmcdonald/deletedcoach where I've got user pages set up and many of the articles have had some significant work on them. Some just need a few more touches and they'll be ready!

But the neat part here is that we now have a serious argument using WP:SNOW that a head coach article should not be deleted. Of those gone through deletion in a huge block, nearly half have been restored--and there's more to come! I'll grant you it's taken a lot of time and research, but that should still carry some serious weight in our AFD discussions and ability to make a case for notability.--Paul McDonald (talk) 16:35, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Notability concern: Individual teams by season

I note that there are currently pages for the 1941, 1956, 1957, 1960, 1962, 1964, 1988, 2000, 2003, and 2006-2009 Oregon State Beavers football teams. It is not obvious to me that individual teams by season are inherently notable. I expect, though, that members of this WikiProject would have more informed opinions on this issue than I do. What do you think? Cnilep (talk) 21:20, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

It comes up every now and then, see here for some discussion on it Wikipedia:CFBSEASON Ryan2845 (talk) 21:24, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

I can't speak for every member of this project, but I believe standing consensus here is that all seasons for a major college team are notable. Each individual season, even when marked by mediocre or poor performance, has wide-ranging effects on other notable topics, for example, head coaches, notable players, and "more" notable teams that win conference championships and contend for the national title. And there is really no more appropriate location to place that information. Also, any season like this will have received extensive coverage in the media and other reliable sources, which satisfies the general notability standards. Many of the teams you cited participated in a postseason bowl game.

Those articles you give as examples aren't well developed, but when expanded these can be extremely useful and interesting articles (which, though not the only factor in notability, is indeed a consideration. WP:BIO, for example, says "The topic of an article should be notable, or "worthy of notice"; that is, "significant, interesting, or unusual enough to deserve attention or to be recorded.""). See for example, the Featured Articles 2005 Texas Longhorns football team and 2007 USC Trojans football. Good Article 2008 Maryland Terrapins football team is for a team that won neither a conference championship or a national championship, but all three contain information that could not reasonably be included elsewhere due to WP:WEIGHT considerations.

This issue has been discussed several times at AFD, and usually concludes in concordance with my above statements. See for example: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2008 Oregon Ducks football team, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2005 California Golden Bears football team, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1906 Auburn Tigers football team, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1902 LSU Tigers football team, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2006-2008 Southern Oregon Raiders football teams (resulted in "no consensus", but this is a lower-level team), Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2005 Northern Iowa Panthers football team (second-highest level team, resulted in "keep"). Strikehold (talk) 21:40, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Bobby Dodd infobox

So I just added {{College coach infobox}} to Bobby Dodd's article. I managed to fill in most of the fields, but I have a question. He was nominated to the College Football Hall of Fame twice, as a player (1959) and as a coach (1993). Is there any way to represent that in the infobox? Also, is there a listing of awards by coach somewhere? I'm sure he's won something or other, I just don't know what. —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 22:37, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

In other news I'm thinking of nominating it for Good Article. Any general advice on it before I do so? —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 06:49, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

I went ahead and nominated it. —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 04:50, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Content dispute at Quarterback U

Could some other editors please take a look at this article. There is an ongoing content dispute between myself and User:Cgsports12 who is attempting to include research from a newspaper article that he wrote himself. The info includes statistics that could conceivably be useful, but there is so far no evidence to show that it is directly relevant to the term covered by the article. There also may be conflict of interest and original research issues at hand. More information is on the article's talk page. Strikehold (talk) 03:17, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Deletion without discussion

There was a discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Toilet Bowl (game) where it looks like no one from the projecdt had a chance to participate.--Paul McDonald (talk) 03:07, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

It does appear to have been a poorly cited article. I'd actually never even heard of the term.↔NMajdan•talk 12:15, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Conference Football Season

I saw that there was a template for Conferences' respective football seasons {{2009-10 NCAA Division I FBS football conferences}}. Is there a layout that we should follow to create these pages? I saw that they were somewhat similar and I would like to start one for the MAC. Thanks.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 15:46, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

As far as I know, this type of page is relatively new, compared to team and division seasons. I don't think there is any kind of standard style guide yet, so maybe we could add something like that to the project style guide. Personally, I like what has been done with the 2009 Big Ten Conference football season article, which is why I emulated it in the Mountain West article. DeFaultRyan 21:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Steve Belichick

I have just deleted the article Steve Belichick because it was, from its earliest revisions, plagiarized from a book by David Halberstam. I've restarted it as a very short stub. Any help in expanding it would be appreciated. Thanks. Chick Bowen 22:00, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Change in project archival method

Would there be any objection to changing the way threads on this talk page are archived from the current date method (i.e. May2009) to a more prevalent numbering system (i.e. 1)? More projects use this method making it more standard and it is supported better by other bots for indexing. Also, it would allow us to specify a page size before incrementing. Right now, we are having months with less than 10 threads so the archives are becoming too numerous. Any objections?↔NMajdan•talk 13:41, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

No objections. I'll implement this today.↔NMajdan•talk 14:20, 1 September 2009 (UTC)

GAN backlog reduction - Sports and recreation

As you may know, we currently have 400 good article nominations, with a large number of them being in the sports and recreation section. As such, the waiting time for this is especially long, much longer than it should be. As a result of this, I am asking each sports-related WikiProject to review two or three of these nominations. If this is abided by, then the backlog should be cleared quite quickly. Some projects nominate a lot but don't review, or vice-versa, and following this should help to provide a balance and make the waiting time much smaller so that our articles can actually get reviewed! Wizardman 23:39, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

In need of Editing Help

Hey peoples, i need someone to help make the reference links (since i dont kno how to make them) on the 2009 NCAA Division I FBS football season page and mabye even clos off the table (for now, as there are still more games left). I did my best in makeing each key game column good and entertaining as well (even tho im a noob at editing). cheers —Preceding unsigned comment added by JDM08 (talk • contribs) 04:11, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

I'll take a look tomorrow if nobody else has. But for now, try taking a look at WP:REF and WP:CITET. Citing references is an important part of editing Wikipedia, so it would probably be best to get learned up.↔NMajdan•talk 15:07, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

GA thoughts requested

I haven't been involved in editing college football articles but chimed in as second a second opinion for the GA review of Maryland Terrapins football. It was the original reviewers opinion that the lead was to long and I see it as being focused too much on the accomplishments of the coaches. I was wondering if anyone more familiar with these articles had any thoughts. I'm reading it as I am reading it but I could be completely wrong. I also wanted to mention that this is one of the better college football articles I have come across. Not even sure if I would prevent the promotion or not if I was the primary reviewer. Assuming it gets to GA sooner than later, any other thoughts from project members on how to get it higher in the assessment scale (FA?) might be useful.Cptnono (talk) 07:35, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

A lot of times, an outside observer's opinion (one who does not read CFB articles on a daily basis) is usually more subjective and beneficial since that is our target audience. Should be easy to understand for those that are familiar with CFB and those that are not. But, I will give it a once-over.↔NMajdan•talk 13:27, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

I meant to say "I see the lead as being focused too much on the accomplishments of the coaches." (That changes the meaning quite a bit).

Thanks for the input, Nmajdan. Those are all things to fix that no one else caught.Cptnono (talk) 22:21, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

I'll take another look at the lead. Some of my suggestions may go beyond the scope of GA. Honestly, With the exception of the Dark Ages section header, I'd probably approve GA as is. Just some concerns on some sections lengths before you approach FA.↔NMajdan•talk 22:50, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

New College Football Team Depth Chart Template

I have created a new template to help with the task of creating team depth chart displays. It eliminates the need to have any HTML or Wikitable editing abilities, which used to be a real pain (and the results were still inconsistent). I have implemented the template on several articles:

• 1981 Clemson Tigers football team#Depth Chart
• 2009 Clemson Tigers football team#Depth Chart
• 2009 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets football team#Depth Chart
• 2009 Alabama Crimson Tide football team#Depth Chart

Please take a look at the template and its documentation and give me some feedback. Cheers!--CobraGeek ^{The Geek} 15:27, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Good job; I like it. However, unless the school or a periodical of some kind of periodical publishes a verefiable depth chart then this would constitute WP:OR, especially the "Key reserves" section, which smacks of requiring OR in order to fill it out. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 15:54, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Revisiting format of List of NCAA Division I FBS football stadiums

I made a suggestion here and I would appreciate the input of others. Thanks.↔NMajdan•talk 17:05, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

New referencing format

Just passing on some general wiki knowledge. There is a new way to cite sources in articles and I find that it helps declutter the text of the article allowing all the cite templates to be put in the {{reflist}} template. You can read about it here and here and I've used it in one of the articles I'm working on so you can see it in action on List of Oklahoma Sooners in the NFL Draft.↔NMajdan•talk 22:02, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Peer review request

I have submitted List of Oklahoma Sooners football seasons for peer review. Any help would be appreciated. A link to the review is here. Thanks.↔NMajdan•talk 21:04, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

I just submitted List of Oklahoma Sooners in the NFL Draft for a peer review. Again, any advice would be appreciated. A link to the review is here.↔NMajdan•talk 23:18, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Box score and summary in game summaries in season articles

Long section title, sorry. I was looking for a way to possibly improve on game notes for the 2009 Pittsburgh Panthers football team article that I've been working on, and I came across something interesting. Most articles seem to use {{Linescore Amfootball}}. However, I came across {{AFB Game Box Start}}, {{AFB Game Box Scoring Entry}}, and {{AFB Game Box End}}. Those templates aren't used as frequently as the Linescore template; AFB Game Box Scoring Entry is, as of this writing, only used in two articles! What's the consensus on these templates, and do we want to use them or not? As you can see at 2008 Kansas City Chiefs season, that when implemented it places the statistics in a box and allows for a prose summary that is more infrequently interrupted by scores, times, and statistics, than in other articles such as 2008 Indianapolis Colts season and many other number-heavy sports season articles. Thoughts? JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 16:28, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

I just saw those a couple days ago myself. I decided not to use them because I felt it did duplicate some data that was already present in the schedule table but it did have some other useful data but I just wasn't too inclined to seek out a source for weather and announcers. So, for me, it simply came down to more effort than I was willing to put in. Besides, it a bit larger than the regular score template so it needs a bit more text in the section to compensate - something else to keep in mind. But I am not against others using it at all.↔NMajdan•talk 16:56, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Hey everyone. I just went into the aforementioned box score templates and created documentation pages for each one. They should be much easier to use now. Check 'em out and let me know what you think. The only thing that I know for certain that will need done is to create additional fields for additional overtime periods in order to accomodate the overtime system used in the college game. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 13:43, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

List of Heisman Trophy winners is broken

Can somebody please take a look at the article above? Its a featured list and a pretty prominent list for our Project and it is severely broken and needs immediate attention. I don't have time this weekend to search through the numerous changes of the last three days to identify which edit broke it, but if no one else addresses it this weekend, I will on Monday.↔NMajdan•talk 02:38, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Ok, found some time. I reverted to a version from 8 days again. I went through every edit and didn't see anything constructive so hopefully this revert is ok. In a list of Heisman Trophy winners, especially one that is already featured, it pretty much just needs editing once a year.↔NMajdan•talk 13:31, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Wrong link for All-American team

The Sporting News link is linking to the 2007 year in 2006 College Football All-America Team. See comment at Talk:2006_College_Football_All-America_Team#Sporting_news_link_to_wrong_year.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 04:44, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Nominated List of Oklahoma Sooners football seasons for Featured List

Comments are welcome and appreciated. The nomination is here.↔NMajdan•talk 17:23, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Nominated List of Oklahoma Sooners head football coaches for Featured List

Comments are welcome and appreciated. The nomination is here.↔NMajdan•talk 17:23, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Suggestion for linescores

I think it would improve the appearance of seasonal team articles if we enabled the use of colors in the team cells in the linescore template (i.e., where team names now appear simply in black against a white background, edit the template to allow allow the text and background in the team fields to appear in each team's respective colors). The score fields would be left in black and white so things don't get too loud. It's a small suggestion, but I do think it would be an aesthetic improvement and be beneficial to readers by giving them a sense of each team's colors. I'd do it myself, but I must confess I lack the technical wherewithal to edit the template code to allow this.-PassionoftheDamon (talk) 11:01, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Meh. This is an encyclopedia, not a coloring book.↔NMajdan•talk 15:33, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Colors are used all the time in Wikipedia to great illustrative effect (e.g., 2009 NCAA Division I FBS football rankings, various infoboxes, tables in rivalry articles like Red River Rivalry, etc.). Large swaths of black-and-white are not terribly attractive to the eye. Aesthetics do matter and help improve the overall quality of articles. I suspect similar considerations animated your decision to stylize your signature.-PassionoftheDamon (talk) 12:07, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

The article that you referenced, however, uses "softer" colors, whereas if we were to use team colors in the linescore template, then it could get too noisy or unaesthetic.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 00:28, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm actually the one that toned down the colors on Red River Rivalry. I thought about ditching them all together, but thought I'd respect the edits of the original editor. They previously had the full school colors and it made it very difficult to read.↔NMajdan•talk 01:21, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Keep in mind that we also have some readers who are colorblind, and using colors in certain combinations may be unwise. See WP:COLORS#Using_colours_in_articles. Oren0 (talk) 00:03, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Getting Portal:College football back in shape

Been working on this the last couple of days. Any additional help would be appreciated. Instructions can be found on the select picture page and selected article page. Converting them to the new format is tedious. Previously, we had to make sure we had a new selected article every month and a new image every week. This new format I'm working on uses a new (well, new since I worked on the Portal last) template that picks an article or image at random. Feel free to ask any questions if you are willing to help.—NMajdan•talk 19:03, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Logos on articles of past seasons

There is a recent wave of edits removing logos on individual team's yearly pages with the reasoning of "not the team's logo in this year; didn't become logo until xxxx". It is of my opinion, that there is no existing policy or criteria that requires use of historical logos in the infobox in this context, as the logo in the infobox is for the identification of the article topic to the reader. For this reason, contemporary logos might better serve here for identification purposes for the association of the team with the institution it represents, using the modern incarnation of how that institution chooses to represent itself. This is not to say that it is wrong to use historical logos, but it should not be required in my opinion, as a single year or sports team is not typically defined by one particular logo, rather it is a continuing and ongoing representation of the institution that currently choses to represent itself in a specific, and modern way. Historical logos or uniforms could also be presented in the text. This reasoning, in regards to the Pitt logo, was discussed with the single editor making this wave of changes here. I would like to try to form a consensus on the appropriateness of contemporary versus historical logos for past season infoboxes, as his edits have continued without seeking consensus for such a guideline or policy. CrazyPaco (talk) 19:00, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

I think it makes perfect sense to apply the then-current logo to any given season article. This is an encyclopedia, and an article about a team from 1976 should include, if possible, the logo that the team used in 1976. I find it hard to believe that a reader would become lost due to the use of an historical logo. If a reader finds his/her way to a specific team's specific, historical, season article then he/she is probably already familiar with the team. In a scenario where the reader is not familiar with the subject, the first line of the article as well as the infobox should already include a link to a more general article about the team and university, one that would presumably include a modern equivalent logo. However, mass logo-deletes seem a little unnecessary to me. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 19:27, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

I think that is a valid thought. However, two points for people to consider 1) should it be mandatory to use historical logos? and 2) What about for seasons when no "official" logo existed, i.e. it was much more informal as far as what was displayed. The further you go back in history, the more ambiguous this becomes because there was not as much emphasis placed on marketing practices as there is today. Also, what is the "official" logo for any year's team? It is the helmet logo? Is it a mascot logo? What about leather helmet era? How does this impact point #1? BTW, these mass logo-deletes are ongoing. CrazyPaco (talk)

I do agree that there are many historical teams that simply do not have logos. Pre-1950s college football teams are one example. Brian Reading (talk) 05:13, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I think this even gets to the question of whether the logos even team-specific? Generally, most logos tend to represent the entire athletic department and/or university. In that way, do they belong in the infobox at all? What is the purpose of the logo in the infobox in these cases: is to convey identity or historical information? CrazyPaco (talk) 18:27, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I realize that there was less emphasis placed on logos at points in the past than nowadays, but if something is available, something that was official or commonly used – and can be verified – then it should be applied where appropriate. I realize that doesn't sound like a law or rule because it leaves room for interpretation or variation, but college football was the Wild West for a long portion of its history. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 11:40, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Certainly I think guidelines could be set up to prefer the use of historical logos in the infoboxes. I also want to be clear the motivation for this discussion isn't based on having having logos available to populate the Pitt season articles as, thanks to a completely digitized on-line library of former media guides and student yearbooks, "logos" could be added the whole way back to the 19th Century. However, I feel uneasy about a mandate for their use, especially since the logos often don't fall neatly in the category of what is and what is not official. Once you start going down the road, how do you decide which logo is appropriate to use in a standardized way for the football team x of year xxxx? An example: for the 2004 Pitt season article, which of these three official logos do you use: helmet logo, arched Pittsburgh, the Pitt logo; or even the one that appeared on the official Fiesta Bowl t-shirts, a transition to the current logo, that was something like this? I think it has to be one of the first two, but If one choses a helmet logo, what does this mean for Notre Dame, Navy or Penn State? Even during the script-Pitt era, you had logos with block like this and this. Actually, I am torn on this issue because while I think it would be neat to have vintage logos, but I hesitate because of potential complications like above and also because I don't know whether that serves the purpose of identifying the represented institution. Is the point for the infobox logo to convey information about identification or historical context? Along these lines, many third party companies produced memorabilia using contemporary logos such as this football card of Tony Dorsett and how this memorabilia of Jim Brown uses the Syracuse block "S" that hadn't yet existed. There are many such memorabilia products that exist using contemporary logos. Is this preferable to using the vintage logos? Is this even applicable to Wikipedia? These are open ended questions I don't have an answer for. This may seem the issue is splitting hairs, but something needs to be addressed because of the ongoing wave of logo deletions. CrazyPaco (talk) 18:27, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Allow me to pose some questions.

1. What is the purpose of the lead image in the season-specific infoboxes?

2. Current-use logos are being deleted from season-specific articles on the charges of revisionist history. Is it true that use of current-use logos as the lead image in the season article infobox constitutes revisionist history?

3. Should current-use logos be deleted and banned from use in season-specific articles?

4. Should current-use logos be discouraged from being used in season-specific articles in favor of vintage logos, when available?

4a. If yes, is it acceptable to use a mix of current-use and vintage logos across season-specific articles for one team, particularly in years when no logo is available? How does this impact question number 3?

CrazyPaco (talk) 21:09, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I think simplicity is best way to look at this. I see four basic options (if we are going to use logos) with three contingency options if no logo is available:

1. Use the current primary logo for all of them
2. Use the current Public Domain logo for all of them (season specific is preferable) as the primary logo is usually, but not always copyrighted
3. Use a logo used during that season
4. Use a PD logo used during that season

Contingency options

1. default to the current logo of whichever option is chosen
2. default to the oldest logo of whichever option is chosen
3. no logo at all

I think options 2 and contingency 1 or 2 provide the best options. This minimizes the number of fair use copyrighted images we have (an expressed goal of Wikipedia) and still provides an accurate visual representation of the entity (i.e. the 2001 team)

This "revisionist" stance is the latest in a series of issues with the same user. I see nothing in any guideline or policy or any other consensus that justifies such actions. I recommend reverting and then discussing on the various pages under WP:BRD.

While I believe his motives to be pure, his tactics rub a lot of people the wrong way, create additional animosity, and don't usually help develop consensus. Please remain calm and don't get frustrated. We will all get through this. — BQZip01 — ^talk 18:22, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for outlining those possibilities so clearly. I agree with it completely and agree with option 2. My only concern is the contingencies in terms of inconsistency when no logo is available. For instance, if the 2000, 1980, 1960 teams for a school all have year-appropriate logos, but then 1950 does not and uses instead 1960 or current use? Which is more accurate or is less likely to confuse the reader? I would almost prefer contingency 3 and then I fall back to thinking option 2 with only current use may be the way to go. Then there is the issue of availability of PD logos across the timeline. Some schools may have used a non-PD logo for some years, and then reverted to a PD logo. PD logos may not be consistently available across the years (I just don't know for sure whether this is true or not). Really, I'm just not sure how to proceed. Perhaps it is best left up to the editors of the individual pages to determine what makes sense for each school/team? As long as it is clear current-use logos does not constitute revisionist history and vintage logos can be appropriate even if they cannot be applied consistently across all season articles for one particular team. Perhaps a better question is, should the NCAA Season infobox have an additional field for a "contemporary" logo for the particular season, if available? Would that eliminate the issue?

Regarding the user, as noted at the top, there were previous discussion with the editor who pulled the images, but he refuses to discuss guideline creation at Wikiprojects, despite my invitation and assurance that his input, regardless of stance, would be valued. To avoid edit warring, I have not reverted any but the Pitt season articles to which I actively contribute pending the outcome of this discussion, and for the others I have only placed a notice about this discussion on the respective talk pages of the articles that had their images removed. It is far to many articles to engage in discussion on a individual page-by-page basis. Unfortunately, I think most season-specific articles are lightly monitored for edits so those notices have not generated much additional input here. CrazyPaco (talk) 19:44, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I also agree that the contingencies are the prblem area. Quite frankly, it doesn't matter to me what we decide. Either option has its plusses and minuses. PD logos are not consistent across the years, but one exists at almost any time. How many time have you gone through the school bookstore and seen dozens of school trademarks. Many are simply

INSERT SCHOOL NAME HERE

INSERT SPORT HERE™

Note that it is always trademarked. I'm sure we can find old photos from just about any school to use with those, though they may take a little effort. Once you get past 1923, it doesn't matter if you choose a copyrightable logo or not as they are all PD.

As for the user in question, I have attempted many discussions with him on various forums (this has gone on since at least last December with some discussions easily eclipsing the 500KB mark). I think the only way to resolve this is to continue to discuss with fellow Wikipedians and work towards building a consensus, addressing concerns, and then submit it as a guideline to policy. While this will surely take longer and probably generate an RfC, mediation, or ArbCom submission on the subject, it will finally bring this to an end and we will have a concrete setup by which to create articles. — BQZip01 — ^talk 20:10, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Number of All-Americans?

Someone might want to look into the edits of Dutchbelted5 as he or she just changed the number of All-Americans in several articles. I don't see any sources cited for the old or new figures so it's difficult to tell if these edits are welcome corrections or vandalism. In either case, please consider more consistently citing sources in these articles. Thanks! --ElKevbo (talk) 06:57, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Per an earlier discussion we decided that the source for these (at least in the infobox) should be the NCAA Awards book and only include consensus all-americans. Although, I would say that majority of pages remain un-updated to reflect only consensus players. We may need to start an effort to update all the pages and place a reference to the ncaa awards book. Ryan2845 (talk) 13:44, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

What would everyone think of an All-Americans template that kept the number of every school's All-Americans and you simply pass a parameter to it to return the value? I've thrown something together real quick in my userspace to give an example of what I'm talking about. <Removed since the real template has been created.> Those are the only two schools I've programmed in the template so far. It would be a lot easier to control the number of All-Americans in one template than making sure every school's article is correct. This same concept can be expanded to many other areas as well. Heisman Trophy Winners, National Championships (maybe), bowl games, etc. Thoughts?—NMajdan•talk 14:44, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I had one worry, if this template was used in a table, would it still be sortable. A quick experiment shows that a table can remain sortable even if the template is used.—NMajdan•talk 14:50, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I like that idea ALOT! That would be a good way to hopefully put the debate over all american counts in the infobox to rest once and for all. Then we could just update the whole table from the latest awards book each year. Would also give us one centralized place to discuss discrepancies in the data ( i know of at least one error in the record book). If you can make it work and others agree, I say go for it! Ryan2845 (talk) 15:03, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

{{American college football All-Americans}} has been created. Long name, I know, but it had to be accurate. I'll work on populating data but any help would be appreciated.—NMajdan•talk 15:08, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I've got all schools with 5 or more All-Americans populated. Will have to work on the other ones over time.—NMajdan•talk 16:07, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Well crap. Just realized there is a newer version of the record book out. All that work. Oh well. Guess I'll go fix it.—NMajdan•talk

Added the 2009 data for, again, those with 5 or more AAs. I incorporated the template into Oklahoma Sooners football (diff) but found another bug. When using the template in a sentence, if you have a space between the template and the next word, it causes the next to be wrapped in one of those <pre> boxes (see here). A temporary workaround is to just omit the space after the template (i.e. "Oklahoma has had 76consensus All-Americans."). Crap, another bug. Still a work-in-progress.—NMajdan•talk 16:35, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Appears to be working now.—NMajdan•talk 17:34, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Template help

Can anybody get rid of the extra lines for the record at Frank Cignetti, Sr.? I'm not sure what I am missing. Thanks! Grsz¹¹ 22:19, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

I took a look, but I don't see it. What extra lines are you talking about? DeFaultRyan 23:51, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

I added additional fields since posting, but they are visible here. If the "Poll" field is not used, the columns still appear. Grsz¹¹ 00:39, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Also, is there any way to show multiple post-season games, whether using Template:CFB Yearly Record Entry or some other way? Grsz¹¹ 00:45, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Roster templates nominated for deletion

Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2009 October 13#College football roster templates—NMajdan•talk 20:50, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Claimed National Championship table

I've nearing completion now completed in my sandbox a table of sourced claims on national championships by every applicable school. Input on how to integrate into the existing NCAA Division I FBS National Football Championship article, or into its own separate article would be appreciated. The information and sources must specifically indicate which national titles the school claims and come from the institution itself (either the athletic website or media guide in most cases). The second and third sections in my sandbox would not appear in an article and are just to help me verify claims or a lack thereof while I'm researching the topic. Also, I'm stuck on Iowa. I can find no source indicating that they claim any football national championships. They would be the only team that I think might make an official claim (1958) but for which I can not find any source for. Any comments would be appreciated. CrazyPaco (talk) 02:02, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

New template for categories

I created the template Template:CFB Seasons Cat Header for use on the yearly category pages. I haven't started rolling it out to all categories yet but have placed it at Category:2009 NCAA Division I FCS football season so you can see it.—NMajdan•talk 20:55, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

You really need to parameterize the link in the header. It's pointing to the wrong articles. DeFaultRyan 20:24, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I did. header_link —NMajdan•talk 00:22, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Help!

I have a burning question of absolutely vital importance at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Entertainment#Extra point try. Magog the Ogre (talk) 17:34, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

season article categories

I recently created categories and sorting data for Big East football. For each of the 2009 team season articles I replaced the Category:2009 NCAA Division I FBS football season with Category:2009 Big East football season because the latter is a sub-category of the former. However, someone went back in and re-inserted the category on all of the articles. For a similar situation I would point to Category:English football (soccer) clubs 2009-10 season, which is a subcategory of Category:Football (soccer) clubs 2009-10 season. None of the English club season articles have the latter, more broad category on their page. I wanted to bring this situation up here to provide some clarification and get some feedback. Having both categories makes no sense because one is a subcategory of the other, but if that is the consensus of this project then I have no problem with it. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 16:22, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

First question that comes to my mind is, is this necessary? Do we need a subcategory for each conference and are we pushing the envelope of overcategorization? At most, Category:2009 NCAA Division I FBS football season will have, what, about 120 articles which is by no stretch too much. They would all fit on one page. But back to your specific question, you are right. The article only needs the lower of the two categories. So if it had the conference category, it would not need the division category.—NMajdan•talk 17:08, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Proposal on revising template

I have Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/American football on my Watchlist and find it to be a helpful thing to monitor. Since it is the most up-to-date listing of college football articles that are currently proposed for deletion, would it make sense to link it in the college football project template or someplace else? Cbl62 (talk) 22:45, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

We already have Article Alerts. Is that what you're looking for?—NMajdan•talk 23:28, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

The Article Alerts link has to be updated manually and tends to get out-of-date. For example, it doesn't currently identify any of the four college football articles that are currently up for deletion. On the other hand, the list at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/American football is routinely updated by people doing AfD's and, in my experience, is much more up-to-date than the project's Article Alerts link. 23:58, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Article Alerts is updated daily by User:ArticleAlertbot; see this page. And the reason those articles aren't included in the alerts is because they are not tagged with the WikiProject's banner on the talk page, at least that's the case with Jasper Howard and Marcus Davis (American football). However, I do not have an issue with transcluding that AfD page somewhere, I just don't want to duplicate the same information.—NMajdan•talk 01:06, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I tagged those articles with the WikiProject banner and they were added to the Article Alert. Again, I don't mind with your suggestion, but if you see a CFB-related article that doesn't have the project's banner, please add it.—NMajdan•talk 19:02, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I will keep that in mind. I do try to monitor Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/American football, and if I see an article posted there which lacks the WikiProject banner, I'll add it. Since such deletion discussions are likely to be of interest to project participants, I want to make sure that people here are aware. Cbl62 (talk) 22:13, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Another WikiProject task

I just came across a subpage that I didn't know existed. Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Cleanup listing has a list of CFB articles that are tagged with various maintenance tags.—NMajdan•talk 02:44, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Cato June/archive1

Please feel free to comment at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Cato June/archive1.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 21:21, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages

A new feature will be coming to the project in November December. Mr.Z-bot collects data for the most popular pages for a given WikiProject. I have added this project so the bot will collect traffic data for all the articles within this project's scope in November and in early December, the 500 most visited articles will be posted here. This should show us which articles are being read the most and allow us to focus more energy on those articles. With college football being so cyclical, the stats should be interesting.—NMajdan•talk 15:27, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Very cool. I'm looking forward to seeing this. I've got $500 bucks (not really) that says Tim Tebow and Colt McCoy, in no particular order, are #1 & 2. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 17:02, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

player bio pages

Just a reminder to keep an eye out. I did a check on the 2009 Pittsburgh Panthers football team roster the other day, and I found that about 10 player bio articles existed that hadn't been tagged with either {{WikiProject College football}} or {{WikiProject University of Pittsburgh}} on their respective talk pages. Most of them were or almost were orphans. This probably isn't a big issue for old-time players – or even players from earlier this decade – but there are lots of people out there who think that their favorite player or friend from school should have their own WP page. As far as I'm concerned, the ones that I found meet general notability (media coverage, etc.), but I'm sure there are ones out there who don't. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 17:09, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Also, tagging them with the project's banner will ensure they show up on the Article Alerts should the article be nominated for deletion.—NMajdan•talk 17:45, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Top College Football Upsets

The article referenced above is currently a mess. It is completely unsourced at this point and appears to consist of the creator's opinion as to what are the biggest upsets. If someone had the time and inclination, sources might be found to rescue this article and turn it into something worth saving. Cbl62 (talk) 01:55, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

To make a list of top upsets you would need to know the point spreads of every game in history. I'm sure there's a file at the sports book at the MGM in Vegas that has that info, but without that data (or some other source) this article is purely WP:OR. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 15:04, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Agreed.—NMajdan•talk 15:27, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

New categories popping up - are they needed?

User:Levineps has recently created a lot of new college football-related categories, and I'm not sure if they are needed. Examples: Category:College football culture and lore by team and all subcategories (is this necessary? What is wrong with the articles in these subcategories simply staying in the general football category?), Category:College football venues by team and all subcategories (all likely to have only a couple pages in the category), Category:College football head coaches by team (previous consensus has been against creating such a category scheme, see here, although I wouldn't mind taking a second look at this issue), subcategories of Category:College football announcers such as Category:Boston College Eagles football broadcasters (seems like performer by performance overcategorization). Thoughts? VegaDark (talk) 13:49, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Agree. Over-categorization, IMO. Most of the new categories will have only a handful of articles in them. It would be more useful to the average reader to have all the pages in the "<school> football" category. — X96lee15 (talk) 13:54, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Agree as well. What action to take? CFD?—NMajdan•talk 14:28, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

First of all, all of this is a work in progress that's going to take time. The seasons one was hardly my idea, many teams had already had separate seasons categories to begin wth and it's common in other sports. The broadcasters have only been grouped for the most part when there is atleast 3 or 4 of them. The head coaches should be separate to begin with, you wouldnt put baseball managers and coaches together, would you? The bowl games was also not my idea and had been done by another person. Also culture and lore has been used similarily like Category:Texas A&M University traditions so I am simply trying to group all of these together. I would go through each of mine on a case by case basis but the whole idea is to be easier to find what they are looking.--Levineps (talk) 14:42, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

First of all, all of this is a work in progress that's going to take time - I'm not objecting to these categories because they are currently incomplete or not populated properly yet, I'm objecting because I think they are a bad idea to create in the first place. The seasons one was hardly my idea, many teams had already had separate seasons categories to begin with and it's common in other sports - I didn't mention the seasons categories. I think it is acceptable for college teams to have a separate subcategory for seasons if there are enough to warrant it. The broadcasters have only been grouped for the most part when there is atleast 3 or 4 of them - That doesn't satisfy my concern that this is a "performer by performance" type category, which historically have been discouraged. The head coaches should be separate to begin with, you wouldnt put baseball managers and coaches together, would you? - I don't particularly mind a category for head coaches specifically, but I think there would need to be community consensus for this first, as there is past precedent (cited above) that has deleted similar categories. The bowl games was also not my idea and had been done by another person. - Once again, I didn't mention the bowl game ones, as I don't have any major issues about that category scheme. Also culture and lore has been used similarily like Category:Texas A&M University traditions so I am simply trying to group all of these together. - This category is for the university as a whole, which is different than making an entire category tree specifically for football. I can't imagine that even the oldest and most popular football programs have more than a few things to put into their respective categories, which seems like too small of a scope for a category, and seems like it would fit just fine in the general football category. Also, see WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, in that just because one thing exists doesn't necessarily justify the creation of a similar category. It could simply be that the category hasn't reached CfD yet, and the community could very well decide that such a category isn't necessary. VegaDark (talk) 19:25, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Adding in my two cents: I think everyone is agreed that coaches, players, seasons, and bowl games categories for each college program are not up for debate. They are needed and their contents will continue to grow over time. As for the venues, broadcasters, and culture and lore categories, I don't really have an objection even if a lot of these categories won't be filled by more than a small number of articles, unless, of course, there are some overarching Wikipedia principles being violated, which VegaDark does suggest. As for the culture and lore categories, if they are to stay I think we need a better definition about what they contain. Take Category:Florida Gators football culture and lore, for example. I don't think all those SEC Championship Game articles really belong there. Do we need a game category of which bowl games would be a sub-category? Then what do we do with an article like The Choke at Doak? It seems like it belongs in culture and lore, but maybe it should be in games instead, or both? As for the head coaches categories, what do we do with articles for people who were both an assistant and a head coach at a particular school, like, for example, Lloyd Carr at Michigan? Do to need make assistant coaches categories and then sub-divide coaches into head and assistant? Jweiss11 (talk) 23:41, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Overcategorization in my opinion. Superman7515 (talk) 00:53, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I think these are a problem. And it's not limited to college football—the creator has been creating similar categories for most of the major North American pro sports leagues. There have been fairly consistent results at CfD that categorizing a venue by what team has played games there is overcategorization. It seems to me there was also a discussion previously about using "lore" in sports categories names—we wanted to steer away from that because it's too much of an undefined, mushy term. The question is—how do we deal with the mass of these categories that have been created by this user? Do we want a mass deletion of some sort, or do these need to be discussed individually? Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 02:38, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

My vote goes for a mass deletion of them. It is clearly unneccessary and having a discussion on possibly thousands of categories is going to be ridiculous. Just the time alone spent tracking them all down. The creator has even been coming up with categories that can only possibly fit 1 building/structure/season/etc in the entire universe. There is no reason to have a subcategory of 1 thing, regardless of what it is.Superman7515 (talk) 04:34, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

I think it's a bit ridicioulous to delete everything, period. I think you need to look at everything on a case-by-case basis. It sounds like seasons and bowl games are drawing positive reviews.--Levineps (talk) 05:16, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

EVERYTHING should be done on a case-by-case basis. If a school has only two season articles, then there should not be a category. If a school has 20 season articles, then it should. There shouldn't be a season category for every school, just ones where it is needed. Categories with one article, which is what is happening here, is absurd. Because one school has a category does not mean that EVERY school should have that same category. — X96lee15 (talk) 05:21, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Amen to that, I've been trying to put it in a category only if there is enough articles. This number is obviously arbitrary and obviously varies.--Levineps (talk) 05:23, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

How are you trying to put it in a category "only if there is enough articles" if you're creating articles that can only apply to a single structure or season or person? For example Category:Delaware Fighting Blue Hens basketball venues or Category:Delaware Fighting Blue Hens football seasons which only has 2 seasons created? Superman7515 (talk) 00:27, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Superman, as Jweiss points out seasons are in the process of being created and/or will be created for future seasons. Venues, I will admit are a different issue, but you still need to judge on a case-by-case basis.--Levineps (talk) 00:35, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

In the case of seasons articles, even if a given school only has a small handful, the seasons category should be maintained. Most schools that only have one or two season articles have them for the most recent season or two. Likely, a 2010 season article for that school will be created next year and so on. Older historical seasons articles are being created all the time. Just in the past few weeks I created articles for every missing Michigan season going back to 1969 and pending my patience and sanity, I plan to create all the missing ones going back to program's beginning in 1879. Jweiss11 (talk) 06:04, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

PLEASE STOP creating the new categories. There does not need to be a category for every single type of article. For example, the Category:Western Michigan Broncos category is nearly unusable since there are no article in it, only subcategories. Finding anything is now harder than it was last week. — X96lee15 (talk) 01:46, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

X96lee15, I don't see what's wrong with Category:Western Michigan Broncos, which Levineps recently created, or any of its direct child categories. Should all that stuff be up a level at Category:Western Michigan University? Jweiss11 (talk) 02:54, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm not thrilled with this category idea, it seems like it could be nebulous and open to a lot of different interpretations of "what is lore?" --Bobak (talk) 05:57, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

My biggest problem is just the mass-adding of categories as a personal project. It would be one thing if it were done after some consensus or by a task force, but this seems a bit much. Many of the college football teams from non-BCS and FCS conferences would be fine without a bunch of sub categories and I echo the sentiments of Bobak as "lore" is wide open for interpretation. Consistency is good, but treating every college football team as equally notable isn't realistic. For instance, there are going to be a lot more articles on Ohio State football than on Kent State football (even though they are both Division I FBS), so they both shouldn't have the same amount of subcategories because the lesser known (and less notable) team will have maybe one article in each category. Most non-BCS and FCS schools are fairly safe under just the general category (like "Western Michigan Broncos football") and subcategories for the coaches and players. Even then, many hardly have that many articles in their subcats. I say create categories as necessary on a case-by-case basis for each team. Some just don't need them IMO. --JonRidinger (talk)

I'd like to reiterate that seasons categories should be treated as essential like players and coaches. Every FBS school has a 2009 season page and almost every one has a 2008 as well. I expect they will all have 2010 season pages created by next year, and so on. Historical season pages are being created all the time. Jweiss11 (talk)

New conference standings box templates

Hello, all. I've noticed that there is very little uniformity among the various conference standings templates. In order to remedy this I've created three templates (based upon the college basketball standings table equivalents). The templates are: {{CFB Standings Start}}, {{CFB Standings Entry}}, and {{CFB Standings End}}. I haven't yet added parameters to account for divisions and championship games, but it's very much on the agenda and shouldn't be difficult. I've already applied it to {{2007 Big Ten football standings}} if you want to see the templates in use. It's fairly simple and straightforward to use, and it cut the size of the aforementioned 2007 Big Ten standings template from 2,492 bytes down to 1,426 bytes, which is over a 40% decrease in file size. No more cumbersome formatting and markup analysis for every conference standings table for each and every season! Hooray! JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 18:12, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

While I'm all for standardizing these with a template, these all look pretty uniform to me. Other than that, the template looks good.—NMajdan•talk 18:34, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Those certainly do look mostly uniform, and I wasn't trying to criticize anyone's work. However, the farther you go back – 2008, 2007, etc. – the more un-uniform they become. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 18:49, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Ahhh. That makes sense.—NMajdan•talk 19:08, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. DeFaultRyan 19:27, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I added the option for a "division name" entry into {{CFB Standings Entry}}. I also added a parameter to {{CFB Standings End}} that allows for the display of a conference title game result. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 19:33, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I've tried applying the new template to a few standings boxes, but it keeps getting reverted with shoddy markup instead. Is there opposition to these templates? It really seems to me that these templates make it much easier to update and edit standings boxes. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 13:43, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Which templates are being reverted? Using templates for something repetitious like these is the preferred method. I don't know why anyone would be against it.—NMajdan•talk 14:21, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Template:2009 Big East football standings has been reverted a few times. I also posted on the talk page of the user who has been doing it. I've been meaning to do a roll-out on the rest of the 2009 templates too but haven't gotten around to it yet. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 15:39, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

...or maybe I kind of forgot that I meant to do it... I'll get them all uniform this week. :) JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 15:41, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

I really don't understand the comment on the revert: "this format makes it like every other conferences template." Isn't that what we're going for? That is the point of a template - to establish uniformity among related objects.—NMajdan•talk 16:49, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Portal update

My ultimate goal is to get the College football portal featured. A big step toward that was completed today. I have not converted 58 good/featured college football articles to portal selected articles which appear randomly on the main page. Yesterday, I also tied the news section on the portal to the football page on WikiNews. Now, I need to convert all the old selected pictures to the new format as well. Any help would be appreciated. The list of pictures to convert is here. I've already done a few, so those can be used as a template.—NMajdan•talk 20:32, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject task

If anybody is looking for something to do, Category:Excessive uses of cfb link needs to be cleaned out. Just throwing it out there.—NMajdan•talk 17:07, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Just out of curiosity, is this something that we could possibly set up a bot for? I would do it if I can learn how to create one.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 00:09, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

I thought the exact same thing after I posted this. WP:BOTREQ#Replace template with wikilink—NMajdan•talk 00:55, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

I've been gradually making the rounds. I've been going back and cleaning up all the team links in articles dating back to the 1990 season. I don't care much for a bot doing it, because it might clean out the list before I see it. Seeing this list often allows me to see when new team pages are created, so I can clean up their links, because they usually don't use cfb link, and often don't even wikilink the teams at all. DeFaultRyan 20:22, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Just keeping tabs on our bot request... WP:BRFA#AnomieBOT  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 18:01, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Better link: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/AnomieBOT 33.—NMajdan•talk 17:42, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Future schedules

I recently came across Colorado Buffaloes football (future schedule) and Notre Dame Fighting Irish football future schedule. Are these notable enough to keep? I think that they might be, but I also think that this information might possibly be better off reserved in someone's sandbox. If kept, these types articles would also definitely need citations to prove the data. Anyone else have thoughts? JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 13:35, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Personally, my personal requirements for notability may be lower than that of the projects. I usually ask myself if I would ever look up this information. In this case, yes, I have wanted to look up the future schedules of various teams. So, I personally have no problem with it. That being said, it would need to be well cited as these two examples do appear to be. It would be nice if we could settle on a standard naming convention, though.—NMajdan•talk 14:15, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Template issue

I'm real disappointed with the way Template:CollegePrimaryColor and Template:CollegeSecondaryColor are set up. The primary color template has background hardcoded while the secondary color template has color hardcoded. This really limits how the templates can be used. Not sure what can be done about it, but just mentioning it here for any brainstorming. Ideally, it would be nice if we could remove all hardcoded CSS and just leave the hex color codes and then have a bot replace every instances of {{CollegePrimaryColor|Tulsa}} with background:{{CollegePrimaryColor|Tulsa}} and {{CollegeSecondaryColor|Tulsa}} with color:{{CollegeSecondaryColor|Tulsa}}.—NMajdan•talk 15:41, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

It may be an easier fix than once thought, all we would have to do is adjust the few templates that use it. Right now, the only main use in articles is through these four templates:

• {{American football roster}} (which you just created)
• {{CBB roster}} (which you also just created)
• {{Infobox college football player}}, and
• {{Infobox CollegeBasketballPlayer}}

I think that if we can fix it through these four templates, then all of the articles should follow right along.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 23:28, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

I created two new templates, {{CollegePrimaryHex}} and {{CollegeSecondaryHex}}. These will only return the six-digit hexadecimal code, and not the # symbol (for some reason, when I kept the # sign, Wikipedia kept reading it as a numbered list, perhaps that is why the previous templates were so restrictive?) I also went ahead and replaced the latter two templates I listed above, but I'm not sure how you want to incorporate it into your roster templates, so I will leave that to you. To replace them, I made the following two find-and-replace changes:

• {{CollegePrimaryColor → background: #{{CollegePrimaryHex
• {{CollegeSecondaryColor → color: #{{CollegeSecondaryHex

It seems like with the two template changes I made, no article is now transcluding the old {{CollegePrimaryColor}}, so maybe that can eventually go up to WP:TFD? Let me know what you think.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 04:59, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

You duplicated the whole template. While that would normally be the preferred method, I was going to suggest using something like {{str right}} to extract the number from the main template. Now, if a better color is found, two templates have to be updated. Maybe we can replace all instances of the original with your new template and delete the originals. Nevertheless, thank you very much. I will definitely use those in my roster templates.—NMajdan•talk 13:18, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Oh, sorry about that, I didn't know about the {{str right}} template. However, my intention was to replace {{CollegePrimaryColor}} with {{CollegePrimaryHex}} and as of right now there is no page that uses the former. Once you use the new Hex template in your roster templates, the old one should be ready to delete, leaving us with only the new template (and only one to update).  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 15:30, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

No, you did the right thing. I definitely prefer replacing the template completely. I have changed those templates to use the new Hex template. I don't think anything else is using the Colors template.—NMajdan•talk 22:17, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Robert Hodge, Colorado Buffaloes

Whilst disambiguating Robert Hodge, I came across a quarterback for the Colorado Buffaloes, who I have included in the dab page as Robert Hodge (American football) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). I don't know enough about the subject to assess whether he is notable, but may be someone here might like to take a look and possibly create a stub article if appropriate. He is listed in the template {{ColoradoBuffaloesQuarterbacks}}.

Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:11, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Books

I had never heard of Wikipedia Books before (outside of the link in the print/export box) but I stumbled across them tonight. Might be something to look into for off-season work. Check out Category:Wikipedia:Books on sports.—NMajdan•talk 03:45, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Templates for team seasons of a conference for a given year

It seems to me that templates such as Template:2009-10 Big Ten football teams that list the team seasons of a conference for a given year aren't really needed if we have a standings template for that conference year, e.g. the analogous Template:2009 Big Ten football standings, that provides all the same links and conveys additional information as well, i.e. the records, standings, championships. What do others think? Jweiss11 (talk) 07:30, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

This is similar to politician succession boxes that are redundant with infobox information. One is at the top and one is at the bottom.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 15:48, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Conference awards

Do we need a template for conference awards and honors? Alternatively, a new section could be added at the bottom of Template:College Football Awards. I can only find Big Ten Conference football individual honors and Big East Conference football awards using Category:College football awards. I am not sure if no other conferences have pages or if they are just not categorized.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 15:50, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

A new section in the existing Template:College Football Awards sounds like a good idea, but it probably makes sense to build out the pages for the other FBS conference awards, or at least the other four BCS conferences, first. Jweiss11 (talk) 16:31, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

That template needs to be reworked anyways. It should at least be hideable.—NMajdan•talk 17:38, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I don't know about waiting. This is the time of year when people are going to be looking at the template. If we add these two, people will get the hint to create the otheres, if they don't exist already.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 17:43, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I just added them.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 17:56, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I think adding Southeastern Conference football individual awards to Template:College Football Awards in its sketchy state is wrong. Unless you expect to fill it in very quickly it should not be on the template. Therefore, I have hidden it.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 07:16, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I've fleshed out all the major conference awards as listed in the SEC media guide and unhid the link on the template. Jweiss11 (talk) 20:04, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Mid-American Conference football awards has been added to the template, however the article is still incomplete. Right now, a lot of the players' positions are missing from the table. Does anyone know any reliable sources where I can find this information? Especially those before 2000.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 17:06, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

New bot request

I have requested a bot that would go through various templates and replace hyphens (-) with en dashes (–) in certain parameters. Any other suggestions, approval or even disapproval would be appreciated. Also, if I missed any template, please add it to the list on the Bot request page. Thanks.—NMajdan•talk 16:04, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea for consistency-sake. Should en dashes be used for all date ranges, won-loss records, and game scores? I've been doing a lot of work to add and clean up infoboxes and tables for CFB coaches and team season articles and have generally been using hyphens out of convenience. Jweiss11 (talk) 06:43, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Yes to all of those questions regarding the use of en dash. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 12:30, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

What about when designating a tied standing in a record table, e.g. "T-1st". Hyphen or en dash there? Jweiss11 (talk) 21:04, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

According to WP:DASH: "In lists, to separate distinct information within points—for example, in articles about music albums, en dashes are used between track titles and durations, and between musicians and their instruments. In this role, en dashes are always spaced", so perhaps this includes the "T-1st" record table listing?  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 21:31, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Winning percentage calculator

I needed one for a list I was making because I was too lazy to do the math myself, so I created a template to do it for me (that probably took 5x as long as it would've taken me to just do the math myself, go figure). Its there if anyone else needs it. {{Winning percentage}}.—NMajdan•talk 21:55, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Good work Dan. I was thinking there was a need for one myself. Very nice. — X96lee15 (talk) 22:09, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Excellent, surprised no one made one sooner. Not that it's that hard to pop open calculator, but why bother if you don't have to! Ryan2845 (talk) 01:48, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

I added it to {{Infobox NCAA football school}} and removed the percentage parameter. So now it takes the input for wins, losses and ties and computes the percentage automatically. Might consider using it like this in other templates.—NMajdan•talk 02:47, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

You're one step ahead of me, I was about to do the same thing. — X96lee15 (talk) 02:55, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

One comprehensive season template

Instead of having 13 different nav templates for this FBS season – one for each of the 11 FBS conferences (such as this), one that links to each conference season, and one for the bowls – I've taken the liberty of creating one central template that navigates the entire season. I left it here in my sandbox so everyone can check it out first. What does everyone think of just redirecting all of the various 2009–10 season templates to this or a similar, comprehensive nav template? Other sports WikiProjects have created nav templates this large, such as Template:2009–10 in English football and many other large soccer-related templates. However, I was thinking that one way to condense the CFB season template would be to eliminate team nicknames and leave only the school name to display. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 13:54, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

I am definitely not a fan of a navbox that size. I have posted an alternative on your sandbox using the collapsible groups navbox template.—NMajdan•talk 14:33, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

I like the collapsed version, to which I made a few small tweaks, mostly adding back in the links from the original. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:51, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm not usually a fan of navboxes within navboxes, but in this case I think that it translates pretty well. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 18:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Looks good, but I think we also need to add this year's championship games, either in a separate section or under their respective conferences.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 22:50, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

I threw the outline of the CCGs in the alternative template to get a look at it.—NMajdan•talk 23:02, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

I touched it up a little so that everything displays properly. I think we might be ready to roll it out. Does everyone like how it looks? JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 14:21, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm not really a fan of the comprehensive navbox. Too many articles in one template that would be better served by the 2009 NCAA Football category, IMO. I don't see the necessity to navigate between Army and San Diego State (for example). That's my opinion though. I do see the advantage in navigating between San Diego State and Colorado State, since they are in the same conference. I like the navbox situation the way it currently exists. — X96lee15 (talk) 15:26, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

We have one opposed voice so far, but then the discussion died. Is there sufficient interest to move forward with the template? JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 11:57, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

I have no problem with it.—NMajdan•talk 12:58, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages issue

So it doesn't look like our popular pages listing got created for this month. We'll definitely get it next month. In the meantime, you can see the 100 most popular CFB articles in December here (updated daily). That should suffice for this month. This highest article that is actually CFB-related (as opposed to NFL or other former players/coaches) is Bobby Bowden. The highest ranked currently active player is...drum roll please...Tim Tebow.—NMajdan•talk 21:11, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Very interesting, thanks for the link! This brings up a curious question though, why is Theodore Roosevelt in our WikiProject? Doing a search on his article doesn't even bring up the word "football", let alone on the college level.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 22:37, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

See http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/kidscorner/football.htm . Assuming that it's true, it seems that TR belongs here and that his article needs a little work.--Hjal (talk) 22:45, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I've long had a problem with the number of players covered under the scope of the project. But that would be another discussion.—NMajdan•talk 01:02, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Very nice tool. Thanks for creating it. Cbl62 (talk) 03:02, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

New roster template

A few weeks ago, I created a roster template for college basketball articles (like this) based on a similar template for NBA articles. I really liked the functionality that allowed you to sort by various attributes. I was thinking about bringing this over to the CFB world but the number of players on a team was definitely a hurdle. I knew I couldn't have each player on one row and so I knew I couldn't have as much info about each player (no height/weight, home town, etc). But then how best to break up the columns. I thought about leaving the structure the way we do it now where we pretty much break it up by each position. But that would be too difficult to code. So I figured the easiest way to break it up would be offensive players, defensive players, and special teams (obviously the latter column would be incredibly short compared to the other two). So, what we lose in dropping the numerous separate categories, we regain with the ability to sort by position. Then I had to figure out how to code this multi-column list as it couldn't be done the same way as the CBB template.

So, I think I got it all finished now. I have used the new template in the 2009 Oklahoma Sooners football team article, so check it out and let me know what you think. I have parameterized the year column so it can be dropped and used in an NFL article (I'll let the NFL project know later). I will work on the help documentation tomorrow but you can get a good feel for how it works by looking at the example above. I think it ended up a little longer than the old format, but again, I love having the ability to sort (I did compact it a little to save a bit on vertical space).

• Template:American football roster/Header
• Template:American football roster/Player
• Template:American football roster/Footer

—NMajdan•talk 22:34, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Documentation has been created.—NMajdan•talk 14:40, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

No feedback? Will this template get any use?—NMajdan•talk 03:46, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, just coming to this discussion after (oops) creating my own template which I'm testing on 2009 Central Michigan Chippewas football team. This template ({{NCAAFootballTeamRoster}} is based on the existing bare html and the roster templates used for professional baseball (e.g. {{MLB roster}}). Mackensen (talk) 19:51, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

New template request

I am writing the Tai Streets article and realize it would be good if Bowl games had a link like {{cfb link}} that would link to the general bowl game article until the specific year article is created.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:31, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

I think in this case, leave the bowl game as a red link. It will show people that the article still needs to be created.—NMajdan•talk 22:34, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Red link it. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 20:13, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

All-American in infobox

There is discord among the editors of Brandon Graham about how to discribe his All-American Status in his infobox. The disagreement is between whether it should say

"All-American (1st-team: Rivals, Scout; 2nd-team: WCFF, TSN, AP, SI, CFN)" or

"First-team All-American"

According to the five lists that are recognized by the NCAA he is a consensus second team All-American with no first team recognition. His only first team recognitions are by "unofficial" lists that do not count towards consensus or unanimous AA status. I feel it provides disinformation to the reader to describe a consensus second team player with no official first team recognition as "First-team All-American". Opinions welcome.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 00:08, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

The main thing is that wiki is not a rubber stamp for what the NCAA considers official or not official. The standards for wiki is verifiable. NCAA standards for official and unofficial are sketchy, they have changed over the years, such as Sporting News is now "official" and it was not two decades ago. There have been times that the AP or UPI was included and times they were not. Sometimes Time magazine was and other times it was not. So, rather than go by what the NCAA does at the moment, we should follow the Wikipedia standard, which is verifiable. Footnotes are there for a reason, so if a guy is a first-team AA and it is verifiable. I am also in favor of accuracy, so if it is noted in the infobox and in the text of the article it is not misleading. I just don't want wikipedia to have restrictions based on a myopic view of what is and is not an All-America team. If a player is consensus and that is verifiable by using the NCAA website, fine, that is verifiable.

Please note that what I am trying to do has nothing to do with the NCAA. I hope to include the four recognitions that are not recognized by the NCAA. If a guy is mostly second team, that is verifiable and should be shown, not hidden as you would like.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:26, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Also, there could be a potential "homer-ism" that could come into play. Where a guy who likes College Team A and they have a player who is a consensus AA, and his hated rival has a guy who was on the Scout.com or ESPN.com AA team and he opposes the inclusion of the "unofficial" team not for principle or loyalty to the NCAA but out of partisanship for his team. I have found with younger editors (none have posted here) they will puff up things their "guy" did and discredit things a rival may have done. With the big-name athletes like Tebow or McCoy they have to be semi-protected.

I am about the biggest Michigan football fan by wikipedia activity (aside from possibly Cbl62 (talk · contribs)). My problem is that your insistance on First Team only is homerism. It misrepresents a consensus Second team All-American as a First team All-American. Rather than mislead the reader, it would be better to give him all the information. Describing him as a first team AA is O.K. on his University of Michigan Bio page, but here the reader wants to know how he was recognized. I attempted to tell the reader he was mostly 2nd team with a few first team recognitions. You are attempting to hide the fact that he was mostly second team. That is homerism.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:26, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I write so many Michigan articles that I actually look at everything I write and ask myself would a Michigan State Spartans or Ohio State Buckeyes fan agree with what I am saying. My point here is that an MSU or OSU fan would say. "Graham ain't $#!t. He is only consensus second-team and his Michigan fans are fronting like he is first team." This is an international encyclopedia.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 04:46, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

So, I am in favor of accurate notations and verfiable information, which is the wiki standard. I am not in favor of puffing up or tearning down what the NCAA does. NCAA standards have no bearing as to what Wiki editors should be allowed to add in an infobox or in the text of an article. Bigmaninthebox (talk) 21:34, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I am not attempting to only include what the NCAA includes. Note my attempt is to fully describe all recognition, including the four publications not recognized by the NCAA. You are attempting to only include the ones that make you happy (1st team). Wikipedia is an attempt to synthesize all knowledge. It is not an attempt to edit it in a way that says what you want. I wish Graham was first team. He is mostly second team and we should synthesize that information for the reader.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:26, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

The body of the article accurately notes which selectors chose him as first-team and which chose him as second-team. IMO, nothing misleading about that. As for the infobox, the reference to first-team status is referenced by two footnotes that clearly identify the selectors awarding him that status. Again, given the precise referencing, I don't think it's misleading. Rather than a question of it being misleading, I think you're raising a policy issue as to whether the project wants to adopt a rule limiting which kinds of AA selections can be referenced in the infobox for player awards. On that policy issue, there has been consensus that team infoboxes should be limited to consensus All-Americans, if my memory is correct. However, that discussion was intended to achieve consistency in comparing team totals, i.e., we don't want one school's AA total to be based on a different set of rules than others. In the case of player infoboxes, I think that, so long the referencing is accurate and verifiable, it's fine to include references to significant awards other than the specific AA selectors who go into consensus determinations. If you do have concerns about it being potentially misleading, how about modifying the infobox reference to say "First-team All-American (Rivals and Scout)"? Cbl62 (talk) 16:04, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Actually, your proposed wording above is probably the most accurate alternative. Cbl62 (talk) 16:05, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

So you support the first of the two alternatives above.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 17:04, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I have to say I'd favor the first alternative mainly because it tells the reader who selected him what. The second could certaintly be considered misleading since he wasn't a first-team all-american across the board. The second alternative should only be used when the player is a consensus first, second or third all-american.--Giants27(Contribs|WP:CFL) 19:26, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

The debate about which All-American selectors are legitimate or official will never end to everyone's satisfaction. As expressed in prior discussions on related topics, I'm in favor of more, fuller information as the best way to avoid bias. My main concern is that the body of the article accurately and fully identify all of the notable, verifiable AA designations. An infobox is supposed to be a quick, accurate overview. Where there are numerous AA designations for a player, listing each one in the infobox will create infobox over-crowding and somewhat undermines the purpose of the infobox as an overview. I'd be inclined to go with something like this:

• If someone is a "2009 consensus first-team All-American", just say that without identifying the selectors.
• If there are a handful of designations (i.e., one to five?), list them all in the infobox per Tony's suggestion: "All-American (1st-team: Associated Press; 2nd-team: WCFF, TSN)"
• In cases with numerous designations (i.e. more than five?), and there's a split among the selectors, the details should be reflected in the body of the article and a short form statement could be used in the infobox along these lines: "2009 All-American". In other words, don't say-first team or second-team but include a wiki-link to the article detailing the specific selectors' choices. Just a thought.Cbl62 (talk) 04:04, 17 December 2009 (UTC) Cbl62 (talk) 04:04, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

• Yes Unanimous and Consensus First-team are well understood by most aficionados. Saying All-American is generally understood to mean first team unless otherwise designated, so I am not sure just saying All-American would resolve the issue. Furthermore, the 2009 College Football All-America Team does not detail anything but first team selections. So sending the reader there will also give less information. Keeping in mind that both ESPN and Pro Football Weekly teams have yet to be announced and could add more text, what about using font change to something like

"All-American (1st-team: Rivals, Scout; 2nd-team: WCFF, TSN, AP, SI, CFN)" (2009) or

"All-American (2009)
(1st-team: Rivals, Scout; 2nd-team: WCFF, TSN, AP, SI, CFN)"

instead of

"First-team All-American (2009)"

• All players list should fit on two lines in the infobox.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 04:34, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

• I tried plugging in your small font version into a preview of the Graham article, and it looks fine to me. This version certainly conveys the most and accurate info. I'd go with that. Cbl62 (talk) 07:46, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

• Which one? All on one line or with the detail underneath?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 07:58, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Heisman Trophy template

Not sure which (if any) of you may have the {{Heisman Trophy}} template on your watchlist, but I just made a suggestion on the talk page and would like some feedback (either here or there). :) – Latics (talk) 05:49, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

TFA nomination for 2000 Sugar Bowl

Just a heads-up I nominated 2000 Sugar Bowl for Today's Featured Article for January 4, the ten-year anniversary of the game. I thought this especially appropriate since Bobby Bowden is retiring three days earlier. The request can be found here. –Grondemar 17:16, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Suggestion: MWC to auto-bid and national championship game selection: Boise State, or Tulsa + Houston; Colorado and Iowa State/Kansas State; Washington State?

Discussion (collapsed)

MWC's strategy to become a legitimate auto-bid conference: add Boise State, or Tulsa and Houston if BSU declines; invite Colorado, who has major incentive to join; add, ideally, one (or two) more auto-bid conference schools, e.g. Iowa State, Kansas State, or Washington State; let weakest football programs (New Mexico, SDSU, UNLV) break off to re-join the WAC. The first objective of the conference would be to add strength. The conference is notoriously weak below the top 3, stealing legitimacy from their undefeated records. Act I: invite Boise State to join the conference. This is a no-brainer for the MWC, and has already been rumored, as noted in the MWC and Boise State Wikipedia articles. The addition of BSU, while not increasing Conference depth, builds a top-of-the-conference that is on par (arguably) with several automatic bid conferences, specifically: the ACC, Big East, and (this will incur more debate) Big 10. The caveat is that BSU may have no interest: their current setup is ideal. They play in a terrible conference and have a legitimate shot to go undefeated and play in a BCS game every year. If Boise declines, the next action is to invite Houston and Tulsa from C-USA. Each school would add strength to the conference, and both have considerable incentive to join. C-USA has a lot of depth now, but it's unwieldy. Tulsa, especially, has been good for awhile, and would benefit markedly from the opportunity to jump to a smaller, stronger conference. They could win 6-8 games and get a better bowl game. Houston would have similar incentive. The top of the conference would then be Utah BYU TCU Boise State OR Tulsa Houston The strength of the top of the conference would be enough that,if any school were to run the table in the MWC, they would have a legitimate case to have a shot at the National title game. However, the additions would not necessarily (in my opinion, would NOT) be enough to earn the conference an automatic bid. To gain that status, the conference would need to strengthen its depth. Happily for the conference, there are several big-name schools close to the region that, in my opinion, would find serious motivation to join a conference with those four or five teams at the top. Act II: Invite Colorado. The Conference would benefit greatly from adding a big-name, automatic-bid conference school. Colorado would have a lot of incentive to jump: they've been bad now for over a decade, with no end in sight; they compete in an insanely deep conference; the MWC is actually a better regional fit; and their addition to the established, strong programs above would likely bump the MWC into auto-bid territory. Colorado would have a better opportunity to compete and build while still living in an auto-bid conference. It'd be win-win. If Colorado were to make the jump, I would expect at least one other Big 12 North school to want to join them--perhaps Iowa State or Kansas State, which currently struggle to be competitive in the Big 12. Suggestion: MWC to auto-bid and national championship game selection: Boise State, or Tulsa + Houston; Colorado and Iowa State/Kansas State; Washington State? MWC's strategy to become a legitimate auto-bid conference: add Boise State, or Tulsa and Houston if BSU declines; invite Colorado, who has major incentive to join; add, ideally, one (or two) more auto-bid conference schools, e.g. Iowa State, Kansas State, or Washington State; let weakest football programs (New Mexico, SDSU, UNLV) break off to re-join the WAC. The first objective of the conference would be to add strength. The conference is notoriously weak below the top 3, stealing legitimacy from their undefeated records. Act I: invite Boise State to join the conference. This is a no-brainer for the MWC, and has already been rumored, as noted in the MWC and Boise State Wikipedia articles. The addition of BSU, while not increasing Conference depth, builds a top-of-the-conference that is on par (arguably) with several automatic bid conferences, specifically: the ACC, Big East, and (this will incur more debate) Big 10. The caveat is that BSU may have no interest: their current setup is ideal. They play in a terrible conference and have a legitimate shot to go undefeated and play in a BCS game every year. If Boise declines, the next action is to invite Houston and Tulsa from C-USA. Each school would add strength to the conference, and both have considerable incentive to join. C-USA has a lot of depth now, but it's unwieldy. Tulsa, especially, has been good for awhile, and would benefit markedly from the opportunity to jump to a smaller, stronger conference. They could win 6-8 games and get a better bowl game. Houston would have similar incentive. The top of the conference would then be Utah BYU TCU Boise State OR Tulsa Houston The strength of the top of the conference would be enough that,if any school were to run the table in the MWC, they would have a legitimate case to have a shot at the National title game. However, the additions would not necessarily (in my opinion, would NOT) be enough to earn the conference an automatic bid. To gain that status, the conference would need to strengthen its depth. Happily for the conference, there are several big-name schools close to the region that, in my opinion, would find serious motivation to join a conference with those four or five teams at the top. Act II: Invite Colorado. The Conference would benefit greatly from adding a big-name, automatic-bid conference school. Colorado would have a lot of incentive to jump: they've been bad now for over a decade, with no end in sight; they compete in an insanely deep conference; the MWC is actually a better regional fit; and their addition to the established, strong programs above would likely bump the MWC into auto-bid territory. Colorado would have a better opportunity to compete and build while still living in an auto-bid conference. It'd be win-win. If Colorado were to make the jump, I would expect at least one other Big 12 North school to want to join them--perhaps Iowa State or Kansas State, which currently struggle to be competitive in the Big 12. If Boise State joins, the MWC should also consider extending an invitation to Washington State University. WSU's program is in the dumps; WSU is also closer in size and culture to the Mountain West schools than the Coastal and California schools. Its incentive would be similar to the Big 12 North schools. The addition of one or two of these schools would add significant depth and legitimacy to the conference, filling out the middle of the 'pack'. Auto-bid conference teams jumping may seem far-fetched, but the MWC is actually in great position to build a strong conference, and these teams have significant incentive to join an auto-bid conference that would be not as strong as the Big 12 or Pac 10. As UTAH, BOISE STATE, BYU, and TCU demonstrate annually, there is considerable talent to be found in the region, and the conference is the 'only game in town' for an entire region of the United States. The MWC is a better geographical fit for several auto-bid conference schools. The fact that those schools have struggled for some time now in extremely deep conferences gives further incentive to move to a conference in which they might have a better shot to be competitive and vie for BCS bowl-game bids and shots at the national title. For several reasons, adding Colorado, e.g., would benefit the conference far more than adding Fresno State. The top of the conference would then be Utah BYU Colorado Boise State Washington State TCU Iowa State Wyoming Air Force Colorado State or Utah BYU Colorado TCU Houston Tulsa Iowa State Wyoming Air Force Colorado State The remainder of the conference is UNLV, New Mexico, and San Diego State. Given their location, school-size, and weak football programs, I suspect all three might be tempted to take their chances in the WAC. If the PAC 10 loses WSU, they may extend UNLV an invitation to replenish conference depth. The Big 12 could drop to 10 teams and renew the round-robin format, or look to add a couple of teams. At the end of these moves, the MWC would become a 10 or 11 team conference with good strength, a lot of depth, and several big-name schools. It would make a rock-solid case for an automatic BCS bid and, over time at the very least, build credibility to produce teams that are selected to play in the national championship game. This would be a qualitative leap for every school that is currently in the conference. Schools in non-auto-bid conferences are unable to offer coaches the opportunity to compete for championships or build consistently national-caliber programs. Thus they frequently struggle to retain excellent coaches. A robust conference would enable these schools--who have clearly demonstrated that they have the resources and infrastructure to build consistent excellence--to retain talent and build consistency, increasing profile and revenue. The strategy above adds significant strength at the top and considerable depth to the conference, without overwhelming the 3 schools who have consistently dominated the conference. Fresno State and a handful of strong c-usa teams likely would want to join the conference; however, the perils of building a conference out of excellent mid-major teams is that the conference 'beats itself up', failing to produce teams with 1 or 0 losses.Mwcadv (talk) 14:41, 24 December 2009 (UTC) The addition of one or two of these schools would add significant depth and legitimacy to the conference, filling out the middle of the 'pack'. Auto-bid conference teams jumping may seem far-fetched, but the MWC is actually in great position to build a strong conference, and these teams have significant incentive to join an auto-bid conference that would be not as strong as the Big 12 or Pac 10. As UTAH, BOISE STATE, BYU, and TCU demonstrate annually, there is considerable talent to be found in the region, and the conference is the 'only game in town' for an entire region of the United States. The MWC is a better geographical fit for several auto-bid conference schools. The fact that those schools have struggled for some time now in extremely deep conferences gives further incentive to move to a conference in which they might have a better shot to be competitive and vie for BCS bowl-game bids and shots at the national title. For several reasons, adding Colorado, e.g., would benefit the conference far more than adding Fresno State. The top of the conference would then be Utah BYU Colorado Boise State Washington State TCU Iowa State Wyoming Air Force Colorado State or Utah BYU Colorado TCU Houston Tulsa Iowa State Wyoming Air Force Colorado State The remainder of the conference is UNLV, New Mexico, and San Diego State. Given their location, school-size, and weak football programs, I suspect all three might be tempted to take their chances in the WAC. If the PAC 10 loses WSU, they may extend UNLV an invitation to replenish conference depth. The Big 12 could drop to 10 teams and renew the round-robin format, or look to add a couple of teams. At the end of these moves, the MWC would become a 10 or 11 team conference with good strength, a lot of depth, and several big-name schools. It would make a rock-solid case for an automatic BCS bid and, over time at the very least, build credibility to produce teams that are selected to play in the national championship game. This would be a qualitative leap for every school that is currently in the conference. Schools in non-auto-bid conferences are unable to offer coaches the opportunity to compete for championships or build consistently national-caliber programs. Thus they frequently struggle to retain excellent coaches. A robust conference would enable these schools--who have clearly demonstrated that they have the resources and infrastructure to build consistent excellence--to retain talent and build consistency, increasing profile and revenue. The strategy above adds significant strength at the top and considerable depth to the conference, without overwhelming the 3 schools who have consistently dominated the conference. Fresno State and a handful of strong c-usa teams likely would want to join the conference; however, the perils of building a conference out of excellent mid-major teams is that the conference 'beats itself up', failing to produce teams with 1 or 0 losses.Mwcadv (talk) 14:41, 24 December 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mwcadv (talk • contribs) 14:38, 24 December 2009 (UTC) Uhhhhh... WTF? DeFaultRyan 17:41, 24 December 2009 (UTC) Sorry, dude, but this isn't a message board. And why did you re-paste your comments repeatedly? I'm sure we all have ideas as to how to solve the problems of the college football world or even the Mountain West Conference, but Wikipedia is not the place to do that. However, if you're interested in improving Wikipedia, we've here for that. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 17:48, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Overhaul of List of NCAA Division I FBS football stadiums

I have begun a little overhaul of the above list as the current list is a little messy and doesn't sort correctly. This was discussed ad nauseum on the article's talk page. I'm doing several things in this overhaul, including verifying the numbers that we currently have are either accurate, up-to-date and/or verified by the source (I've already found several discrepancies). Also, I'm archiving the sources and switching to LDR reference format. At my current pace, I'll have the list ready to go in 2011, so any help would be appreciated. With the season almost over, I'm sure we'll all have a bit more time to devote to these articles. The development page for the list is here: Talk:List of NCAA Division I FBS football stadiums/Dev.—NMajdan•talk 19:52, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Do you think this article needs images? Take a look at what I have done to List of American football stadiums by capacity and List of current National Football League stadiums. Would you like to use the same table for this article? --Pgp688 (talk) 10:01, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Moving Brian Kelly (American football coach) to Brian Kelly

I have requested that Brian Kelly (American football coach) be moved, because I believe this article is the primary topic for "Brian Kelly." I would appreciate the comments of my fellow editors on its discussion page. Thank you in advance. --Pgp688 (talk) 11:12, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

• I chimmed in, if it isn't supported, I would still recommend moving the article to Brian Kelly (coach) per WP:NAME. Iamnothuman (talk) 04:07, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

• Agreed, if this move fails, I'll request a move to Brian Kelly (coach). --Pgp688 (talk) 10:29, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Mike Leach's coaching status

Not wanting to get in a revert war, I'm bringing this here. In light of Leach's suspension from Tech, another editor added the DC as the head coach at Template:Big 12 Conference head football coaches. I feel that Leach is still the official head coach as he has not been fired, but suspended. I reverted the change to the template, restoring Leach as the coach but the editor reverted it back. What are the thoughts of others on this issue?—NMajdan•talk 18:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Leach is still officially the head coach and should remain on the template until such time as he quits or is fired. →Wordbuilder (talk) 20:08, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Well it appears Leach has now been fired according to this ESPN article and Ruffin McNeill appointed as interim head coach. Guess that clears things up. Geologik (talk) 18:27, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Haha, guess so. Thanks TT for clearing up this dispute!—NMajdan•talk 19:12, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Pageview stats

After a recent request, I added WikiProject College football to the list of projects to compile monthly pageview stats for. The data is the same used by http://stats.grok.se/en/ but the program is different, and includes the aggregate views from all redirects to each page. The stats are at Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Popular pages.

The page will be updated monthly with new data. The edits aren't marked as bot edits, so they will show up in watchlists. You can view more results, request a new project be added to the list, or request a configuration change for this project using the toolserver tool. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks! Mr.Z-man 00:51, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

New York and college football

(I asked this question over on WP:Reference desk/Entertainment, but I thought I'd also ask over here since that RefDesk seems rather music-dominated, and there might be more people knowledgeable about college football on this WikiProject talk page.)

Why is the state of New York so bad at college football? This result is surprising considering that New York has at least two strong reasons to be good at college football:

First, American football is certainly a very popular sport in New York. Consider that it has not one or two but three professional teams: the New York Giants, the New York Jets, and the Buffalo Bills.

Second, New York has the third-highest population of any state in the United States, so there should be a large pool of high school players from which New York colleges can recruit. Consider that almost all the other high-population states have historically elite or near-elite college football programs (this list is descending by population):

1. California - USC Trojans
2. Texas - Texas Longhorns
3. New York - glaring lack!
4. Florida - Florida Gators, Florida State Seminoles, Miami Hurricanes
5. Illinois - okay, this is the other exception besides New York, but even the Fighting Illini and the Northwestern Wildcats are better than anything New York has
6. Pennsylvania - Penn State Nittany Lions
7. Ohio - Ohio State Buckeyes
8. Michigan - Michigan Wolverines
9. Georgia - Georgia Bulldogs

Who does New York have? The Syracuse Orange? The Army Black Knights? The Buffalo Bulls? Even if we include New Jersey (as right next door to NYC and where the Giants and Jets are actually based), we only get the Rutgers Scarlet Knights. Putting it charitably, these are not exactly elite football programs. So why is New York so bad at college football, considering that they should have popularity and population advantages over most other states?

I can account for Army's weakness -- being a military academy makes for stringent admission standards which make it difficult to recruit an elite football team. But the question is why New York doesn't have elite state university system football programs like other high-population states do.

—Lowellian (reply) 22:06, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

First, Illinois doesn't produce a huge program because most of the best athletes from the state end up at Notre Dame. Second, I think that historically you are selling Syracuse short, but SUNY doesn't spend a lot of money on athletics, and a lot of those potential "New York State" athletes have gone to Syracuse, Penn State, Pitt, Rutgers, Boston College, and elsewhere. Syracuse won a national title in 1959 and sports an all-time 673–472–49 record; however, it's been a rough decade since going 10–3 in 2001. Fordham used to be a national power – even winning an unofficial "national title" in 1929[1] – but the decline of Catholic school football post-WWII ended their reign. (Notre Dame and Boston College are the only Catholic schools left in the FBS.) I also think there is just more going on in New York to take away young athlete's attention, namely basketball. Most importantly, are there even a lot of high school football programs in New York City proper? 13,209,006 of the 19,490,297 people from New York state live in New York City or its suburban counties; that's 68.42% of the entire state's population! I'd be shocked if there was enough affordable land for the necessary amount of high school football fields to service that type of dense population. This sounds like a good email topic for Beano Cook on the ESPN College Football podcast, which I highly recommend. Going back to the SUNY-spending-money issue, Rutgers is the same way. They've historically spent next to nothing on their football budget. Only recently have they begun to spend big on their football program, which has reaped benefits in exposure and winning[2][3], but it's been a major bone of contention among those who believe that big-time spending on big-time college athletics is a waste of money, which is a common belief in the northeast US.[4][5][6] The northeastern part of the country simply doesn't spend as much money on athletics as much of the rest of the country. Penn State is the lone exception, but Pennsylvania is the frontier to the midwest. Look at the Big East for additional comparison: it was founded as a basketball-first conference centered around New York City. Many of the schools in the conference get many of their basketball players from in and around New York City. Back to football... Pitt used to be a major player nationally – the school claims nine national championships[7](PDF page 2) – but local public school mergers and the Pittsburgh diaspora – which is a topic that should have its own article but is only briefly discussed at History of Pittsburgh#Reinvention (1973–present) – have contributed to Pitt's historical decline. Pitt's board has almost cut the football program on multiple occasions – around 1940, during the 1960s, and again during the 1980s – due to financial concerns. I love history and social sciences as well as college football, so I could go on about this forever. I'm just going to stop now. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 20:11, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Just a guess I'd say it's because kids in New York State (and even more so NYC) don't play football nearly as much as kids in other states. NYC, for example, doesn't have a lot of premium land to give up for college athletic programs and a football field isn't a practical expense of university dollars in that setting. Therefore, there isn't much recruiting base. Just a guess...--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:06, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

I don't think you can blame Illinois' struggles on Notre Dame: they had 11 players from Illinois on their roster this year. Purdue had more players than that from Illinois (13), not that they were better ... I think it is more the focus of the athletic program and its willingness to spend money on the right coach and the right facilities. Illinois prioritizes basketball over football, as do the states of New York and Pennsylvania. I suspect that is partly due to being in the Snow Belt; around here (Indiana), between November and March you can't be sure you can get outside and have the same kind of practice you could in Jacksonville or Austin or Sacramento, but you could certainly shoot free throws or play five-on-five or run baseline drills. There's also the question of I-A vs. I-AA/lower-division or non-NCAA football. How many students go to SUNY campuses? How many of those are in I-A or even I-AA? Buffalo, Stony Brook ...? (Illinois would have UI, NIU, and Northwestern - FWIW I would say Syracuse has a better history than Northwestern, just ask Jim Brown; ISU, SIU, Western, Eastern all in I-AA. I think that's all?) For what it's worth, Florida only has one historically elite program: UF. Florida State has been solid for "only" 30 years, Miami for maybe 25. -- Zlionsfan (talk) 03:32, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

I know this reply is coming late, but Pennsylvania most definitely does not prioritize basketball over football. It's huge in Philly in the city, and Pitt's been successful at different times in it's history, including recently, but football is king in Pennsylvania. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 01:10, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Consensus All-American Template

Colege basketball has a series of American college basketball Consensus All-American templates. I was going to make one for the 2009 College Football All-America Team. Is there a reason why we do not have such templates?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:28, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Two things come to mind (well really three, but I can't find a reference for the third). Mainly they both go back to the fact that a navbox of this kind would be crowded. First off, would they be any All-Americans, or simply those that are consensus? (I would assume the latter) Second, there are only ten basketball All-Americans, first and second team, whereas in football you would need at least 25 players, not to mention organizing them all into their respective sides (Off/Def/Special)  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 06:40, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I would probably use a format like {{2010 Pro Bowl AFC starters}} for first-team consensus.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 06:48, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Here is my draft of it {{2009 NCAA Division I FBS College Football Consensus All-Americans}}

edit: I see the first issue has already been resolved (I should try to read things through more often)

NOTICE unless there is objection to this draft, I will begin copying it to bios in a few days.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 20:52, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

2010 schedules?

I'm not sure what the purpose of 2010 Kentucky Wildcats football team is. It seems to fail WP:CRYSTAL and WP:NOTDIR. Others, like 2010 Florida Gators football team seem more developed, but still not much more than a bunch of near-blank tables. My main issue is, is there consensus to create such articles before the season begins? I would like to know whether it would be appropriate to create Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/2010 NC State Wolfpack football team and Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/2010 South Carolina Gamecocks football team? Thanks,  fetchcomms☛ 22:59, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have too much of a problem with it. Outside of the schedule, a lot can happen this early in the year with a team that will effect the 2010 season. Coaches (head and assistants) can come and go, National Signing Day is early next month, the NFL Draft is in April. So, yes, I can see a legitimate reason to create the 2010 article as early as February. On an unrelated note, I'm going to go about the game summaries in the Oklahoma Sooners article next year. Summaries for each game are a pain to write, so I may break it down into sections for the non-conference games, conference game, and postseason games. So rather than 2-3 paragraphs per game, I can do 2-3 paragraphs for non-conference, 4-5 for conference, and 2-4 for postseason. Should be a bit easier. Others may want to try it out.—NMajdan•talk 00:28, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with it either. They are useful for finding team rosters and schedules. ~Richmond96 t • c 00:31, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I think that it would be preferable if such articles weren't written until this season is over, but we're so close to the end that it doesn't really matter much. Why fight it if all you're doing is waiting on a technicality? Most team's seasons are over, and I agree that off-season staff changes and the approaching signing day make this a good time to gather sources "hot off the press" because they tend to be a little easier to find. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 01:03, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

• Agree -- after the 2009 season and when the team posted its new schedule. Bband11th (talk) 16:39, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I have created the two articles accordingly.  fetchcomms☛ 21:34, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Articles for each year's roster of a specific team?

Jweiss11 (talk · contribs) has been creating an article for, as far as I can tell, every team fielded by Michigan in history, e.g. 1906 Michigan Wolverines football team, 1908 Michigan Wolverines football team, etc. I recognize that my personal idea of notability in the realm of bands and sports is somewhat more limited than most people's, but this seems like overkill. Wikipedia is not a collection of lists; unless specific rosters had lasting notability (e.g. won a high profile championship), I'm not seeing the justification for these articles. —ShadowRanger ^(talk|stalk) 18:47, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Please see: Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Notability. These articles are all good. Jweiss11 (talk) 19:04, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Wow. That's way too loose in my opinion. *Any* NCAA team, regardless of division, visibility, coverage, performance, etc.? Applied generally, that's hundreds of articles every year. And since it won't be applied generally, it seems like an excuse for boosterism by creating fifty articles for your favorite school (I'm not accusing you specifically, and I honestly don't care one way or another). —ShadowRanger ^(talk|stalk) 19:15, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I think unless you are going to create a good sized article for, say, the 1905 Michigan Wolverines football team that includes schedules, rosters, game summaries, etc, it is a better idea to group multiple articles together like Michigan Wolverine football, 1900-1909 or Notre Dame Fighting Irish football under Knute Rockne.—NMajdan•talk 19:26, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Exactly my point. Eras (defined as a period of time or, better, the presence of a key coach or player) of a sports team can be more than just a list. You can track the development of the team, and I'm sure there are tons of good secondary sources that can analyze the effect of specific players on the performance and style of the team. A year at a time is too fine grained, you lose all context. —ShadowRanger ^(talk|stalk) 19:42, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

First, let's all understand that there is a individual article for every season of every NFL and MLB team; see Category:National Football League teams seasons and Category:Major League Baseball teams seasons. Why shouldn't we have the same for college football, at least for the teams in D-I FBS? One day, I'd like one to see a good sized article for every year of every program. Why not leave the door open for that?

The limitation with eras is that there's no discrete, systematic way to organize them. It's a judgment call, and the way one team is organized by era isn't necessarily going to break in parellel with other teams. The season is a fundamental unit of time and play that applies equally to every team. You do not "lose all context" with a single year. In fact, the single season can provide greater context by linking to other teams, conferences, divisions, games, rankings, etc of of that very same year in a neat and ordered way that the "era" structure cannot afford. Links to previous and following seasons provide context across the years.

And yearly articles can obviously be more than "just a list". Please see 1930 Michigan Wolverines football team. User:Cbl62 has done a ton of work of excellent work of late on this article and others about early Michigan Wolverines football. Jweiss11 (talk) 20:03, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

As I look at Category:2009 NCAA Division I FBS football season it seems like it is general consensus to create articles for each season of a team and a conference. There is no reason not to create them historically if you can properly wikify them.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 20:24, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Also, having season articles makes biographies more substantive. E.g., when I was writing Cato June, I was able to link his college career to specific teams that he performed against.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 20:32, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

I believe annual articles on (at least) the major programs are appropriate. The major programs receive, and have for more than 100 years, received extensive coverage in the mainstream US media. (Given the lack of substantial media coverage, groupings by decade or era may be deemed preferable for other programs.) An effort is actively underway to create quality articles for each significant season in the history of Michigan's football team. In addition to the 1930 team, other examples of what we're striving for include the 1895 and 1898 teams. A lot of others are just stubs now but even those serve a useful function in filling out the template and providing a base from which to build. Others (particularly those not familiar with American college football) may think this an absurd waste of time, space, etc., but that's a matter of personal opinion and not the standard for inclusion. There's no question in mind that these teams meet notability req'ts; each has a distinct composition of players and key events, and each has been the subject of extensive coverage in the US media. The real issue is the low quality of some of the stubs. That's a legitimate gripe, but IMO the solution is improving them, not merging or deleting them. Cbl62 (talk) 20:46, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

It looks like the Florida Gators, Nebraska Cornhuskers, LSU Tigers, Oklahoma Sooners, and Ohio State Buckeyes have followed the same year-by-year approach on historic team articles. See, e.g., the year-by-year templates at the end of these articles: 1906 Nebraska Cornhuskers football team, 1906 Florida Gators football team, 1955 LSU Tigers football team, 1955 Oklahoma Sooners football team and 1930 Ohio State Buckeyes football team. I see nothing wrong, and a lot good, with such an approach for the major programs. Cbl62 (talk) 21:14, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have any problem with individual articles, but I think it might be helpful to group some of the stubs together (via redirect) by head coach tenure, as other schools have done (see 1920 Georgia Bulldogs football team, 1920 Minnesota Golden Gophers football team, 1970 Utah Utes football team, etc). Doing so provides a more substantial article rather than several little ones with little to no prose. Also, starting the articles as merged "head coach tenure" articles (with individual season redirects) does not preclude the possibility of individual seasons getting split off as appropriate. Personally, I think that if all that can be put in an article is the record and schedule, aggregating the seasons into a collection makes more sense. DeFaultRyan 22:13, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Groupings should be done from redirects from the years until each year has an article. Grouping should not be used to replace and delete separate years.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:53, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

College Football Performance Awards

User:Obamafan70 just created College Football Performance Awards. Anyone ever heard of these awards? Because I didn't. --bender235 (talk) 18:35, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

While I've never heard of it, it looks legit and has third-party references. – Latics (talk) 21:24, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

WP 1.0 bot announcement

This message is being sent to each WikiProject that participates in the WP 1.0 assessment system. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, the WP 1.0 bot will be upgraded. Your project does not need to take any action, but the appearance of your project's summary table will change. The upgrade will make many new, optional features available to all WikiProjects. Additional information is available at the WP 1.0 project homepage. — Carl (CBM · talk) 03:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

All-star games

Was there ever a decision not to have separate year articles for the All-star games such as the 2010 East-West Shrine Game and 2010 Senior Bowl. Many places link to the more generic East-West Shrine Game and Senior Bowl, while linking all other bowls to individual games.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:23, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Peer review: Alabama football

After creating the peer review request several days ago with no feedback, I figured I would add it here. I've added a peer review request which can be found at Wikipedia:Peer review/Alabama Crimson Tide football/archive1. Any commentary is appreciated. Thanks all. :) – Latics (talk) 18:52, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Odds

I can see point spread format confusion in the bowl game articles and some reversions and edit wars. Users are being directed to this discussion, with nothing started yet. The example in the Template:Infobox_NCAA_football_single_game shows "WLSU favored by 2.5 points" as the example. Is there confusion being created by having to refer to the sports betting article just to understand a stat that would seem simpler to others? The example shown is clear enough to both those who make book and those who do not. Although, it may seem to simplistic to those who know betting lines. Also, is just the spread sufficient, or do over and under and other lines belong too? There seems to be some references needed too, but what organization is the supreme authority in gathering the betting lines legal or otherwise? Is someone collecting the consensus legal books, and at what point, right before game time? Thanks much, Group29 (talk) 02:50, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I think if we can succinctly word it to where it doesn't require a link to the sports betting article, then that should be the approach. Someone who is not the least bit familiar will not understand what "USC –8" means. Does it mean USC will have 8 points less than there opponent? No, it doesn't. As you stated, "USC favored by 8 points" is much clearer. All articles should be written as if the reader has no prior knowledge of the subject. As far as the authority in betting lines, I don't believe there is one. Each betting house will have their own line, but they are typically similar. There is one website that I used to use a lot that listed every sports house's line and I would use either the average or majority. Typically now, I can find a newspaper article that mentions the line and I'll use that.—NMajdan•talk 14:38, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

• Agree. Favored by X points has been used for many years in the bowl game articles and it is much simpler to understand. Only this year someone wanted to promote sports wagering, betting or gambling by keep changing them. That's not the purpose of the bowl game articles and it has very little to do with the games. I posted most of the odds of the bowl games after reviewing the previous way of doing them and they were based on the L.A. Times listing, which were listed by separating the team and the points with a ",". User X96lee15 said: "Doesn't really matter to me which way it's represented," but hypocritically reverting them. They were good for years, but not this season. Bband11th (talk) 16:58, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
  • Comment: You are correct, I do not care how it is represented. I did care though that you kept reverting changes without participating in any discussion. The situation had WP:OWN written all over it. That is why I kept reverting your changes. Just because something has been done for years does not mean it is the correct way to do things. There was nothing hypocritical about what I did, nor was there any reason to bring up my comment here. — X96lee15 (talk) 17:18, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
• ?? You are the police here? lol. 169.232.221.196 (talk) 00:58, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

• • So you chose to use ONE newspaper as an example of how you would personally like to see a sports line listed, and yet you discount the countless other papers who list it in it's standard format in line with the sportsbooks which actually set the lines themselves? Is that really your argument? Keep in mind the very reference links behind nearly every point spread in each bowl game is a link to an ESPN page which then further links to the same "-" notation which has been used in this year's bowl games.Tigerman81 (talk) 15:15, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
• First let's start by examining the notation in the template itself. The word "odds" is not an ambiguous term at all. The very nature of sporting events to this term is predicated by the odds or betting line of that event assuming it is an event that has a betting line.
  
  Next, let's look at the nature of the wording and the line itself. Bottom line is that any line that you see is set by a sportsbook. Furthermore anyone who reads the sports betting article or any other offshoots would realize that betting lines which you see printed in papers or any other publication are NOT meant to suggest which team WILL win the game. The very nature of spread betting is done in such a way to balance the amount of wagers placed on one or the other team. To list a team as a "favorite" by a certain amount of points suggests that said team is expected to win by that amount of points, that is incorrect as a odds line set by a sportsbook isn't meant to signify a winner.
  
  Next, if you will note on the template itself in article view, if you click on the favorite link guess which wikipage it takes you to? Answer ... Spread betting. It seems pretty obvious to me that the intent of that line is to denote the spread of the game as set by whichever or the consensus of vegas and/or various other sportsbooks. As such because that line is meant to notate the spread of the game it only makes sense to notate it in the correct format which is used by the sportsbook, in this case "-" for the favorite and a "+" for the underdog which is not used in the infobox.
  
  Finally, as it was noted earlier, just because bowl game articles in past years were incorrectly notated does not mean that current and future articles need be notated incorrectly as well. The fact that one or more people finally decided to notate them correctly this year shouldn't have any bearing on past years. I find it somewhat amusing that someone would believe that changing odds lines to their correct notation would have anything to do with promoting gambling or sports betting. Wiki would be the last place someone would come to if they were interested in placing a sports bet, especially given the fact that betting lines can and do change (sometimes rapidly) prior to the start of a contest, and I'm fairly sure that someone isn't sitting around updating 35+ bowl games in real time for the purpose of promoting sports bets.
  
  Either way this year's notation of '-' is and should be the correct notation on that line in accordance with the article for which it is wiki linked to, both now and in future years. Should someone wish to go back and correct these notations in previous years to the correct notation I would have no problem with that. Tigerman81 (talk) 03:36, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

• If I didn't know anything about odds (as I didn't before I saw Two for the Money (film)), then I would say that yes, the notation "Alabama –3" would mean absolutely nothing to me. But if one were to say "Alabama favored by 3 points", then it would be much more clearer and I would understand what it meant. The former is too short and easily misinterpreted.  –Nav  ^{talk to me or sign my guestbook} 06:16, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
  • Tigerman's argument is that "Alabama -3" does not mean Alabama is favored by 3 points, or at the very least, that is not the intention of the sportsbooks setting those lines. As this is an encyclopedia, we need to agree on the actual meaning of "Alabama -3" as dictated by those providing the number. Are they in fact saying that Alabama is favored by 3 or are they not. Tigerman is arguing the latter. It may very well be all semantics.—NMajdan•talk 14:25, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, Tigerman's explanation of how and why betting lines are set is correct. It does not mean that "Vegas thinks Alabama will win by 3 points". What it does mean is that "Vegas thinks it can make the most money for itself by collecting bets against a spread that gives three points to Texas". I don't bet on sports, but anyone who does understands how it works. Anyone who is ignorant of sports betting won't really understand it by either suggested notation – "Alabama –3" doesn't explain enough for the novice and "Alabama favored by 3 points" is slightly misrepresentative, but that might just be arguing semantics. Linking to the "Spread betting" article is a good way to help people to undertand and should not be eliminated. I think that keeping it simple is a good way to go. For example, the infobox on 2007 Pittsburgh vs. West Virginia football game simply states "WVU by 28". From my way of understanding, you could possibly expand to "WVU favored by 28" but again, I think that is putting more weight into who Vegas thinks will win, because that's not what spread betting is about. However, if you were to abbreviate it to "WVU −28" then, as NMajdan's already pointed out, I'm not sure that the sports betting novice would understand how to interpret the "−28". If you were to expand that to say "WVU favored to win by 28" then you would be totally misrepresenting the meaning of a 28-point spread. Now, in the example I'm using you could say that "of course Vegas thought WVU would win – they were favored by 4 TDs!", and I would agree with you in this instance. But what about the aforementioned 3-point spread for Alabama–Texas? A poll on ESPN's SportsNation showed that in every state but Texas, more people thought Alabama would beat Texas than the reverse. But why only a three-point spread if so much of the country thought Alabama would win? Because it's all about balancing the bets and optimizing profits. (A lot of people would probably bite on it because they could still expect Alabama to win, but just in a close game.) So to say "favored" or especially "favored to win" in misleading as to the meaning of the spread. Another example that I think is even more revealing is the record of certain teams against the spread. I read an article earlier this decade about gambling that explained how after Sports Illustrated picked (I believe it was) the Miami Dolphins to win the AFC in a season. That year, the Dolphins were 1–15 against the spread, though their actual record was much better than that. Why? Because casual sports betters were convinced that Miami was good because SI said so and that they should ride them out. However, in reality, one does not equal the other. An inordinate amount of bets in Miami's favor pushed the spread beyond what Miami could cover, so even though they were a good team they were being given spreads that didn't indicate "how many points better than the other team that they were". It may be semantics, but let me know if I am not expaining myself adequately. This is why I think that "[Insert team name] by [number of points]" is the best way to do it. JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 16:22, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

I believe as the article template continues to use sports betting lines, then they should be represented as they are by the sportsbooks and betting houses which set them. In this case you will not find a sports betting line set by any sportsbook which lists the line as "(team) by (points)" As the template already includes a wikilink to spread betting, those who may be confused by this have the opportunity to figure out what it means, as opposed to being mislead into thinking that a particular team is indeed predicted to win by a certain number of points which is incorrect and not the purpose of a betting line in the first place. I guess the main discussion here is which display style is accurate and which one is misleading. It should be noted that the spread which is represented in the infobox is NOT a prediction of a winner in any way, it is in actually just a representation of a handicap placed on one team in order to even the bets placed on a particular event. To present a team as a favorite by points conveys a message that a team is picked to be the winner of that contest which it is not. If that was the case then there would be NO reason to even include the points in the notation ie (Favorite: Alabama)Tigerman81 (talk) 03:15, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

• It says "Favorite" team and by how many point. Nothing to do with odds on betting. Let's change to "by" and keep with tradation. Why make things complicated? and promote sports gambling? Some people just love to bet, a sad society. By giving the number of points, it indicates how close or how far the game will be. Or just say the favor team. 206.170.104.63 (talk) 02:15, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Once again any line you see regarding a football game is set by sportsbook and thus have everything to do with odds on sports betting. The fact that it is included in the infobox does not have anything to do with promoting sports gambling. Your suggestion that notating a game by number of points indicates how close a game will be is faulty at best. Bottom line is you can't consider a team to be the favorite when the points which you want to notate are listed by a gambling agency and once again not mean to suggest the winner of a game, but the handicap by which a sporting event has. If you want to note point spreads then either notate it correctly or leave it out all together.Tigerman81 (talk) 02:25, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I vote for "favorite team by". Who cares about a gambling agency. The newspapers never mentioned any agency or where they come from. They just list them. 216.175.107.228 (talk) 01:53, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

What "newspapers" are you referring to specifically? Just as an example I have included the following links to show that favorites from most major news reporting agencies will list favorites as notated by the set line. I will use the upcoming NFL divisional playoff Dallas vs. Minnesota.
1. ESPN - http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/intel?gameId=300117016
2. Kansas City Star - http://www.sportsnetwork.com/merge/tsnform.aspx?c=kansascity2&page=/nfl/gaming/NFL-GMATCHUP-DAL-MIN.htm
3. Dallas Morning News - http://dallasnews.sportsdirectinc.com/football/nfl-matchups.aspx?page=/data/nfl/matchups/g1_summary_3.html
4. Denver Post - http://stats.denverpost.com/football/nfl-matchups.aspx?page=/data/NFL/matchups/g1_summary_3.html

And the list goes on and on. I have not seen any specific examples of any website or any print newspapers listing a favorite team "by" number of points. It is quite obvious that the standard way of listing favorites is by their line notation and that is the way that Wiki should list them if they are to be included in the info boxes.Tigerman81 (talk) 09:10, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

• Not broken, no need to fix. This has been done for years with the bowl article. LA Times is a good example of listing by or ,. Bband11th (talk)
  • Just because something has been done a certain way in the past does not mean it is the best way to do it. — X96lee15 (talk) 17:41, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
    • Slaves were used for centuries, that doesn't mean it was correct.24.255.210.125 (talk) 14:23, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
• It was and is the best way! Bband11th (talk) 20:00, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
  • WP:ILIKEIT! — X96lee15 (talk) 22:17, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
    • By is fine. No gambling in sports page. 169.232.232.28 (talk) 00:11, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
• Count me in too. 64.183.42.63 (talk) 03:19, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Depopulating Category:College football coaches

Jrcla2 has been removing Category:College football coaches from all articles on college coaches, including coaches that have no other subcategory. This has resulted in many coaches, such as Bruce Young, having only a stub category and a living people category. Opinions would be appreciated at Category talk:College football coaches. If there is a better talk page for notification on a discussion on this, please let me know. Thanks, --BaronLarf 09:19, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

GA reassessment of Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech

I have conducted a reassessment of the above article as part of the GA Sweeps process. You are being notified as this project's banner is on the talk page. I have found some concerns which you can see at Talk:Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech/GA1. I have placed the article on hold whilst these are fixed. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:59, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Copyright concerns related to your project

This notice is to advise interested editors that a Contributor copyright investigation has been opened which may impact this project. Such investigations are launched when contributors have been found to have placed copyrighted content on Wikipedia on multiple occasions. It may result in the deletion of images or text and possibly articles in accordance with Wikipedia:Copyright violations. The specific investigation which may impact this project is located here.

All contributors with no history of copyright problems are welcome to contribute to CCI clean up. There are instructions for participating on that page. Additional information may be requested from the user who placed this notice, at the process board talkpage, or from an active CCI clerk. Thank you. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:57, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

GA Reassessment of Oklahoma Sooners football

I have done a GA Reassessment of the Oklahoma Sooners football article as part of the GA Sweeps project. My review is here. I have found problems with the article that will require work to maintain its GA status. I have placed the article on hold and I am notifying all interested editors and projects. If you have any questions or concerns please contact me on my talk page. H1nkles (talk) 17:58, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Need help on Northwestern quarterbacks template

Could someone help me out filling in the missing starting quarterbacks for Template:NUQuarterback? I have the quarterbacks from now to 1996 and a few before 1996, but I need some help. Thanks, Eagles 24/7 (C) 22:35, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

College football season categories

There is a discussion going on here (Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2010 April 2) regarding the naming of college football season categories. I'd appreciated input from CFB project participants. Thanks. Jweiss11 (talk) 15:37, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Head coach deletion discussions

Visit Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John D. Schwender and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert Larsen to participate in current active deletion discussions.--Paul McDonald (talk) 03:34, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Notification regarding Wikipedia-Books

Hadronic Matter An overview

An example of a book cover, taken from Book:Hadronic Matter

As detailed in last week's Signpost, WildBot has been patrolling Wikipedia-Books and searched for various problems in them, such as books having duplicate articles or containing redirects. WikiProject Wikipedia-Books is in the process of cleaning them up, but help would be appreciated. For this project, the following books have problems:

• Book:Big 12 Conference head football coaches lists (problems)

The problem reports explain in details what exactly are the problems, why they are problems, and how to fix them. This way anyone can fix them even if they aren't familiar with books. If you don't see something that looks like this, then all problems have been fixed. (Please strike articles from this list as the problems get fixed.)

Also, the {{saved book}} template has been updated to allow editors to specify the default covers of books (title, subtitle, cover-image, cover-color), and gives are preview of the default cover on the book's page. An example of such a cover is found on the right. Ideally, all books in Category:Book-Class college football articles should have covers.

If you need help with cleaning up a book, help with the {{saved book}} template, or have any questions about books in general, see Help:Books, Wikipedia:Books, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Wikipedia-Books, or ask me on my talk page. Also feel free to join WikiProject Wikipedia-Books, as we need all the help we can get.

This message was delivered by User:EarwigBot, at 00:39, 8 April 2010 (UTC), on behalf of Headbomb. Headbomb probably isn't watching this page, so if you want him to reply here, just leave him a message on his talk page. EarwigBot ^{(owner • talk)} 00:39, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

This ones mine. There is one article that hasn't been created yet. This warning will go away when I get the last list created.—NMajdan•talk 13:59, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia College Football Project "coaches" ??

No, I'm not talking about coaches such as Bobby Bowden. I think we could add a column in our project active participant lists for someone who would be willing to coach or mentor new project members. Further, it would be a good idea to find a way to "assign a mentor" to each new member. Comments?--Paul McDonald (talk) 17:34, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Point spread/Odds Edit war in football game articles

In the Archive 7 [8], there is a discussion about Odds, or the point spread format in the football game templates. No consensus had been reached. But a slow edit war has been going on in 2010 bowl game articles between User:Bband11th (who favors X team by n) and User:X96lee15 (who favors X Team -n). See the example at 2009 EagleBank Bowl. Group29 (talk) 01:49, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for trying to generate more discussion. This situation has been going on for way too long. — X96lee15 (talk) 02:06, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Try taking it to WP:3O and ask somebody who has no knowledge of sports betting.—NMajdan•talk 14:04, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

In the book The College Football Handicapper: How to Beat the Spread in College Football by Bill Bravenec, the author uses both forms. One example has both forms in the same sentence on page 12, "The game opened with Minnesota favored by 14, but Minnesota was bet up to -17 by game time..." Group29 (talk) 00:02, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Navbox controversy

I have been debating with folks at WP:HOCKEY about navboxes. Can you please make sure that I am representing the college football position on the policy User:TonyTheTiger/sandbox/Hockey mafia issue correctly.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 17:29, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Sports Notability

There is discussion ongoing at Wikipedia_talk:BIO#RFC:_WP:Athlete_Professional_Clause_Needs_Improvement debating possible changes to the WP:ATHLETE notability guideline. As a result, some have suggested using WP:NSPORT as an eventual replacement for WP:ATHLETE. Editing has begun at WP:NSPORT, please participate to help refine the notability guideline for the sports covered by this wikiproject. —Joshua Scott (LiberalFascist) 03:18, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

NFL draft

I think All conference should copy the 2010 NFL Draft format and relevant info like I did at 2009_Big_Ten_Conference_football_season#2010_NFL_Draft.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:34, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

I'll comment on this in detail later, but consider the discussion at Talk:2010 NFL Draft.—NMajdan•talk 02:13, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Could you be more specific.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:02, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Couple other quick comments. Is trade information really needed outside the NFL Draft article? I don't think so. Also, consider the format I used in List of Oklahoma Sooners in the NFL Draft.—NMajdan•talk 02:18, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I removed all the details except for the sequence of the selection ownership. I could remove this as well.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:02, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Get rid of the rows that specify the round and just add a round column. Its really messing up the sort and makes it impossible to sort by round. (If I sort by name, the only way to resort by round is to reload the page.)—NMajdan•talk 03:16, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Unreferenced living people articles bot

User:DASHBot/Wikiprojects provides a list, updated daily, of unreferenced living people articles (BLPs) related to your project. There has been a lot of discussion recently about deleting these unreferenced articles, so it is important that these articles are referenced.

The unreferenced articles related to your project can be found at >>>Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Archive 7/Unreferenced BLPs<<<

If you do not want this wikiproject to participate, please add your project name to this list.

Thank you.

Update: Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Archive 7/Unreferenced BLPs has been created. This list, which is updated by User:DASHBot/Wikiprojects daily, will allow your wikiproject to quickly identify unreferenced living person articles.

There maybe no or few articles on this new Unreferenced BLPs page. To increase the overall number of articles in your project with another bot, you can sign up for User:Xenobot_Mk_V#Instructions.

If you have any questions or concerns, visit User talk:DASHBot/Wikiprojects. Okip 01:14, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

• Done and directing the bot to write to WikiProject College football/Unreferenced BLPs.--Paul McDonald (talk) 20:13, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

  Shouldn't that be Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Unreferenced BLPs or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Unreferenced BLPs?--Rumping (talk) 22:23, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for fixing this guys. Let me know on the bot talk page if you need anything. I refactored my comments to show the correct link. Okip 01:14, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

This Wikiproject currently has over 400 unreferenced BLPs. Regards, SunCreator ^(talk) 14:43, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Bowden award

Can someone with more patience, time, and interest please check out Bobby Bowden National Collegiate Coach of the Year Award? The article has some severe style and content issues and the editor probably needs to be blocked for a username violation and warned about COI. Thanks! --ElKevbo (talk) 21:43, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

This is a really bad article. Most of the citations aren't really citations -- they just go to general webgpages like the homepage for SEC baseball. This should be the definition of stub-class, as far as I'm concerned.166.82.82.98 (talk) 00:45, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Merging templates

I am looking at attacking template clutter. One thing I am thinking about is merging all templates that recognize the same honor. E.g., how about

Rather than {{Heisman Trophy}} {{Maxwell Award}} {{AP Players of the Year}} {{Archie Griffin Award}} {{Walter Camp Award}} {{Chic Harley Award}} {{Sporting News College Football Player of the Year}} or

Rather than {{Sammy Baugh Trophy}} {{Davey O'Brien Award}} {{Manning Award}} {{College Football Quarterback of the Year}} {{Johnny Unitas Award}} Thoughts?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:19, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Don't comment on the above. Based on feedback at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_College_Basketball#Merging_templates, I am going to attempt to reformat these for consideration.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:35, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I have added a collape feature above and a redesigned format by decade below:

For someone like Kerry Collins who only won one award, both formats could automatically open to that one like below

You should consider giving each award its own parameter so if used on a player, you can specify which ones to include. For instance, on John Doe's player page, it would be {{CFB Player of the Year|heisman=yes|maxwell=yes|manning=yes}}. That way, only the awards that player won show up. Thoughts?—NMajdan•talk 02:12, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

The way my understanding of the code is that currently that template can be programmed to have one open automatically. It would take adjustments that I don't know how to make to have more than one open automatically.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:34, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not talking about which ones to open, i'm talking about only including ones that pertain to the subject of the article.—NMajdan•talk 02:57, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Alternatively, I could lay it out so that all awards show with separate templates for each decade. I would not know how to set it up so just selective list show.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:00, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I'll see if I can throw something together tomorrow or Monday to show what I'm talking about.—NMajdan•talk 03:17, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

This has been a bit more difficult to implement than I thought. I've asked some other people. I'll see if what I want to do is even possible.—NMajdan•talk 14:50, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Here's an example for such an opt in template: User:Amalthea/sandbox/CFPlayer of the year (optin) Uses kind of a hack to rename the template parameters for the navbox groups, which makes them unrecgnizable by the wrapper, and thus hidden. Collapsing logic can then probably be removed.
Amalthea 15:01, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Think I got it. what do you think about this? (Bear in mind, this is all one template with different calls; see the wikicode), (changed to nowiki as these were causing issues with other templates on this talk page): {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|heisman=yes}} {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|waltercamp=yes}} {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|ap=yes|heisman=yes}} {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|heisman=yes|waltercamp=yes|griffin=yes}} {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|ap=yes|harley=yes|tsn=yes}} With this, you can explicitly call only the awards that the subject of the article won. One template would serve all players of the year and you wouldn't have to have a list on the subject's article that they didn't win. And, you don't have to break it down by decade.—NMajdan•talk 15:03, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I can definitely support this and similar setups for positional awards such as QB of the year and any position that has more than 2 or 3 awards. This way a great QB could have 2 templates representing his great collegiate year instead of over a dozen cluttering his page. What is the significance of the collapsed part of the code. Is that an artifact or is it necessary. I tried {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|HT}} and it show not do anything.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:15, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't see why we need to split this off into positional awards. They can all be placed into this one template and called as needed. Regarding your question, the HT (and MAX and TSN), are inside the wrappers, so you have to call the award you want first (and some of these parameters may need to be given new names). So, to do what you want, you need {{User:Nmajdan/Test2|heisman=yes|heisman_show=yes}}.

I think QB of the year and player of the year should be separate templates. The reader will get confused if we merge templates representing different things. If there are any other positions with more than 2 or 3 awards, they should also have a merged template (IMO). So far for RB I only see the Doak Walker Award and Jim Brown Trophy and for WR I only see Paul Warfield Trophy and Fred Biletnikoff Award. There is not a need to merge these.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:51, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

As you can see, what that does, is it expands the Heisman awards. So when you click "Show" on the main green bar, the award is already expanded. This would be used if the person only won one award. If he won two or more, it would be best to leave them collapsed.—NMajdan•talk 15:31, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I like the option to automatically show.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:51, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

But again, it should only be used if there is one award. Other, you expanding and showing a lot of information, pretty much getting rid of the benefit of putting them into one template. I think they should remain collapsed if there are two or more.—NMajdan•talk 15:56, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Autocollapsing multiple is fine.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 16:17, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Deletion Review

A deletion review has been proposed for Directional Michigan. Feel free to participate in the discussion.--Paul McDonald (talk) 03:58, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Update A deletion discussion recently took place on the article Directional Michigan. The result was "no consensus" In that deletion discussion, one argument was made that there were few links to the article. After the "no consenus" resolution was reached, one of the editors supporting deletion has been removing the links in the articles for Western Michigan Broncos, Eastern Michigan Eagles, and Central Michigan Chippewas as well as other articles such as Central Michigan University, using the argument of "undue weight given to directional michigan article" in the editing comments.

So here's the question (rather than get in an "edit war"): What does everyone think of this issue, and how should links to Directional Michigan be handled?

FYI-I will post this comment on each of the respective pages in the interest of gaining a "wider breadth" of discussion, but ask that we combine all comments on the Talk:Directional Michigan page.

Essay Reference: Wikipedia:Content removal may be helpful.--Paul McDonald (talk) 19:06, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

This is a really odd case because Directional Michigan is used as a derogatory term, particularly by the ESPN College Football Live Crew. Dan LeFevour hopefully puts this to rest in the coming years. Also, Central Michigan beating Big Ten teams more regularly can only help distinguish them.

• Comment I don't buy that it's a derogatory term (by the way, the previous comment was unsigned but posted by User:166.82.82.98).--Paul McDonald (talk) 02:11, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

• You don't find it slightly disrespectful towards Central Michigan that they are just thrown in with EMU & WMU? Western Michigan and Central Michigan are rivals. I'd be interested in poll responses from students at those schools concerning the matter. Obamafan70 (talk) 01:01, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

College Football Performance Awards, Part II

See also: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive 7 § College Football Performance Awards

Are these awards notable enough to deserve a prominent spot in certain players lead section (like Dez Bryant, Dennis Pitta)? User:Obamafan70 keeps adding those, but he seems to be in a WP:COI situation, as his contributions to Wikipedia indicate some sort of affiliation to CFPA (it's basically a single-purpose account to spread those awards everywhere on Wikipedia). --bender235 (talk) 22:14, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm with Bender on this it that they are not notable. If you look at Dez Bryants Oklahoma State bio there is no mention of the award at all and Obamafan70 continues to add it to the intro insisting that it is a notable achievement. The user is clearly in violation of WP:COI.--Yankees10 22:23, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. These appear to be awards established just recently. Not sure how notable or not they may be, but I don't think they're worthy enough to be in the lead. I removed the link to them in the {{College Football Awards}} template under Best Player Awards and was reverted by him so I let it go. In no way do these things belong in the template along side the Heisman, Maxwell, Walter Camp, etc. He's definitely attributing too much weight to them. Geologik (talk) 22:28, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

You clearly ignored the following 4 articles: http://www.okstate.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/011210aaa.html http://www.okstate.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/092909aaa.html http://www.okstate.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/091409aaa.html http://www.okstate.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/060909aaa.html

You also ignored the 2 articles about Dennis Pitta: http://www.byucougars.com/Filing.jsp?ID=12782 http://www.byucougars.com/Filing.jsp?ID=12742

The program is covered by the AP here: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/2010-01-11-3700403542_x.htm

Bender235 and Yankees10 appear to be the ones with conflicts of interest. Perhaps they work for the Mackey Award.

If these awards are so notable can you please explain to me why on Dez Bryants official Oklahoma State bio and Dennis Pitta's offical BYU bio there is no mention of the award whatsoever?--Yankees10 22:43, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

>>They are covered in the Pitta profile: http://www.byucougars.com/Profile.jsp?ID=2086 under 2009. They aren't covered in the Bryant profile because it hasn't been updated since December 2007, before he won all those awards. Then again you could just watch the presentation here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mg8Wjbn1s34&feature=channel ....video has over 3,500 views. Obamafan70 (talk) 22:51, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes the Bryant page has been updated since 2007 considering he earned all of these awards in 2008. Also are you really basing the importance of an award based on how times the presentation of it has been viewed on Youtube?--Yankees10 23:00, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

The notability of an award is certainly based upon many factors. Some of the criteria should include:

1) National media attention 2) University press releases, etc. 3) Level of social media 4) Website traffic/audience size, etc. 5) Longevity of award's existence 6) Sponsorship name (e.g. AT&T, Verizon, etc.) 7) Academic/governmental respect/recognition 8) Respect from coaches, players, etc..

Your criticism of the notability of CFPA seems to be only centered around (5) or possibly (6). It's pretty clear that CFPA has national media attention, university endorsement, praise from coaches, etc.. And with the audience size of 550,000+, I don't know how you could possibly maintain that it's not notable, unless you had some sort of pre-existing bias against new football programs. I mean come on -- there were presentations at both Texas and Alabama, the BCS title participants -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIkNME4Z_Ik http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3b0aH62LKkw&feature=channel Obamafan70 (talk) 23:53, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Simple question, Obamafan70: Are you affiliated to College Football Performance Awards? --bender235 (talk) 10:08, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

No, and I resent the continued accusations. You guys are the ones who keep deleting sourced material. And since a lot of this is coming from the university themselves, from the Associated Press, CBSSports.com, I think you guys are the ones who have to answer to the WP:COI charge, if anyone. I also noticed you didn't respond to my suggested notability criteria -- am I missing something?

First of all, not everything that is "sourced" is notable for Wikipedia. And most of your criteria above are nonsense, like website traffic, sponsorships or "respect". Longevity is a valid point, but CFPA certainly does not have that (awarded since 2008, according to your article). Also, media recognition is a good way to measure the importances, but CFPA receives barely any media attention at all. And no, a university press release is not media attention. In a nutshell, CFPA does not have the significance of a Heisman, Outland or Nagurski Trophy, therefore should not be mentioned in any player article's lead section. And in my opinion, CFPA barely meets Wikipedia's notability standards at all, so we might talk about a AfD nomination pretty soon. --bender235 (talk) 15:28, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Take the discussion to WP:3O, WP:NPOV/N or WP:RFC.—NMajdan•talk 15:06, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it's perfect right here. --bender235 (talk) 15:28, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I see no harm in letting these awards stay in the article. However, the lead is only for major awards, such as the Heisman Trophy, so they should be removed from the lead. Eagles 24/7 (C) 02:33, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Yankees10 and bender, this award is non-notable and has no place in the article. Just being sourced doesn't make something notable and neither does web traffic.--Giants27(Contribs|WP:CFL) 01:19, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

There are about 3 or 4 different issues at play here, brought up by numerous parties. I think there are some definite equivocations here and possibly even quote mining.

(1) Is a CFPA trophy equally notable to the Heisman Trophy? I think any sensible person would agree that the Heisman Trophy is a transcendent award. It's like winning an Oscar or Grammy as people outside the domain of interest often know who has won the award. Universities pay millions of dollars to advertise their candidates and build full-fledged campaigns to promote them throughout national and local media. The Heisman has inspired iconic displays, rap music, and even film. In fact, a sizable minority of the public probably even cares more about who wins the Heisman than the actual US presidency. And to clarify, I've never suggested that a CFPA trophy was equally notable to the Heisman.

(2) What is the actual criteria for award notability? This is pretty interesting question as there are many awards in college football. I listed what I think are pretty good criteria above. I have not attempted to weigh them, describe them, or even specify how they could measured. A few brief points--

1. 5 Longevity of existence...certainly this is an important thing. Some awards are notable primarily (possibly even only) because they have been around since the 1930's. But clearly this can't be the only criterion. Facebook has only been around for a decade or so, but I don't see that reducing its Wikipedia notability below the US postal service.

1. 6 Sponsorship...I think this is a pretty legitimate point. For example, if ExxonMobil, the world's largest company, started an award, then it would be somewhat notable just because ExxonMobil was pumping money into the program. On other hand, if Joe's BBQ started an award with the same principles and award winners, we would probably say it was less notable.

1. 8 Respect from coaches & players...I think this is a valid criterion. For example, if Mark Ingram won the Doak Walker & the Heisman (hypothetically), and he said that he loved the Doak Walker Award and hated the Heisman, I'm pretty sure that would pay some small respect to the notability of the Doak Walker Award. It's kind of interesting here because Mark Richt seems to prefer CFPA, and so does Drew Butler, who also won the Ray Guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoSzORBLx9o&feature=channel

(3)Is CFPA as notable as the Doak Walker, Ray Guy, Lou Groza, Maxwell? I think this is wholly debatable. Certainly, the Doak Walker, et al have been around longer, but we're also talking about an entire system of awards (22), which had a cumulative audience over 500,000 last year. And the program has 5 special teams awards, including the only punt returner and kickoff returner awards. Also, the audience is basically on par with the audience of all 5 BCS games combined. We're talking about a company with high level endorsements, including someone from the NSA. These are the type of people upon whom lives depend on a daily basis. You can't say either of those things about the traditional awards, for lack of better words. I would possibly concede that CFPA is less notable than say, the Davey O' Brien Award, but I think it's pretty much open terrain here.

(4) What awards are notable for a header? This is closely linked with (3) and also with the recommended criteria. Awards are important because they often demonstrate the notability of the subject. In particular, if we are talking about a freshman player like LaMichael James, then there is likely some debate about whether or not he meets WP:ATHLETE. Mentioning that he won the CFPA Freshman trophy and was Pac-10 Freshman of the Year is valuable for a lead, in my opinion, to demonstrate his legitimacy for inclusion on Wikipedia. Of course, one of the problems here is that it is going to be very difficult to achieve agreement on (4) with the entire Wikipedia community (practically speaking). It would be nice to see athlete articles adopt similar standards across the board for headers.Obamafan70 (talk) 17:24, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

As a Sooner fan in Dallas, originally from Tulsa, I've been hearing about the Performance Awards program since 2008. It's covered on a weekly basis by the Tulsa World and Oklahoman, since so many players from OU, Ok State, and Tulsa win their weekly honors. Broyles was covered on KTUL, the local ABC affiliate when he won the punt returner of the week award against Ok State. Of course, since it's new, it means different things to different people. Ok State and UT have them on display in their trophy cases. The Dez Bryant trophy is in a case right next to the Barry Sanders Heisman. OU just won a Heisman, so we could care less. 166.82.82.98 (talk) 00:33, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Dude, you should stop sock puppetting to create an illusion of support. It didn't work here, nor did it here. It's just ridiculous. —bender235 (talk) 09:04, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Dude, you should start WP:AGF. It's just ridiculous how far you'll go with this inflammatory and unhelpful approach. Obamafan70 (talk) 11:28, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I usually do assume good faith, but it's pretty obvious that you're sock puppetting in order to strenghen your argument. Anyway, what's actually unhelpful is your ignorance regarding the arguments above. --bender235 (talk) 13:42, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I have been absent from this debate because, well, I just don't care of the outcome. However, as a Sooner fan in Tulsa, I can say I have never heard of this award before this discussion.—NMajdan•talk 13:49, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Team templates

In my infancy with college football articles, I created a Michigan team template that, with the benefit of 2 years of hindsight, I think is WAY too long. TonyTheTiger has suggested that the "Important Figures" section is too subjective, and I agree. As part of any revamping, I'm inclined to eliminate that section. Here's how it looks now:

Before revamping it, I thought I'd raise the question here as to what others in the project think are the key components to include in a team template. I don't think we need complete uniformity in how the team templates are done, but some discussion of key elements and consistency is a good idea. Here are some samples of what others have done:

I agree with Tony that "Important Figures" is too subjective, but I'd be interested to know which other elements people think should/should not be included. My preliminary views are noted in italics. Consensus All-Americans? Link to a list rather than putting all the names in the template College Football HOF inductees? Yes, these individuals have been recognized as all-time greats at the collegiate level University athletic hall of fame inductees? Link to a list rather than putting all the names in the template Former or current NFL players? Link to a list rather than putting all the names in the template Players with numbers retired by the University? Yes, same rationale as College Football Hall of Fame Lore/Culture? Undecided. Pretty subjective stuff, and I'm not sure how to limit what's in it, but lore is such an integral part of the college game Rivalries? Probably fine Heisman Trophy winners? Undecided National championships? Yes Conference championships? Undecided Seasons? I think so, and then we could eliminate separate templates that do the same thing. Historic listing of home fields? I don't think so. I'd just list the current home stadium as is done in most templates Historic overall win-loss record? Undecided Current coaching staff? Yes Starting quarterbacks? No Input from others appreciated. Cbl62 (talk) 02:04, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

The reason some of these templates are not working is because this talk page has exceeded the number of expensive template calls one page is allowed. I may remove some templates from the Player of the Year discussion above to allow more here.—NMajdan•talk 13:03, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Wow. Yeah, I always preferred to keep it simple. I still have never created a specific University of Oklahoma football navbox, I keep it all in the regular Template:University of Oklahoma navbox. I've got some logic in the template to show the current football and men's and women's basketball team articles. I figure I have a link to the list of coaches, a link to the list of seasons, a link to the list of All-Americans and NFL Draftees, so I got most people covered. I don't see a need to make sure every article related to OU football is covered in one navbox.—NMajdan•talk 13:15, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Is there a page that lists articles exceeding WP:TLIMIT? How is Peyton Manning doing in regard to this limit?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:57, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

List: Category:Pages where template include size is exceeded. Peyton Manning:

NewPP limit report
Preprocessor node count: 92900/1000000
Post-expand include size: 1270237/2048000 bytes
Template argument size: 643262/2048000 bytes
Expensive parser function count: 0/500

—NMajdan•talk 14:20, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

That page seems to have as many if not more templates than this one. What makes the number of templates here a problem?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:14, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm mostly in agreement with Cbl62. Any lists of persons that use a qualifier such as "important" is completely subjective and qualifies as WP:OR. Lists that would be comparitively short, such as "head coaches", "heisman winners", and "retired numbers" make more sense because there is clear criteria. I'm also not a fan of repeatedly listing season links under "undefeated seasons", "conference championships", "national championships", and "seasons"; it's unnecessary in a navbox, and that kind of information could easily be clarified/distinguished on a list of seasons page. My main disagreement with Cbl62 is that I believe all former home stadiums should be included. Stadiums are a major part of a program's history. For example, I couldn't imagine removing the demolished Pitt Stadium from Pitt's navbox because it was such a huge part of the team's history. Among the navboxes on display in this conversation, my personal favorite as a navbox to be emulated is the Notre Dame box. (disclaimer: i did some cleanup/editing on that one a while back). JohnnyPolo24 (talk) 20:13, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure on why the issue here but not on Manning's page. However, if I had to wager a guess, I think the test template I created above is fairly expensive, more so than the regular, plain navbox. According to WP:TLIMIT, nested transclusions are expensive and there are several of those in my test template. Might be worth investigating if there is a way around that.—NMajdan•talk 13:37, 3 May 2010 (UTC)