Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive-Mar2007

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Contents 1 Yet another player AFD 2 Opinions before I nominate for deletion 3 Issue with article 4 Canadian Football Hall of Fame 5 Possible new template 6 Chris McFoy 7 New data source 8 All-disctrict performer 9 New solution for multiple WikiProject banners 10 Useful template 11 Portal 12 A.J. Suggs 13 Notability of per-year team entries

[edit] Yet another player AFD

Greg Olsen (Football) has been proposed for deletion here.

Let me launch a trial balloon here ... does anyone think we should come up with our own notability guideline? WP:FOOTBALL (the other kind of football) has a discussion page here. We might want to come up with our own guideline ... regardless of how restrictive or lenient it is, at least we could have something to point to and try and get some consistency so we can try and curtail the random players being AFD'd or even speedied here and there. Any thoughts? --BigDT 14:36, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

This was tried before. See [1] and [2]. I'd still support having something, even if we leave it under this WikiProject and tag it as a guideline, though see input from outside folks as well. --MECU≈talk 15:14, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Here ... check out Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Notability. This is really what we need. Feel free to edit/add/delete/whatever. I'm not picky on what we decide - we just need something written down so that we can be consistent in our application of it. --BigDT 15:38, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Its a good idea in theory, but it has been tried before. What would you vote if there was an AFD for Paul Thompson (football)? By the criteria specified thus far, he would be deleted. But what criteria would need to be specified that wouldn't also include many players who probably do not need articles?↔NMajdan•talk 15:59, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Maybe we could add, "well-known starting player for a BCS team" or some such thing. Honestly, though, I think Paul Thompson is right on the edge of acceptable. If he is going to be drafted, then ok, but otherwise, there isn't really any information in that article that couldn't be folded into a team year page for the one year that he played. --BigDT 16:20, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

See, thats the point. I agree he is right on the edge of acceptability. But, I would argue he does deserve an article given the situation surrounding Rhett Bomar and Thompson's rise back to starting QB and leading his team to a CCG. But this is the type of sticky situations I can see getting into surrounding this issue.↔NMajdan•talk 16:41, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, that's true ... and that's why notability is a guideline more than a policy. I just think that we ought to have something that we can point to and agree upon. I think that if we should have an article on a person, we should be able to come up with a rule that includes them. Maybe that's a little bit of the programmer in me - wanting an algorithm for everything. ;) Maybe we could add, "starter for a division I-FBS team about whom there is substantial media coverage". That would include Paul Thompson. --BigDT 19:09, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Just another note, Jamaal Anderson has also been nominated for deletion here--Thomas.macmillan 21:30, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Same guy that nominated two other CFB players going to the draft for deletion. May want to watch his contribs.↔NMajdan•talk 21:48, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
• Found the AfD for Victor Abiamiri by looking at that editors contribs--Thomas.macmillan 22:11, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Opinions before I nominate for deletion

The Jimmy Clausen article appears it was recreated a week ago (it was previously deleted in August). This person is not a notable athlete yet. He has not played one down of college football. Nothing has changed since it was last deleted. This article should wait until he is named the start at least.↔NMajdan•talk 14:09, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Taking a look at it, it's got sections, it's well-referenced, and it even has an infobox. In terms of quality, it's an impressive start to an article. As for notability, I'd say "Offensive Player of the Year" sounds pretty impressive. I'd say leave it, if only because it will have to be recreated at some point anyway, and it's a high-quality (e.g., Start or B-class) article. —Disavian (^talk/_contribs) 14:39, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I think it would be a bad idea to delete the article. He is notable enough to warrant an article. There are numerous ESPN, Sports Illustrated and other sports news articles written about him. He's the #1 rated football prospect in the nation. National Signing Day is only a week away and then he'll be a college football player instead of a high school football player. Deleting this article would almost be futile because its going to be recreated within the next 6 months. So my vote is keep. Here's another reason why I vote to keep: I use Wikipedia as pretty much my primary search engine. When I want to look something up I check Wikipedia first because there is less BS, no advertisments, and its generally pretty damn reliable. If Wikipedia doesn't have what I'm looking for then I move on to Google. So say you're a sports fan curious about Jimmy Clausen. You don't really know much about him and would like to learn. Well, without this Wikipedia article you have to go through sites like ESPN.com with a ton of advertisements and videos playing automatically, search through their massive website, click "Skip This Advertisement" screens, then finally find an article that's 5 pages long, and read through it before you finally learn what you really wanted to know about Jimmy Clausen. Or you could just read this Wikipedia article and get all the vital stats on Jimmy in 1 minute. But hey, that's just my opinion. Seancp 14:44, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

This new article is of much better quality than the one that was deleted so I guess I won't nominate for deletion. I still feel he doesn't meet WP:BIO though. What if he doesn't become starter this year? The article will be sitting idle for at least another year. According to ND's roster, there are four quarterbacks (not including Clausen) so its safe to say the chances are against him (how often does a true freshman start for a major team) as two of the other players are sophomore and two are juniors.↔NMajdan•talk

I think it's a good subject because of how much coverage he's got on the major SI.com/ESPN.com sources. If he ends up being a bust, then it will probably still be notable considering the hype machine.--Bobak 15:20, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree to keep this one. He's received a lot of press, and he's notable for that alone. I don't buy the "stagnant" argument. So what if it's untouched for 2 years? That's 2 years that someone was able to read about him with no one complaining about the information enough to touch it. --MECU≈talk 18:49, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I also think we should keep this one. Some high school players are notable just for their accomplishments at that level. Also, I support what Mecu said. If the article doesn't change for 2 years, it is still a valuable resource for those two years.

Proponents of deleting such an article sometimes say - "if he doesn't play in college no one will care about him in 10 years. We should wait until he plays otherwise he fails the 10 year test." I don't buy this argument either. Even if he sits on the bench for 4 years or gets hit by a bus and never plays - let's wait until no one cares about him and THEN worry about deleting it. In other words, we don't need to worry now about whether someone will care about him in 10 years. The fact is people do care about him today. What we say in the article is verifiable. Therefore, we would do a dis-service to our readers by deleting the article. Johntex\^talk 19:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Issue with article

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

[edit] Canadian Football Hall of Fame

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

[edit] Possible new template

So I was working on adding the recruiting classes to the 2006 Oklahoma Sooners football team (and eventually to the 2007 article) when I realized that it might be a good idea for a template. Of course, it would only be applicable to college football recruits (actually it might work for college basketball recruits too if I drop the 40 column). I thought I'd bring it up here to get some feedback before going forward with my manual development of the table or beginning the actual template. To see the table I've started go here.↔NMajdan•talk 17:12, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

It looks pretty good to me. I'm not sure that I like the image for the star rating since it's really flat and I could have sworn I'd seen a more 3-D one on other pages. I'll look around and see if I can find it. Which page do you expect to put this on? I would expect to see the 2006 class in the post-season section of the 2005 page. z4ns4tsu\^talk 17:32, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, if you find a better one, let me know. I found this one here: commons:Category:Star_symbols.↔NMajdan•talk 17:39, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Really? I would put the 2006 recruiting class on the 2006 page. It has much more relevance there. What relevance do these players have to the football season in which they were high school seniors? I would put the 2006 recruiting class on the 2006 article.↔NMajdan•talk 18:27, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Take a look at Image:Crystal Clear action bookmark.png and Image:Five-pointed star.svg. If you want me to, I'll try to put these together into a series of ratings star images when I get home this evening. z4ns4tsu\^talk 18:01, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Ok. I tried just using the image for every star needed but for some reason, its causing the row to increase in size (see here). Anyway, I've got a pretty good working sample at the link previously in parentheses. Take a look and tell me what you think. I have the references from Scout and Rivals auto generated from information in the template. If this is too difficult, or we find instances where it doesn't work, it can be scrapped and replaced with a regular cite template.↔NMajdan•talk 18:24, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Awesome template. I actually prefer the simpler star style. The 3D one with the white highlisht is pretty at large size, but at small size it looks to me like it is a half-filled star, which could be confusing. Johntex\^talk 18:30, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Take a look at 2006 Colorado Buffaloes football team for what I did with the recruiting for another take on the table. I'm not sure I like the large, two row size because the table will likely get VERY long. I think 2007 recruiting (current) should go on the 2006 page (like I did for CU). This is still part of the season. No, they didn't play for them, but they were recruited during this season, they attended games this season. Putting the information on the 2007 year isn't really good, since recruiting information starts coming out during the season, so someone looking at the 2006 page would want to know about what recruits they have, and have to go to the 2007 page, they really shouldn't exist yet? --MECU≈talk 18:47, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm...dilemma. I like your table and I like my table. I do disagree whole heartedly about including 2007 recruits on the 2006 article for the reasons I stated. For many football fans, the season is over after the national championship game. Recruiting is the beginning of the next season. Start puling up great recruits that may be able to help your team next year.↔NMajdan•talk 19:09, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Where on the season page would this information go? Does it make sense to have it at the top? For importance and therefore chronological sense, it should go near the bottom. The first thing someone sees isn't recruiting info. I completely understand your point though. --MECU≈talk 21:51, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that information about recurits coming in between the 2006 and 2007 seasons belongs in the 2007 article. Those recruits did not factor into the game play of the 2006 season. The most logical place to put the table is at the start of the 2007 season. Alternatively, one could argue that they were being recruited during 2006 in parallel to the games being played. By that logic, we could put the table at the bottom of 2006. If we do that, though, the top of the 2007 article should link back to the recruiting informaiton found in the 2006 article. Either way, the first section of 2007 should be "Prior to the season" or "Leading intot he season". That is the place to talk about who left the team and who joined the team. That is the most logical place. Johntex\^talk 16:52, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

If Mecu is worried about having such a dominant table at the top of the page, where it would go if the article is done chronologically, we could always have a parenthetical description of the recruiting class and a link to the actual table which could be placed at the bottom of the article or even on another article. The question is, which format should I pursue with this template? I've halted development for the moment. I like my format better, with the two rows, but it could get pretty long, as Mecu said, for a recruiting class of 20+ athletes.↔NMajdan•talk 20:00, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Any further comments on this? I'd love to get this finished by tomorrow so it can be used on Signing Day on Wednesday. Do more people prefer the single row format of Mecu's of my double row format? I see benefits and setbacks for both so I'm really neutral. I do like mine better but I can see it getting pretty long.↔NMajdan•talk 14:24, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

I was hoping for some more input. I'm fine with the summary at the top of the 2007 page and full table lower on the page format. Though I still think it should all be on the 2006 page. I'll go with the flow. --MECU≈talk 15:12, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Another possibility is using {{hidden start}}. I've added it to my userspace page as a demonstration.↔NMajdan•talk 20:27, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Okay. You win. (though shouldn't it start collapsed? it didn't for me) Also, since we're WP:NOT paper, let's go with the expanded format you have. It has more style than my boring chunky table. --MECU≈talk 20:34, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

I know. The article I first saw this hidden template started out hidden but when I added it, it starts out shown.↔NMajdan•talk 20:37, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

One thing I just noticed, you don't have the ESPN ranking. It's not a star ranking so it's not as glamorous, but it still should be given, since rivals, scout and ESPN are the three main (only) sources for recruiting nationally. Also, maybe add the team overall rankings per rivals/scout/ESPN at the bottom? Looking good. Good work. --MECU≈talk 20:38, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

I've never used ESPN's recruiting system. But I don't see a reason not to add it. However, now that we have three sources, what are your feelings on determining height/weight/40? Its a little more difficult and time consuming getting an avg of three.↔NMajdan•talk 20:51, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Check that, I'm against using ESPN. If you look at a school's list of commits on ESPN.com (see http://insider.espn.go.com/ncf/recruiting/tracker/school?schoolId=201&season=2007 for OU's 2007 class), you'll notice it says Data provided by Scouts, Inc. So it looks like ESPN gets a lot of its information from Scout. So is it necessary to have ESPN as well? Yeah, the grade is different but how much research is ESPN doing beyond what it gets from Scout?↔NMajdan•talk 20:58, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

I'd also noticed that ESPN used Scouts' information. While using their grade might be a good extra indicator, we definitely shouldn't use their ht/wt/40 info since it's most likely straight from Scouts. Over-all, I like the two-line format better. Have we decided whether we will be putting 2007 recruits on the 2007 or 2006 page yet? I still think it makes the most sense on the 2006 page in a "post-season" section, but I can see how it could be more appropriate on the 2007 in a "pre-season" or "recruiting" section. z4ns4tsu\^talk 21:13, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Wow, guys. I just don't see at all how the 2006 recruits pertain to the 2005 season. Sure, they were recruited during that season and probably attended games of that season but they had no effect on that season at all. I mean, take a athlete I am familiar with, Adrian L. Peterson. He signed in 2004 and was recruited in 2003. What role did he play in 2003 that would warrant his mentioning in a 2003 Oklahoma Sooners article (if there was one)? Now, what role would his recruitment play in the 2004 season? He was signed that year, and he went on to become a star that year. Look at 2006 Chicago Bears season as an example. Even they have the 2006 NFL Drafts as preseason (offseason). Once the national championship game has been played (whether its the BCS NC game or Super Bowl) the season is over. Anything after that it a fresh start, a new season. I know I'm getting hung up on this so I apologize.↔NMajdan•talk 21:43, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

The templates have been created: {{College Athlete Recruit Start}}, {{College Athlete Recruit Entry}}, and {{College Athlete Recruit End}}. I'm still working out some bugs, such as one mentioned on the talk page of the End template. Nevertheless, I have added it to the 2006 Oklahoma Sooners football team article and the 2007 Oklahoma Sooners football team article for review in a live environment. I have utilized the {{hidden start}} template but am still trying to figure out why it defaults to show instead of hide. I would appreciate others to test it more, especially on basketball recruits.↔NMajdan•talk 21:57, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The difference seems to be determined by where each person considers the season to start and end. For me, the season ends between recruiting and spring practice. Thinking about it, I'm not sure it makes any kind of logical sense, but that was/is the basis for me expecting it on the previous season's page. I would be happy, however, with a link in the 2006 page's post-season section that points to the 2007 pre-season section. After this discussion has taken up so much space and time, it also seems like a good idea to avoid confusion from fans, too. We wouldn't want a curious mother in Africa thinking we don't have any information on recruiting just because we put it in a place she didn't expect to see it and didn't cross-link. z4ns4tsu\^talk 21:59, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I found a bug. If you look at 2006 Colorado Buffaloes football team#Recruits (I know it's supposed to be on the 2007 page, but I haven't created it yet so this will do for now), when a 40 time isn't listed, it moves the signed data into that field. You can really tell by looking at Nick Nelson. --MECU≈talk 14:38, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

That is not a bug. Its in the design and in the documentation. If you include the 40 times in the Start template, then that field in the Entry template cannot be blank. Just put a hyphen in the 40 time if you don't have one. I thought it would be better to have the template default to no 40 time so you have to take extra steps to include a 40 time.↔NMajdan•talk 14:42, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Okay, maybe make a note of that in the documentation, that putting - or something for a 40 time that's not available? Also, can we increase the border between the rows of the whole player, after looking at the whole list it starts to get more difficult to determine the stars-ranking belongs to who. Making the border a few pixels thicker or a darker color or something may help. Otherwise, I am liking it overall, and the two-line format concern I had isn't really a problem. --MECU≈talk 14:46, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Its already in the documentation. I'll look into increasing the border size between players. Did you see the issue I'm having with the End template?↔NMajdan•talk 14:54, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

No, I don't see any problems and don't really understand what you mean on the end talk page. I did notice that the Scout.com link doesn't link directly to the school. It seems to be missing a "&toinid=660" in the URL. At least, for Colorado. --MECU≈talk 14:59, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

I fixed the issue with the Scout source. I guess I need to provide better documentation on how to get that number.↔NMajdan•talk 15:08, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Also, the scout team rankings link doesn't work. --MECU≈talk 15:02, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

You see, thats the issue. If you look at the actual ref, you'll see both team rankings urls are missing the year. I don't know why its not working. And accessdate isn't working. The only reason Rivals works is because it defaults to this years team ranking.↔NMajdan•talk 15:08, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Maybe it's because the URL's have = in them? It might be confusing the template. --MECU≈talk 15:22, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

But the sources that are actually in the footer are fine. Its just the refs. As I mentioned on that talk page, I think it might have something to do with the whole ref tag being inside a {{#if: statement. I tried replacing all the pipes with {{!}} but that didn't work. May have to go to WP:VPT.↔NMajdan•talk 15:26, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I understand now. But I don't know how to solve it. You're using a varaible inside a template inside an #if. That's messy. Can you make the year and accessdate mandatory (ie, not make them and make it {{{year}}})? --MECU≈talk 15:30, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

<ad>I'd like to take this important day where you're likely to get some source-able quotes to put in a plug for our ill-forgotten WikiQuotes q:College football. It'll be great in a few years to be able to source some of these comments made today. If you get a great quote (like I found: "In the next four years, I'll give you at least one national championship.") please add to the WikiQuote!</ad> --MECU≈talk 15:14, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Any thoughts on how grayshirts should be listed? For example, if a player commits to the 2006 class but then is grayshirted and doesn't enroll until Jan 2007, should he still be part of the 2006 recruiting class or is he part of the 2007 class? Scout doesn't appear to list the player as part of either class, but Rivals would list him as part of the 2006 class. ESPN lists him as part of the 2006 class too, even though they get their data from Scout, weird. -- Billma 14:04, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I think listing them when they sign the LOI, so if they signed yesterday but are going to grayshirt, list them. One can always put a note in the next season saying "so and so signed last year but grayshirted". It'd be nice to have some kind of symbol for that in the table as well. Just take the redshirt image and make it gray. --MECU≈talk 14:08, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I added a grayshirt option to the entry template. Just add | grayshirt = yes to the tag and it will add Image:Grayshirt.png to the Commitment Date cell.↔NMajdan•talk 14:42, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Chris McFoy

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[edit] New data source

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

[edit] All-disctrict performer

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

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

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

It is very easy to find a source saying that Vince Young was an "all district" performer. For instance, this fact is mentioned in his official bios with both the Tennessee Titans[4] and the Texas Longhorns[5]. That is not the issue. The issue is finding a source that explains what it really means. I suppose I could take it out, but I find it interesting that he was an all-district performer in basketball. Hence, it makes for a non-football fact to help round out his biography. Johntex\^talk 14:55, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

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

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

[edit] New solution for multiple WikiProject banners

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

[edit] Useful template

This template: Template:American football uniform may be useful if we could add text and numbers to the jersey. The helmet may not be needed as we can get a good image of the helmet logo/design from elsewhere and use it like the NFL pages do. If someone wants to work on this, it's been around for a month and not used at all. --MECU≈talk 16:28, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmm....interesting. I knew they had something like this for Soccer. I may try this out.--NMajdan•talk 17:15, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

I added images for a few different number/jersey color combinations here, using the same techniques used for Template:Football kit, such as transparency. Generally with the soccer uniforms, they ignore details (e.g., sponsors, badges, team names) in favor of colors. For a first cut, the helmet could just be the main color of the helmet. Again, for soccer clubs (which is a very successful project), the template is used to do a very simple rendering of the uniform, and then there are other elements to see details of the uniform, such as the club's badge. Rolando 01:15, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

On a similar note, any thoughts on using the NCAA helmet images at The Helmet Project? The guy's given his permission to use them and I think their use would certainly add some eye candy to the various team infoboxes and help delineate this project from the standard swill. My apologies if this subject has already previously been broached, but I couldn't find any mention of the subject. Pepto gecko 02:54, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

That article specifically states "Commercial use of the images is NOT permitted, because the various colleges and professional teams own all such rights to their respective logos" so I would not use them.↔NMajdan•talk 17:12, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I saw a similar discusson on User talk:Football79 between Football79 and MECU where they seem to approve of their use. Just curious, but is the use of helmets w/ logos different than the use of school logos for illustrative purposes? Pepto gecko 20:37, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, their use would have to be under "Fair Use" and thus fair use rationale would need to be provided upon upload. Edit: Looking at the talk page above, it appears Mecu already stated the helmet images would have to be fair use, so he concluded the same as I.↔NMajdan•talk 21:46, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Yup. See Denver Broncos for how the NFL Project does it. Not that the way they do it is the way we should, but just as an example. It's hard coded into their template even so someone even gave it some pre-thought as to the naming convention of the filenames. Football79 wanted to do this as a big project and I was letting him lead, but if others wanted to as well I'm fine with that. --MECU≈talk 22:22, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Portal

We are in the process of improving the Portal and would appreciate any help.--NMajdan•talk 15:43, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Please nominate and/or support articles and pictures for the Portal. February is fast approaching. Portal:College football/Selected Content/Nominations.--NMajdan•talk 20:03, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Another month is coming. Any input would be appreciated.↔NMajdan•talk 22:25, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A.J. Suggs

Hi there everyone,

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

[edit] Notability of per-year team entries

I have a question - I've noticed there are a lot of entries for specific teams for 2006 [6] [7] [8]. For at least a few teams, it makes a lot of sense to have their own articles (like Florida and Ohio State). For teams with breakout years I can see that it makes sense too (Rutgers, Wake Forest). But does every major program need a seperate entry for this year and presumably every year to come (Tennessee, Georgia, Florida State)? Cogswobble 20:22, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

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

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

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

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