Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Stan Musial/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by SandyGeorgia 05:54, 13 August 2010 [1].

Stan Musial[edit]

Stan Musial (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): Monowi (talk) 21:19, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this as a Featured Article because after having become familiar with the Featured Article criteria with my work on Ozzie Smith's article, I believe this article meets the FA criteria. Monowi (talk) 21:19, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment—no dab links, no dead external links. Ucucha 21:32, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sources comments:-

  • "Retrosheet": the site looks a bit amateurish; do you know who's behind it, and why it can be considered as reliable?
  • Ref 78: Publisher given as "St. Louis Post-Dispatch", but I can't find anything on the website that confirms this. Copyright is claimed by STL.com
The copyright holder of the material on the site is the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, a notice displayed at the webpage here[2]. I believe it is clear that stltoday.com is an online outlet/digital version of the paper Post-Dispatch, hence I think it would be misleading to list the publisher as simply "stltoday.com" in the reference. Monowi (talk) 04:25, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough Brianboulton (talk) 23:28, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ref 106: As Sports Illustrated is a printed source it should be italicised.
The titled has now been italicized. Monowi (talk) 04:13, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Otherwise, sources look OK, no other issues. Brianboulton (talk) 23:25, 16 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To answer the first one, Retrosheet was founded by a University of Delaware professor, and is considered a highly regarded website for baseball statistics.[3][4] There's an article on this site too if it helps; Retrosheet. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 01:30, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
All sources issues resolved. Brianboulton (talk) 23:28, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support as GA reviewer, finding this article to be quite impressive. I do have a question though; have you looked through the baseball digests on google through 1963 in hopes of finding any free images from his playing career? That would add to the article. If there aren't any that's fine, so long as you've looked. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 22:17, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the support; as far as finding of picture of Musial goes, I've looked through the May 1947, Oct. 1948, Oct 1950, and two other editions from 1957 and 1959 on Google books with no luck. I'll take a look at some other editions from that time period if I get the chance. Still, even if there was one available, could it even be utilized as a free-use image? Monowi (talk) 03:28, 18 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yes; any Baseball Digest issue pre-1963 can be used as public domain in the US per the copyright laws. I found one of him from 1948 looking through myself, which works. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 02:36, 31 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
As I mentioned on your userpage, that's a really great find, and I appreciate the time you invested in this task to get the cover included in the article. Thanks again! Monowi (talk) 04:33, 2 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments – I enjoy seeing articles like this on historical sports figures, and it's great to see someone who doesn't get as much credit in modern times as he deserves. The article looks like a nice one to me. I did find the following things, but most are quite minor.

  • The bibliography is impressive, but I know that there is a recently released biography of Musial entitled Stan the Man: The Life and Times of Stan Musial. Has this book been consulted at any point while this was being worked on? I don't think the absence of one book would prevent this article from being "a thorough and representative survey of the relevant literature", since there are a lot of good works used already. Worth mentioning, though.
Thanks for heads up on the new book. I actually read an article about "...The Life and Times of Stan Musial" in a recent edition of St. Louis Cardinals Gameday Magazine. In a review of the book, the reviewer mentions a lack of new info coming to light about Stan personally or professionally, which leads me to believe the article can make FA status without it. Personally, I remain convinced the biography by Giglio is the definitive Musial book to date, as it isn't afraid to delve into original research, such as Giglio's finding that Musial's dad never wanted Musial to take the college scholarship, but instead take the "security" of steady work at the coal mine. I'll see if I can get the book from my local library within the next week or two though. Monowi (talk) 19:54, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've never seen Baseball Almanac (reference 134) proved to be a reliable source. Is a different reference possible for the quote?
I do not have an alternate reference for this quote. I too cannot recall Baseball Almanac being used as a reference in a Featured baseball article. This quote & reference were included at the persistence of another editor. I don't think this quote fits into the article very well, & as such, I've gone ahead and removed it. Monowi (talk) 08:11, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • References 78 and 81 should have the publisher in italics since they are printed publications. Also, should the publisher for refs 81 and 147 be the same? They both seem to be from Time.
I added italics for refs #78 & 81, and since Time is technically "Time Inc.", I changed ref 81 to "Time Inc." Both good catches. Monowi (talk) 08:11, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not sure if General Manager should be capitalized in the lead.
I've gone ahead and capitalized General Manger in both the lead section and the body of the text. I like this better, and I'm sure there's no right or wrong answer on this one. Monowi (talk) 08:11, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
No, I'm afraid you're incorrect. Titles following a personal name, used alone in place of a name, used in apposition to a name, or used generically are lowercased—there is truly no debate about this in American English style. Every major style guide concurs and every publishing house style sheet I have ever seen concurs. I have made the correction. I would also note that before I made the correction there was no consistency on the matter: two instances of "general manager" were already properly lowercased. (Titles are capitalized when they immediately precede a personal name and are used grammatically as part of the name, i.e., "Later that month, General Manager Stan Musial made the trade.") Overall, the article looks in very good very shape. I look forward to reading through it.—DCGeist (talk) 11:27, 30 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the heads up. I appreciate you taking the time to correct this, and the info will be helpful for future baseball articles I work on as well. Cheers, Monowi (talk) 20:55, 30 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Career: For the first mention of ERA, spell out the term in full and leave the abbreviation in parentheses at the end. This will help non-baseball fans a little.
Done. Monowi (talk) 08:32, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • "with manager Dickie Kerr. Kerr...". It would be better without the little repetition of the name.
The text now reads, "Musial spent the 1940 season with the Cardinals' Class D team, the Daytona Beach Islanders, where he developed a lifelong friendship with manager Dickie Kerr.[1] Musial's pitching abilities improved under Kerr's guidance, and Kerr also recognized Musial's hitting talent by playing him in the outfield between pitching starts." Monowi (talk) 08:32, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1941–1945: Tiny thing, but I think a comma is needed after the first use of Browns.
Fixed. Text now reads, "The Cardinals claimed the NL pennant for the third consecutive season, and faced St. Louis' other Major League team, the Browns, in the 1944 World Series." Monowi (talk) 07:20, 29 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • The see also and external links sections are almost overflowing with links. Would it be possible to trim these back somewhat? For the see also section, see if some of these links could be incorporated into the body of the article. A couple of the external links—SABR Biography Project and St. Louis Walk of Fame—are being used as references, so I'm not sure they need to be repeated in that section.
This same issue came up during the GA review, and I totally agree with you. Deleting the utilized references from the "See also" section is a great start. I've also integrated the "4,000 total bases list" link into the text, which was simply a link to the total bases article, and not a unique list by itself. More integration work to come. Monowi (talk) 19:54, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've had the chance to do additional integration work. The "See also" section remains a bit long though. Monowi (talk) 07:40, 29 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Giants2008 (27 and counting) 03:56, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I really appreciate your comments, they are all excellent suggestions. Monowi (talk) 19:54, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments - a brief look at the article reveals that very relevant items like strikeout, base on balls, and batting average were not Wikilinked (I've tried to start work on this). I don't know that a baseball biography will pass a FAC if most baseball terms aren't linked. You have to assume the reader is completely unfamiliar with baseball and thus, make sure that these items are at the very least linked to the proper articles so they can research their meanings. Y2kcrazyjoker4 (talk) 18:42, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've been attempting to only wikilink the first mention of team or key statistic in the body of the text, but I'm sure I've overlooked a bunch of potential links. I've noticed you've already had the chance to add a bunch of these links, which is fantastic work. If I find any more potential links I'll be sure to add them in. Cheers, Monowi (talk) 19:54, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Your approach is definitely the right one, but just be aware that you should ignore the lead when it comes to first mention of a term/word. Also, I've tried to replace the minor league locations with the actual minor league teams. Baseball Reference was very helpful in this regard. Also, hope you don't mind some adjustments I made to the References section (per a recent FAC I went through) and the tweaks to the quote boxes for readability. I think these changes improve the article. Y2kcrazyjoker4 (talk) 20:16, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If I may make one additional comment - several of the quote boxes repeat quotes already used in the article body in prose. Per WP:QUOTE, it's not a good idea to repeat quotes - it's best to just use them just once, either in prose or in the quote boxes. Y2kcrazyjoker4 (talk) 13:46, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I understand where you're coming from; it's something I kept in mind for Ozzie Smith's article, but even in that article I couldn't avoid having one of the quotes in both a quotebox and the article's body due to the context I needed to provide with the quote. For Stan's article, right now there are three quotes utilized both in the text and in a quote box; the Leo Ward quote, the Bob Costas quote, and the Ford Frick quote. Notice though that each of quotes are approximately one sentence in length. I believe for these particular quotes, utilizing them in the body of the text gave them the proper frame of reference that works in the reader's benefit. If these quotes had been composed of multiple sentences, or even longer worded single sentence, then I would whole-heartedly work towards your suggested changes. As is, I think the currently setup in the article is best setup possible right now. Monowi (talk) 20:31, 30 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - good piece of work, well done...Modernist (talk) 21:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I am curious if you can find Musial's batting statistics at Ebbets Field as I remember he was as good as it gets there - he owned the place. In my own rankings of the top dozen players - its Ruth, Cobb, Mays, Musial and Aaron as the 5 best, followed by Gehrig, H. Wagner, Speaker, T. Williams, Hornsby, Foxx, and Ott and/or F. Robinson. Although I guess ARod and Bonds have to be taken into account nowadays. Followed by Rose, DiMaggio, Mantle, Clemente et. al...Modernist (talk) 21:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Quote You might consider adding this well known descriptive quote about Musials batting stance: Hall of Fame pitcher Ted Lyons likened his plate appearance to a kid peeking around the corner to see if the cops were coming [5]...Modernist (talk) 14:23, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your support. To answer your question about his stats at Ebbets Field, no, I do not have those available; maybe someone at SABR can round those up though. I've also added in the quote about his batting stance per your great suggestion. One of the driving forces behind my work on this article is to present unbiased info so maybe more people will rank Stan in their own top five or ten "greatest hitters" list. Cheers, Monowi (talk) 07:57, 29 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I'm about a quarter of the way through. Good, easy read so far. Nice work.

  • Similar to the style point I addressed above, I made the style for "major league" consistently lowercased ("major league debut", "major league record"), except where it appears as part of a proper noun like Major League Baseball or Major League Player of the Year. I know this can seem one of the more vexatious style points in writing about baseball—as evidence, proper nouns aside, there were 13 instances where "Major League" was capitalized and 8 where "major league" was lowercased. In fact, the rule is essentially the same as that with personal titles: if the term is grammatically part of a proper noun, it's capitalized; in all other cases, it's lowercased.
  • In Baseball career, the second part of this sentence is both ungrammatical and confusing: "This stance was later described by pitcher Ted Lyons as 'a kid peeking around the corner to see if the cops were coming', while also being compared to a coiled rattlesnake." Did Lyons also compare Musial's stance to a rattlesnake? Did someone else? Please edit as appropriate.—DCGeist (talk) 21:43, 30 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Quote Here is the entire quote - Hall of Fame pitcher Ted Lyons likened his plate appearance to a kid peeking around the corner to see if the cops were coming, a description that writers of the day would like; opposing pitchers thought he looked more like a coiled rattlesnake. [6] - A quote is a quote - bad grammar and all. However Lyons quote ends with 'cops were coming', and the rest appears to be the author Jan Finkel's input, perhaps it's just a famous paraphrase...Modernist (talk) 21:51, 30 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Of course a quote is a quote. And there's nothing wrong at all with the quote in our article. It's the second part of the sentence in the article, just as I said, that is ungrammatical—"while also being compared to..."—and confusing. Thanks for providing the entire quote, which has allowed me to track down the source of the "coiled rattlesnake" description—which Finkel inappropriately reproduced without attribution or quotation marks, and which our article in turn inappropriately reproduced without quotation marks: this June 1950 Baseball Digest article. I have emended the article to reflect this sourcing. Note that the truly original source of the description is not actually the Baseball Digest article, but the book it condenses, Baseball's Greatest Hitters (1950), by Tom Meany. This book is not accessible via Google Book Search.—DCGeist (talk) 07:10, 31 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: In 1955–1959: "When his left arm pulled out of its joint..." I believe an arm involves more than one joint. What are we talking about here? A shoulder dislocation seems most likely, given the wording, but an elbow dislocation is also possible. Please specify if you can or recast to avoid suggestion of solitary "joint" if necessary.—DCGeist (talk) 12:05, 31 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I went back to my reference material and added some more specificity. The existing reference also mentioned specific damage Musial incurred, such as a fractured bone in his left shoulder socket and muscle tearing. The new text reads, "When he overextended his swing while batting during a game on August 23, Musial fractured a bone in his left shoulder socket while concurrently tearing muscles over his collarbone.[107] Musial was unable to play again until September 8, ending his consecutive games-played streak at 895.[107]" Cheers, Monowi (talk) 04:33, 2 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent. A major improvement.—DCGeist (talk) 22:14, 2 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: Almost there. But I'm afraid Post-playing career is a bit of a mess. There appears to be no logic supporting the placement of the paragraph devoted to personal matters such as his children and harmonica playing smack dab in the middle of the section. And then to have the sentence about the St. Louis Walk of Fame smack dab in the middle of that paragraph? Bizarre. You're going to need to restructure, and might want to consider splitting the material into multiple subsections or even creating two distinct sections, perhaps Post-playing career and personal life and Legacy, or something of the sort.—DCGeist (talk) 11:45, 31 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As comparable examples, you might want to look at how two other articles satisfactorily handle post-playing career material: the Featured Article Jackie Robinson and the current FA candidate Wally Hammond (yes, a cricketer, but still structurally pertinent). Jackie has four sections:

  • Legacy
  • Post-baseball life
  • Family life and death
  • Awards and recognition

Wally has (after Style and technique, the equivalent of which you cover in your playing career narrative) one section, with four subsections:

  • Personal life
  • Personality
  • Marriage
  • Business
  • Final years

There are any number of ways to improve Stan's structure, and there's no requirement for as many as four or five structural elements, but what strikes me as certain is that the single Post-playing career section, with no subsections, does not work.—DCGeist (talk) 22:14, 2 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Note I restuctured it a little bit, as nominator wasn't active for the past week. Secret account 17:11, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Great. I restructured a bit more. See what you think.—DCGeist (talk) 22:49, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support I saw nothing wrong with the article other than post-playing career needs some restructuring but that's minor. Secret account 00:58, 4 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: The lede says, "Musial served as the Cardinals' general manager in 1966 and 1967." But the main text gives no indication at all that he served as general manager in 1966. Please confirm with your sources exactly when he became general manager, and then make sure that the lede and main text agree, and the latter supports the former.—DCGeist (talk) 10:43, 5 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: In 1960–1963, this passage is unclear and confusing: "Finishing the 1960 and 1961 seasons with batting averages of .275 and .288 respectively, he continued playing despite speculation about his retirement. In 1962, Musial posted a .330 batting average..." During what period does the source say such speculation was going on? Throughout 1960 and 1961, or between the 1961 and 1962 seasons? The Lansche is not accessible via Google Book Search or Amazon Search Inside.—DCGeist (talk) 21:44, 5 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • I'm going to buy the Lanche book today it's only about 5 bucks with shipping in amazon. Let's see when it arrives. Secret account 17:11, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • My apologies on my protracted absence from this FAN discussion. I have used the Lanche reference to rephrase the text, which now reads, "Newspaper articles began speculating about Musial's retirement in June 1960, yet at season's end Musial finished with a .275 batting average.[39][123] Musial had clarified the retirement speculation in September 1960 by confirming he would play again in 1961, and Musial's .288 batting average during the 1961 season later reaffirmed his decision.[39][124]." To User:Secret, I would like to express my appreciation for your help in addressing some outstanding issues, and even going so far as to utilize your own hard-earned cash! Since you will have a copy of the Lansche book in the near future, I'd love to hear your thoughts on the phrasing of this section, and anything we could do to improve it. Cheers, Monowi (talk) 06:52, 12 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Has there been an image review? If not, please locate an image reviewer. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:47, 7 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Media review: One WPian-created pd logo consisting only of noncopyrightable elements. Three images:

  • License: GFDL (1.2 or any later), CC-BY-SA-3.0, and Copyleft. Supported by all circumstantial evidence.
  • Quality: Acceptable.
  • File:Musial statue.JPG: Statue of Musial outside Busch Stadium (photo PD/GFDL/CC-BY-SA, but subject makes it fair use).
  • Usage: Good—shows Musial's widely noted batting stance, supporting well-sourced discussion thereof. Also supports considerable discussion of statue itself later in text.
  • Rationale: Lacks specific fair use rationale for this article. Given the nominator's apparent disappearance, I'll add this. Good.
  • License: PD-US-not renewed (pre-1964). Well evidenced.
  • Quality: Fine.—DCGeist (talk) 22:51, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support: The article's in fine shape now. With the exception of nailing down the period when speculation spread about Musial's retirement, which Secret will shortly address, I see no remaining issues.—DCGeist (talk) 23:16, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Ack! That "See also" section is awful :) Aren't some of those in the text, if not can't they be incorporated into the text, and are some of them in the navigational templates at the bottom? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:27, 13 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I was able to eliminate five of them. At present, I don't think there's a clear basis for eliminating any of those remaining. Incorporating most of them into the text would require nominator to research, integrate, and cite new sentences along the lines of: "In 19XX, Musial led the league in Ys for a record Zth time."—DCGeist (talk) 05:56, 13 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
  1. ^ Giglio 2001: 35–38
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