Talk:Anže Kopitar/GA2

GA Review
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Reviewer: Saskoiler (talk · contribs) 02:31, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

It's my pleasure to take on a GA review of this article. I will assess one criterion at a time, capturing the assessment in the table which follows. Below the table, I'll list items which I believe need attention, if any. Please be patient; it may take me a few days or longer to get through everything. -- Saskoiler (talk) 02:31, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

Items to Address
The following is a list of items which need attention. Please respond to each to let me know when it is resolved, or enter an explanation to justify why it should not be changed.

Main aspects
 * Playing style
 * There are some hints of Kopitar's playing style sprinkled in the existing prose, but there's really no focused summary of his playing style to answer questions: What kind of player is he? What do other players say about him? Who are his peers in terms of playing style? Because of this, the article seems a bit out of balance. I scanned numerous other GA-class hockey biographies as rough comparables: Markus Näslund, Martin St. Louis, Paul Kariya, Scott Niedermayer, Joe Nieuwendyk, and Alex Tanguay. All of these contain a top-level article section named "Playing style" with 2-4 paragraphs of varying length.
 * Recommendation: Since "Playing style" appears to be the consensus way of presenting this information (not just in hockey, but other sports too), I suggest creating such a section and summarizing his playing style. I think there's probably some facts sprinkled through the article that could be amalgamated in such a section, in addition to potential new material.
 * Note that in source #13, there's a paragraph about "... a full game ... defensive-minded NHL coaches... " which you may find useful for "Playing style".
 * Personal life
 * There's some detail in the article about Kopitar's family life (as a child, and also his wife and child).
 * Other than that, the only "other" detail is that he speaks 5 languages and enjoys football. This feels like a gap in the article. I am not suggesting you need massive amounts of material here (GA criteria simply says the main aspects should be addressed).
 * Several of those comparable articles linked above have details such as: where he spends off-seasons? Charities/philanthropy the player is involved with? Political or social causes? Business pursuits? Summer hockey camps? Endorsements?
 * Recommendation: I recommend that you add some minimal amount covering some aspects of his adult life that are not directly his playing career or family to provide a bit of balance.
 * For example, his personal website mentions a summer hockey academy (which he runs with another Slovenian ex-player). Is this worthy of inclusion?
 * His personal website also mentions charity work. Is there any media coverage about this?
 * Can any media coverage be found about his impact as a sportsperson in Slovenia? One can imagine that he must be quite a celebrity there, both among hockey fans and beyond hockey fans. Some quick google searches suggest some connection with other prominent Slovenian athletes in North America (e.g. Goran Dragic). This wikipedia article—Sport in Slovenia— calls him "one of Slovenia's most famous athletes", but unfortunately doesn't offer a citation. This article says "He is a national hero in his native Slovenia"
 * Does he have noteworthy endorsements?

Verifiable
 * Dead URLs
 * The Checklinks tool shows 11 URLs that are dead. I was able to locate new URLs or archived URLs for 8 of them.
 * Can you please locate correct or archived URLs for the remaining three?
 * You may also want to check other URLs or proactively archive the remaining reference URLs.


 * Infobox
 * The height and weight require inline citations. However, I don't think there's any way to cite them in the infobox. Is it worth mentioning and citing in the body prose?


 * Lead
 * Re: source 1 (nickname "Kopi") - Is there a better source for this nickname? The Google translation of that page is not great, and does not seem to explicitly say that it is his nickname. (Granted, I don't speak Slovenian, but...)
 * Re: source 2 (The Hockey Writers) - Is this a reliable source? It appears to be somewhere between blog and full-blown trusted journalism. I think this fact could probably be supported by hundreds of more reliable sources (journalists), like this one?


 * Personal Life
 * Mother's name is given as "Mateja" (with an 'e'), but source says "Mataja" (with an 'a').
 * Source #6 (si.com) does not give Jesenice as birthplace. We need a different source for that.
 * "Matjaž played hockey for HK Acroni Jesenice in the Yugoslav and later Slovenian championship in the 1980s and 1990s, and competed in three World Championships (in the B and C pools; lower levels) for both Yugoslavia and Slovenia in the early 1990s." ← This claim is unsupported. This URL seems to have the details.
 * Source #7 ("Jeseniški trenerji skozi čas") is no longer the same site at all, so some other source is needed to support "He also coached HK Acroni Jesenice of the Austrian Hockey League in the 2006–07 season...". Looks like the same source I gave for his playing career has the coaching detail too.
 * "...and has been the head coach of the Slovenia national ice hockey team since 2010" ← This statement needs to be reworded as it isn't precise enough. This URL] suggests he was only the national team head coach for parts of five seasons from 2010-2011 to 2014-2015.
 * Again, "Mateja" is used in article, but source #9 has "Mataja".
 * Source #9 does not support "Mateja worked at the family restaurant, Gostišče Kopitar, in Hrušica, a village about five kilometres from Jesenice." (The source doesn't name the restaurant or the village Hrušica.)
 * Source #10 does not support "When Kopitar was four, his father first taught him how to skate; Matjaž built an ice rink in their backyard in Hrušica, and Kopitar would go out there whenever he could." (The only part which is supported is the ice surface in the backyard... the rest is not.)
 * Because source #11 is dead, "... Gašper joined a junior team sponsored by the Kings. He then played for the Portland Winterhawks of the major junior Western Hockey League (WHL) and the Des Moines Buccaneers of the United States Hockey League (USHL), before turning professional with Mora IK in Sweden." is unsupported.
 * Ditto for "Kopitar's grandmother taught English ... learned to speak English from her."
 * Ditto for " After his first season in the NHL, the rest of Kopitar's family joined him in Los Angeles, first living in a house in Hermosa Beach, before moving to Manhattan Beach."
 * The citation for source #13 contains no details in the "References" section (just a plain URL).
 * Why is source #16 here? There's nothing in the text offering support. Does the video contain necessary detail? If so, I'm not sure how accessible that is, but I'm not sure about non-English video.
 * Source #17 says that Kopitar met his wife in Maribor in 2005, but makes no mention of it being during a hockey tournament. Is there some other source for that?


 * European Career
 * These sentences ("In 2002, Kopitar began playing for...in 20 games for the junior club.") requires an inline citation. (I see that "Career statistics and player information" is listed in the "External links" section, but my understanding is that inline citations are needed to support statistics. I've asked for guidance over at Wikipedia_talk:Good_article_nominations.) Update: Confirmed. Inline citations should be added as the "External Links" are not sufficient for GA criteria.


 * Los Angeles Kings
 * "third among rookies in scoring, behind Evgeni Malkin and Paul Stastny" requires an inline citation.
 * "He was the youngest player in the Game, nearly two years younger than the second-youngest player, Paul Stastny." ← While technically correct, this sentence is a bit misleading because Sidney Crosby (only 17 days older) was selected, but did not play due to injury. Without mentioning Crosby, it implies that Kopitar was, by 20 months, the youngest player selected, and that's false. I think it would be better to mention both Crosby and Stastny, as the cited article does.
 * Source #29 does not load for me. (It tries to... but repeatedly times out.) Perhaps replace with a better source?
 * OPTIONAL: The 2015-2016 media LA Kings media guide (PDF) is presently showing up in the references list as #4, #36, #40, and #42. There's no problem with a reference being used multiple times, but would it make sense to merge them into a single entry? You can still refer to different page numbers in various ways. One such way is shown here: Milos Raonic (See "Tennis Canada Media Guide") Note that this is not strictly required for this GA nomination as formatting of citations is outside the GA criteria.
 * "On June 16, 2016, Kopitar was named the new captain of the Kings, replacing Dustin Brown." requires an inline citation.


 * International Play
 * "Kopitar scored si goals and eight points in five games during the under-18 tournament and finished second overall for goals scored and third for points, leading Slovenia in both categores;[47][48]" ← Sources #47 and #48 are duplicates (showing goal totals only). I assume that one of them was meant to show point totals to support the statistic claimed?
 * "In 2005 Kopitar appeared in three international tournaments for Slovenia; he took part in the World Juniors, U18 Championship and the World Championship. Both junior tournaments were at the Division I level, while the senior championship was at the top level." ← An inline citation is needed to support his participation in the two junior tournaments. (The senior tournament is supported by the citation in the next sentence.)
 * "Kopitar helped Slovenia reach the quarterfinals of the tournament by scoring two goals and one assist" ← The cited source does not mention his goals or assists.


 * Career Statistics
 * Inline citations are needed to support the tabular statistics in "Regular season and playoffs", "International", and "All-Star Games" tables. If a single citation applies to the whole table, it can be included in the table caption. Otherwise, citations per row may be necessary.


 * Awards and Honours
 * Inline citations are needed to support all of these awards. In some cases, a single citation may apply to a whole table (e.g. perhaps the LA Kings awards all trace to that media guide?), but otherwise citations are needed per row or per award year.

Neutral
 * "Kopitar's dynamic offensive talent allowed him to immediately become Los Angeles' best offensive weapon, though in recent seasons, he has improved his defensive game and has also emerged as one of the NHL's premier two-way forwards.[5] Praised as one of the best players in the League, " ← The language used here ("dynamic offensive talent", "immediately become", "best offensive weapon", "premier two-way forwards") is subjective in nature and unnecessary. As described in WP:PEACOCK, it would be better to simply use facts and attribution. For example:
 * Rather than saying he's a "premier two-way forward", say that he's a three-time finalist for the Selke award which is given to the top defensive forward.
 * It's not necessary to say that he's "Los Angeles' best offensive weapon" because the lead already states that he has led his team in scoring every season except his first.
 * Rather than saying he's one of the best players in the league, I would suggest offering (sourced) quotations from reputable individuals (not his teammates, coaches, or anyone associated with LA Kings). For example, Wayne Gretzky called him the third best player in the world, after Crosby and Toews in 2014. I'm guessing other similar quotes exist.
 * Keep in mind that some of this type of detail could be expanded upon in a "Playing style" section (as recommended above), and kept brief here in the lead.

Prose
 * Overall
 * I've made several copyedits to address a few items which seemed straightforward. Please review and let me know if there's anything you disagree with.
 * Lead
 * "...points on both occasions with 20 (tied with teammate and former captain Dustin Brown) and 26 points, respectively." ← I think it would be better to end this sentence after "...points on both occasions." They key item for the lead is that he led the playoffs both times! The details of how many points and who he tied with are already present in the body of the article, and clutter the lead. (re: WP:LEADCLUTTER).
 * Personal life
 * Re: "(in the B and C pools; lower levels)" ← This is a bit confusing. Would it be better to explain it a bit more: "competed in three World Championships for both Yugoslavia (1991) and Slovenia (1993, 1994), which competed at the lower-level B and C pools, respectively, at that time."
 * Re: "He then played for ... in Sweden.[1][2] His favorite player growing up was Sergei Fedorov" ← This is ambiguous because the "he" and "his" refer to two different people. There are many ways to resolve this, but one option is to move the Gasper detail to the first paragraph.
 * Re: "when he was 13 at a European Youth Olympic Festival." ← Where? The Youth Olympic festivals are held every two years, so he could only be 13 at the one in Vuokatti, Finland, right?
 * International play
 * Re: "The following year he appeared in the 2004 U18 tournament and the 2004 World Junior Championships. Slovenia competed in Division I at both tournaments, one level below the top division. Kopitar scored six goals and eight points in five games during the under-18 tournament and finished second overall for goals scored and third for points, leading Slovenia in both categories;[1][2] he had one goal and one assist in five games at the World Juniors.[3]" ← Even after I did some copyediting on these sentences, I find them somewhat confusing. Would it be clearer if the two tournaments were treated separately? e.g. "he competed at U18... he scored this... he also competed at world junior... he scored this..."
 * Career statistics
 * I think the column labels (which are neither linked nor written out in full words) need to be explained using the Template:Abbr template. This includes: GP, Comp.
 * Awards and honours
 * For the Selke and Lady Byng, it says "nominations". To be more accurate, I think this should say "finalist". (Many players get nominated each year simply by being on the ballot of just one voter, but only the finalists are generally deemed as notable, I think.)

Lead
 * I think that some of the citations in the lead can be removed (but this may depend on how other changes are made), as per WP:LEADCITE. For example, that he is the first Slovenian to play in the NHL can be cited in the body, and does not need to be cited in the lead.

Other suggestions
 * I know the 2016 World Cup of Hockey hasn't happened yet, but I think Kopitar has been named to Team Europe and I think I read somewhere that he was really excited (because he's often excluded from top international play based on being Slovenian).
 * He was named Slovenian Sportsman of the Year in 2012. It is in a footer box, but not mentioned in the prose. It probably should be, no?

General comments

 * Okay, I've completed the first pass of the review. I'll check back in once the items above have been addressed. Let me know if you have any questions about any of my comments. -- Saskoiler (talk) 20:00, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks for taking the time to go over the article, definitely seems like you were thorough and put some work into it. It`s going to be a few days before I can properly address everything here, but I will get to it soon as I can. Most of it seems like it won`t take too much effort to resolve, so soon as I do I`ll let you know. Thanks again. Kaiser matias (talk) 17:22, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * I see there's been a series of edits on the article, but no responses above yet. I wanted to let you know that I'm still around for another week or so, but then I'll be heading out on vacation for several weeks after that. Saskoiler (talk) 17:35, 16 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Yeah sorry about that, been busy taking care of some other things and just haven't had time to come back. I'm hoping I can get everything done by tomorrow, the next day at the latest. Definitely before next week though. Kaiser matias (talk) 23:45, 16 July 2016 (UTC)
 * So have everything done, far as I can tell. If there are any specific issues please let me know, and I'll clean them up, but from what I see there are no major problems left. Kaiser matias (talk) 22:46, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, many of the review comments have not been addressed and remain outstanding. In its current state, this article does not pass the GA criteria in my opinion. My recommendation is to work through the review comments one-by-one, and respond to each above (inline) as you go. If any of my review comments are unclear, then let me know (inline), and I'll try to clarify. I can see that you've put some work in here, but without any inline comments, it's difficult to know which you've addressed. Saskoiler (talk) 04:20, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Saskoiler, I don't see any edits by Kaiser matias on the article since your post above three weeks ago, and only seven Wikipedia edits in total during that period. I think it may be time to close the nomination. BlueMoonset (talk) 14:47, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the ping to check on this as I've just returned from vacation. I agree that this should be closed after several weeks of inactivity. There's a good base of material in this article. If the comments above are addressed and this article is resubmitted for GA status, I'd be happy to review. For now, I'm closing this nomination. Saskoiler (talk) 15:58, 16 August 2016 (UTC)