Talk:Bill Simmons/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: Wizardman  Operation Big Bear 17:18, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

I'll review this in the next few days, once the one I'm currently reviewing is wrapped up. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 17:18, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

The first thing I noticed is that I think the article's overreferenced. I'm usually pretty stringent on refs, but this is overkill. For example, "William J. Simmons III[2] was born on September 25,[3] 1969,[4] to William Simmons[5][6] and Jan Corbo.[7]" That should need one reference at most, let alone six. Could I get a rationale for the immense referencing? If it's not that good I can do some trimming, though I'd prefer you do it. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 03:05, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Aside from the above, here are the prose issues I found:
 * "Simmons was an only child[7] and grew up in Marlboro and Brookline, Massachusetts[2] before moving to Stamford, Connecticut[7] to live with his mother after his parents divorced at the age of 13.[2] His father, William Simmons, was a school administrator,[5][6] and his stepmother,[8] Molly Clark, is a doctor.[6]" I would swap these sentences around; flows better that way.
 * "He began getting email from people asking if he could put them on his mailing list." first, e-mails. second, confusing; do you mean others wanted Simmons on their mailing lists?
 * "The website quickly built up a national following since so many friends from high school and college all e-mailed it to each other.[7] In the winter of 2000, Simmons thought about quitting and going into real estate since there was little money in sportswriting but didn't." this could probably be written more encyclopedically.
 * There are some bits and pieces of making his bio sound slightly POV. For example, "In 2007, Simmons conceived the idea for the critically praised[26] 30 for 30," the critically praised part really isn't needed, since that's tangential to Simmons.
 * "His current contract with ESPN, which he signed in 2007, expires in 2010.[24] In May 2010, it was reported that Simmons and ESPN came to an agreement on a new contract, although no official announcement has been made on the terms.[37]" This can be modified; obviously, the 2007 contract part can be taken out.
 * There are some cite needed tags in the rooting interests section, which I'm not sure if that's even needed.
 * Going off on the referencing above, there are many sentences with 3-4 refs that only need one.

Due to the various concerns, as well as the article nominator having now edited in a couple months, I'm going to fail this as a GAN. It can be re-nommed when the issues are fixed. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 04:12, 20 December 2010 (UTC)