Talk:Mike Mussina

major overhaul on 7/25/07
i just spent about 2 hours completely overhauling this page, fixing grammatical errors, providing linkage to many things, removing unneccesary info. HOWEVER, this former absolute *eyesore* is far from being done, and whoever edited or wrote the page previously should stay away and not do anything else except read it.

im gonna work on integrating the trivia section into the overall article, since many of the facts in trivia either dont belong there, or are completely useless and irrelevant. but for now, while ive done enough, i just posted some stuff in the trivia to help me remember and move them at a later time.

also, ill plan on writing a little bit more in depth about each of his individual seasons, and either completely take out the "post season" subsection, or write about his postseasons in it. everything is very out of order and thrown around concerning his post seasons.

also, i took out that entire "near perfect games" section, since it was completely useless and relatively long. if we listed every near perfect game a pitcher throws, then nolan ryan, pedro martinez, roger clemens, sandy koufax, bob gibson, and many others would have 2 pages worth of the section on each of their respective wiki articles. if he pitches a no hitter or he DOES throw a perfect game, then u can add a section for it, but for now, we dont need to know about all of his "near" perfect games.

ill try and add a "personal" section (his marriage would then be moved there from the trivia section) if i can find enough stuff about his personal life.

also, im probably gonna end up completely taking out all that stuff on his football and basketball stats from high school. its completely useless to the article. hes a baseball player, if u wanna list his stats from high school list his baseball stats. u can MENTION that he played football and basketball as well if u want, but no need to go in depth about it. if he were a professional 3 sport star, then sure, go ahead and list all the stats u want. but for now, he doesnt play football, he doesnt play basketball, we dont need to know his stats of those sports from HIGH SCHOOL.

i dont know, and never have known or understood, how exactly to add references, so i decided not to add any. however, if anybody wants the references, just tell me and ill post the link here and tell u where they should be. i assure u, i have references for many of the things in this article that need them (unless of course its bullshit), but like i said, i just dont know how to add them.

i didnt clean this up a bit cuz i like the guy, being a sox fan and from boston i absolutely hate him, but i hurt my foot yesterday, so while im bedridden, ive decided to clean up the wiki pages of all the players on my fantasy team >_> 69.119.143.219 00:46, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

First changes
Made a few changes:

"Mussina had become the ace of a questionable Yankee pitching rotation." Questionable is something of POV. Changed to "was proclaimed to be the ace."

"This anthropomorphic Moose is considered a first-ballot hall-of-famer.". I'm a Yankees fan (and Moose fan, even when he was in Baltimore), but he is NOT a first ballot hall of famer. I don't want to clutter the talk page with a bunch of baseball chatter and comparisons, but its simply (unfortunately) untrue. lucidMatt

Mike is listed as batting "left" but he's actually a switch hitter. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 67.140.42.95 (talk • contribs) 10:10, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Layout cleanup
I cleaned up the layout a bit and updated the stats to their current status. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.17.205.25 (talk • contribs) 11:50, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Baseball America American League All Star?
Where did this term come from? Is it actually the All-Star game or something else? None of the cited sources in the article mentions any term close to it. There are no relevant Wikipedia articles about it, either. Please clarify. Thanks. Vic226 22:31, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi. For reference that particular award having been awarded to Mike Mussina, see http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/M/mike-mussina.shtml. --Epeefleche 23:02, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Last two sentences in the lead section
I am having trouble moving the last two notes of his less-general awards (as opposed to the more commonly known Cy Young Award and Gold Glove Award) elsewhere in this article. As a list of awards (especially by years) would look more or less cumbersome, I compiled them into the lead while knowing that Baseball-America-related and Baltimore Player of the Year awards are too specific for it. Does anyone have suggestions on where to settle these awards, or is there a way to note them as explicit omissions next to the link Epeefleche provided? Vic226 05:29, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Deletion on Orioles fans' reaction to 2000 trade & No-Trade Clause
I have deleted the following paragraph:

"'Many Orioles fans saw the move as a failure to act on their hometown team's part. Many felt that Orioles management wrongly assumed that Mussina would stay loyal to the team, despite being offered more money and being heavily courted by Yankees management. Contrary to popular belief, it was the Orioles' refusal to include a 'No-Trade Clause' in his contract that forced a change in teams.'"

The first part on Orioles fans are unlikely discovered by researches from reliable sources, not to mention that it might have a slight taste of biased view. The second part on "Orioles' refusal to include a 'No-Trade Clause'" contradicts this source, in which there are notes about Mussina unwilling to waive his apparenly existed no-trade clause. --Vic226 05:03, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

(And the above paragraph sounds like an Orioles fan and a Yankees fan contradiction each other :-) first 2 sentences were added by one and the last sentence was added by another) Vic226 09:49, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

The "no trade" issue was a major factor in new contract talks with the Orioles. They had purchased no trade clauses from other players (there were only 2, I think and Brady Anderson was one) and had made it policy not to include that clause in any future contracts with any player. Many believed that Mike went to the Yankees for the money and that is simply not the case, moreover his desire to stay close to home. I am neither an Orioles or Yankees fan, just a friend of Mike's and you could say that I heard it straight from the Moose's mouth!--67.140.40.86 22:43, 9 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, as your explanation goes, maybe you could verify it by finding a reliable source that supports what you said above? Also, I'm not sure if I would buy that, but it would still be original research for saying that "I heard it straight from the Moose's mouth" (which would be unwanted for Wikipedia's standard). After all, one of the reasons I deleted the paragraph was because it wasn't even properly sourced.


 * After some more brute work of searching, I found this news in a good flavor to the deleted information above. Respond here for any questions/comments about this source and the readding of the information back into the article (but not without some rewriting to be done. For example, "forced a change in teams" sounds rather too extreme as he indicated that "depending on what they want to do, I'll be back or I won't. But nothing's going to happen before then"). Cheers,  Vic226  (chat) 10:51, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

numbers
I do not agree with the last change ... on numbers. Where in that wikipedia reference are you referring to? Also, you spell out the numbers incorrectly in a number of places. I would suggest a revert. Thanks. --Epeefleche 08:35, 13 November 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't know if Wikipedia has a consensus of editors on the style of the ordinal numbers, but (though irrevalent) I found the guideline discourages using ordinal suffixes, so I wonder if the general consensus considers the use of ordinal suffixes awkward.


 * Let's take "ninth" for example (by the way, I fixed the "nineth" to "ninth" which is the only apparent error when I double-checked again): ninth, 9th, or maybe even 9th. I'm not sure how you would view each of them, but of the three, "9th" would be the least fluent in appearance to me. Though "9th" looks in a few ways better than "ninth", it would be quite a work, even a nuisance, to convert every ordinal numbers in every article to that style since most people adapt to the ordinal numbers written in words. Of course, there is a limitation: this would be best only to numbers composed of two words or less (e.g. in the case of twenty-thousand-ninety-sixth, 2096th is more preferable). Since Mussina isn't ranked in 100th or lower for any category listed in the article, I changed them to words.


 * And I just realized that I missed the numbers-only part. Same things apply (see Manual of Style (dates and numbers)):


 * "'Whole numbers from zero to ten are spelled out as words in the body of an article. Use numerals in tables and infoboxes.'"


 * By the way, my reference to WP:NOT is about the ranks of categories you have listed for each year. These are going somewhat too detailed for a general audience, and they cannot be any more notable than his breakthrough of 2,500 strikeout barrier or his six-time Gold Glove Awards. Since there lacks a bit of his milestones/achievements/media attentions (which is more important for Wikipedia), I did not revert them.


 * Still, I'm open for any opinions and/or suggestions you might have after reading my annoyingly overwhelming essay above ;-). Cheers, Vic226 09:45, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi. If you continue reading the Manual of Style re numbers, you will see the following modification to the rule that you mentioned: "Numbers in words....Within a context or a list, style should be consistent. Example: There were 5 cats, 12 dogs, and 32 birds. or There were five cats, twelve dogs, and thirty-two birds." Thus, I would submit that it is contemplated that here is is permissible to say 5th -- rather than fifth. Actually, required when we will later say "100th" rather than "hundreth." And, given that in these article we are dealing with a great number of numbers, I believe that it is much easier to read 5th than fifth.

I might also point out that you in the above wrote 100th rather than hundreth. Which, in my view, is better for our purposes.

To me, 9th is the most fluent in appearance, the most common, and easier to type than 9th.

BTW, I believe that while it is know as W-L percentage, if you for some reason want to spell it out it is not win-lose, but rather won-lost, percentage.

I would still suggest that you revert the numbers, given the above. Thanks.--Epeefleche 17:53, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

My opinion on this is the same as the Blue Book and the California Style Manual; when it is a number less than 10, spell it out, so "fifth," "ninth," &c. If it's a number 10 or over, use the Arabic, so "11th," "13th," &c. No need to use superscripts. --Nlu (talk) 18:10, 13 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Hi, I write in response to the message left on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers).
 * The guideline that numbers under ten should be spelt out also holds for ordinals. It is generally considered standard practice for small numbers to be spelt out.
 * With respect to the consistency guideline, I would note that in this instance, all the affected numbers can be expressed in two or fewer words, and that the vast majority of them can be expressed in one, so to spell all them out is preferred. For the purposes of this guideline, the numbers in brackets do not count, as they are not the same context: they could not be considered to be part of the same "list".  Therefore, it would be correct to spell out all of the subject's rankings and phrases such as "six-time" in this article.
 * As a sidenote, decimals less than one should be written with a leading zero (e.g. 0.275, not .275) for clarity; percentages in prose should be written with per cent (British) or percent (American) rather than %; and acronyms should be written out in full on the first occurance, and then noted in brackets after, e.g. "American League Championship Series (ALCS)" on its first occurance, then "ALCS" (not linked) every time after that: never assume that a reader knows what the acronym means. Neonumbers 00:52, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I don't remember there being any consensus reached anywhere in Wikipedia before the reversion to numeral forms for several contents (and I'm not going to change it back now only to contradict my statement above). So, let me try again.

Take this small passage for example:

"In 2006, he end the season with a 15-7 record. He was 2nd in the league in OBP allowed (.279.; 224/803); 3rd in the AL in walks/9 IP (1.60), batting average against (.241; 184/762) and strikeout/walk ratio (4.91), 4th in ERA (3.51), 6th in win-lose pearcentage (.682), 8th in strikeouts (172), and 9th in strikeouts/9 IP (7.84)."

I think I do have an explanation to change all the orders with single numbers to letter form while abiding what you have been persistent on about the "consistency" rule. In the passage above, there are actually two distinct contexts (one is the ranks, and another is the statistics), except that they are crisscrossed with each other. This would undoubtedly confuse some of us because there was never a clear definition of "context" in the Manual Of Style. Hence, I believe the ranks have nothing to do with the statistics that followed all of the stat names. The example you have been using (i.e. "There were 5 cats, 12 dogs, and 32 birds") contains only one simple context, and therefore is easier to determine whether to use numerals or letters. Therefore:

"In 2006, he end the season with a 15-7 record. He was second in the league in OBP allowed (.279.; 224/803); third in the AL in walks/9 IP (1.60), batting average against (.241; 184/762) and strikeout/walk ratio (4.91), fourth in ERA (3.51), sixth in win-lose pearcentage (.682), eighth in strikeouts (172), and ninth in strikeouts/9 IP (7.84)."

I believe it would still follow both the single-number and consistency rules in the MOS. The overall context is still illustrating his ranks (and they are all under 10) in different fields of statistics. The number-form statistics was added afterwards and appeared to "merge" into the original context of the passage. There are many others that have the same confusion as the one presented above.

Feel free to share your thoughts on the argument I presented above. Regards,  Vic226  (chat) 02:55, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

"In 2005, Mussina was no longer the Yankees' ace."
This line is somewhat 'biased,' and I am sure that there is a better way to write this line to make seem less like a negative fact. Lawrenceku 02:19, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Hall of Fame Debate
I worked hard and carefully on this today and someone hastilly and inconsiderately reverted. This area will tend to attract POV so we need to be vigilant. In all fairness I'm a big Mussina fan and I expect other Wikipedians to keep me in line. :) That said, I changed a lot of stuff that needed to go. Jdickert (talk) 00:54, 10 August 2008 (UTC)Jdickert

On second thought, I am wondering whether there ought to be a "HOF Debate" section in this article at all. Feedback anyone?

Jdickert (talk) 01:54, 10 August 2008 (UTC)Jdickert


 * That section should definitely stay. There is legitimate debate among reliable third-party sources, which is what our Wikipedia guidelines are meant to ensure. With that being said, I think certain areas of that section need to be reworked, specifically the Kurkjian quote. Not only is it unsourced, there's also a POV issue with it. For every Kurkjian, there's probably another counterpart who thinks Mussina doesn't deserve the Hall of Fame. Chengwes (talk) 16:25, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

the_tamale I thought the section was unnecessary filler, and that's why I came to this page. The section references an article written six years ago, two years before Mussina retired! I think there is little doubt that he will be elected... some who will think he shouldn't be, agreed, but hardly a "controversy," in my opinion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by The tamale (talk • contribs) 17:41, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry belated reply. In my view, this section remains worthwhile until Mussina is actually elected to the HOF. Mussina received 20% of the BBWAA vote in 2014; I would certainly call that a 'controversy' in light of Mussina's compelling objective merits. If and when he is elected, it would be superceded by that news. Until then, I also want to suggest including some reference to advanced baseball metrics (e.g. WAR) which are now even more mainstream just three years after the immediately preceding posts, with proper citations of course. Those metrics demonstrate an overwhelming case in favor of Mussina's election to the HOF, and support Kurkjian's expert judgment about Mussina's numbers. Jrgilb (talk) 21:19, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

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