Template talk:Infobox ice hockey biography/Archive 6

Team years
This infobox should allow for the display of years next to the teams played for, as is the case in baseball, basketball, soccer, football, and virtually all other athlete infobox templates. This becomes especially important for players who played for a European club during the lockout for half a season, people who don't know much about hockey might think Joe Thornton played half his career with HC Davos before moving to San Jose as they are given equal emphasis in the infobox. displaying years would easily solve this InterMiami (talk) 09:21, 19 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The infobox is just a summary and as such we try to cut out extraneous information from it that is more easily shown in the full article. This would just clutter the infobox. To be honest it should probably be removed from most of the other infoboxes as well but that is unlikely to happen. -DJSasso (talk) 17:51, 21 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Strong support: This is a no-brainer. It's vital information and just one of several things that makes hockey player pages far less attractive than other athletes' pages. Dennis C. Abrams (talk) 04:46, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Strong support: It should definitely be included. While 'years played with each team' could be more easily shown in the full article, the fact is it is never more easily shown in the full article. Also, if putting the team years is extraneous, then former teams should be omitted from the infobox as well because by the same logic, it can be 'more easily shown in the full article' as well.  Bait30   Talk? 23:31, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
 * There have been a number of discussions on this and consensus was pretty strongly against this as it just adds too much clutter to the infobox. Not everything has to be in the infobox, former teams are much more important than the years themselves. And in most articles except stub articles, it is pretty much always shown better in the full article, and often in better context than can be shown in the infobox. -DJSasso (talk) 17:25, 28 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Would it be possible for you to link some of those discussions? I can only find one discussion on this topic here.  Bait30   Talk 2 me pls? 07:03, 2 June 2020 (UTC)
 * You should WP:DROPTHESTICK. If you want to discuss this again then start a new discussion. – Sabbatino (talk) 11:53, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

New discussion
Would it be possible for someone to link some of those discussions (about years in infobox)? I can only find one discussion on this topic here.  Bait30  Talk 2 me pls? 03:31, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Trying to gauge interest because I can only find two discussions, the one above from 2019 and the one I linked first from 2012. It seems like WP:HOCKEY thinks that adding the years a player was on a team is clutter. However, like I said, one of the discussions was from 2012. And the 2019 discussion had 3 people (including myself) say that the team years is very useful and should be included, while only one user responded saying that it's too much clutter. I'm not trying to be disruptive and waste anybody's time, but I do think it's important to consider that WP:CCC and that the opinions of editors outside of WP:HOCKEY should at least be considered instead of being readily dismissed, especially because these are the people who are more likely to consume the material.  Bait30   Talk 2 me pls? 01:39, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Listing years in the infobox is indeed clutter. WP:NHL takes a minimal approach towards the infobox and only key information is listed (if you were to compare it to NBA or NFL infoboxes). – Sabbatino (talk) 15:21, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I understand reducing clutter, but I would say it's some pretty key information. Looking at the infobox for Zdeno Chára, you would think that after his tenure with the Senators, he left to play hockey in Europe before returning to the NHL. It's especially confusing because the subsection headings for his player career are only for NHL teams. For example, there's literally only one sentence for his tenure at HC Lev Praha and it's buried within the Boston Bruins subheading. Another example is Jamie Oleksiak. Looking at the infobox, you wouldn't realize that he started his professional career with the Stars, only played for the Penguins for a little more than a year, and then returned to the Stars.  Bait30   Talk 2 me pls? 21:25, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Adding years to the list is unnecessary excessive clutter, considering how quickly some players change teams. Flibirigit (talk) 23:26, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
 * (outdent) I do see the argument for the years, but would still stand against it. The examples noted show that effort should be made to make things clearer in the articles themselves, not further inflate the infobox. This would also be an issue for players who had multiple tenures on the same team, as it is a little redundant to have the same team listed two or three times, but including multiple clusters of years beside one team would look equally garish. Kaiser matias (talk) 01:49, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Exactly, I also say adding the years would be adding clutter. Just as we don't include every lower-level minor league team in the infobox, we also don't need to identify each team that is listed in the infobox by its league nor the player's tenure. The body of the article, and the stats table, are both sufficient sources of those additional details. Echoedmyron (talk) 14:38, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't have any opinion (just came here from WT:SPORTS) but for those interested there are players in rugby as well as football (both as players as well as coachers or managers) with tens of years listed for their teams, often with the IB being longer than the bio itself, but with that content not included in the article.
 * I'm not sure which side I'm giving a "good" argument for, as on the one hand the IB contains info that the body doesn't (and/or saves on "he played for...he then played for..." repetition in the body), but on the other hand it isn't in the body and thus some would argue it shouldn't be in the IB (even if sourced) or the article should be expanded.
 * Curious to see which way this goes, as it might prompt me to see about removing such instances in those other IBs. Primefac (talk) 15:58, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

It seems like there are less people on my side than I thought. Oh well. At least we know that consensus hasn't changed.  Bait30  Talk 2 me pls? 18:16, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I think it's added clutter myself. Indeed, the number of years a player spends with a team is important information ... which can be gained by reading the article.   Ravenswing      21:46, 7 June 2020 (UTC)


 * I would oppose the years as well as it is clutter. The infobox is just a summary, reading the article will get you the years. -DJSasso (talk) 13:47, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Default conversion from ft/in should be to m, not cm
The standard practice for all sports is to use metres for height/distance, not centimetres. This should be changed in the template. In fact, it would probably be better to leave the target units out so that the  template can select the most appropriate units, which it properly does in this case. Getsnoopy (talk) 18:41, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Edit suggestion to de-link "Position"
(Note: I'm taking this into account from Template:editprotected: "If the proposed edit might be controversial, discuss it on the protected page's talk page before using this template.")

I suggest de-linking Position. Firstly, it doesn't have its own article; it just redirects to ice hockey. Secondly, there is no explicit section in the ice hockey article for "positions." Thirdly, individual ice hockey positions have their own articles, so the linked values in the "position" parameter should more than suffice. (In my opinion, the Shot and Glove are not very useful either, but since those articles do have their own "handedness" sections, I don't have a strong argument to remove those.) ~EdGl  !  17:09, 19 September 2020 (UTC)
 * If there's no article, and especially if there's no subsection, then I see zero issue with removing the link. Primefac (talk) 21:45, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

Please de-link the Position label; as described above, the link is not useful.

Specifically, the line | label5 = Position should change to | label5 = Position Thank you. ~EdGl !  22:25, 19 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done Primefac (talk) 22:37, 19 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks again. ~EdGl  !  02:41, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

Possible bug in template
I'm a Teahouse volunteer, and another editor recently came to us with a problem he was having with template:infobox ice hockey player. In his sandbox, if you check the revision history, you can see that the former_teams parameter didn't display anything. The player is retired, so the proper parameter is played_for, and I changed it. But I still can't figure out why the former_teams parameter didn't work here - it works in other articles, such as Marcus Johansson (ice hockey, born 1990). I thought maybe there was some template logic that if the career_end field was populated it would prevent the former_teams field from being displayed, but that wasn't it. Can someone more familiar with this template help figure this out? TimTempleton (talk) (cont)  23:01, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
 * FYI - the old info showing the undisplayed parameters is live at Kevin Regan. TimTempleton (talk) (cont)  23:11, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
 * I looked at the code. It only displays  if   is set. If it stays like that then it should definitely be documented. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:35, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Great job figuring it out. TimTempleton (talk) (cont)  00:24, 5 January 2021 (UTC)
 * As mentioned yeah the former_teams parameter is intended not to work unless there is a team parameter as it is only intended for active players. -DJSasso (talk) 16:47, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

Improvement idea
Add jersey numbers. KRANKENWAGEN (talk) 19:35, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Hockey/NHL players accolades section
I think NHL players should have an accolades section in their infobox like NFL, NBA, and MLB players do. I believe it is labeled as "Career highlights and awards" for those players. It looks nicer and is more convenient to view for mobile users. I'm not an editor, I don't know how any of this really works so I apologize if this would be too large of an undertaking to do. Just a suggestion, thanks 76.70.89.217 (talk) 00:08, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

Supplemental Draft picks
Would it be possible to add parameters for the NHL Supplemental Draft? --75.88.89.194 (talk) 12:19, 10 December 2021 (UTC)
 * The template already handles them. You enter the info like on Steve Rucchin. -DJSasso (talk) 18:34, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

Improvement ideas
Jersey number could be added. You could also add nicknames like "The great one" or "KK" Pallit-on - Say something - 08:52, 19 April 2022 (UTC)
 * That would be a no, because that has been discussed more than once and it was decided multiple times that ice hockey infoboxes are going to include as minimal information as possible. – Sabbatino (talk) 14:22, 19 April 2022 (UTC)

Other League Drafts/Names
I was updating some PHF player entries, and I was going to add their draft information, however the draft links directly to the NHL Draft (which is nice), but with this infobox being used for women's hockey as well, could we get a NWHL/PHF Draft links like there are for the NHL/WHA?

Adding something like
 * phf_draft
 * phf_draft_team
 * phf_draft_year

I'm not certain if it could automatically use NWHL links for years prior to 2022, or some kind of naming logic. But it would be nice to include the women's professional league in this, especially since they are using the same infobox.

Searsandrew (talk) 17:23, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Is there a reason why the infoboxes are so bland compared to other sports?
Title. I just am of the opinion that it would look more interesting and more vibrant to expand on the infobox; adding a career highlights/accomplishments section, jersey number, a more detailed history on teams, stuff like that. Is there a reason why this isn't the case? 172.108.153.162 (talk) 20:45, 29 June 2022 (UTC)
 * If I remember correctly, it's to avoid having excessive stats in the infobox and avoid bloat. Primefac (talk) 08:16, 30 June 2022 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 24 February 2023
Add college_team parameter either above or below draft information to indicate where a player went to college. Hardknicklife (talk) 14:09, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. Primefac (talk) 14:29, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

Opinions on adding relatives field
I do know that there seems to be a concerted effort to keep the infoboxes small for hockey players, which I think is generally a good idea to make them more readable. After having read through the archives and being unable to find a similar discussion, I was wondering what people's thoughts are on adding a relatives field similar to that which exists on Infobox person. The rationale for this being, I was reading Dave Dryden's article and I was struck that Murray Dryden at the least wasn't mentioned there but also Ken Dryden. Having said that, I do understand that the field often tends to violate BLP as it seems like family information tends to be less often source. With that said, what are others' thoughts? TartarTorte 18:12, 8 October 2022 (UTC)


 * I think it sounds like a great idea. I know in Some infoboxes of other notable people like actors there is a field that shows relatives and their relation to the main page. Batgirl-Awsomeness (talk) 08:01, 20 April 2023 (UTC)