User talk:P64/Archive 1

Archive 1: 2006-2010 baseball, sports

Knickerbocker Rules
Yes, I archived a bunch of junk. OK, your point is that the "original" 1845 rules are nowhere to be found, just reprints of them in various publications since then. That could well be. The original Naismith rules for basketball actually hung on a bulletin board for many decades, until someone thought maybe it was a good idea to preserve them before they got stolen. I read someplace that some over-eager researcher had razored out the "first" game in the Knickerbockers scorebook some years ago. There are way too many "five finger discounts" in this world. Wahkeenah 02:19, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, I have that point, may be able to clarify or extend it soon (early August 2006).
 * I wrote to you a moment ago about Origins of baseball (let me send others there), just before checking my incoming messages, just before signing off, until??? --P64 02:42, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm a little confused by your posts on this issue, but I'm gathering that there is some question as the authenticity and/or existence of the 1845 rules. That could well be. I recall reading someplace that the rules were a virtual reprint of someone else's rules from 1834 or so, which blew away both Abner Doubleday and Alex Cartwright in one shot. There are also those who think that Cartwright gets too much credit for his role in the formation of the Knickerbockers and formalized baseball play, as if some folks were looking for the "real" Abner Doubleday of the game. Being a member of the Church of Baseball, I'm inclined to go along with the theory that God handed the first baseball to Adam, "in the Big Inning", as the saying goes. d:) Wahkeenah 07:26, 5 September 2006 (UTC) [[Image:In the Big Inning.JPG]]

County and first-class cricket
Hello. Good to read your pieces re cricket. I've edited "Point of Origin" in First-class cricket to note England as the place in question and I've added some info re when first-class cricket began elsewhere.

I need to look into the North American situation as I'm not sure about it: I believe the 1859 tour was held to be "not first-class" but I need to do a bit of research. So I'll make some more edits when I've done that. The strange thing is that cricket probably reached America before it reached Yorkshire!

Re your question about JL, I'm guilty as charged. I'll come along quietly. ;-)

Seriously, I'm glad you like the ACS site and have found it useful. The Fat Chronology is great. I've bookmarked it and I'll definitely make use of it. All the best. --BlackJack | talk page 09:34, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Update. Apparently, first-class cricket in the USA is generally deemed to have taken place from 1880 to 1913.  I've included this in the article.  All the best.  --BlackJack | talk page 19:12, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Re "Early Cricket History Project", I've contributed a long list of known fixtures but I'm not really involved beyond that. I've left it that if they want anything from me they only have to ask.  I'm not sure if the project is still moving forward.  I'm actually more interested in Wikipedia than the ACS site because, obviously, Wikipedia is one of the internet's top 100 sites and ACS is not.  I want cricket and its history to reach as big an audience as possible.  I'm also working on a book which is based on the "Mists of Time" paper but completes the picture up to the foundation of Lord's in 1787 (but I've no idea if or when I'll be able to get it published).
 * As part of the process of raising the profile of cricket, I'm very interested in any approach to combine it in a global sports project with other major historic sports like soccer, baseball, football, boxing, athletics, golf, horse racing, etc. I think Category:18th century in sports, Category:19th century in sports and articles like Pre-1850s in sports have enormous potential.
 * Do you think there would be any mileage in a WikiProject devoted to general sports history, say, prior to the First World War? I give that as a delimiter because of its catastrophic impact on British sport (certainly neither cricket nor soccer were ever the same again) but also because, by then, all the major sports had completed their main development phases and were, shall we say, "ready to join the 20th century".
 * Anyway, good luck with your researches. All the best.  Regards.  --BlackJack | talk page 09:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


 * It is probably too early to talk about an early all-sports project. As you say, the cricket project has so far barely touched the period from 1772 to 1889 and a lot more work needs doing.  Same with the period from about 1905 onwards.  I've made a start with the 19th century: I'm hoping others will join in.  Cricket seems to be far and away the biggest sports project on the site.
 * Thanks for pointing out the Newland link which I've repaired.
 * I'm still uncertain about dates in the late 19th and early 20th. In cricket terms, the first-class game was all but dead during WWI.  I think I'll address that in due course when we have more material about the period.  --BlackJack | talk page 13:25, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Nicely done
The rework to the Cincinnati Red Stockings article looks good. Mfields1 01:32, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Union Baseball Grounds, Lakeshore Park, etc.
Many years ago, I spent a good chunk of time off-and-on, reading the microfilm of the Chicago Tribune, to learn all I could about early Chicago baseball and its ballparks from 1870 through 1893 or so. I think I passed some of that info along to Phil Lowry, and others have picked up on it from him and re-edited it, etc. What I should really do is go back to my notes from 30 years ago and see what all different names the place was called. I must tell you I wasn't really happy about that title "Union Baseball Grounds" because I don't recall that it was the prevailing name of the park... but I don't recall that it wasn't, either, so I let it be. The issue of whether to have separate articles is kind of slippery. I have the West Side Parks lumped into a single article, because I don't much like this "West Side Park I" and "West Side Park II" stuff, since it is an artificial invention. Similarly, all the various Polo Groundses are in a single article. I think the various Madison Square Gardens might be that way also. Here, you have effectively two different ballparks on the same site, simply built at different times, just a few years apart, and having different names for them in the press. So I think they should be a single article with one redirecting to the other. But the name itself needs some revisiting. What was your question again? d:) Wahkeenah 05:38, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I found the summary page I had written for my own usage, and it's of some help. It looks like the 1871 park was primarily called Union Base-Ball Grounds. That was a popular name for ballparks then, for whatever reason. The first and most famous Union Grounds was in Brooklyn, and while it might have been a reference to the American Union (vs. the Confederacy) it might also have meant bringing different organizations together, as with a train station that might serve more than one line and is called Union Station. The field in Cincinnati in 1869 had also been called Union Park. Anyway, the 1871 stands were in the northwest corner of the plot of land, but were set back a ways (i.e. south) from Randolph. The 1878 structure went all the way to the streetcorner, although the stands themselves were in the southwest part of the small block. The park was called Chicago Base-Ball Grounds. However, it was also called White Stocking Park (apparently in both of its incarnations), and it was also called Lake-Shore Park and Lakeside Park. I've also seen it referred to in other sources as just plain Lake Park. The problem gets to be that the ballpark itself wasn't Lake Park, the entire park grounds that we now call Grant Park was then known as Lake Park. Wahkeenah 05:57, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I think we should go with modern spelling. The first World Series in 1903 was between Boston and "Pittsburg", but it's now spelled Pittsburgh and that's the way it should be. Similarly, Base Ball, Base-Ball and Baseball are all the same thing and probably should all be spelled Baseball. Spelling them literally as they were then is liable to cause confusion. For this ballfield, I would be inclined to call it Lakeshore Park (for continuity with South Side and West Side Parks) and redirect Union Base-Ball (or Baseball) Grounds to it. But I'm flexible, and would like to study the matter further. What I'm not flexible about is this erroneous stuff about "West Side Grounds" for the 1893-1915 home of the Cubs. It was West Side Park. Even its ticket stubs said so. A minor issue, I suppose, but sufficiently annoying. Wahkeenah 06:09, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, more notes, after scattering the moths away. In 1871 it was called primarily the Union Grounds. As the season wore on, the editors were starting to call it White Stocking Grounds or White Stocking Park. They were also starting to call it Lake Shore Park. In 1878 they picked up where they had left off, calling it White Stocking Park nearly all the time. In 1883, when the ballpark was remodeled (hence the nice sketch from Harper's Weekly) they started calling it by the somewhat more formal "Chicago Base-Ball Park". They also sometimes still called it "White Stocking Park" as well as "Lakeside Park". I'm not sure that helps much, but it's what I found, and it explains the ambiguities in the Lowry piece. Technically, its name was always probably the rather prosaic "Chicago Baseball Park". Wahkeenah 06:47, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

By "continuity" I meant that several of the park names merely cite where the park was located in general terms, so too with "Lakeshore Park" or "Lake Park". However, the one name that seems to transcend both versions is "White Stocking Park". It's a dilemma. Thus I can't get too worked up over what name wikipedia uses for it. The place is of interest primarily for 3 reasons: (1) it was Chicago's only downtown ballpark; (2) it was wiped out by the Great Chicago Fire; (3) it was the site of a curious home run record in 1884. Also, honorable mention for having gotten that glowing writeup in Harper's Weekly in 1883, which of course said nothing about what a bandbox it was. Actually, the first item in the list has a lot to do with the other three. Wahkeenah 08:12, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I just took the liberty of redirection Lake Front Park to Union Base-Ball Grounds. That article not only added nothing new, it had several facts wrong. Wahkeenah 08:18, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Dexter Park
Whatever I know about Dexter Park (Chicago) I got from contemporary accounts from the Chicago Tribune microfilm. One interesting thing is that a horse would be so famous they would name a track after him, which gives an idea of how much interest there was in the subject then. It's as if they were to rename Santa Anita Park as "Seabiscuit Park". Wahkeenah 06:02, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The 1870 team also played a couple of games at a site called Ogden Park, possibly when the racetrack was in use or something. A couple of games doesn't sound like many, but they only played about once a week. Dexter park was west of Halsted between 43rd and 47th, later the site of the International Amphitheater. There is, or was, a Dexter Park Street to the west of it. Ogden Park was the home of the Ogden Skating Club. Not much skating going on in the summer. My notes say it was east of the present (in 1974) T-intersection of Ontario Street and Michigan Avenue, i.e. it was on the near north side. It was apparently also the White Stockings' practice field. Wahkeenah 06:32, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I would have to dig through my stuff again. Not tonight. I should have done it when I posted this. Oh, well. :( The other issue would be whether those were "important" games or not. Given that there was no league as such, just individual professional teams making arrangements with other teams for contests that they thought would bring money in, it's kind of hard to say. Wahkeenah 02:20, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
 * There were more games at Ogden Park than I had realized. In fact, I think it's fair to say they played roughly half their games there, although the games the Tribune regarded as "legitimate" were mostly at Dexter. Looks like I'll have to revise my articles on the subject. After starting on the road in late April, their debut at Ogden was May 21, and at Dexter Park was June 3. They continued playing maybe once or twice a week (presumably the players had real jobs otherwise), clear into November (I'm guessing the climate was a little different then), playing their final game at Dexter on November 16. Looks like their last Ogden game was October 8, a date which would live in infamy a year later. Many of their "legitimate" opponents would turn up in the semi-organized (pardon the sarcasm) NAPBBP in 1871: Atlantic; Mutual; Eckford; Forest City (both the Cleveland and Rockford, IL, versions); Maryland; Olympic and National (of DC); Cincinnati Red Stockings; Athletic; etc. There also seemed to be games against various obscure teams that came and went, like Niagara. They also played some games against college teams, such as Harvard and Yale (rules were a bit more lax then). There also seemed to be a second Chicago team called Garden City, which I never researched for whatever reason... probably because they weren't the White Stockings (silly me). Wahkeenah 00:59, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Browns, Reds, etc.
I'm not totally following your plan as regards the two St. Louis NA teams, but I'll just wait and see. Regarding the Cincinnati Red Stockings of 1869-70, I regard them as the ancestor of the Atlanta Braves. The key issue would be, who was the "owner" of the 1869-70 Cincinnati club and the 1871 Boston club? It seems as if they were both Harry Wright's baby or babies. If so, the lineage is fairly clear. Wahkeenah 19:22, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

New York Mutuals
Why did you take out that section in the New York Mutuals? I don't know much about the topic, but please come to the discussion page. --Awiseman 20:36, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I still don't understand why you took them out. What was wrong with them? --Awiseman 21:01, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I put another message on the Mutuals talk page. --Awiseman 13:30, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Ditto --Awiseman 13:55, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Sports History Project
Hello again P64. I'm becoming quite serious about getting an all sports history project up and running. It's still early days but there is already a lot of useful material throughout WP that can form a foundation. I'm going to work my way through it over the next month or so (I'm away on holiday for a couple of weeks).

What I wnat to ask is if you have a list of WP members as contacts in various sports who I also could contact? If you can just supply me with a list of names and perhaps the sport they are writing about, that would be great.

By the way, I'm now working outside the "cricket project" which is too focused upon the current game and has too many Wikipoliticians in it. So I've quit and am developing cricket history independently (which in practice means nothing has changed!!). All the best. --BlackJack | talk page 12:30, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Eckford, etc.
I think the bottom line on these various team names is that anyone who followed the sport knew who they were, so there was no need for "qualifying" the names. Another good point you make is that there were many teams in New York City (where the NABBP arose), so none represented the city as such, that was retrofitting by historians. I liken it to the Texas Rangers. They aren't the Arlington Rangers. (I used to use the same analogy about the California Angeles until they started calling themselves the Anaheim Angels for awhile. It still works, though, with the Minnesota Twins). Wahkeenah 09:17, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

New York Mutuals
I looked back at my 11/10/05 edit to Mutual and agree that it was in error to say that Mutual "won" a championship in 1869. Mutual was the reigning champions at the beginning of the 1869 season. As I discussed in the articles on Atlantic of Brooklyn and the National Association of Base Ball Players, the championship could change at any time during the season, kind of like a boxing champion or the World No. 1 Golfer. According to Wright, Mutual lost the pennant on July 3, 1869 to Eckford.

Mutual won the championship back in 1870 with a second win over Atlantic in September, only to lose the championship to Chicago in the disputed final game.

In general, though, I would not be inclined to list all in season championship changes.

Brooklyn Atlantics
Wright was my principal source for the early years. "Undisputed" champions for 1859 probably overstates their claim. Wright cited Chadwick as his source. I have replaced "Undisputed" with "recognized as champions" in Atlantic and "decisive champions" in the NABBP article

ballclub names
I agree with the commenter who suggests incorporating the long discussion of naming into the NABBP article. Drewinmaine

Discussion about splitting YYYY in baseball articles...
...is going on at Talk:List of MLB seasons. —Wknight94 (talk) 05:20, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Sports history
Hello again. There seems to be a bit of interest in expanding the sports history material if you look at the talk page of category:History of sports. Would you be interested in getting involved again? Best wishes. --BlackJack | talk page 17:41, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Years in sport
Hello. Primarily working on structure to date but I intend to work on content when that is complete. I have been addressing categorisation, project templates, navigation templates (ongoing), lead sections (ongoing) and general tidying up, including provision of the Reflist pending inclusion of references in due course. I haven't supplied any particular event or history articles but I have seen a few of these relating mainly to baseball, so that isn't part of what I'm doing. Hope this is useful. --Orrelly Man (talk) 20:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Charlie Gould reference
Hey there, I see that you used a reference for the Charlie Gould page, the Marshall Wright book. I am attempting to expand the article with all the proper references, could you please tell me which prose belongs to that reference? None of the online book sites have previews available for the book. Thanks. Neonblak talk  -  01:29, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Also what pages that the information came from. Thanks again. Neonblak talk  -  01:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Sorry, for that matter, the Ellard book reference needs the same, I don't want to have to delete good information if I can't find a suitable reference. Neonblak talk  -  01:42, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Marshall Wright, NABBP 1857-1870 (McFarland 2002) is primarily a compilation of facts, probably more than 100,000 facts laid out in more than 10,000 lines. See User P64/NABBP data by Marshall Wright, which needs to become a wikipedia article explaining the scope and limitations of its subject, available for reference by all articles on baseball players with NABBP service and all articles that mention NABBP team-seasons. One footnote in every player or ballclub article should identify Wright as a source, merely hint at some issues, and refer to this special article.

Ellard is mainly narrative like Ryczek but it is a shorter book with more lists and box scores, so there is much less narrative, maybe less than 20%. I will try to look at it soon regarding detail references for the Charlie Gould article. (It isn't handy like Wright because I don't use it.)

There is or was five years ago a man based in Cincinnati who plays Charlie Gould at historical sites, birthday parties, ballgames, etc. Maybe he is listed on the 'net and he has something to share. --P64 (talk) 16:14, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Ellard on Charlie Gould: see my notes posted to your talk page this hour. (2009-03-09 16:00 EDT)

careers of NABBP players
Neonblak --is your User page full? following some error I post here instead--

My User page now begins with a big wikitable, providing some background data for 20-odd clubs and navigating the information on NABBP teams and player careers that I have recently provided behind the scenes. The latter are versions of reports I provided first at Category talk pages; probably I will maintain these versions in my User space.
 * rosters that feature important teams (commonly the 1869 and 1870 professional teams of the club)
 * "members by team" Categories of wikipedia player pages
 * reports on major leaguers (who has a page, who played for the team when)

Team roster data is unwieldy, relative to its importance. For now I am not willing to work at making tabular rosters part of the encyclopedia; there would need to be some agreement that a particular format works well, and I doubt that that is true. Most of the rosters I have presented for "featured teams" are unwieldy or close to the maximum wield although they feature only one or two seasons and they list five-game players only. --P64 (talk) 21:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

TOCright
Hi there. I've no real preference when there isn't another box in the vicinity but the trouble is that the individual year articles do have the yearbox at the top of each page and this is also right-aligned. All the best. --Orrelly Man (talk) 14:10, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Hello again
Hi there, P64. I'm glad to see you're active again. I've had six months off myself but am looking in and may get involved if time allows. All the best. --Jack | talk page 18:01, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Baseball all time rosters
I notice you've changed some of the intros for the all time roster lists to say it's a list of players who've appeared in championship games. To the casual reader, that would be players who've appeared in World Series games. It would be best to discuss this change over at WP:MLB first, since there was a lot of consensus for the "at least one regular season game" type wording several years ago.-- Fabrictramp |  talk to me  14:27, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi. "Regular season games" should work without any explanation needed for American readers, although it mis-describes the early years. It does need to be linked so I have changed it to "regular season games" (linked) on all six pages. By the way, none of them yesterday specified the "regular season". Atlanta Braves all-time roster, aka the Boston Red Stockings, previously specified "one competitive game". --P64 (talk) 16:37, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Works for me. Thanks! -- Fabrictramp |  talk to me  22:27, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Category:Negro league baseball players
I just responded on Category talk:Negro league baseball players‎ to a comment you left there over a year ago. BRMo (talk) 15:21, 20 March 2010 (UTC)