Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/J. J. Thiel


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Excepting Willis Bates and Harry Huston, as they satisfy WP:ATHLETE.

This AfD had quite a few arguments to it. It appears that the NAIA teams (small colleges) are equated with NCAA division III. As such, their athletes would fail notability for athletes, as they have not competed at the highest level (NCAA division I) of amateur sports.

But, that's also assuming that a coach could be grouped an athlete, so that would be cause for falling back on general biographical notability; however, the subjects are not recipients of notable awards nor made widely-recognized contributions in their specific field&mdash; at least, the articles do not assert that. J. J. Thiel's article, for example, states that he is the "9th most successful coach in Southwestern's history." That makes this individual the 9th successful coach at the 3rd successful grouping of college teams. Finally, falling back to the more general notability guidelines, there is no demonstrated widespread media coverage from independent, reliable sources.

Some arguments allude to WikiProject_College_football/Notability. This is neither a policy nor guideline, nor is it supported by consensus from the entire community. In fact, it could be seen as contradictory to the official notability guidelines.

Finally, there are arguments that a bundled afd is inappropriate; however, there is neither a guideline nor policy discouraging it. In practice, it is actually encouraged that afds are grouped into one page if the nominator believes, in good faith, that the articles will meet the same rationale and that none of them would be likely to survive on their own. There appears to be no malice in this nomination, as they all appear to be Southwestern College Moundbuilders Head Football Coaches, and the rationale was that simply being a coach at the non-highest-level of an amateur team does not, in and of itself, satisfy notability guidelines&mdash; a notion that it appears is supported by consensus in Articles for deletion/Walter J. West, for example. -- slakr \ talk / 08:15, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

J. J. Thiel

 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

Obscure football coach for a low-level NAIA college, fails WP:BIO, WP:V. No biographical information other than his won-loss record. See other recent AfDs on similarly obscure coaches for similarly obscure colleges: Articles for deletion/Max Holm, Articles for deletion/William McCracken, Articles for deletion/Walter J. West.

I am also nominating the following related pages, all for coaches at this school, and all which lack any biographical information save for their years coached and won-loss records:

As a side note, I am not nominating seven of the coaches from this school, four because there is evidence of their independent notability, three because while I feel they are not notable, an assertion of notability is made sufficient that their inclusion in a bundled AfD is inappropriate.  RGTraynor  15:41, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Living people-related deletion discussions. --Erwin85Bot (talk) 00:02, 19 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Please Move Discussion All of a sudden, there are a large number of college football head coach articles being considered for deletion. There has always been a trickle--one or two at a time, but my current count shows 28 [Wikipedia:WikiProject College football#Articles & Pages being considered for deletion|articles for deletion]], and I'm sure I'm missing many.  One editor has achieved a deletion of Walter J. West and is now claiming "precedent" to delete coaches.  I suggest (and have been suggesting for some time now) moving these argument to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Notability so that we can have a uniform and open discussion about what truly makes a notable college football coach.  This will prevent arguing article-at-a-time and help to make Wikipedia a better encyclopedia.  It will prevent a "scramble" on both sides of the argument and make for a single place to come to a true consensus instead of a hit-or-miss end result.--Paul McDonald (talk) 01:57, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment: I'm not at all against people having general discussions, and when and if WP:ATHLETE is amended to explicitly grant prima facie notability to coaches of even the lowest possible levels of college ball, of course we ought to rule on black letter policy.  RGTraynor  02:45, 19 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete all per nom and precedent at Walter J. West. Dpmuk (talk) 11:56, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment Walter J. West is not precedent, but one AfD that "slipped through" the process. There many, many, many, many other articles very very similar that have passed the AfD process.  Oh, and since I now have to go put this on a whole bunch of other AfDs, this once again supports my reasoning to please move the discussion to a single location.--Paul McDonald (talk) 14:11, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Reply: Mm, if you've seen other Div III or NAIA coaches without any biographical info that have survived AfD, feel free to cite them, but I don't believe there are any. That being said, fourteen editors advocated deletion on the West article, which is not "slipping through" anything.  Among them, the sentiment was very broadly held that (to choose one of the less caustic quotes) "[A] Wikiproject does not make policy that can override site-wide policy."  That's considerably more consensus than actually levied "Support" or "Oppose" opinions on CFB:COACH.   RGTraynor  14:45, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Reply: I feel justified calling it a precedent for three reasons:
 * These articles are unlike many other articles that you gave in the West case as most of those other articles had significantly more detail and often other claims to notability. Hence there AfDs aren't precedent for this case.
 * Consensus can change (see WP:CCC). As Walter J. West is a very recent discussion I feel happy saying that's a precedent where as I'd be less happy saying some of the older discussions were a relevant precedent.
 * Walter J. West got comments from a lot of editors - certainly more than for any of the other AfDs mentioned - so again IMO this makes it the most valid precedent.
 * AfDs are an area for discussion. If I want to call it a precedent I'm quite entitled to and you're quite entitled to disagree (which you obviously do).  Given that it's meant to be a discussion and people will often disagree I do not find your language or the use of bold to be helpful - please try to respect other user's opinions even when you disagree with them. (Only going to post this on one AfD at the moment). Dpmuk (talk) 15:47, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Let's Talk Precedence Please forgive the table in this discussion... it bears scrutiny.

[ Table moved to Discussion page]

If "Precedence" is the true guidance on this, the result must indeed be keep.--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:18, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment Actually that would be a WP:WAX arguement and is not a very good one. Nevermind the fact that a number of those were non-admin closures and should never have been closed by a non-admin, and one was withdrawn. So there really isn't any "Precedence" going your way either. -Djsasso (talk) 18:24, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Question why is it "precedence" when there is one AfD discussion that says "delete" and "WAX" when twenty-four say keep? And remember, I didn't bring up precedence... the deletion argument did.--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:58, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Table and rebuttal moved to the Talk page for discussion.   RGTraynor  19:05, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * You already raised this issue in the Holm AfD, and if you require a reiteration, so be it. (1) Dahlene passes WP:ATHLETE as a prominent kicker for a major college program and WP:PROF as a college president, both long-held to be prima-facie passes; (2) Moulton's nomination was withdrawn after you claimed that he was an Olympic athlete, another prima facie pass on WP:ATHLETE, although your evidence for the same never was revealed or made it into the article; which was in fact in error, because the Olympic athlete was Fay R. Moulton, who has his own Wikipedia article; (3) Taylor was a state official prominent in the civil rights controversies of the 1950s; (4) Wright was elected to a Hall of Fame ... so all those are discredited.
 * 1) I added a merge tag to Moulton several months ago because I thought they might be the same person.  It turns out that they were not as SYSS Mouse confirmed on May 8 (check the history of the page).  2)  Fay G. Moulton was a head coach at Kansas State University which is now a Division I FBS school and not related to this discussion at all.  You can read about it at Articles for deletion/Fay G. Moulton.  Yes, the nominator withdrew and it appears it may have been for that reason (or may not, read closely), but there was no intent on my part to mislead anyone.  3)  A "guideline" is not the same thing as a "policy".  "Guidelines" are used for notability essays.  4) CFB:COACH specifically states it is an essay and any editor can check the page to verify.  5)  How does continually calling me a liar when there are historical archives of the pages that anyone can look at comply with "black letter of policy throughout" ?? Wikipedia is about truth, not falsehoods and you have obviously been digging like crazy into my editing and contribution history.--Paul McDonald (talk) 20:16, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Gottsch, Stevens and the SINGLE Prairie View mass AfD, I'll grant you, a decision based upon your misleading inference that CFB:COACH was an official notability guideline and a misreading of the then-current wording of "Competitors and coaches who have competed at the highest level in amateur sports (who meet the general criteria of secondary sources published about them)" from WP:ATHLETE. You failed completely to cite, in those AfDs, that the coaches neither competed at the highest level in amateur sports (that being Division I NCAA football), nor that they met the general criteria of secondary sources. DJ's also dead right in that all but one of those AfDs was closed by a non-admin, which they are not allowed to do for any result other than an unambiguous, non-controversial Keep, and was therefore a heavy violation of process, so much so that the editor responsible for most of them had a 75% Oppose vote at his subsequent RfA on the strength of his poor closures.  Are you sure you want to claim those AfDs as supporting your case?   RGTraynor  19:20, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Question can you please cite the source or policy covering non-admin closures of AfDs? One other time an admin stated that it was policy that only admins could close AfDs but that was false.  If you have new-different-more clear information, can you please present it before we go further?--Paul McDonald (talk) 20:06, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Not a problem: WP:DPR, which holds: "Editors in good standing who have not been made administrators may close deletion discussions, with the following provisions ... Deletion discussions must be decided in accordance with consensus and taking account of Wikipedia policies and guidelines. If you are not familiar with deletion policy or the workings of deletion discussions, it is best that you only close discussions with unambiguous results ... Close calls and controversial or ambiguous decisions should be left to an administrator ..."  RGTraynor  20:12, 19 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete All fails WP:BIO, WP:V. -Djsasso (talk) 18:24, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete all per nom. Kittybrewster  &#9742;  20:56, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * question RGT, have you checked that none of these had a professional career? That was a problem with some of the other nominations in these groups of articles.. And I'm also thinking of some similar cases where a few of the apparently non-notable athletes later became state legislators, or notable surgeons, or whatever.-- Agreed its the article authors fault for not checking & inserting the information, but so should we before we delete. But I thing your careful approach here is very reasonable, it would just help to know what you have checked.   DGG (talk) 04:39, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Reply: While deletion policy holds that it is the responsibility of editors who want to save an article to provide sources and prove notability, not the responsibility of noms to prove otherwise, pro-football-reference.com has no record that any of the subjects listed above played pro football.   RGTraynor  12:42, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Response that would be unlikely for many of them... Thiel, for example, coached for the 1903-1904 seasons. The NFL didn't start until 1920.  This was most definitely the highest level of the expression of the sport at the time for many of these coaches.  Think history.--Paul McDonald (talk) 19:51, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * So find offline sources that prove they are notable. You have 7 days to do so, if you just sit here and argue then of course they will be deleted. -Djsasso (talk) 17:00, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Timely? For these and 57 other articles. See AfD talk page, that's hardly enough time to address and improve articles on them all.  Sorry I don't devote my life 24/7 to Wikipedia.--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:55, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Or the months and months since the articles were created. -Djsasso (talk) 01:48, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * That's a cheap shot, DJ, and adds nothing to the discussion. Please retract it. — BQZip01 —  talk 16:22, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * It's no more counterproductive than claims that, for articles now nearly a year old, the project that engendered them hasn't been given enough time to improve them.   RGTraynor  16:29, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I never said they weren't given enough time to make some improvements, but demanding that 57 articles suddenly improve all at the same time virtually guarantees that some will not be fixed, even if they can meet WP standards. I'm simply saying that that this is an unreasonable demand in general. Moreover, the "months and months" comment doesn't help anything and only serves to inflame the discussion into areas that are not directly related to the deletion discussion. — BQZip01 —  talk 17:11, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks, and I'd like to add to it that there have been many, many articles that started out as stubs that have been improved! You can start by looking at the other coaches at this school in question and checking their history.  Start with Harold Elliott and go from there.  By placing these stub articles out, many other editors have been easily able to collaborate and grow articles.  Deleting these articles will lose that benefit.--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:07, 22 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete all, Wikipedia is not an indiscrminate collection of information. See also WP:BIO, WP:V, and WP:RS. Stifle (talk) 14:29, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Request As discussed on the AfD talk page, if this article (or any of the series of articles) is closed as a delete, please kindly first move the article to User:Paulmcdonald/Articlename, where "Articlename" is the name of the article (or articles) being removed. Also, please note the new page location at User:Paulmcdonald/deletedcoach so we can be sure to find the moved page.

Why? There have been, at present count, 58 articles of our project placed on the AfD list and there is just not enough time to adequately and appropriately respond and ultimately improve the articles themselves. This would give the project memebers time to work on improving the articles. This request should in no way imply that I believe that the article (or articles) in quesiton should be deleted at this time. I am making a simple cut-n-paste request due to the sheer volume of AfDs in such a short period of time.--Paul McDonald (talk) 01:02, 21 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep Harry Huston. He satisfies all policies and has played professional baseball at the highest level. No opinion on any of the others. Wizardman  02:31, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep Harry Huston. He reached a major league, making him notable enough to have a Wikipedia page. Alex (talk) 02:34, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment: This information on Harry Huston was just added today, and while of course WP:ATHLETE gives Harry Huston, the baseball player, a free pass, I'd be interested in Paul McDonald's (who added the info) evidence that we're talking about the same fellow. While I understand the temptation to believe that contemporaneous Harry Hustons in Kansas must be the same fellow, the chronology holds that while he was supposedly attending the University of Kansas in Lawrence, he also did a stint as a head coach for Southwestern College in Winfield, KS, as a sophomore, with the campuses a hundred miles apart, which seems a bit of a stretch.  Is there any actual proof that these are the same fellow, or is this speculation?    RGTraynor  03:00, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Response it wasn't all that uncommon for someone to participate at a school for baseball in the spring and not attend that school in the fall. From everyone that I can reach at the time, it appears to be the same person.  Hard, linkable, online proof?  Nope.  But it is more than reasonable.  If it does turn out to be a different person (like the crazy coincidence of the two Fay Moultons at Kansas State) then of course we fix it right away.  But it's a good faith contribution.--Paul McDonald (talk) 03:34, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * So, do you have any paper evidence that shows these two are the same person? For that matter, is there any evidence that the Huston who played on the Phillies is the same as the one who played for the Lowell Tigers? "Harry Huston" isn't that unusual a name. Zagalejo^^^ 03:44, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * No paper evidence, no. As this is an AfD, I'm throwing it out to the community for collaboration and support.  I did attempt to mark it with a fact tag, but it looks like that didn't work.  I suppose the Lowell Tigers player could be different now that you mention it, but I have a good deal of confidence that the KU/Philadelphia player is the SC head coach.  Same region, same time period, low population base, common for the time period...--Paul McDonald (talk) 04:12, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * The Fay Moultons is indicative of the problem. We can't just assume that people of similar names just must be the same person, because you've already been proven to be dead wrong in such an assumption. (Heck, I can find three "Harry" or "Harold" Hustons in Kansas today.) "From everyone that I can reach at the time, it appears to be the same person."  What makes you say that?  What precisely is your evidence?  Online's not necessary; if you have a newspaper cite, that's what the Boston Public Library is for.    RGTraynor  04:25, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * FWIW, I just called the Southwestern College library to see whether they have any biographical info on Huston-the-coach. The library staffer on duty said that she couldn't find any, and that she didn't really know of anyone else there who could help me. -Hit bull, win steak(Moo!) 19:05, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * If we're able to come up with any evidence that the two Hustons are the same person, I think his article should be kept, as with all MLB players. If they aren't, or we aren't able to verify that they are, then I think we should still keep the article, but remove all reference to the football coaching until such time as it can be verified. -Hit bull, win steak(Moo!) 19:07, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * That makes sense. No matter how it shakes out, an article on the baseball player is warranted.    RGTraynor  19:41, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Agreed I'm good with that, actually.--Paul McDonald (talk) 19:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Request Please consider Willis Bates separately. He also coached at what was once called "Fairmount College" that became Wichita State University.  There's some more detail for him from the others.--Paul McDonald (talk) 20:40, 22 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment I find this nomination, well ... obscene, there are 19 articles here and another 9 that I'm aware of. Surely other means to address some problem could have been attempted instead of taxing everyone's time and energy. --  Banj e  b oi    23:46, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
 * To be more specific, it was suggested to run a RfC regarding the essay of the related wikiproject to directly address concerns.
 * A merge of all these coaches from the same school into a list tied to the history of the football team might be an elegant solution. If any of the coaches gets enough coverage to warrant their own article then re-create it. The football team is notable but is part of the schools sports article, take the content from there and add the coaching info and viola! --  Banj e  b oi    00:00, 23 September 2008 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.