Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of bespectacled baseball players


 * 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   keep. Spartaz Humbug! 18:32, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

List of bespectacled baseball players

 * – ( View AfD View log )

Baseball players who wear glasses are now a notable subset? – Muboshgu (talk) 18:46, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Baseball-related deletion discussions.  —– Muboshgu (talk) 18:47, 27 July 2011 (UTC)


 * strong keep the sources seem to indicate that, perhaps contrary to expectation, baseball players who wear glasses are indeed a notable subset. I admit that the article needs work, especially given that the inclusion of some of the players on the list isn't sourced and that most of the information comes from one article, but it's a serious article in a serious publication.  also, I think that in baseball circles, anything that bill james thinks is worth mentioning is notable.  Alf.laylah.wa.laylah (talk) 21:27, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment. I think it could use another source or two if it's to be kept, but really I think it would need to be renamed to "List of baseball players with glasses," because this title is just funny. Roscelese (talk &sdot; contribs) 23:12, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
 * comment I found a few more sources, and, amazingly, a couple more players. Even more interestingly, the word 'bespectacled' is used in all of them.  I personally love the title, but perhaps your suggestion is more dignified and we could add a redirect? Alf.laylah.wa.laylah (talk) 00:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment I need a couple more non-routine sources to be identified to justify this not being developed on a WP:userpage first. —Bagumba (talk) 23:39, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete per WP:NOTDIR #7, a non-encyclopedic cross-categorization. It cannot be shown that the intersection of baseball players and people who wear eyeglasses is a notable intersection.  &mdash;SW&mdash; yak 16:48, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep The sources provided demonstrate notability. The current title is fine. Warden (talk) 06:52, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * How so? As far as I can tell this is the only source in the article that focuses on vision in baseball. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:22, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * No, the source Beating the breaks: major league ballplayers who overcame disabilities covers the topic in considerable detail too. These sources demonstrate notability and list examples, just like our list. Q.E.D. Warden (talk) 22:45, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
 * As was said elsewhere here, this fails WP:NOTDIR #7. Q.E.D. yourself. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:08, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * comment it seems that if tattooed baseball players were as widely discussed in a range of sources as bespectacled ones, then we would want to have a list of them, yes. Alf.laylah.wa.laylah (talk) 14:03, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Frank Umont's spectacles are in the Baseball Hall of Fame. We could have a separate list for umpires but it seems sensible to keep this together.  We could amend the title to make this clearer, if we think any reader is actually going to be confused by this. Warden (talk) 14:49, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * A list of players should not include an umpire unless he was also a player. Spanneraol (talk) 17:12, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * This subpoint should probably be addressed on the talkpage of the article (if kept), rather than at AfD. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:21, 28 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Merge with List of fictional cats and other felines to create List of fictional cats and other felines owned by baseball players with glasses. What, you think that may not be a notable intersection?  Nor is this.  The fact that there are sources out there that have listed players who wear glasses doesn't make it notable, I'm afraid.  Delete. Black Kite (t) (c) 18:20, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete Neutral but kind of leaning delete-- as an overly specific categorization. Yes, someone has written an article about a few baseball players that wear glasses. And yes, there are sources that show other players also where glasses. But there's nothing to show the notability of the intersection. People have also written about actors who were in both Robocop and 24, but, as much as I would love it, we aren't going to have an article about that anytime soon.--Yaksar (let's chat) 18:32, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. To a non-fan, this might indeed seem a completely random intersection, along the lines of "list of baseball players with long hair" or "list of baseball players with braces on their teeth." But in fact, it's of interest and significance, because there is a growing literature discussing the relationship between a prospects making and succeeding in the major league and the quality of his eyesight. (Believe it or not, there is also a growing literature discussing the relationship between success and eye color, because light-eyed players assertedly have greater difficulty picking up the ball against a bright background during day games&mdash;but that's a different discussion.) Against the potential stereotype that a player who has to wear glasses is at a disadvantage, this list contains some interesting counterexamples. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:21, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment A lot of the "deletes" could probably be persuaded if someone could identify for this AfD the "growing literature" Newyorkbrad referred to that presumably has non-trivial coverage (i.e. not just listing players that wear glasses). —Bagumba (talk) 23:31, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Yep, I'd be more than happy to change to keep.--Yaksar (let's chat) 23:59, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Ditto. At the moment, the sources are trivial.  I remember a similar AfD (which annoyingly I can't find now) about professional sportsmen who had Aspergers syndrome. Black Kite (t) (c) 00:35, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I've asked Newyorkbrad on his talk page to help us out with these sources. Hopefully he'll be able to come by and clear things up.--Yaksar (let's chat) 22:25, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
 * What's stopping you guys finding sources yourself? I just spent a few more minutes on the matter and soon turned up the fact that David A. Goss, Professor of Optometry at Indiana State, has written a history of spectacle wear by baseball players.  A version of this was published in 1996 in a journal devoted to Sports Vision topics.  Looking further, I find an article about the topic, Glasses Half Full, which indicates that The Cultural Encyclopedia of Baseball is a good source for this sort of information.  Now you could have found all this yourself - you just had to look.  If you haven't looked and you're not familiar with the topic, as NYB seems to be, then please don't comment as this is not a vote and so we prefer informed input. Warden (talk) 23:42, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Because this encyclopedia is a collaborative effort, and there's nothing wrong with asking another editor to help out. Not everything has to be so dramatic.--Yaksar (let's chat) 23:59, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I ask editors to assume good faith that editors will fix any problems when they can with a reminder that the burden is on editors who add material to provide reliable sources. —Bagumba (talk) 07:27, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, I did look, and I found the same item as you, which - like all the others unearthed so far - is effectively a list of baseball players who wore glasses. As I said, if there was deeper significant discussion of the cultural significance of the intersection, then fine, but I don't see anything like that so far. Black Kite (t) (c) 14:30, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete The article is taking one trait—wearing glasses—from a few sources, and incorrectly applying notability to all players wearing glasses. The sources discuss notable players who have worn glasses, but never discusses as a whole all players with glasses. USA Today only points out individual notable players with glasses. The Glasses Half Full article also discusses individual players and notable events, but not the entire glasses-wearing universe. WP:LISTN says "A list topic is considered notable if it has been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources, per the above guidelines." This criteria is not met. In fact, Glasses Half Full implies the group today is rather non-notable, saying "By the end of the 1970s, the wearing of glasses and contact lenses had become commonplace—so much so that they practically ceased to bring attention to themselves."  In most cases WP:OTHERSTUFF is a poor argument, but consider that a topic such as black players in baseball has a list, List of first black Major League Baseball players by team and date, but does not have an exhaustive list of all blacks in baseball. There may be potential for an entirely different article based on reliable sources to discuss trends in glasses or overall corrective vision (let's include contacts and laser surgery) in baseball history.  However, the subject and format of this current article implies notability of a group of people that is not verifiable. —Bagumba (talk) 22:56, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. The intersection of the categories is noted in several reliable sources. A USA Today article is already referenced in the WP article.  I don't have access to the full text of this NY Times piece,, entitled "Spectacled Sportsmen; Not only in baseball but in most other sports, ranking players wear glasses", but maybe someone else does.  In response to a reader comment, Baseball Digest replied  "There have been many major leaguers who excelled while wearing glasses." and posted a montage of 'bespectacled MVP winners" Dick Allen, Reggie, and Jeff Burroughs.  The subject gets at least five paragraphs in this book -  IMO these suffice. Novickas (talk) 01:16, 3 August 2011 (UTC) P.S. To expand a little on the Glasses Half Full piece that Warden mentions above  - it's about 1,100 words on the topic and the author is Bruce Markusen, who works for the Society for American Baseball Research . Novickas (talk) 23:07, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep - There is a logic to this list. HItting a moving baseball is one of the supreme tests of hand-eye coordination — a fraction of a inch or a hundredth of a second and a homerun becomes a pop up or a foul ball. Therefore, players with impaired and corrected vision are of interest to aficionados of the sport. This is not a list of unrelated things, such as List of baseball players who drive a red car would be, for example. Published sources are showing above to indicate that the notion of "bespectacled baseball players" is novel and noteworthy. Carrite (talk) 15:18, 3 August 2011 (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.