Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of current female college gymnasts


 * 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. Lankiveil (speak to me) 10:06, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

List of current female college gymnasts

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This is a case of WP:LISTCRUFT. There are far too many redlinks. Also, given that college gymnasts graduate every year maintaining this list is going to be a nightmare. If a gymnast is notable they could be mentioned on their college page instead of in a list like this Gbawden (talk) 13:58, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom. —Swpbtalk 16:07, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sportspeople-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 16:08, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 16:08, 9 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Rename to list of college women's gymnasts in the United States (to drop the unacceptable "current" criteria, to match the category, and to clarify that this is, in fact, just American gymnasts), purge the redlinks if we're confident they will never merit articles, and expand to include any other articles we have that are missing because they weren't "current". I count 53 articles in the category structure, so definitely enough for a list, and maintaining one list will help balance the subcategorization by school that prevents readers from browsing all at once. postdlf (talk) 16:35, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete Almost impossible to maintain a constantanly expanding list like this and merely being a college gymnast isn't itself notable. Wikipedia is not meant for keeping all sports records and information.204.126.132.231 (talk) 19:55, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
 * It's ordinary practice for us to limit such lists to notable people. There's no maintenance problem if we drop the "current" criteria. postdlf (talk) 20:05, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete - I've been pondering what to do with this list for several days. I follow college gymnastics, and I want to be supportive, but I can't rationalize keeping this generic list.  It's a question of whether this topic is more appropriate for a "list" or something else.  Would we sanction a generic "List of American college football players" or "List of American college men's basketball players"?  No, because there is nothing particularly notable about college football players as a class, and there are literally thousands of such persons and the list would be unmanageably large.  The only difference here is that there are fewer notable college gymnasts -- there is nothing particularly special about this particular group.  This class is much better treated as a category, which is how we treat all other generic classes of college athletes.  If someone wants to start a "List of college gymnastics All-Americans" or a "List of NCAA gymnastics champions," I will support that in a heart beat and contribute.  Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 08:40, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Please read my response to the last comment. postdlf (talk) 13:35, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Postdlf, my issue with this is not the notability of its individual members; as you mention, that can be readily cured by deleting the red links. My issue is that there is nothing exceptional about the generic list topic, in the same way we would not create a generic list of college football players.  I would have no problem with a list of All-American college women's gymnasts.  FYI, in order to be "notable" for Wikipedia purposes, I would bet most of these athletes are All-Americans (or top performers from pre-college national and international competitions), which would make a quick conversion of the list to a more interesting topic relatively easy.  Very few gymnasts are going to be notable based solely on the media coverage they received for their college sports careers.  "American college gymnasts" is a basic category, not a good list topic.  Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 13:45, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 * "My issue is that there is nothing exceptional about the generic list topic..." That's not a thing. Most of our lists of people are not about "exceptional" characteristics, and we simply limit them to notable examples because obviously most people who would literally qualify for such lists would not be notable. There is nothing exceptional about being from Idaho, being Irish American, having epilepsy, or dying in 2014. No one is notable because of those things. Not to mention lists of alumni by university; certainly merely attending a school is less "exceptional" than having played a sport for that school. So there's no basis for this heightened standard you're trying to apply (why did you think otherwise?). The main purpose of such lists is to index articles, but they also give information relevant to the notable topics of the place, school, etc. by listing the notable people associated with those things. See WP:LISTPURP. And you're also contradicting WP:NOTDUP without giving a reason as to why it shouldn't apply here. postdlf (talk) 14:47, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Post, you're either missing my point or ignoring it. I have readily conceded your point about the notability of individual list members; in fact, I would not have it any other way.  Lists where half or more of the listed items are red links either need to be deleted or restructured.  Back to my point: as a general proposition, we (as in the various sports WikiProjects) have not compiled generic lists of college athletes (e.g., "List of college football players").  By sport, we have lists of college All-Americans, college hall of fame members, recipients of particular college awards, athletes who were members of particular teams, members of college teams who played in the pros, etc.  We do not have generic lists of college athletes where the sole distinguishing characteristic is the sport they played; for that, we have consistently used categories.  My !vote is an !vote to continue that well established precedent.  As we both know, satisfying NLIST, GNG, and/or LISTPURP is not a guarantee of inclusion.  Members of the community may exercise their judgement and common sense with regard to other standards and other precedents, and that's what I choose to do here.  Frankly, I think it's a sensible approach, notwithstanding the existence of other generic lists of limited utility like "List of Irish-Americans (see WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS).  Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:07, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
 * You made the claim that a list based on something that isn't "exceptional" should be deleted. I pointed out that this is completely contrary to practice and guidelines. "OTHERSTUFF" is not a further response to that. Nor can a Wikiproject ignore guidelines that apply project-wide. You're always free to simply not work on such lists, but you have no basis for deleting them if someone else starts them. If you want to make a WP:TNT argument here, fine, but the problem is you seem to be arguing that as a matter of principle we shouldn't have any list complementary to Category:College women's gymnasts in the United States contrary to WP:CLN, and there's been no valid or relevant argument for that yet. postdlf (talk) 23:15, 13 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Comment Whilst I would like to agree with Postdlf for a rename, this list has more redlinks than bluelinks. Many of the blue links are of questionable notability, sourced from primary links, or just a single reference. I think when this list is cut down to those notable on wikipedia we will be left with a handful of people. Martin 4 5 1  01:27, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, slakr  \ talk / 10:17, 20 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete: This is a topic for a category, not a list. p  b  p  00:38, 28 September 2014 (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.