Wikipedia talk:WikiProject National Football League/Archive 2

Gross Errors
My original Al Davis page never gave his birthplace. That "gross error" must have been added by a later editor. I regretully accept the decision of the "board" about deleting the American Football League Hall of Fame page, but its' premise was never that the "pro football hall of fame" didn't have former AFL players: the point is that outstanding former AFL players are grossly under-represented in the "pro football hall of fame". The AFL website gives detailed evidence and reasons for that under-represenation, and hence the evolution of the American Football League Hall of Fame. RemembertheAFL 19 August 2005
 * As the person who nominated the article for deletion, I will say for the record that I very much enjoy your website. However, I didn't feel it was appropriate for a Wikipedia article.  I am also a fan of the AFL and have made an effort to improve the articles on Wikipedia relating to the league and its players.  --Cholmes75 15:25, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

Naming conventions for seasons
I totally disagree with the naming convention on the project page that says that the last seasons should be named, for example, 2004-05 or 2005-06. Those two seasons should be called "2004 season" and "2005 season" respectively, regardless of whether the last games of the season are played the following year. In other words, the 2005 season is the season that ends in 2006 and so on. The NFL also uses to number seasons that way, also on their Web site. 2004-12-29T22:45Z 02:35, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
 * You have misread it. It says "For playoffs after the AFL-NFL Merger, the year should be in the form 20xx-yy." Otherwise, "For dates pertaining to regular seasons and playoffs held prior to the AFL-NFL Merger, the year should be in which the majority of the season was held." I have since made the bolding on the page more clear. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 03:39, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
 * I did not misread it. The two seasons I mentioned were just exmaples, and I still disagree with the text you wrote. 2004-12-29T22:45Z 05:50, August 29, 2005 (UTC)

NFL team infobox
Someone who is good with infoboxes should alter it so that the link to the AFC points to the right pages. The actual AFC article is a disambiguation page. --Cholmes75 21:11, 3 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I fixed the infobox to bypass the redirects. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 21:20, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Articles for individual rules
Someone recently created Horse-collar tackle (aka the "Roy Williams" rule).

Is it really encyclopedic? None of the other rules in National_Football_League have articles.

Al 12:35, 16 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I would say this does not need its own article. --Cholmes75 13:01, 16 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I created the article. Normally, I would agree - individual rules have no need for files - but I think that the fact that it is rather unique, along with the fact that it is now banned (which has been highly contested by coaches, fans, and management alike) means that it deserves its own page. I mean, we have pages for specific kinds of pitches - such asknuckleball and the palmball - why not pages for kinds of tackles?

I don't think the page should be deleted. TheImpossibleMan


 * What makes this rule any more unique than any others? The clothesline tackle is also illegal, but it doesn't deserve its own article.  As for the baseball pitches, the knuckleball article is quite lengthy and well-written.  The palmball article isn't really worthy of its own space.  --Cholmes75 13:09, 17 August 2005 (UTC)


 * It's not about a rule, it's about the history surrounding the rule. The term isn't utterly obscure and the article isn't just two sentences; it's not a dictionary definition ("The horse-collar tackle consists of bringing a player down by the shoulder pads..."), it gives additional information, including why the tackle was banned and what people think about it. Also, keep in mind, I didn't title the article "Roy Williams Rule". I think it's outrageous for you to say "This doesn't deserve an article because there are no other articles like it." TIM


 * I'm not really interested in a debate over this. Someone asked whether this deserves its own article, and I replied.  That's the way things work here.  BTW, you might want to indicate your sources on the article.  --Cholmes75 23:53, 17 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm happy to cite my sources, but I'm not exactly sure where to put them. I checked the Help section, but I couldn't find it. Help, anyone?
 * At the bottom of the article, you should put a header with "References" or "Sources" as the title and list your sources underneath. --Sophitus 05:33, August 20, 2005 (UTC)

NFL lore
I have recently moved the NFL lore section of the NFL article to a new page. Please have a look at it and make any improvements necessary. --Sophitus 05:03, August 17, 2005 (UTC)

Images of Super Bowl tickets and rings
I noticed that a couple of Super Bowl articles have images of those specific games' ticket and rings that are originally posted at http://www.superbowl.com/history/rings. The question is: Should we eventually have them on all of the Super Bowl articles (which might possibly happen in the near future anyway as more users come and edit those articles)? Zzyzx11 (Talk) 00:34, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I think this sounds good, I just added the pic for Super Bowl XI today. --Cholmes75 01:50, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
 * This is a great idea. Is there an archive that has Conference Championship Rings? (ie. Super Bowl losers' rings?) Also, should Super Bowl Rings be its own article? Bill shannon

Infobox standardization
As you may or may not know, there has been an ongoing debate at Infobox standardisation on whether or not infoboxes should be standardized. Thus, I want everyone to know that I am prepared to make the necessary minor style changes to Template:NFL team and Template:Infobox SuperBowl to make them look more like most of the other infoboxes on Wikipedia. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 00:34, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I think making the infobox look closer to other infoboxes (e.g. Template:Infobox University2) makes sense. I think the extra info at the top of each team article that is not in the infobox should be removed. madh 08:43, September 12, 2005 (UTC)

Putting Patriots history into separate article
I noticed that New England Patriots is getting very long. Thus, I am considering separating the history section into a new page called History of the New England Patriots. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 02:15, 28 August 2005 (UTC)
 * That's something I've been meaning to bring up. I think we are going to start seeing article creep in the next few years with some of these articles.  We need to have some standards for the history sections of these articles.  What I've noticed is that some teams have a paragraph each for the last 2 or 3 seasons, which is way too much.  I'm open to thoughts on how to standardize things.  --Cholmes75 03:59, 28 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I think the standard format should be very flexible because each team has had different periods of success and failure, and thus I do not think it is appropriate to have the sections and the sub-sections based solely on decades or years. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 17:24, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Agreed, but using the Pats' history as an example - having a play by play of their Super Bowls is too much (well maybe not a play by play but you get the point). --Cholmes75 19:18, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Would it be prudent to perhaps earmark certain "eras" of certain teams' success (or infamous failure) in either articles of their own (e.g. The 49ers of the 1980s, the 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers)?
 * Alternately, we could do five-year spans of seasons -- set up much like the Saturday Night Live articles are set up. That way we could include trends over many years by including multiple teams, such as the concurrent success of the Bills and Cowboys in the early nineties. I think adding separate "history of" pages would make the regular team articles either redundant or irrelevant. Bill shannon
 * Would it be possible for individuals to begin putting together game summaries of teams? Obviously, it's a huge undertaking, but it might help broaden the reach of the team articles, without making them endless for an online reader.
 * Instead of putting a hard date range in the history, I feel that teams make their own date ranges. I have been working on a separate history page for the Chiefs.  They have the Texan era, the AFL Chiefs era, the late 60s/early 70s era when they were winning, the 70-90 era when they were losing, then the 90s when they began to win again.  There's no point in discussing much of the 80s, but there was a lot of history in the 90s.  As for separate articles, I feel that each team should get a separate history page when the history is at least a full article on its own.  There's no harm in it and it allows people to get very detailed if they like. --Kainaw (talk) 20:09, 27 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Agreed. It adds to the tapestry of the history of football to include notable eras or seasons. Bill shannon 18:43, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
 * That's fine. But I think we need to put an end to this running game-by-game commentary trend; at least in the main articles.  --Cholmes75 22:27, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
 * The article has been split, and I'm current working on citations, prose, and whatnot to get the main article to FA status. Deckiller 01:10, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

NFL COTW
Would anyone here be interested in having a American Football COTW. There is already a Cricket, and Soccer COTW. Falphin 20:48, 28 August 2005 (UTC)
 * What is COTW? --Cholmes75 01:44, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Collaboration of the Week, WP:CO. Falphin 02:42, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I believe the NFL was already nominated a few weeks ago; not sure what came of it. --Cholmes75 03:50, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * NFL only got only six votes, not the eight required before the deadline. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:46, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Falphin, I assume that you talking about setting up a separate weekly collaboration page just for the subject of American football, yes? Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:52, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Thats what I meant. Football topics don't succeed in any of the COTWs right now.Dan Marino ended his career with 1 vote in the Bio and NFL only got like 6 votes. It would be an opportunity to fill in gaps. Falphin 23:05, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I think that'd be a good idea. --Cholmes75 19:16, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

New roster templates
I borrowed the new template for current rosters from the NHL team pages and adapted it for the NFL. I started with my team, the Raiders. I haven't added all the players, but the basic template is at Template:Oakland Raiders. I think this would look much better than the straight text lists being used for each team. Let me know what you all think. Just an FYI - I listed the players in order of jersey number, but alphabetically by last name is fine. We just need to be consistent. --Cholmes75 20:55, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Great work, I like it a lot. Now this isn't the whole roster, right?  What method did you use to decide which players to include.  The current players section in team articles, which I've been keeping up to date for a couple of months now, go by a criteria I established early in the history of this wikiproject.  Are you going by something similar or some other method?  Also, I think alphabetically would be better, though numbers should be included.  This will make it easier to find a name on the list. --Sophitus 03:41, August 31, 2005 (UTC)
 * I just reviewed your criteria for what players to include, and it sounds good to me. I'll work on that today.  --Cholmes75 13:27, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Quick thought: I suggest that you move it out of the template namespace and into the main article namespace, as either a subpage (like Oakland Raiders/Roster) or as a pseudo-namespace (like how Atlanta Braves roster is put onto Atlanta Braves). Otherwise, it might be put on Templates of deletion because the template would only be used on one article. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 10:57, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Unless of course you intend to create a page similar to List of Current NBA Team Rosters. Then having them in the template namespace would probably be fine. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 11:07, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * By the way, I am a football fan who prefers depth charts. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 11:17, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * For criteria I basically used the roster as listed on Oakland's web site (again, keeping in mind I haven't finished adding all the names). I'm fine with naming the template whatever it needs to be named to prevent deletion.  I like depth charts too, but my only qualm is that I think someone going to a team page on Wikipedia would likely be more interested in what players are on the team, rather than who the 2nd string fullback is.  --Cholmes75 13:15, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I like depth charts too, but I think they're even more ephemeral than rosters. --Sophitus 15:05, August 31, 2005 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Depth charts can change week to week, but a 45-man roster is pretty stable once the season starts.  --Cholmes75 16:00, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * OK, I finished the one for Oakland and added it to the main article. I went with Zzyzx11's suggestion and made it a pseudo namespace (Oakland_Raiders_roster).  If this looks OK we can get to work on the other teams.  --Cholmes75 14:00, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

OK, something's not working right due to my cluelessness. I added one for the Arizona Cardinals, but the one showing on the main article is not updating to reflect changes I make to Arizona Cardinals roster. What am I doing wrong? --Cholmes75 20:12, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * You just encountered one of the bugs/drawbacks of using a pseudo namespace: sometimes the one showing on the main article does not update immediately. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 21:47, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
 * So I see. Oh well, no big deal.  --Cholmes75 13:51, 1 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Actually, I might move them to the template namespace after all, because, like MLB rosters and List of Current NBA Team Rosters, it would be more convenient for me to have them all listed on one page. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 15:52, 4 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Whatever works best. : )   --Cholmes75 20:41, 4 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Ok, I created List of Current NFL Team Rosters to list all of the rosters on one page. But now I am thinking about reformatting the roster tables so they appear as three columns. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 04:19, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Since there seems to be no objections now of reformatting the roster tables into three columns [1) Offense, 2) Defense, 3) Special teams and injured players], I'll see if I can get all 32 of them ready before this Sunday. Also, instead of having the team logos appear twice at the top, I might replace the left one with the helmets. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 18:55, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

More Career Statistics
Does anyone favor something like this:

Stats for Mark Brunell and from nfl.com. I might make a template out of it if some people think its alright. Its far less difficult to edit than the other one IMO. Jobe 6   06:17, September 5, 2005 (UTC)


 * It looks nice, but way too much info. --Cholmes75 21:46, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
 * I removed some trivial info. Comments would be much appreciated. Jobe  6  [[Image:Peru flag large.png|20px]] 18:41, September 10, 2005 (UTC)
 * I think this is great. Like an online football card. Excellent job, looks nice. Bill shannon

American football (generic)
Did you guys consider / find interest in a similar project for American football generally? I've been poking through, and the state of a lot of the technical articles seems pretty bad, so I'm considering looking at firing up a project along those lines. If you've got any thoughts or input towards that, that'd be great (I've noted some of my thoughts on specifics in my user space). &mdash; Lomn | Talk / RfC 03:52, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

Talk Archive
I'm guessing that most of the talk page was archived, but where is it? --Sophitus 16:06, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
 * I guess I have to make the link to it more prominent. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 16:24, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

Endzone terminology
Not really the purview of this project, but since there's a good collection of fans in here, I'm looking for input. At Talk:Fumble I've brought up the problems I'm having finding good terminology for distinguishing the endzones, and I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions you guys have. &mdash; Lomn | Talk / RfC 20:25, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

Browns alternate logo
Does anyone know if the Browns are still using their "B" logo as their alternate logo? The Dawg Pound logo? Or any other alternate logo? If not, I am thinking about changing the infobox so that part does not show up on that page. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 20:14, 12 September 2005 (UTC)


 * On NFL and on the Browns' website, there are no logos of any kind. They simply use a brown helmet (it looks orange to me). Kainaw 20:22, 12 September 2005 (UTC)


 * In the newspaper in the Washington Post each team had their logo in a little cirlce and the Browns' logo was just an orange circle. Jobe  6  [[Image:Peru flag large.png|20px]] 01:34, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

NTBF editorializing
I've noticed a trend on some team articles of adding comments next to players in the Not to be forgotten section. This can lead to some comments that I'm not sure are encyclopedic (see the Bengals article). Perhaps a ruling would be in order as to whether or not comments are allowed in that section. If a player is notorious or famous enough, they would have their own article, and that would be the place for comments, IMO. --Cholmes75 15:28, 13 September 2005 (UTC)


 * The players in this section are not Hall of Fame players, but did something to make them more memorable than other players. A brief mention of what they did is worthwhile.  If you want to learn more, you can read and article on the player.  But, something as brief as: "had over 1,000 yards rushing three years in a row" is not editorializing.  If is said, "best running back for three years", it would be POV. Kainaw 16:18, 13 September 2005 (UTC)


 * I raised a similar question on the Patriots discussion page. How does one define even which personalities are not to be forgotten?  I was astounded that Weis and Crenel - two assistants most pundits say were almost as crucial to the Patriots' dominance as Belichick - were left off the list, but then it occured to me that to some, offensive/defensive coordinators aren't all that special.  The fact is, Not To Be Forgotten is, in and of itself, driven by opinion and thus POV.  How is this rationalized?  Has this point been brought up before?

NFL stub
Would this work? User:Jobe6/sandbox2 Job  E  6   16:01, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Looks good to me. --Cholmes75 16:39, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Looks good, but I actually would prefer you spell out "National Football League" for those international readers and editors. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 17:31, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Cool I changed it to "National Football League". Job  E  6  [[Image:Peru flag large.png|20px]] 00:01, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

You're have noticed this has been listed on Stub types for deletion; basic problem is that there already is the broader category of Amfootball-stub, and it's not at all clear that this 'needs' to be split further at present. OTOH, there is Amfootbio-stub, with over 900 stubs, which certainly could do with being split up; if anyone has any thoughts on the best way to do this, it'd be appreciated. (By league? By decade?)  Alai 17:24, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

NFL Draft Busts and Steals
I feel that the draft "bust" and the draft "steal" are two definative parts of any sports draft and therefore make it a valid and solid addition to the Wikipedia library. Due to my success with these lists for the NHL, I am going to make these lists for the NHL as well (under the names List of NFL Draft Busts and List of NFL Draft Steals).

If anyone wishes to contriblute to these lists, feel free to do so. And if you wish to look at my previous works (in the genre of "busts" and "steals"), see List of NHL Draft Busts and List of NHL Draft Steals. Hossmann 21:59, 20 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Perhaps these lists would be better organized chronologically rather than by position. Any thoughts? --Sophitus 02:39, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
 * An explanation of what a "bust" and what a "steal" are should be included on all of those pages. Job  E  6  [[Image:Peru flag large.png|20px]] 15:22, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Sophitus: I have thought about putting them alphabetically, but I felt that they would be better organized by position (sorted alphabetically inside the positions, of course).

Jobe6: I will put up the definitions of both a "bust" and a "steal" over time. (I have added definitions for both "busts" and "steals" on my NHL lists as well). Hossmann 18:53, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Those lists seem very interesting and I'll be glad to help. The terms would be very helpful to people who are not as knowledgeable in sports as you and I. Many non-sports fans would probably find them interestnig. Job  E  6  [[Image:Peru flag large.png|20px]] 02:06, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

These lists are intriguing and have potential to be great references. In the same spirit, would there be any interest in assembling a list of the most noteworthy and/or lopsided trades in NFL history? (Herschel Walker to the Vikings, Saints trading an entire draft for Ricky Williams, etc.) I'd like to maintain such a list if there is interest. Andrewdupont 22:47, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I like the idea of a lopsided trade article, however it does run the risk of being subjective, but then again, so is a "bust" or a "steal". It's a good idea. Another idea would be to put them all under the category of Blockbuster Trades (e.g the Eric Dickerson/Cornelius Bennett/Greg Bell trade of 1987). Maybe lopsided trades could be a sub-heading. Bill shannon

Roster Templates
Could we have people "adopt" or claim teams in order to avoid duplicates being made? Job E  6   13:12, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Project Tag
I'm putting the project tag on almost every NFL related article on the assumption that it will be helpful in getting more people willing to work on this project (I myself was recruited through the article on the Pats). If this is a gratutitous amount of tagging, tell me and I'll change it. I'm not sure if it's appropriate or not, but I'll go ahead and do it and if I'm wrong, I'll go back and change it. That last sentence was like a carbon copy of the preceding one.
 * So now its on the league page as well as both conferences and all divisions. Partway through it occured to me: could someone make a bot to add the project tag to anything in an NFL related category?  I'm not positive exactly how bots work, but this seemed like pretty mundane work that pretty much was edit page, paste the template, and enter "added proj tag" in summary.  is that possible / worth the effort of making a bot?  Is this venture even useful?jfg284 15:34, 31 October 2005 (UTC) I'm an idiot, posted them all on the wrong pages.  my bad. probably now this whole section is superflous. jfg284 16:14, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
 * If you would like information on bots, please see Bots. But it looks like someone has already posted a request for a "WikiProject notices on talk pages" bot on Bot requests. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 15:56, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

Nominated for Peer Review
I nominated List of NFL champions for peer review, see Peer_review/List_of_NFL_champions to leave comments. Looked good to me, comprable to the featured article of List of Super Bowl champions, and i figured it was worth a peer review, at least. Could be im jumping in doing really stupid, easy, small tasks with this project (see idiocy above) that have already been done / considered / rejected and whatnot, but im just going ahead and being bold like i was told to. jfg284 21:49, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Yes, being bold is one thing. But jumping into something that has already been discussed or has already been set as policy and guidelines is another. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 23:39, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
 * That's why i was bold enough to use peer review instead of going ahead and nominating it...i was following the policy set forth on the featured articles page. I was unaware of a seperate featured lists page.


 * Oh, and you may continue to improve that page when it is on peer review, using the What is a featured list criterion. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 23:42, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

Nominated for FLC
List looked good to me, listing on peer review got two comments, one saying it looked good and one saying to change some of the images. I personally disagreed with the image comment, but if it becomes a problem during the FLC phase, its an easy fix. In any case, List of NFL champions is now a featured list candidate.

List of NFL champions is now a featured list. jfg284 20:45, 15 November 2005 (UTC)