Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Steve Davis/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was archived by Gog the Mild via FACBot (talk) 25 June 2021 [1].

Steve Davis[edit]

Nominator(s): Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 11:08, 14 May 2021 (UTC), User:The Rambling Man[reply]

This article is about one of the most important snooker players of all time. Davis is a six-time world champion, and absolutely dominated the 1980s, winning 28 world ranking tournaments and a further 56 invitational devices. Three times a winner of the Masters, Davis was also a master of nine-ball, poker and chess during his professional career from 1976 to 2016. Gaining an MBE in 2000, Davis is also the only snooker player to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year, and was part of the most viewed broadcast on BBC2 and post midnight at the 1985 World Snooker Championship.

I think the article is fantastic, so I would like your comments as to how this looks alongside my other nominator The Rambling Man. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 11:08, 14 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from BennyOnTheLoose[edit]

I may claim Wikicup points, if I consider my review substantial enough. Will probably add my comments in a few batches. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 23:26, 15 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

General

  • No mention of Frank Callan?
    • I have added a mention. I'm sure there's loads of sourcing about it, but other than him being the coach, there's not much to say. Happy to add a quote if Davis says something specific. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:15, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • In Pocket Money, Gordon Burn notes how Davis had never publicly mentioned Callan and how "Stalin-like, [Callan] has been written out of all the official Davis histories." Seems like Bill Davis and Callan clashed, but given how Griffiths, Hendry, Mountjoy and others have spoken about Callan, it seems very possible that Callan was important for Davis's development and success. He's mentioned now, so cool. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 12:11, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • No mention in the text of the tours to China, etc in the 80s? I think these were pretty significant for the later development of snooker, and he was the headliner IIRC.
  • No mention of his off-table sponsorships/endorsements? The ratio of his other income to prize money appears in quite a few sources.
    • Any examples? I feel it's a bit of a throwaway thing, other than his relationship with Hearn being monetary in nature, Davis isn't a businessman; and this is a bio about a snooker player. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:15, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • "At 29, Davis is the game's first millionaire. … cued his way to 255,000 pounds sterling ($510,000 Cdn.) in tournament winnings last year, while endorsements and exhibitions boosted his income to about $1.5 million … Davis has a five-year, $1-million pound contract with a brewery that calls for him to devote 40 days a year on their behalf - at roughly $10,000 a day. His other endorsements include men's toiletries, luggage, watches and, of course, snooker equipment"[1]
      • "his season's earnings in official prize money to a record$A1.06 million. And it is estimated that he earned the best part of another million in restricted tournaments, exhibitions, endorsements and sponsorships … By 1981, the year in which he won the championship for the first time, he was already a millionaire. It is accepted that he has earned a million pounds a year ever since."[2]
      • "Courage’s original agreement to become patron to Davis made him the best-paid sportsman in Britain"[3]
      • "Hearn and Davis need each other"; coverage of Hong Kong trip, and Riley and Goya deals.[4]
        • and another: Dominic Sandbrook, Who Dares Wins: Britain, 1979-1982. London: Allen Lane. 2019. ISBN 978-1-846-14737-1 p.492 : "[Davis] was not merely an exceptional sportsman but an exceptional business, cashing in on the transformtion in snooker's image ...[By 1985] he was raking in three times as much from endorsements, an estimated £600,000 a year, than he was from tournament prize money." BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 23:23, 27 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • On my desktop view, the names of the tournaments in the performance and ranking timeline disappear when I scroll past a certain year, is there any way to make this a bit more reader-friendly?
  • Legacy section looks a little light, but let me have a look at sources to see if I have any more specific points/comments.
    • I agree there's room for improvement. You've certainly added some good sources below that would benefit. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:15, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • I haven't read it as it's paywalled, but this might be interesting. There's a Eurosport article that might be useful here. The last couple of pages of the Davis chapter of Masters of the Baize are on Google Books (on my view), as is some of Black Farce and Cue Ball Wizards (see the start of chapter 7, for example). I suppose what I'm looking for in the article, ideally, is some comment or speculation (from suitable people) on why he was so successful, his influence on other players (e.g. style of play, general inspiration), him becoming the UK's highest paid sportsperson, and possibly something about his contribution to the growth of snooker worldwide. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 15:50, 22 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox

  • Shouldn't info be cited in the body rather than in the infobox?
  • "Master Cueman" is not sourced in the article.
  • "Golden nugget" is not sourced in the article, but does appear in two headlines of sources used.
  • 147 as being his highest break isn't explicitly sourced, only that he compiled it...perhaps doesn't need to be as it's called a "maximum break" in the body and breaks over 147 are virtually unknown?
  • Total number of century breaks isn't sourced.

Lead

  • "he remains the only snooker player ever to win the award." - not explicitly sourced in the article.
  • "Davis domination of the game waned in the 1990s" - Davis's?
  • "at age 39" - "at the age of 39" seems better to me.
  • "He made a record 30th" - doesn't look like the "record" part is sourced in the article.
  • Should MBE be wikilinked?
    • It is linked after the name in my eyes. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 08:32, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • OBE (same target) is, but not everyone will know that MBE is part of the same Most Excellent Order. I suppose it might be seen as overlinking. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 08:43, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Images

  • "Davis playing a trick shot exhibition during the break of the 2012 German Masters final" - maybe something like "interval" rather than "break" (to avoid any possible confusion with break)?

Early career

  • "introduced him to snooker at age 12 took him to play at his local working men's club and gave him an instructional book" seems to be lacking some punctuation or words.
  • "Pontin's Spring Open" is redlinked here; "Pontins Spring Open" (no apostrophe) is wikilinked in the Pro-am finals section.
  • "He made his debut at the World Snooker Championship in 1979, losing 11–13 to Dennis Taylor in the first round" - consider mentioning that he won two qualifying matches to get there.

Professional success (1980-1984)

  • "defeating defending champion Terry Griffiths in the second round" merits a little more detail, I think.
  • "Over the next 18 months, Davis won seven more events" - not verified by source, as far as I can see. (Seems that after the 1980 UK, he won the the English Professional, the Yamaha Masters, the 1981 World Championship and "The following season he won seven more titles" which would probably be ten in 18 months - I've not checked all the dates.)
  • "Davis followed up this with a 9–0 whitewash victory over Dennis Taylor in the International Open final" - sort of, but I think he lost to Griffiths in the Pontins Pro Championship and also won the Lang's Scottish Masters inbetween the world championship and the International Open (if Hayton has the sequence right).
  • "This began a six-month period in which Davis and Griffiths contested almost all the major tournament finals." - source?
  • "In doing so, Davis won a Lada car" - possibly worth mentioning that Lada were the sponsors of the tournament. Also, it feels like that belongs with the previous sentence rather than with "but lost 8–9 to Griffiths in the final"
  • "defeating Griffiths 9–6 in the final." - the source (and Hayton) say 9–5.
  • "falling to the Crucible curse" - I suppose a little poetic licence is allowed even in featured articles.
  • "he was the first player to retain his title at the Crucible Theatre – the venue for the event " - may be worth adding since when it was the venue.
  • How about adding when he first achieved the number one ranking?
  • Feels like this section is slightly out of balance with the Retirement (2010–2016) section, which looks like it has a higher proportion of match scores but for matches which are IMO less significant in his career. (e.g. "He qualified for the Shanghai Masters by defeating Alfie Burden 5–1 and Andrew Higginson 5–0, defeating Zhu Yinghui 5–1 to reach the last 32[116] before losing 4–5 to Ricky Walden" v "Davis reached the final by defeating White in the first round, Higgins in the second round, Griffiths in the quarter-finals and defending champion Cliff Thorburn in the semi-final." and "Davis also won the 1984 UK Championship, defeating Higgins 16–8 in the final".)

1985 World Snooker Championship

  • "lost only 23 frames en route to the final" - might be useful to add how many he won, to put the 23 in context.
    • I've added who he beat instead, which is much more relevant. 23 isn't a low amount of frames to conceed. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 10:03, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Later world championship victories (1985–1989)

  • "The result did not affect his position at the top of the world rankings, since he had won the UK Championship, the Grand Prix and the British Open in the 1985–86 season.2 is not sourced.
  • "By the end of the 1980s, Davis was snooker's first millionaire" - fair interpretation of the source. The Evening Standard for 7 April 1983 says Davis was a millionaire, and there was a March 1985 edition of Sportsnight that said the same, so the current wording is supported but he was probably a millionaire earlier than it implies.
    • Yeah, not much more we can do than say this, unless there's a specific source that says when this was. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 10:03, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

1990–2005

  • "His last victory in a major tournament was at the 1997 Masters." - source? (BBC source after the next sentence mentions it, but not that it was his "last")
    • We do say his last ranking title was in 1995, source added that specifically says this. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 08:57, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • "After a season in which he reached only one ranking event quarter-final" - source?

In other media

  • I'd suggest wikilinking or explaining " sixth form"
  • Combine the two mentions of Phoenix FM, I think
  • Is The Official Matchroom actually The Official 1990 Matchroom Snooker Special (isbn 0600566005)? If so, Ian Morrison is the author, although Davis wrote the introduction and, unlike Morrison, has his name on the cover. ("Introduced by world champion Steve Davis")
  • Could add Medical Grade Music to his list of books. There's a Guardian interview about it here.
  • Could add Steve Davis Snooker, Virtual Snooker and /or Steve Davis World Snooker to the list of software.
    • Virtual snooker is already mentioned. Added the others - I will try and clean these articles up one day. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:26, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Legacy

  • "Davis won a record 83 professional titles and was the runner-up in 38 events, with 28 of these as ranking event victories. His modern-era record of six world titles has been broken only by Hendry, and his six UK Championship titles has been bettered only by Ronnie O'Sullivan. Davis compiled over 300 competitive centuries during his career. " - all seems to be unsourced.

Personal life

  • "he is honorary president of the Snooker Writers' Association" - source is from 2005, is he still President?
    • I'm not even convinced it still exists. There's nothing online in the last decade. Any ideas? Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:05, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • No idea. Maybe change wording to something like "became", and perhaps remove the redlink as the association doesn't appear to be notable. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 10:26, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • "he is on the board of Leyton Orient F.C." - source is from 2011, is he still on the board?
    • Doesn't look like it. It's hard to find sources, as they've had both a player and manager named "Steve Davis" at Orient. I'll put "was on the board", unless anyone can find differently. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:05, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Davis lives in Brentwood, Essex" - source is from 2004, does he still live there?
    • No idea. He still was as of 2019, so probably. The mail online suggests he might have been selling [2], but hardly a trustworthy source. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:43, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Performance and Ranking Timeline

  • What's the source for 1990 Shoot Out?
  • What are the sources for Pot Black performances? (Excluding the finals, which are cited in the article)
    • We could use [3], which I'm never sure if it's suitable or not. Looks to have a 13 year history (copyright 2007). Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:40, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Career finals

  • 1989 Hong Kong Gold Cup - no source given (I've not been able to find one for the result)
    • Added Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 09:31, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • That source has "Alex Higgins meets Steve Davis in the 11-frame final of the Hong Kong Gold Cup today" (and some other details) - not the result of the final. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 11:43, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2018 Seniors Irish Masters - source has his opponent's name spelt "Jonathan Bagley"
  • 1991 World Mixed Doubles Championship - might be worth linking to 1991 World Masters as it was part of that.

Sources (I'll try and help where I can if you get stuck....)

  • What makes http://www.cuesnviews.co.uk/ a reliable source?
  • What makes https://www.snookerisland.com/ a reliable source?
  • What makes "The Mob Poker Database" a reliable source?
  • what makes britishcomedychannel.com a reliable source?
  • "Guinness Book of Snooker match report" - not sure what this source is. My book with this title is from 1982, and Guinness' The Records book was published in 1985 so neither of those could comment on a match in 1989.
  • "White Crowned Senior Champion". Archived from the original on 7 August 2011. Retrieved 24 May 2011." looks to be lacking publisher/site.
  • ""Champion of Champions Group Seeds Announced – Matchroom Sport". 17 October 2014. Archived from the original on 18 June 2015. Retrieved 21 October 2014." Publisher is part of the title.
  • "Davis, Steve (1989). The Official Matchroom 1990. Hamlyn" - looks like title is incomplete. (see comment under "In other media")
  • There's something odd about " "When Snooker Went Loopy". BBC. 20 November 2000. Archived from the original on 13 June 2011. Retrieved 20 June 2010." which looks like a BBC site but an IMDB archived page.
  • ""Snooker Loopy". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 5 February 2009." links to Square Dance Rap by Sir Mix-A-Lot.
  • "Williams, Luke; Gadsby, Paul (2005). Masters of the Baize: Cue Legends, Bad Boys and Forgotten Men in Search of Snooker's Ultimate Prize" I'm surprised to only see this used once. The "detailed comparison and ranking of snooker professionals" is only 12 pages out of 235 in my edition so I think that's more a description of part of the contents rather than of the book as a whole.
  • Snooker Scene refs aren't consistent. (Also, publisher was Everton's News Agency before Snooker Scene Ltd)
  • Notes section doesn't have any sources. I think this is the first snooker bio to be nominated for FA so I'd be interested to hear views on how far the contents of the performance and ranking timeline (progress, and statements like "not held" or "ranking tournament" or "did not participate") need to be sourced within a bio article.
    • I'd argue these are cited to the reference sections to the individual tables. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 08:41, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Seems to be quite a high proportion of "World Snooker" and snooker.org sources, which is fine by me to confirm results, but would we be better with some more commentary from secondary sources? (I'll reflect on this after re-reading)
    • I mean, sure, but these are both independent sources in this case. I'd love to use news publications to talk about things, but they aren't all that indepth, especially for the smaller comps. I don't have the snooker scenes from anything earlier than this year, so the worldsnooker links were really helpful, and snooker.org is a good database for what we need. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 08:52, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • I'm happy for those sources for verifying the facts of results, dates, etc. I was thinking more of secondary sources for general commentary/analysis, like Black Farce and Cue Ball Wizards (nearly 60 references to Davis in the index, some of which likely lead to interesting stuff), Masters of the Baize, or Hayes's Snooker Legends and where are they now? There are also some older books like Trelford's Snookered and Burns's Pocket Money that cover a couple of years in depth (not just about Davis). There are a load of other 1980's books that talk about Davis but obviously recent publications would be preferable. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 10:26, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • The archive for "Boniface, Susie (6 March 2005). "Steve's Cutie". Sunday Mirror(Questia Online Library). Archived from the original on 4 May 2021. Retrieved 4 April 2012." isn't very helpful
  • "Layton, Eric. Cuesport Book of Professional Snooker. pp. 159–160." name should be Hayton, as per "Hayton, Eric (2004). The CueSport Book of Professional Snooker. Suffolk: Rose Villa Publications. pp. 344–347. ISBN 978-0-9548549-0-4."
  • Inconsistent ISBN number format in the "Sources" section.
  • Thanks for the responses, Lee Vilenski, I haven't checked through them all yet, but will do. I need to have a look at a few sources to make any other specific suggestions about legacy etc. I haven't found a reliable source for the Hong Kong Gold Cup result - seems it wasn't covered by Snooker Scene unless I haven't found the right issue. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 11:43, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yeah, I can't find much either. I'd suggest a cull, it was just a glorified exhibition with three participants after all. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 14:56, 19 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'll re-read as a lot has been done on the article since I last looked at it, but the outstanding points from above are:
  • "Master Cueman" is not sourced in the article.
  • Link MBE in body? OBE (same target) is, but not everyone will know that MBE is part of the same Most Excellent Order.
  • "falling to the Crucible curse" - my point about "poetic licence" was that he lost to Knowles, not to this abstract concept.
  • "Davis won a record 83 professional titles and was the runner-up in 38 events, with 28 of these as ranking event victories" - BBC source has 28 ranking and 53 non-ranking (and 9 team) events, which would be a total of 81 (excluding team events). Our table lists 56 non-ranking wins, and I'm not going to guess which 53 are counted in the sources - possibly some not in our list. Perhaps a footnote? I didn't see "was the runner-up in 38 events" in the sources; if it's from the tables in the article then, again, maybe add a note to that effect?
  • Does he still live in Brentwood, Essex? In the absence of RS after 2004, reword or omit.
  • What are the sources for Pot Black performances? (Excluding the finals, which are cited in the article)?
  • Source used for 1989 Hong Kong Gold Cup doesn't have the final outcome or result.
  • "Williams, Luke; Gadsby, Paul (2005) ... The "detailed comparison and ranking of snooker professionals" is only 12 pages out of 235 in my edition so I think that's more a description of part of the contents rather than of the book as a whole.
  • Notes section doesn't have any sources - I'll wait and see what other reviewers think.
    • I don't have much of an issue around this - the table itself is really well cited. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 12:52, 14 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 14:33, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Outstanding points:

  • No mention in the text of the tours to China, etc in the 80s?
  • No mention of his off-table sponsorships/endorsements?
  • Legacy - "I suppose what I'm looking for in the article, ideally, is some comment or speculation (from suitable people) on why he was so successful, his influence on other players (e.g. style of play, general inspiration), him becoming the UK's highest paid sportsperson, and possibly something about his contribution to the growth of snooker worldwide." (Note "ideally", not "or else")
  • (Added 15/06) Is The Official Matchroom actually The Official 1990 Matchroom Snooker Special (isbn 0600566005)? If so, Ian Morrison is the author, although Davis wrote the introduction and, unlike Morrison, has his name on the cover. ("Introduced by world champion Steve Davis")
    • Hi BennyOnTheLoose - I've added something suitable. Probably do with a bit more expansion when I get a few minutes to check through sourcing, but let me know what you think as I've covered the other points. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 13:24, 14 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

New points

Early success (1980–1984)

  • reword second sentence of "Despite making the maximum, he lost 8–9 to Griffiths in the final. Davis defeated Griffiths 9–5 in that year's final..."
  • change either "won or "win " in "he won 18–12 against Doug Mountjoy to win"
  • "retained the UK" - add "championship" or "title" or similar.
  • The link shortcut "Classic" is used twice - once to the 1980s Wilsons Classic and the 1982 Classic; I'm not sure if that is an issue.
  • "In doing so, as Lada were sponsoring the event, Davis won a car" - slight reword, as them sponsoring doesn't necessarily mean there would be a car awarded for a maximum.
  • "Despite making the maximum, he lost 8–9 to Griffiths in the final" - the maximum was in a different match, so I'm not sure it was "despite"

1985 World Snooker Championship

  • "left Taylor with a reasonably-straightforward pot to secure the championship." - feels to me like a mention of Taylor actually potting it should be here.
  • I think I now have everything BennyOnTheLoose Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 14:57, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose from Amakuru[edit]

I feel really bad here, because I've worked a lot with Lee and TRM in the past and consider them to be very good wiki-friends. But without having gone into the detail yet I think there's a fairly fundamental balance issue in this article with the Career section. I ran a quick prose-size check on Sunday evening on the different subsections, and found the following:

Year range Bytes Words Bytes-per-year
1970-1979 1580 271 words 158
1980-1984 2323 385 words 464.6
1985 1082 184 words 1082
1985–1989 3258 569 words 651.6
1990–2005 1467 253 words 97.8
2005–2010 3855 652 words 771
2010–2016 4570 778 words 761.7

As we can see, the prose is heavily skewed towards the last ten years of Davis's career, a period which evidently wasn't his heyday. (He won all of his world titles in the 1980s). Looking at the narrative itself, it switches in 2005 from extremely broad-brush statements to suddenly having intricate detail of individual seasons, including individual scores in minor events such as the Australian Goldfields Open. By contrast, the 15-year period from 1990 to 2005 is the shortest of all the sections, with only two shortish paragraphs covering an entire period in which he was presumably a higher-profile player than he was in his twilight years.

Of course, it doesn't take a rocket science to figure out why this phenomenon might have occurred, it's something we see across the Wiki: 2005 marked the point in time when our august project really hit the big time, and from that point on there would have been editors updating details of his tournaments on a daily basis, as and when they happened. This is why our article on John Isner, a decent tennis player but never anywhere near the best in the world, is significantly longer than Pete Sampras, one of the all-time greats.

It's totally understandable why this occurs, and at GA level I would rate this an easy pass. But for FAC, I think I regretfully have to fail this on both criterion 1b and criterion 4. The Career section needs to be written so that it:

  1. has significantly more detail on the earlier years (particularly that 1990–2005 period), to satisfy 1b "comprehensive", and probably
  2. a bit less detail on the 2005–2016 period, in order to satisfy criterion 4 "It stays focused on the main topic without going into unnecessary detail". I doubt we'd want to include Australian Goldfields Open calibre events for every one of the 40 years he played!

Sorry again, but I'm not able to support at this time. If you're able to fix the above issues while the FAC is active, or if there's some fundamental detail that I've missed here, then I'll happily look again and also take a look at the prose and the other sections. There's no doubt this is well on the road towards being an FA, but for now I'll leave it there. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 09:21, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I've begun an expansion of that particular section. There's still a bit more that can be added (I haven't gotten as far as 2000-05 yet), but we are already bordering on 200 bytes per year. I agree the later years are too in-depth (for the reasons you outlined), so I'll get on removing some fluff. I'd argue the 70s section is the right size, as he didn't turn professional until 78, perhaps a little more on his development in the early 80s. The later 80s looks about right, considering that's when he was the most popular, most famous snooker player on the planet.
Give me a day or two to fix, and I'll drop you a ping. Thanks for the in-depth statistics. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 10:42, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's worth noting, that even after the cull, there are a lot more tournaments in the later seasons compared to those in the 1990s (6 per year against 20ish nowadays). I'm going to do a c/e and get back to you. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 13:51, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Amakuru - I don't know if you mind having another look? Sorry it's been so long, I'm having a few issues offwiki; but if at all possible I'd still like to progress this. :) Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 18:48, 27 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Lee Vilenski: thanks for the note, and it's certainly looking much better now. That said, the "1990–2005" section is still giving me a cause for concern though. Is there no more detail that can be added to that? I'd favour splitting it into at least two, and bringing it up to having the same level of detail as we see in the post-2005 sections. Just as one example, we have "During the 1990s, Davis also won the Irish Masters four times: in 1990, 1991, 1993 and 1994"... this has no scores and no individual detail; yet below, we have match-by-match detail on all sorts of tournaments such as the Paul Hunter Classic, Shanghai Masters etc. Perhaps those are more important tournaments than the Irish Masters of the early 1990s, but in general I think the level of coverage needs to be consistent throughout his career for an FA. Regreta that this isn't the answer you want, but this is the gold-standard when it comes to article awards! (Also, the readable prose is at 25kB at the moment, so I don't think there's a danger of the article becoming too long). On the plus side, I'm confident that this can eventually make it, whether on this FAC or a future one, so please keep up the good work. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 10:12, 28 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I've added some additional to those sections. The issue is around the lack of tournaments during the late 90s and early 2000s, where the game was almost killed off. I'll do a bit more to cull some of the extrenous stuff from later years, as clearly the weight of his career is around his titles in the 90s. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 18:08, 1 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Lee Vilenski: Ok thanks, let me know when you're done with that. By the way, ahead of more detailed analysis on this, I'm thinking that some expansion of his media career may be in order as well. Although obviously his career is the dominant aspect of his notability, I think he has become quite ubiquitous on the commentary at the crucible in recent years and I think it would be worth saying more than just the current one-liner "... is a commentator for the BBC's snooker coverage". I think a "Media career" section similar to Mark_Lawrenson#Media_career might be in order, covering when he joined the BBC, which events he covers, any other TV commitments, plus newspaper columns etc (if any). Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 09:44, 3 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The Lawrenson bio is good, but most of it is uncitable. To my knowledge Davis doesn't do newspaper columns, doesn't do radio, doesn't have much criticism, he's just been ever present on the commentary and punditry team for the BBC's coverage of the Triple Crown events. I did miss out that he is a pundit, which is more of what he does. Looking at the 2005-2010 section, most of the text is on the 2010 World championship, which is particularly important, reaching the quarter-finals and beating Higgins, and the replay of the 1985 World Championship; which are big deals. I have however, culled the remaining final section, which covers his final title, his retirement and dropping off the tour. Let me know what you think Amakuru. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 13:06, 6 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't know if you have any further opinions on the weight of the article Amakuru? I think it's suitable now and his later career covers the important results (specifically against Higgins at the world championships, and then his retirement. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 14:00, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Lee Vilenski: I will hopefully be able to give this another look-over tomorrow morning. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 16:20, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Back for another look. Apologies for the delay compared with what I said above. I've re-run the sub-section prose counts again (yesterday) and found the following:
Year range Bytes Words Bytes-per-year
1970–1979 1636 280 words 163.6
1980-1984 2300 385 words 460.0
1985 1172 198 words 1172
1985–1989 2891 505 words 578.2
1990–1999 2386 408 words 238.6
2000–2005 1596 281 words 319.2
2005–2010 2597 426 words 519.4
2010–2016 2333 387 words 388.8
It's certainly much better than it was before, and thanks for the update. However, regrettably I still think there's some more work needed to get it balanced. Discounting the 70s (when he wasn't yet amongst the elite, so that's fine) it looks like the 90s is now the under-represented era, followed by 2000-2005. All the stuff from 2005 to 2016 is interesting and can be kept, I just think we need more in the 90s. A split into 1990-95 and 1995-2000, so that each section covers five years, and then expand each of those up to the same level as the others. Or, even better, have the length of the early 90s section be a bit longer than the others, since he was still going to the latter stages of tournaments on a regular basis at that point. We need to act as if there was a Wikipedia around at that time with people updating as-it-happened, including the interesting anecdotes such as the glasses and wig-wearing we see in 2010.
I'm really sorry this isn't the answer you're looking for, you've done brilliant work and this article will definitely get there in the end, whether it's at this FAC or a future one (I might also help out with it myself with that later in the year, if you and TRM don't get to it before then, and when I'm not snowed-under with other things). But as I said above FAC is the diamond-standard when it comes to articles, and my honest opinion is that it's not quite there yet. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 17:28, 16 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That's fair. Looking at the section, we cover his world championship results in reasonable detail until 96, and then don't cover 97, 98 and 99. I'll add something on that (not that he did well!) and expand the bit on his 97 Masters win. I think that would probably cover what you are looking for. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 11:41, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Probably last chance saloon on this one, Amakuru, but I think I've just about made it consistent across all of the sections, with the exception of 1985 being larger (and, for obvious reasons, it deserves more WP:WEIGHT), and his 80's sections being slightly longer than the rest. I'm not a big fan of colour for colours' sake, so I've moved the bit about the anniversary match at the Crucible to legacy, which is probably a better fit. If this isn't quite good enough, let me know as I'm out of ideas. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 14:46, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'll have another look later on tonight. THanks  — Amakuru (talk) 16:41, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
OK, back again and it's definitely getting better but I don't think I'm really close to a support yet, I'm afraid. I just think the prose in all of the early years, and I'd even count the 1980s in this, has lots of room for expansion. Just for interest's sake, I've just looked at Milos Raonic, another FA, and I think that gives a very rough clue as to what we might be looking for. Obviously I'm well aware that you can't really compare sportspeople across different disciplines with different calendars, and most likely tennis players play more than snooker players do throughout the year. But in that article, the whole career section (which is 13 years so far) has 35kb of prose in it, compared to around 17kb at present for Davis. And look at Mark Selby, perhaps a player of similar stature to Davis but playing in the 2010s rather than the 1980s. That one is your GA, it has lots of detail and clocks in at 28kb. I'm not saying you have to get it all the way to those levels necessarily, but I want to feel like there aren't gaps or that there's a difference in coverage between pre-Wikipedia and post-Wikipedia subjects. Just to pluck one example, Davis won the International Open six times in the 1980s, several of those as a ranking event, but only two of those are even mentioned at all in the prose, let alone with some detail on whom he beat and so on. What I would recommend is to go through season by season as we see for Selby; pick out the notable tournaments and how he did in them (particularly any tournaments he won), and document it here. Chapter and verse. The post-2005 era is fine, but the 1980s and early 1990s should definitely have more detail in them than post-2005, not less or even the same, because that's when he was among the best in the world and really winning things. I don't think this one is a million miles away, and I definitely hope to be back with a green tick at some point. Also, if other reviewers don't agree with my assessment here and support the FAC now then I won't stand in its way, because I don't pretend to be the expert. And if I'm applying a standard to this that you think I shouldn't be applying, then I'll be happy to listen as well... but at present this is how I see it. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 21:34, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ "Davis pockets snooker crown", November 2, 1986, Toronto Star, The (Ontario, Canada), Author: Rick Morrison, Page: E6
  2. ^ "... - BUT THE MILLION-DOLLAR MAN WILL NOT BE HERE – SNOOKER", May 4, 1988, Sydney Morning Herald, The (Australia), Author: LES WHEELER, Page: 66
  3. ^ "Elders renews its sponsorship of snooker ace Steve Davis", Gideon Haigh, The Age (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia),11 Apr 1990,Page 26
  4. ^ "Earn with Hearn – it’s the life of Riley" Michael Herd, Evening Standard ,(London, Greater London, England), 01 Apr 1985, page 37

Ceoil placeholder[edit]

Accessibility review[edit]

Source review, Support from Vami_IV[edit]

Placeholder for now. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 06:21, 12 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

First comments: There are three books under #Sources, and several books, or at least references with an ISBN, in #References. Of the three books under #Sources, two presently do not have citations pointing at them; of the one that does, it presently has a single citation pointing to it. Some of the books in #References, particularly The CueSport Book of Professional Snooker, are cited many times. There are also a lot of missing page numbers, named below. For consistency, I advise for book citations either sfnrefs, or Template:RP to keep the long-form citations. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 00:02, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Also, at the time of writing, Citation [9] does not point to any of the books under #Sources. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 00:02, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This is my first source review for Featured content; if I have demonstrated gross incompetence or caused offense, please let me know. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 00:02, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Vami, to make things easier, as I don't really know much about Harvard style citations, I've made everything into regular style references. The two remaining sources are things that help to cover the writing, but aren't specifically cited. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 13:11, 14 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sehr gutt. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 02:50, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I have identified these technical hiccups:

  1. There is no instance of Template:Notelist; as a result, all uses of Template:Efn are broken and will not display.
    1. Added Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 12:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  2. No instance of citation [65] has a page number. There are additionally several book citations without page numbers. I recommend, for consistency and verifiability, that all book citations be followed with Template:Rp for page numbers.
    1. Might need your help with this, BennyOnTheLoose Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 12:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      1. Sure, Lee Vilenski. Can you list the ones you want help with specifically? The Davis pages in Hayton are 343 to 349. A few weeks ago, I checked the first few years of the performance & ranking timeline and added in some refs for events not in that source, like the 1979 Tolly Cobbold Classic, 1982 Australian Masters, and 1982 Highland Masters. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 13:52, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
        1. Basically need page numbers for the CueSport Book of Professional Snooker book. Even if we had a range for the results per year that would be pretty good. Can easily use {{rp}} after each one. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 13:58, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
          1. I reviewed the use of the book in the article; the exception where page numbers isn't cited is currently ref 65 (used multiple times) and looking through what it's used to support, pages 343 to 349 are indeed OK for that ref. The book has subheadings in bold for each season of results for Davis, so I think that using a range of a few pages in the citation is reasonable. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 14:22, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Citation [175] is broken; there are more than one versions of reference "theg_Stev".
    1. fixed. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 12:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Citation [197] is still an sfn Harvard reference.
    1. Fixed. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 12:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Citations [249], [252], [255], [265], [267], [286], [269], [276], and [287] are missing the |magazine= parameter.
    1. Added Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 12:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Citation [282] also needs |magazine=.

Additionally, I recommend the changing of #Sources's title to #Further reading. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 02:50, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I am ready to support as soon as the page numbers are in place. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 21:58, 15 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

No worries Vami IV - have a page range that covers this now. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski (talk • contribs) 11:39, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sehr gutt. Supporting. –♠Vami_IV†♠ 22:06, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Coordinator comment[edit]

This has been open for a month and while it has attracted a fair few comments it has no supports and has had an open oppose for nearly four weeks. Unless this changes significantly over the next couple of days, I am afraid that this nomination is liable to be archived. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:02, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Little seems to have changed, and so I am archiving this. Can I remind both nominators that "If a nomination is archived ... None of the nominators may nominate or co-nominate any article for two weeks unless given leave to do so by a coordinator".
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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