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. Sources have been found which have been persuasive enough on those commenting here, for me to judge that there is a consensus that the article passes the main notability guideline. Davewild (talk) 18:37, 2 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ernie Jenkins (baseball)

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Ernie Jenkins (baseball) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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Another non-notable article from Alexautographs. He PROD'd then unPROD'd strangely. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:06, 9 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Baseball-related deletion discussions. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:08, 9 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sportspeople-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 23:33, 9 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that there's a danger when it comes to articles from the pre-internet era. I've argued similarly in the Perry Lipe AfD, among others. However, I'm not sure I agree that minor leaguers were "more important" back then. I bet the average minor leaguer in 2011 gets 10 times more coverage than the average minor leaguer of old, yet there seems to be a growing bias here toward deleting modern-day players and keeping the older guys. — NY-13021 (talk) 02:22, 10 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There are a number of important differences between minor leaguers back then and today. Today the minor leagues are strictly a development league - players are there primarily to try to make the major leagues, or because they haven't figured out that they never will, or haven't figured out what to do with themselves after figuring out that they never will. Before 1940 or so, playing in the minor leagues - particularly the high minor leagues - could be an end in itself. If you were a California boy not inclined to move more that 1500 miles away from home, the PCL was the highest league you could hope to play in. If you were a DiMaggio, of course you'd have major league scouts knocking at your door persuading you to try out east. Even if you were a notch or a few below that, you'd likely get enough scouting interest to persuade you to make the trek to try out. But if you were a player who was good enough to be a major league reserve, you may never bother leaving your starting PCL job. In addition, there was no major league baseball west or south of St. Louis (or in Canada) prior to the late 1950s. So if you were a California baseball fan, the bast players/teams you were likely to ever see in a game that counted were PCL. Same with Texas, Georgia, Florida, etc. And with much less TV coverage than there is today (none if you go back far enough), these areas would never even get to see major leaguers on TV. aWhich also helped the minor league gate, allowing them to pay higher salaries to retain their good players, who nowadays would just be called up to the majors by their affiliated major league team. And even major US cities east and north of St. Louis had no major league teams - e.g., Baltimore. For these reasons, Hall of Famers like Lefty Grove and Sam Rice did not make their major league debuts until they were 25. And minor league teams like the 1924 Baltimore Orioles (with Grove, Tommy Thomas, George Earnshaw and Jack Ogden all in their mid-20s) could have better pitching rotations than most major league teams.
So while many minor leaguers were no more important than today's minor leaguers, many were. Do you think that the Baltimore Orioles' or San Francisco Seals' or Los Angeles Angels' players got significantly less regional coverage than their respective major league teams' players do today? And to the extent that today's minor league players get significant coverage today, they of course meet GNG. Many, many high level minor leaguers pre-1950 or so got plenty of coverage - it's just not so easy to find. Rlendog (talk) 02:05, 12 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
All of that may be true, and I have no doubt it is, but GNG still needs to be met. Dozens and dozens of modern-era minor leaguers have been and continue to be deleted. If we're supposed to presume that these older guys passed GNG in a time when there was probably 95% less baseball coverage than there is now, then the same should apply to modern-era players. I doubt there's a single modern minor leaguer who hasn't had at least two or three feature stories written about him, but they get deleted because no one goes and finds them. — NY-13021 (talk) 04:11, 12 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure that the ratio of coverage of today's minor leaguers to those 50+ years ago is anything like you state - for one thing, there were MANY more newspapers around then, and a greater proportion of fans specifically following these minor league teams. But even if it is true, most coverage of modern minor leaguers should be relatively easy to find on the internet - if significant coverage exists and any editor is interested enough, they'll find some. That is not necessarily the case of older minor leaguers, who do pass GNG but the direct evidence is not necessarily available on line. Hence, I look to indirect coverage, such as coverage in modern books, even if that coverage is not in itself necessarily adequate in itself to pass GNG, because when there's smoke (i.e., some coverage in recently published off line sources available on Google Books) there's fire (more significant coverage when the person was actually active). Rlendog (talk) 18:29, 17 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would agree except that there are reliable sources that provide plenty of information, namely the stats sites. They are considered routine for the purpose of establishing notability, but they are still reliable sources with plenty of information on which to base the article Rlendog (talk) 02:26, 21 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Actually, saying that similar pages were deleted is a valid argument. OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is invalid because anyone can create a page in violation of consensus about things such as notability, but the fact that similar AFDs ended in delete means that consensus is generally against articles of this sort. Nyttend (talk) 03:29, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Alpha_Quadrant (talk) 20:41, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, The Bushranger One ping only 01:11, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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.
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