Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kimbo Slice (2nd nomination)

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 -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 15:17, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Kimbo Slice

Kimbo Slice (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

This article is about Internet phenom Kimbo Slice, a streetfighter whose videos are quite notorious. I acknowledge the popularity of these, but there simply is not enough verifiable information about "Kimbo Slice" for a proper biography. I have found exactly five reliable sources that mention Kimbo Slice. These are:

• This Rolling Stone piece. Pretty good, we get the age and occupation of Slice, and he is named "King of Web Brawlers", but that's it.

The next four are all Boston Herald pieces centered on Sean Gannon (fighter), a Boston cop who defeated Kimbo Slice (and directly because of this was picked up by the UFC). But these pieces have only trivial mentions of Kimbo Slice:

• "Brawlin' cop goes extreme; Caught on `ultimate fighting' video" (2004-12-03), Boston Herald
  • Mentions: "Seven-year Boston police Patrolman Sean 'The Cannon' Gannon and Miami 'pro streetfighter' Kimbo Slice beat each other to a bloody pulp in the vicious eight-minute video for sale on extreme fighting Web sites." and says Kimbo's brother is a pro boxer.
• "Cop buddy backs brawler while brass broods" (2004-12-04), Boston Herald
  • Mentions: "On the tape, Gannon and 'pro streetfighter' Kimbo Slice trade vicious bareknuckle punches, elbows and knees until both are bloodied."
• "Taking it off the street; Ultimate Fighting Championship has become all the rage" (2005-10-07), Boston Herald
  • Mentions: "Gannon drubbed a notorious street fighter named Kimbo Slice", and UFC president Dana White calls Slice "a very famous street fighter".
• "Ultimate cop bashes rules, back in ring; Brawling cop back in ring despite rules" (2005-09-16), Boston Herald
  • A trivial mention of Gannon fighting "street brawler Kimbo Slice".

There are no reliable sources to corroborate Slice's real name, jail time, family, income, training, etc etc. All the descriptions of his videos are original research. The "best" version of this article (mostly verifiable information) is here, and even that has some poorly sourced content based on Gannon's post to Sherdog's message board.

This article survived an earlier AfD here. -SpuriousQ (talk) 23:18, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

• Keep, satisfies WP:BIO--Vintagekits 23:21, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
  • How? WP:BIO requires "at least one substantial or multiple non-trivial published works". I don't believe the sources above satisfy that. -SpuriousQ (talk) 23:32, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
• Strong Keep, Revert it back to the suggested version which I agree is the best. User:DHollerman
  • AfD is not a vote. What is your rationale for "strong keep"? -SpuriousQ (talk) 02:06, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
    • "AfD is not a vote." I'm going to have to roll my eyes at that typical display of Wikiholic condescension. Anyhow, I vote strong keep because:

http://ufcmania.com/2007/01/26/final-thoughts-on-ufc-fight-night-8/ http://ufcmania.com/2007/01/10/former-ufc-fighter-buentello-wants-kimbo-slice-and-cro-cop

UFC Mania is directly connected with the UFC.

-) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by DHollerman (talk • contribs).

• • • • Didn't mean to be condescending—bare votes like that are (or should be) typically discounted. Anyway, thanks for the additional explanation, though I'm not too sure of UFC Mania's affiliation with UFC. -SpuriousQ (talk) 08:28, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

• Keep Say what you want about the sources, but the guy exists, he has verifiable videos and you can piece together enough biographical info (interviews, etc.) to warrant a page. His fight explanations are narratives of what happens on the video. If you want to take down sublimedirectory.com, just use the YouTube links. Fact is, a lot of sites link to Kimbo's entry, including blogs and message boards. He has a very strong cult following, and the information reflects this. It basically compiles all of the info -- fact or myth -- into one central location. Isn't that what wiki is for? If I want to quickly find out who Kimbo is, I can do that via this page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Kslice (talk • contribs).
  • I wouldn't say that the purpose of Wikipedia is to compile myths. This is more of a fan page than an article, and it's blatantly biased. I don't think this article does anything more than a fan page could, so my vote is a strong delete. MatthewLiberal 03:39, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Actually, no, compiling "fact or myth" is not what Wikipedia does. The sources absolutely determine what can be put in the article, and the only sources we have are not sufficient for an article. The Internet videos are primary sources and hence the "explanations" of them are original research. Other sites linking to this article and a cult following do not change the fact that there are not enough independent, reliable, non-trivial sources about Kimbo Slice. To quote WP:ATT, "the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is whether material is attributable to a reliable published source, not whether it is true." -SpuriousQ (talk) 06:10, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
• Weak Delete appears to be an internet phenomeon yet has remarkably few google hits. Hardly a notable fighter or he'd have TV coverage, or internet references at sherdog, or one of the MMA organisations. MLA 11:43, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
• Keep after reverting to this version, improving sources and deleting removing unsourced material. Stu ^{’Bout ye!} 16:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Even that version is on shaky ground. The sources cannot be improved; that's the best we have. We'd have to remove Gannon's post to the message board. The table of fights I suppose is tolerable although not attributable to any reliable source and backed only by Internet videos. There is still no reliable source backing SublimeDirectory.com as the official source of the videos, and I'm not too comfortable with the methodology used (by myself) to justify linking to it. We have these few facts:
  • Biographical details: an inexact birthdate, a Miami location, a pseudonym, a vague employer (porn empire)
  • Notability: Rolling Stone calls him "King of Web Brawlers"
  • Accomplishments: fought someone who was subsequently signed by the UFC. Defeated "Rasta", "Byrd", "Afro Puff", "Big Mac" and some other non-notable unknowns.
  • Those who come looking for the truth about Kimbo—what can be gleaned from message boards, etc.—will be disappointed at what they find here. Those looking for an encyclopedic treatment will find only a tenuous one. This is directly caused by the unfortunate fact that there are no non-trivial, independent reliable sources about Kimbo Slice. -SpuriousQ (talk) 16:44, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
• Great way to limit the knowledge of wikipedia by deleting articles for no reason —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 76.170.102.208 (talk • contribs).
• Very Weak Keep. There are admittedlsy several problems in fleshing out Kimbo's notability as discussed in the nomination. However, the article in the Rolling Stone does point to at least some notability inasfar as him being an Internet Fighter. Perhaps the article can only contain his fights and the verifiable information. Otherwise, I'd reluctantly support deletion. Ramsquire ^{(throw me a line)} 19:57, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment I'm not sure what you mean here by "only his fights and the verifiable information". Right now, the article has just this: all the verifiable info we know and a table of his fights. Do you mean we should give narratives of the fights? The problem with that is it's content based on primary sources—not very encyclopedic. But just listing the fights themselves is equally silly since no one knows who his opponents like "Afro Puff" and "Big Mac" are. -SpuriousQ (talk) 20:36, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
    • Sorry for the lack of clarity. I am endorsing the current version of the article as the one to keep (but just barely). Also if there is verifiable biographical information it could be added. However, I suspect that over time there will probably more additions of unverifiable information. If the article continues to go in that direction, then it should be deleted as unverifiable. FTR-- I agree that the names of the opponents are silly since no one know's who these people are outside of the Internet Community that follow Kimbo's fights. But I confess I am not impartial here. I follow Kimbo, so I'd like to keep the article in some form despite the obvious and admitted warts with it. Ramsquire ^{(throw me a line)} 21:32, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
      • OK, I understand now. Thanks for the clarification. -SpuriousQ (talk) 11:25, 6 March 2007 (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.