Wikipedia talk:Sports on ITN

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Moved here from my userspace. I hope to move this towards a guideline in the future. Random89 (talk) 02:10, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

NOTE: Previous discussions on this proposal can be found in my userspace and on the ITN discussion page. —Preceding comment was added at 08:28, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rugby

I would like to take issue with the rugby tournaments selected. Currently, it is the Rugby World Cup and the Heineken Cup. I'm obviously not going to oppose the Rugby World Cup, but the selection of the Heineken Cup is absolutely baffling. It gets little coverage in the Southern Hemisphere, and it is no secret that Southern Hemisphere rugby is dominant (5 World Cups to 1, and New Zealand has topped the world rankings for the majority of the time since they were introduced). Certainly if it were to be included, the winner of the Super 14 - clubs from New Zealand, South Africa, and Australia - should also be included.

I would like to make my own suggestion for the rugby criteria. Since the Rugby World Cup is only every four years, that essentially excludes international rugby from ITN for the other three years. In non-World Cup years, the highest level of international competition is the Six Nations Championship in the Northern Hemisphere and the Tri Nations in the Southern Hemisphere. Neither could be said to be higher than the other, and since they occur at completely different times of the year, it wouldn't result in ITN being inundated by rugby news.

As for club rugby, as I said above, both the winners of the Heineken Cup and the Super 14 should be included for balance. However, if this were to constitute too many rugby items, I would not oppose it being discarded outright in favour of just the winner of the Tri-Nations/Six Nations or the World Cup, depending on the year. Club rugby may be important, but it has nothing on the international arena. - Axver (talk) 00:36, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I have little knowledge of rugby, so if you wish to make the change go ahead, also please see previous rugby discussion on my userspace talk page. Random89 (talk) 08:26, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the link - interesting. After reading that, I stand by my proposal above. I won't make any changes just yet, but if this remains unchallenged in a couple of days, I'll be bold. - Axver (talk) 12:26, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

It seems the northern hemisphere-dominated press gives more space to the H-Cup, and Wiki can't do anything, really. --Howard the Duck 04:24, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Axver. I would say the Super 14 is as important at the H-Cup; it's more or less the Southern Hemisphere's equivalent. WikiProject Rugby union treats them as being on the same level of importance as the other. As the discussion on Random89's page says, the Super 14 has players from countries that have won 5 of 6 World Cups, to give an example of the quality. I think both should be included. Also, is it worth including the Six Nations and/or Tri-Nations series? These involve the world's top teams (excluding Argentina) and may be worth inclusion also. - Shudde ^talk 04:53, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

The 6 nations and tri nations should certainly be included; they are followed by the general public to a large extent. I would also not be adverse to the exclusion of the Heineken Cup and the Super 14, which have a more specialist following. 86.44.6.14 (talk) 10:50, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Like any global sport, the international competitions are going to be more notable then the domestic, but if any domestic competitions are included, it should be those two. - Shudde ^talk 10:53, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Yachting

I propose that the America's Cup winner be included. I believe this has been done in the past. - Axver (talk) 00:36, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Seems reasonable: although that style of yachting is low on participation numbers, it gains a lot of air-time (usually because of all the legal debates). Kevin McE (talk) 15:00, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Not to mention its not possible for it to happen more than once every 2 years and often is more sporadic than that. Grant.alpaugh (talk) 04:34, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Netball

To counter the rather strong male bias in top-level sport, I propose that the winner of the Netball World Championships be included. Some may argue that netball is not that prominent a sport, but besides tennis, I'd say it is the most prominent female sport in the world, especially within the Commonwealth. I know from first hand experience that it gets very good coverage in the media of Australia and New Zealand - I would say New Zealand's Silver Ferns are much better known than the male soccer team, the All Whites. In any case, this would lead to just one news article every four years, which surely can't be that objectionable. - Axver (talk) 12:42, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

How about volleyball? It has quite a following. --Howard the Duck 04:24, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Agree, it's only once every four years, so hardly going to weight ITN down! - Shudde ^talk 04:54, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Athletics

(or Track and field, as North Americans may prefer to call it) The IAAF World Championships are the biggest event outside the Olympics of the biggest event in the Olympics, and are the official World Championships of one of the most widely spread sports in the world, with a wide spread of medalists. It gains considerable news attention in many countries. The proposal already has some events (FIBA and IIHF World Championships) that are secondary to the Olympics, so the argument of top event of the sport appears to have been abandoned. Kevin McE (talk) 15:15, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

No arguments about the notability, but how would you phrase such an entry?Random89 (talk) 16:26, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

On 2009-08-15, the entry would read something like The 12th IAAF Championships get underway in Berlin, and continue for 9 days. The number of events mean that each championship is not announced as a result. I would argue strongly against having on 2009-08-23 The IAAF Championships in Berlin finish with Moldova topping the table with 17 Gold medals and 96 bronze, because such a table is not the purpose of the event. Kevin McE (talk) 23:03, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

IAAF in particular and T&F in general doesn't get enough press, unless someone was caught doping. --Howard the Duck 04:24, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Baseball

The World Baseball Classic has, despite its pretentious name, only been competed once, and it is not clear that the top players made themselves available for it, raising doubts as to whether it is genuinely top level competition. I know little of the sport, but I think there should at least be some debate about the merit of this proposed inclusion. Kevin McE (talk) 15:21, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I put this on instead of the World Baseball Championship or whatever its called precisely because the top players made themselves available (in most cases), which is not the case with the former. Random89 (talk) 16:28, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

The previous World Baseball Classic had a ton more coverage than last year's Baseball World Cup. --Howard the Duck 04:24, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

And players from the Major Leagues didn't compete in any tourney aside from the Classic. --Howard the Duck 04:25, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Viewing Figures

I've tried to find some data on viewing figures for different sporting events as a rough proxy to how 'important' they are. The numbers mainly come from 2 articles in The Independent and are for people watching events at home in the major TV markets. 'Average' seems to mean the number of people who watched the whole event and 'reach' is the number of people who watched at least 3 minutes of it. Obviously some countries have more people/TVs than others, some events are on subscription channels, some are one-offs and some are long tournaments making comparisons especially difficult but maybe this would help some decision making. Note these lists are by no means complete!

[edit] 2006

Football, Italy v France World Cup final, average=260m reach=600m
American football, Super Bowl Steelers v Seahawks, average=98m reach=151m
Winter Olympics, Torino 2006 opening ceremony, average=87m reach=249m
Football, Champs League Arsenal v Barça, average=86m
Formula One, Brazilian Grand Prix, average=83m
NASCAR, Daytona 500, average=20m
Baseball, World Series game five, average=19m
Golf, US Masters (final day), average=17m
Tennis, Wimbledon men's singles final, average=17m
Basketball, NBA finals game six, average=17m
Cycling, Tour de France (final stage), average=15m
Golf, US Open (final day), average=10m
Golf, Ryder Cup (final day), average=6m
Commonwealth Games, Melbourne opening ceremony, average=5m
Cricket, ICC Champions Trophy final, average=3m

ref1 ref2

[edit] 2007

American football, Chicago Bears v Indianapolis Colts, average=97m, reach=142m
Formula One, Brazilian Grand Prix, average=78m reach=152m
Football, Champions League final average=72m
Rugby, World Cup final, average=33m
Handball, World championship final Germany v Poland, average=23m reach=56m
Cricket, Twenty20 final India v Pakistan, average=20m reach=40m
Football, EPL Manchester United v Arsenal, average=8m reach=27m
Cricket, World Cup final Australia v Sri Lanka, average=7m reach=25m

ref3

from this the only thing I can really conclude is that handball has a decent case to be in the list. JMiall ₰ 19:02, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

it's not a big sport in any English speaking country though. It's massive in Poland and obviously they would have a huge rivalry with Germany. Petepetepetepete (talk) 10:58, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

It's been said that the two meetings of the Houston Rockets and the Milwaukee Bucks this season had high ratings. --Howard the Duck 04:24, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I'd be intrested to see where the FA Cup Final ranks on those lists. I'd have thought it would be very high - and it's not on the list. Inarguably one of the world most famous sporting competitions. Petepetepetepete (talk) 10:54, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] World records, boxing title bouts

Most of the suggestions here are regularly scheduled tournaments, games, multi-sport events etc. I think that we should also allow certain "out of cycle" events to pass ITN criteria. Specifically, I'm thinking that new world records in swimming and athletics would always qualify, regardless of the competition the record was set at. There are a handful of other sports that records are maintained for, such as shooting and weightlifting, but I'm not sure that they are popular enough. Similarly, I think any professional boxing bout that results in a change to the list of current world boxing champions would also be notable enough for ITN. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 23:58, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Definitely all in favor of boxing matches that garner international attention (ie hatton-mayweather or de la hoya-mayweather). As far as world records go I don't think most of that matters very much or gets enough coverage to be noteworthy. When there are major track and field or swimming tournaments I'm sure a record or two is broken every time, but that doesn't mean it should be included. For example I don't think most people care much about the fact that the world long jump record was increased by 1/8 of an inch or the 100 meter dash record is .003 shorter or whatever. Grant.alpaugh (talk) 00:53, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Actually the 100m dash record is the biggest deal of them all, so even if it is broken by .01 of a second it made it. --Howard the Duck 02:52, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Right, but I think we can agree not many people care about the world record in pole vaulting or hammerthrow. Grant.alpaugh (talk) 05:58, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

I would dispute that you could limit notability/importance to the 100 metres only. Several other records are fairly "big" — the mile (and/or 1500 metres) and long jump are two obvious ones. Take a look at World records in athletics and you'll see that the "rate of change" is a handful per year, if that. I think there is really no need to limit this to a single event. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 17:08, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, I think we'll know pretty quickly what the consensus is from the general population. When one of the more obscure ones goes up then we're either going to have no discussion or everyone and their mother is going to tell us to take it down. Grant.alpaugh (talk) 00:15, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

I think any changes to the Chess world champion should be included -Halo (talk) 16:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Chess does not strictly fall into 'sport'. I see it similar to a world billiards championship; it would probably be better to nominate those when they happen. I know we put the chess world champion on itn last year, but it isn't stictly a sport. --Plasma Twa 2 (talk) 19:09, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wrestlemania

I'm just wondering here, but would Wrestlemania be qualified to make the list here? I'm not sure if it qualifies under sports or not, but this seems like the best place. I'm pretty sure that the event is significant enough to be mentioned, but I would think there is a certain stigma against it since it's pro wrestling. --Plasma Twa 2 (talk) 09:18, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Oppose a large global audience, but ultimately, it's no more notable than what has happened on Eastenders. Petepetepetepete (talk) 09:54, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree, the sport is scripted, unfortunately they perform rather then participate. - Shudde ^talk 10:51, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Well it hasn't been added before so I don't see a reason why it should be added now. --Howard the Duck 12:32, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] College Basketball

I would suggest that if the NBA finals are included, so too should the winner of the NCAA basketball tournament. When viewership declined to 17.5 million for a Final Four (semi-final) match, it was surprising enough to merit this [1] story in the New York times. In contrast, according to the above list of viewing figures, only 17 million people watch the final game of the NBA finals. The fact that NCAA tournament viwership for semi-finals exceeds NBA viewership for finals suggest to me a strong case for the inclusion of the NCAA tournament on ITN. NoIdeaNick (talk) 22:12, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

What you say makes some sense, but we do not base ITN inclusions on viewership numbers. Outside of the US (and Canada to a certain extent) NCAA is barely followed. Also, we have a rough consensus to include only the highest level of each sport. But after the final game you can nominate it at wp:ITN/C. Random 89 05:02, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, the NCAA Championship Game is not that widely followed elsewhere. --Howard the Duck 04:58, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] NCAA football and men's basketball championships

I think that these two events need to be added to the list of regular ITN sporting events. College sports have a unique spot in US sporting culture, and their championships are followed as much as (if not more in some places) than their professional counterparts. The slowdown to the US economy provided by the first round of the tournament on Thurs/Fri every year is massive (billions of dollars) because people are distracted by the tournament.

While there are lots more people watching the Super Bowl, there are a lot of people throwing parties and women watching for commercials/half time show, whereas college football has larger stadium crowds all year (several are over 100,000) and places that don't have professional teams are heavily involved in their local college team. Also, because most of the best teams are attatched to huge schools (Ohio State, Michigan, Texas, Tennessee, Arizona St., USC, UCLA, Oklahoma, Florida, etc.) there are alums from all over the country that follow their school in both sports. If it makes people feel better I would have no problem supporting the Boat Race being added or similar events from the rest of the world. -- Grant .Alpaugh 05:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] AFL

The AFL grand final should go up as well. -- Grant .Alpaugh 05:06, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Golf

I think if the Ryder Cup is added, maybe the Presidents Cup should, too. I mean the both occur only once every other year, so it's not like we'd have a huge increase in events. I dunno, just a thought. -- Grant .Alpaugh 11:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Additions

It's not a bad list (and these formalisations are to be strongly encouraged), but there are maybe a few howlers- e.g. the Champions League is up, but no Copa Libertadores? No Copa America? The Ashes is an important series, but it only ever takes place between the same two teams- I realise it may cause some yelps, but I don't see why it should go up in preference to say an India-Pakistan series, or indeed any other test series. Not sure why the women's US golf open is up and the other three aren't. I might consider adding the American Indycar CART championship to motor racing, and possibly the world rally championship as well. Badgerpatrol (talk) 12:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I would support Copa Libertadores and Copa America, but no others until a country from outside those two continents wins the World Cup. I know a little about cricket, but not enough to know if Indo-Pak hold a regular series (I know they're major rivals and all). If they do I would support that going up. I think the Indy 500 (just the race not the whole series) and the Daytona 500 (and/or the whole NASCAR Top Series Championship I dunno the current sponsor), as they have significant foreign drivers now and due to this I think they get a decent ammount of coverage in South America/Europe (I could be wrong, but I know there's a Latino former F-1 driver who's a NASCAR driver now and Dario Franchiti (sp?) won the Indy 500 and is starting in NASCAR this year). Rally championship I dunno. I'm curious to hear what you think about my college sports proposal, Badger. -- Grant .Alpaugh 17:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(editconflict)In terms of the Champions league, I had originally added that and not the others as that was what I believed precedence had been, and it is also far and away the most highly followed by the media. Ditto for The Ashes. In terms of Women's golf, it is different from tennis as the men's and women's events are not held concurrently. I think it was discussed somewhere that women's golf was only popular enough for one major championship, and barely that. I made a judgement call that the US Open was the most prestigious of the 4. I'm not sure about CART or the rally cha,mpionship, but maybe NASCAR? As pointless as I find it, it's pretty popular in the states. Random 89 17:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the Copa Lib and Copa America are gimmes. I see what you mean about the African Nations Cup, but I probably would put that one up as well, it generates a lot of attention in Europe (where most of the major African players are based).

I wouldn't support putting the winners of individual races up (e.g. the Indianapolis 500) only the final champions. I was recommending taking the Ashes out, not putting others in. India is cricket bonkers- I suspect the level of coverage for an India-Pakistan series (they aren't held that regularly because they are usually not getting along) eclipses that of an Ashes series, but since it's not a regular event it would be somewhat partial to list it and no others. To be honest, no women's golf championship is imho notable except the Solheim Cup.

Grant, I know nothing about basketball, so I can't really comment with authority. I know that it's big in eastern Europe, in the Caribbean and becoming bigger elsewhere in the world. If this NCAA game is one that those fans will be interested in, then I see no reason not to put it up. Badgerpatrol (talk) 17:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't think any of the women's majors should go up. At least in the US the only open wheel race that gets any (and I can't stress that enough) is the Indy 500. Daytona was the same way until NASCAR took off in the last decade or so, but it is still one of the two races that nonracing fans (like me for instance) even want to hear who won, and that makes them unique on the US sporting landscape. I don't have a problem with the African Cup of Nations going up, especially since it takes place during a time of the year when there is little footy news on ITN (ie N. Hem.'s winter). I can't speak with authority on the rally championships. I say keep the Ashes (it only happens once either every 18 or 30 months so not a big commitment, and there has been significant Aussie support in the past for its inclusion) and put up a Indo-Pak cricket test series when they happen, but that seems like it should be about all for cricket.

You mean for bi-nation series. The Cricket World Cup and (admittedly more weakly) the 20/20 World Cup are also gimmes. Badgerpatrol (talk) 19:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

My biggest thing is for the BCS National Championship game and the NCAA men's basketball championship game to go up, for the reasons I've listed above. -- Grant .Alpaugh 17:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

As I said above, I'm in favour of most of those going up. For something like NASCAR, we should decide whether we want to list the end-of-season champion (I believe its the Nextel Cup) or the most important race (Daytona 500). I'm gonna stay out of the cricket debate, as I have really no knowledge about that. But coming back to NCAA sports, I have some reservations about those. While I admit that in the US the BCS or the Final Four are at least, and usually more, popular than their professional counterparts, only someone in North America could tell you that. In, for example, Europe or South America, people would think of the NBA for basketball and the NFL for football. While I'm not saying that it would be a bad thing for people to read about college sports, especially if the articles are decent, I just think that including non-professional events (i.e. not at the highest level) opens up a myriad of other issues. Random 89 19:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, I don't know much about women's golf, but if the Solheim Cup is the most notable event than maybe it should go up. I feel that since we don't have to base our selections solely on the most popular (media-wise) events, we can afford to throw in a women's golf event for balance. Random 89 19:32, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

It's true that only the National Football League, National Basketball League and World Series have any profile here in the UK- but none of these sports are at all popular here so I am not qualified to say. It may well be that these university leagues actually are big events where basketball is a popular sport, as it definitely is in much of the world (American football isn't really popular anywhere outside NA as far as I'm aware, and there doesn't appear to be a major baseball American university league). Badgerpatrol (talk) 19:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

College baseball certainly exists and the College World Series recieves decent ratings on ESPN, but it's by no means the College Football Bowl season or March Madness.

Explaining to people outside the US why Americans care about college sports is like explaining to Americans why people outside the US are bonkers for soccer or cricket. It's just part of the fabric of the American sports landscape. For a long time, College football was the highest level of the game in the United States, as the game was well established by 1900 or so while the NFL took some time longer to develop. College football in particular is the best equivalent to English and Scottish football. It's parochial and traditional, with massive regional rivalries and even more massive stadiums. Ohio Stadium (Ohio St.), Michigan Stadium (Michigan), Neyland Stadium (Tennessee), and Beaver Stadium (Penn St.), all have capacities over 100,000 and several dozen more have 70,000+ stadiums, which are all larger than NFL stadiums. These stadiums aren't in major cities, either. There are a bunch of stadiums that when full on gamedays exceed the population of the small college towns they are in. Many of the top teams have traditions going back about 100 years, and the regional rivalries grip not just the region, but also alums all over the country. The BCS National Championship game is also a highly controversial process for picking the national champion (unlike the March Madness tournament, more on that in a second), that takes place at the end of a long series of bowl games (almost 30 of them now) that run from mid December to early January, and New Years' Day bowl games are as traditional as Boxing Day football in England. If you took away the scores of people who watch the Super Bowl at a party (something of a cultural institution in the US) who otherwise wouldn't (casual fans, women, people only interested in the commercials which themselves are an institution), I have no doubt that the BCS would be the most viewed event (or at least within a few million viewers) in American sports.

Similarly, college basketball is a very popular sport, and the March Madness tournament is followed by gigantic numbers of fans, who all fill out brackets of their predictions as part of small office gambling pools or other similar friendly wagers. There have been numerous stories about the slowdown to the US economy caused by the 16 games played on the opening Thursday and Friday of the tournament, where upsets are common (think 3rd Round of the FA Cup). There are hundreds of thousands of people who stay home from work to watch these games and millions more who are distracted at work by them. It is undoubtedly the biggest sports story in the US while its happening.

Another thing people don't seem to realize is that you can't join the NFL until you're 21 or the NBA (now) until you're 19, so all of the top players who can and would be able to play at the NFL or NBA level at that age are playing college football or basketball because they can't play pro ball. This would be like if Theo Walcott, Wayne Rooney, Cesc Fabregas, Leo Messi, and others who broke into the top level of football as teenagers, had been forced to play at a lower level simply because of their age. So while the talent level is certainly lower overall, there are many, many players who play college football or basketball and go on to immediately have an impact at the professional one when they are drafted, like Carmello Anthony or Adrian Peterson.

Major League Baseball only requires you to be 17-18, however, so the top players often bypass college baseball entirely and elect to immediately begin playing professionally in their teams minor league outfits. Also, because of the compressed season due to the academic calendar (March-June for college as opposed to March-October for MLB) college baseball never took firm hold in the north like Major League Baseball (Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, New York, Boston, etc.) because of longer, colder winters, and is instead dominated by the Gulf Coast region, California, Texas, Florida, Arizona.

All in all, I think there is a compelling case for adding two of the biggest sports stories in the United States every year. Many of the top athletics departments in the country have budgets that are as large or larger than some of the smaller professional franchises. They have huge fanbases that number in the hundreds of thousands (or millions in many cases). They really should be treated as seperate entities, and I hope that my long, rambling post has helped clarify that. -- Grant .Alpaugh 23:32, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

[Unindent]. It sounds to me as if this is something that is massive in one country and has zero profile elsewhere. That would make it a unique exception amongst the sporting events currently listed (apart from the AFL grand final, which I would remove anyway). Nobody watches the Superbowl in Britain, but at least it actually is on. I'm not sure if this even was (it may have been tucked away somewhere on a cable channel I suppose).

I think you will already be able to guess my feelings on this one. If it is big in the other basketballing nations (Greece, Lithuania, the Caribbean, Spain etc.) then it should go up. Otherwise, no. American football has close to zero global profile (as far as I'm aware, I may be wrong) and so I'm afraid I think the university football final should be excluded for that reason, unless someone can show that it actually does have a profile outside America.

The FA Cup is not on the list, and nor should it be. I don't see a distinction. Badgerpatrol (talk) 23:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(Edit Conflict) I was just trying to provide context with the FA Cup thing, since you didn't seem to have a frame of reference. I guess all I'm trying to say is that these two events are consistently two of the top four or five stories a year in American sports. If that's still not enough to make the cut, I understand, I was just trying to give you as much context since you admit you're unfamiliar with these sports. Also, the Super Bowl is broadcast live or tape delayed in like every country with a satellite tv system, mostly for expats, I'll admit, but there is interest in Japan (which has its own professional league), Canada (which has a professional league that plays under a slightly different code), and Great Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, and some other nations, at least as far as I understand. -- Grant .Alpaugh 01:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, as I am a huge fan of NCAA basketball, I agree with Badger. I don't really see that it is necessary to put up two American sports championships when these sports are not widely followed outside the US. However I am not dead set on this and I could be convinced if someone had an amazing argument. On a related not, I actually support including the AFL. Random 89 01:08, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, in a nearly completely unrelated not that doesn't really affect this, it's a bit ironic that the only "US" sport that is gaining (or has gained) global popularity is Baseball, and of the "Big 3", that is the one that has the least college-level support. Random 89 01:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That's what I meant Grant- the FA Cup is an excellent analogue. A massive tradition in one country, but all but irrelevant elsewhere. Badgerpatrol (talk) 10:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

People all over the soccer-loving world care who wins the FA Cup, but whatever, I get your point. I think its less similar, though because every country has their own FA Cup, while few countries have meaningful college sports leagues. -- Grant .Alpaugh 14:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

People all over the football-loving world (a sizeable but still minor segment of the population) may care who wins the FA Cup- but people all over the football-liking world (i.e. the entire planet) may not even know who's in the final this year. I don't even know who the Brazilian or Argentine league champions are off the top of my head- and those are arguably the two greatest footballing nations in the world. I would argue that we cater for the likers on ITN, not the lovers. Badgerpatrol (talk) 14:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Right but the FA Cup is the oldest, yada, yada, English language wikipedia, yada, yada. -- Grant .Alpaugh 20:09, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

You've brought this line of argument up a few times over our recent discussions Grant- I have never seen any rule, any convention, any guideline, or any built consensus that directs us to preferentially select stories of interest solely or mainly to an Anglophone or Western audience, but you seem to think such a directive exists. Can you post a link to the relevant page? Badgerpatrol (talk) 23:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I can't refer to a policy page, because I think it is common sense. The ITN section is seperate from the encyclopedia itself. It serves to highlight articles that have recieved significant updates due to current events. As a result it is inherently biased toward "recentism," which, in my interpretation proves that it is inherently outside of the NPOV realm of the encyclopedia proper. This means that we are fully within our rights to angle ITN towards our "audience" both because that's who is reading it, and because that's who is providing us with the vast majority of our candidates for ITN. While I don't in any way think we should exclude items because they are not relevant to our readership (say the beginning/end of an armed conflict between two small, Central African nations), I don't think there is anything wrong with including items that are of particularly large interest to one portion of our audience, regardless of whether they cross any arbitrary geographical threshold. I realize this is my own interpretatioin of the WP doctrine, but I don't think I'm straying much from it. I appreciate you asking the question, because I've come close to writing something like this response a number of times in our discussions, but felt it was too wordy and not relevent enough to post it. I hope this explains where I'm coming from and I think you will have a better idea of my logic for supporting some of the items I've supported on ITN recently. -- Grant .Alpaugh 03:28, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[Unindent]. What you're saying is that because 80% of our readers come from one country, it is OK to preferentially select 80% of our stories from that country (which shall go unnamed so that Lemmey and Madcoverboy don't send the heavies round to "have a word" with me ;-). No, I don't agree, although I recognise that this (in a diluted form) is already the de facto state of affairs. There are two issues here, 1) ITN is a highly visible part of the encyclopaedia. If international editors and readers (of which there are many, albeit a minority) see that it is even more dominated by US stories than it is now, the idea that this is an American encyclopaedia is going to take root. And then, quite possibly, no more international editors, and no more international perspective. That would be a considerable shame, and significantly to the detriment of the encyclopaedic value of this project. 2) From a more nebulous angle; this is supposed to be an educational project. I already know what's happening in America, because I speak English, and I read the UK printed and broadcast news, which is often dominated by American stories. I don't know as much about what's happening in India, or Spain, or Japan, or Egypt, etc. etc. I'd like to however, and I believe that disseminating information across national boundaries is very much a key purpose of this project. I presume that most of the sport fans in America are going to know who wins the NCAA championship games, but they're not going to automatically know who won the TwentyTwenty World Cup, or the Tri-Nations, or the Prix d'arc de Triomphe, etc. etc.

As you rightly point out, there is already an inherent bias in ITN towards American stories (and perhaps also those originating in the rest of the Anglophone diaspora). That is in my view a negative, not a positive. We shouldn't be exacerbating it through a consciously and deliberately biased selection. Badgerpatrol (talk) 09:51, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I was not arguing in favor of the US specifically, though I would be a fool to argue that that wouldn't be part of what I'm talking about. I'm speaking about things that happen in Britain (I'm a huge Anglophile, and I care about stories that happen there), or other places around the Commonwealth, in addition to other places around the world. Also, I wasn't arguing in favor of excluding other stories in favor of Western ones, quite the contrary. I'm an inclusionist when it comes to ITN. I've been on ITN/C regularly enough for the past few months to know that by far the most common complaint is not pro-/anti- American bias, it's turnover. I think there are a lot of qualified stories that don't go on ITN, which is a shame. I'm aware that I want American stories to go up (like the cancellations) so I argue equally hard for other stories to go up (like the Aussie GG, Haiti, Ireland, etc.). I guess my main point is that the two are not mutually exclusive, and we can and should be trying to do both. Personally I was unaware that "80%" of the viewership of WP was from the US (I didn't even know it was a US-based project until a few months ago) and would never argue like some people do that because it's based in the US everyone else should piss off. I really think we agree on this much more than our discussions this week would indicate. -- Grant .Alpaugh 10:34, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I should point out that that 80% figure was little more than an educated guess- I would be interested to see the actual stats, but I suspect that the readership (and editorship) are indeed heavily dominated by Americans- but as you rightly point out (and as I did try to state above) this is about systemic bias generally, not just a bias towards any one country. My point is- relaxing or abolishing the rules on international notability is going to lead to a preponderance of US stories, and to a lesser extent those from the rest of the Anglophone world, because most stories that are suggested fall into these categories. We can either a) embrace this, get rid of the rules completely, and make it a news ticker (which would be the least hassle (no need for selection, no worries about turnover), the most fair (sidestepping the bias debate completely), and is my preferred option); b) strengthen the rules and stick to them. If we go for the latter option, it would also be an idea to have a designated cadre of ITN admins who understand and are willing to abide by the criteria; no offence to the admins concerned, but the SAS story, the Northern Wreck story, and the Pullitzer story are all good examples of stories that had weak or no consensus to add and shouldn't have gone up. And yes I agree that there is much common ground and our discussions have been both interesting and productive. Badgerpatrol (talk) 11:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Couldn't agree more about our discussions and I'm glad to have had them. -- Grant .Alpaugh 16:01, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd only approve on the English FA Cup Final to be posted iff the top two teams from the Premiership are the ones participating, and there's something special about the Final. Last year, ManUtd and Chelsea finished at the top of the Premier League at the top and the Final was one of the first events at the new Wembley. --Howard the Duck 15:02, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] NASCAR

Could we decide which NASCAR race is notable? All that's on there is NASCAR, which techincally means every race goes up. --Plasma Twa 2 18:17, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

No, no it means that the Sprint Cup Series (the current top flight championship) champion goes up. -- Grant .Alpaugh 19:27, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Snooker

I'd like to nominate the World Snooker Championship as one of the featured sports on ITN. Although largely ignored in the US it is very popular elsewhere especially in Europe and Asia where viewing figures exceed 100 million. Massive TV audience forecast for Asian Challenge in World snooker championship Yorkshiresky (talk) 22:17, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

It being largely ignored in the US is a major understatement. I don't have any problem adding it to the list. -CWY2190(talk • contributions) 22:38, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be safer to say it is ignored in everywhere but certain European countries and China. Nowhere in North America does anyone care about this, and a look at the Snooker world rankings 2007/2008 suggests that there are only four countries where the game is really big. Of course, everyone from other countries could just suck ass real bad, but somehow I don't think that's how it goes. --Plasma Twa 2 22:43, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree with Plasma here. It's apparent popularity in China certainly boosts its audience numbers, but it doesn't seem to be very widespread beyond there and the UK. I just don't think it is on par with most of the other sporting events we have listed here. Random 89 00:12, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

It is big in China and elsewhere in mainland Asia, although it would be good to have the "100/150 million viewers" oft quoted by commentators actually substantiated (like the obviously erroneous "1 billion viewers" we often hear about watching the Superbowl). The only events currently on the list that it comes close to are the Aussie Rules final (which I would remove anyway, but does in fairness get 90-100 thousand spectators + seemingly practically the entire country watching at home), the horseracing (which doesn't go up habitually and probably attracts significant international interest because of betting) and the Americas Cup, which is practically ignored here but I think we all admit is a big international event. The bottom line is, I love the snooker, but it is an event being played in a small theatre in Sheffield high street. In 78 years, the championship has only been won three times by foreigners. So, sadly, it's a "no" from me on this one. I do not see any events on the list as it stands that this is definitively in the same league as. Badgerpatrol (talk) 03:18, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Are you sure about your AFL claims? See for example Australian rules football in New South Wales and Barassi Line. It's popularity is growing, sure, but I'm not convinced the entire country watches at home, particularly when the Sydney Swans aren't in the grand final... And even if that is true, I suspect the same could be said about a number of other things that aren't ITN worthy, given how nuts Australians are about their sports... Nil Einne (talk) 18:28, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

How about pool? The World Pool Championships is a big event in Asia and Europe, with many Americans tagging along. --Howard the Duck 14:59, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Badminton

I haven't brought this up until now but if we're going to start considering things like pool and snooker and heck we do have the AFL (which isn't even popular throughout all of Australia by a long shot), how about badminton? Very popular in Malaysia and Indonesia (in Malaysia at least, probably the second most popular spectator sport after football). Apparently quite popular in China too (according to this as of 2004 it's the 3rd most popular sport after football and ping pong, and the most watched sport; in Guangdong, Shanghai and Beijing) [2]. Possibly popular in Denmark, South Korea and Japan as well (not sure about these three, just going by the quality of their players more then anything). China has dominated in recent years, but from what I can tell, the popularity in Indonesia and Malaysia still remains fairly strong. Top level individual competition is undoutedly the olympics, top level team championships are undoutedly the Thomas Cup and Uber Cup (every 2 years) for men's and women's competition respectively and these two have just been completed... Nil Einne (talk) 18:09, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cycling

I want to propose adding three competitions to Wikipedia:Sports on ITN#Cycling: Giro d'Italia, Vuelta a España and the UCI Road World Championships. Any thoughts? A ecis^Brievenbus 23:39, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't know much about cycling, but I think the Tour de France is the biggest and the most well known. I think that should be the only one up, but then again that is the only one I know about. --Plasma Twa 2 03:33, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Plasma here. While for cycling enthusiasts, I'm sure those 3 are huge events, but the general public is only really aware of the Tour. Random 89 06:32, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rugby 2

I don't think five rugby articles are neccessary. The majority of them are regional tournaments only. I suggest limiting the number of rugby items to three or less: The Rugby World Cup, the Heineken Cup, and the Super 14. --Plasma Twa 2 02:56, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

I still stand by my suggestion from the original post in the first rugby suggestion as the best way to provide balance, both between seasons and between hemispheres. I'll summarise it here again, to save anybody scrolling back up to it. For international rugby, every four years the Rugby World Cup is covered and I don't think anybody will contest that. For the other three years, international rugby should be featured with both the Northern Hemisphere's Six Nations and the Southern Hemisphere's Tri-Nations, since they constitute the highest level of rugby in non-RWC years and neither could be said to be superior to the other. I would honestly not object to this being the sole coverage, but since club rugby is really starting to be where the money is, then feature the Heineken Cup and Super 14, the equal top club tournaments. This would mean four rugby stories in non-World Cup years and three in World Cup years. Hardly a lot! Though it could be legitimately noted that the Super 14 and Heineken Cup do finish rather close to each other. - Axver (talk) 12:05, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

I've modified the list to take your suggestion into account Nil Einne (talk) 20:56, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Le Mans

I propose adding the 24 Hours of Le Mans to Wikipedia:Sports on ITN#Auto racing. A ecis^Brievenbus 15:21, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Indy car?

As I've stated elsewhere, I have no objections per se to listing the Indy car however when I was checking out the articles at the time, I found out that all our articles including the Indy 500 aritlce, suggest that the Indy 500, Monaco Grand Prix and Le Mans are of equal importance. Therefore it makes little sense to put on one but not put on the other two. So far, the only reason I can see not to put on the Monaco Grand Prix but put on the Indy 500 is because it's been claimed that winning the Indy 500 is generally considered more important then winning the Indy series, which is not the case for the Monaco Grand Prix (I think nearly everyone will agree winning the F1 world championship is more important). If it's true, then this is a significant point and I'm willing to withdraw my objections to listing the Indy 500 without listing the Monaco Grand Prix. However there is no point debating this here, if this claim is true, it needs to be supported by our articles, which last time I checked it wasn't. As someone who doesn't give a flying flip about either, I can't evaluate these claims and since I find it rather odd, I would like to see the claims supported. N.B. I agree with PFHLai here that whatever the case, the articles need to be of sufficient quality for ITN. Nil Einne (talk) 11:15, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

While I am far from an expert about this, and really am not even a fan of auto racing, I definitely know more about IndyCar than F-1, just from living in North America. What I've seen in the general media and sports media suggests that the Indy 500 is the race of the circuit, its glory left over from when Indy Racing was bigger than NASCAR. While in the case of F-1, I may be misinformed, but from what I've seen, I believe the F-1 championship is far and away more important than even the most prestigious race. But I agree with PFHLai and Nil here, the quality of the articles should be the determining factor. Random 89 20:06, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Events per year

I've added a summary for the number of events/stories we can expect per year since it will help those unfamiliar with events get an idea of how frequent we're going to have the varies items. Cricket is a little too complicated to summarise IMHO so I just estimated 1 per year which is about right. I was trying to work out how many football events there will be but confused myself and gave up Nil Einne (talk) 20:59, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Nevermind I redid the football Nil Einne (talk) 21:09, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Horse racing

Should the Melbourne Cup be added? Spencer^T♦^C 15:34, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I would have to say no. I don't really see anything which makes this bigger then other horse racing events. Sure it's a big thing in Australia and to a lesser extent NZ but in the end it's just another race and it's not the premier events of horse races AFAIK. If we did want to add more horse races, we should consider others first. We already have the AFL after all Nil Einne (talk) 05:24, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Olympics and other multiple-sport events

How are descriptions of the Olympics envisioned? A single report of top medal counts at the end? I vaguely recall that there was a proposal during the last winter olympics to actually reserve the bottom of ITN for a separate rotation of Olympic winners over the course of the event, but don't know what came of it. - Banyan Tree 08:11, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Another alternative: We could just say "no more than one or two Olympic items at a time".--Pharos (talk) 10:06, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure the idea was to do nothing about medal counts and just say "The 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing is opened/closed" because we were just going to post the opening/closing ceremonies. -- Grant .Alpaugh 13:51, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

The idea of the medal count and events on the bottom is the best, I think. Each event is notable, particularily if a record is broken and whatnot. That would keep the main template clean of anything about, say, the finals of basketball which would normally make it on the main template. --Plasma Twa 2 18:12, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

This seems like something we should get agreement on before an unholy edit war breaks out when the Beijing Olympics starts. Since we're all throwing out different ideas: how about making an "Sports/Olympics" link at the bottom (next to Wikinews) to Portal:Current events/Sports, or a specialized Olympics page if some group decides to maintain one. We can then reserve the actual ITN for opening/closing/anything major and unusual that occurs during the course of the games. Perhaps we should drop a note with Wikipedia:WikiProject Olympics and Portal:Current events/Sports to see what, if anything, they have planned and which we can integrate into? - Banyan Tree 23:41, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

A prominent link to an olympics portal sounds like a good idea, because for better or for worse, olympic news will dominate media coverage during the period of the games, barring the outbreak of World War 3. As for the main feed, I think that can be reserved for opening/closing ceremonies, any important world records, and the basketball finals (which was previously agreed on, since it is seen as replacing the FIBA championships for this year) Random 89 07:56, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

That is a good idea. Save the main template for the most popular events at each Olympics: Basketball at the Summers, and Hockey at the Winters. --Plasma Twa 2 00:02, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I think we could work with a separate Olympics page. Spencer^T♦^C 15:30, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Youth Olympics

Has there been any discussion about putting these up? Personally I don't think we should, maybe the first ever, but it is a minor world event at the best. --Plasma Twa 2 18:37, 9 June 2008 (UTC)