Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Harrison Smith

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. Ron Ritzman (talk) 01:04, 12 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Harrison Smith

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This article is tiny with no inline citations, birthdate is unsorced, no death date is given. It's only attempt to establish notability is the statement "He placed somewhere between fourth and sixth in his first-round (semifinals) heat and did not advance to the final." An olympic athlete who placed 4th, 5th, or 6th in a heat in his 1 and only olympics and didn't make it to the finals is not notable enough to be included on this website. Rockchalk717 03:53, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Appears to be this sports-reference.com entry. Dru of Id (talk) 04:24, 27 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Weak Keep- You seem to be mistaking this website for Winnerpedia. From Wikipedia:Notability (sports)#Notability guidelines on sports persons: 'Sports figures are presumed notable (except as noted within a specific section) if they: 1. have participated in a major international amateur or professional competition at the highest level such as the Olympics.' (emphasis mine). Where this article fails is Needs Reliable Sources (RS) & Verifiability, which hopefully will be provided by someone at this AfD, since I can't find anything reliable or substantive, but the sports-reference.com info may give someone search ideas. Dru of Id (talk) 04:59, 27 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
delete those are guidelines. Notability is not guaranteed, only presumed. In this case, I think an exception to those guidelines can be made if no evidence of further references has turned up. --KarlB (talk) 13:39, 27 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Expansion on my original Delete There are some key words in there indicating they aren't rules. "Generally acceptable standards", "presumed notable". There really isn't anything notable about someone with an unknown finish in the 1900 olympics that didn't even make the finals.--Rockchalk717 00:30, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sportspeople-related deletion discussions. — Frankie (talk) 18:05, 28 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Competed at the Olympics for crying out loud, arguably the pinnacle of sport, easily meets WP:NSPORTS. This is a slam dunk to me. The article is referenced (just because it's a print source, doesn't mean it isn't reliable) and the sports-reference link supplied by Dru of Id is also reliable. Jenks24 (talk) 21:55, 28 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Compromise What about moving this page to "Harrison Smith (athlete)" so we can move the football player to Harrison Smith, since Harrison Smith (American football) is more notable with him being a first round NFL draft pick this year.--Rockchalk717 02:18, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Since they're both athletes, counter-propose Harrison Smith (olympian), ~(runner), or ~(track and field) (in order of preference). Dru of Id (talk) 07:03, 1 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I used athlete since that's what most track athletes (Maurice Greene (athlete) for example) who need disambiguation have athlete as their identifier but if nobody objects let's close this and I'll create the moves myself.--Rockchalk717 01:59, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Merge and redirect back in the early days of the Olympics the athletes were primarily selected by connections and so forth, that doesn't mean that they were the best of the sport, instead they were basically the best of whoever they knew. There been several AFD discussions on these athletes who competed in the early Olympics and nothing else is known about their life, and they were usually merged or redirect to the sport they played that year. The Smith article should be turned into a dab page, as there's a notable football player, and looking at Google, a notable publisher with him name but no article (tons of sources about that publisher). But for this athlete in particular, there's no information about this guy that I can find, even in the 1890s sources when Yale athletes were among the most well-known athletes of their time, thus failing GNG. Secret ^account 20:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 04:38, 5 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep and move. Unfortunately, precedent is that everyone who competes in the Olympics is notable, even some athletes from the early years of the Olympics for which not even their full names are known. Rename to Harrison Smith (runner) since the newly drafted NFL player is at least as notable as the Olympian from 1900. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:46, 5 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep (and move as suggested above) It is a very good idea to have as many fixed standards for inclusion in the encyclopedia as possible. To the extent we don't have them, we must debate each individual case here. As is, we're debating about 10% of the new intake that pass speedy and prod,, plus an equal number of earlier articles--and this is too many a day to discuss adequately. It does not harm the encyclopedia to have articles on marginally notable subjects; it does harm the encyclopedia to spend any time debating them, especially when the results are going to be more or less random for everything on the margin. We need to write new articles, and improve old ones, not quibbler about requirements. I would never conclude that there is nothing to be found: Secret, have you checked with Yale sources, such as their campus newspapers of the period and their alumni bulletins? Have you asked their archivists? DGG ( talk ) 00:28, 6 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Moved to Harrison Smith (runner)--Rockchalk717 15:54, 9 May 2012 (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.