Talk:Earl Strom/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: –– Jezhotwells (talk) 11:49, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I shall be reviewing this article against the Good Article criteria, following its nomination for Good Article status.

Disambiguations: 2 disambiguations found: foreman and Jim Gardner. No suitable targets could be resolved. Suggest de-linking these.

Linkrot: One dead link found - this has been tagged since March 2010 (ref # 16 [1]).

Checking against GA criteria

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

   Earl grew up in the household as the youngest of seven children comprising five boys and two girls. "seven children comprising" is rather clumsy.

   which was uncommon for lesser experienced referees at the time. "less" would be better than "lesser"

   In fact, the former was assigned to any seventh and deciding game in a series during this time. Better to use just "he" rather than "the former" as the use of the "the former" introduces possible confusion as to who is being referred to, Strom or Rudolph.

   There is a high incidence of the use of "officiating" and "officiated". Can the word use be varied? E.g., "oversee", "referee" (as a verb), "supervise".

   Memorable encounter with Wilt Chamberlain This section heading is a little misleading, I think. Surely the encounter was "with" Gack?

   After more than a decade's experience in the game, Strom was offered a salary contract over 82 games for $16,000 for the first time by Commissioner Walter Kennedy in August 1969. A little confusing. Which league was Kennedy commissioner of? Was Strom paid game to game previously? Please clarify.

   While Strom earned more than twice as much in the ABA than the NBA, he soon became disenchanted with the ABA for the lack of big name superstars and arenas that the NBA provided. The repetition of the intials gartes a little. Could this sentence be restructured to avoid that?

   Controversy again did not elude Strom in the ABA. In a 1970 game between the Texas Chaparrals and Denver Rockets in Denver, Colorado, he was attacked by a fan who came onto the court after Strom confronted the fan who was using profanity Clumsy. Please rephrase: "a fan", "the fan". "Controversy again did not elude"?

   Encouraged with the support of Wayne Embry and Pat Williams "by", rather than "with".

   Strom filed a $275,000 suit against the NBA in December 1972 for breach of an oral contract when John Nucatola told Strom that he could return to the league. Rather confusing, "for breach of an oral contract when John Nucatola told Strom that he could return to the league" It seems that the law suit got him the contract, is that what is meant?

   Layden verbally abused Strom to entice Strom to eject the coach out of the game. "Strom", "Strom" in quick succession.

   Strom originally was going to be suspended six games by the commissioner, but was changed to a $600 fine. Surely needs something like "the penalty was chnaged to"

   Bavetta insisted, which reversed Strom's call and the Nets wound up with the victory. "which reversed Strom's call" - a little clumsy - surely something like "Bavetta insisted on over-ruling Strom's call and the Nets wound up with the victory."?

   These incidents led to Strom being suspended the remainder of the 1979 NBA Playoffs and was required to apologize to Kovler surely "and he was required"?

   The sports reporter meet Strom in a hotel lobby "met" not "meet"

   When the article was published, the reporter wrote that he and Strom were joined by an assistant coach, whom Strom had bought a drink, and the tendencies for Strom to go into pressboxes to drink a cup of coffee and to talk with spectators that he knew in the stands. "whom" is wong, rephrase, perhams "for whom". The final clause should turned into a separate sentence.

   While the league had approved the article, Strom was fined $2,000 and suspended a portion of the playoffs. "While"? "Although" would be correct.

   During the mid-1980s, Strom had a couple incidents with team personnel being in the referees' locker room, which was against league rules "had a couple incidents"? Ungrammatical.

   In 1985, Dallas Mavericks owner Don Carter entered the locker room and accused Strom of having a vendetta against Dick Motta, coach of the Mavericks. The next year during the 1986 NBA Playoffs game between the Atlanta Hawks and Boston Celtics at Boston Garden in Boston, Massachusetts, Hawks coach Mike Fratello was attacked by a fan. Fratello walked into the officials locker room and reported the incident to Strom. Strom eventually was fined and worked a couple more playoff games that year." There seems no direct link or causality between these separate statements.

   It was through this column that Strom discovered he had a malignant brain tumor, a form of cancer, by doctors after his wife, Yvonne, found grammatical errors as she prepared to type the column on a computer Perhaps "It was while writing this column that..."

   Strom began surgery on the tumor in January 1994, which was successful, but he could not overcome the effects of the cancer and died on July 10, 1994. "began"? Surely "underwent"?

   Legacy: The collection of quotes at the beginning of this section is untidy, resembling a list.

   This is in contrast to today's officials who are said to blend into the background during a game and all bear a similar appearance and use of hand signals. Rather clumsy - how about using the direct quote (attributed) from the source"The toughest thing is getting consistency from the staff. I don't think you'll see the Earl Stroms, the flamboyant types, anymore. You've seen the last of that breed. They want them all to look alike and use the same signals. Today, refs are in the background. There aren't many refs who if you said their name you'd recognize them."

   Overall: there are a lot fo examples of poor writing highlighted above, but the entire artcile could do with a thorough copy-edit for style, grammar, and clarity.

   Lead I do not believe that the lead provides a succinct summary of the whole article.

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

   I made some reference fixes.diff

   A number of citations to the autobiography could be consolidated so they refer to the same pages, e.g. ref #19 (Strom et al., 134), ref #20 (Strom et al., 134–135) and ref #21 (Strom et al., 134–135). This would make the reference list a little less unwieldy.

   One dead link as per note above. Also two disambiguations which cannot be resolved.

   All on-line sources check out, support the statements and appear to be reliable sources. I assume good faith for off-line.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

   Inevitably the article concentrates on memorable refereeing incidents, which mostly involve disputes and disagreements, but I feel that it is somewhat unbalanced with only a few sentences focussing on Strom's mission to improve standards of play and officiating.

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

   Can we have a caption for the image in the infobox?  Done

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   OK, on hold for seven days for above issues to be addressed. The major point is the poor prose quality. –– Jezhotwells (talk) 13:22, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

   As work has started on the article I shall extend the hold for a further seven days. –– Jezhotwells (talk) 16:11, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

OK, following on from this massage on my talk page, I shall fail this nomination now. –– Jezhotwells (talk) 21:48, 8 May 2010 (UTC)