Talk:Hap Holmes

Notes on the article

There's nothing much found on Holmes' early life nor the circumstances of his death. The older versions of the article said that he died in Florida when vacationing but that's a bit dubious (World War II), and I haven't been able to find anything to back such a claim up. I think this is the best article about Holmes on the internet, and I think this should make a nice GA. Maxim_(talk) 01:13, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Just a quick question about the birth and death dates. I just added an external links section, and looking at his Legends of Hockey bio, it says he died in 1940, but doesn't give a day or place. As it stands, the article says 1941. In regards for the birth date, the article says 1888, Legends of Hockey says 1889, and the NHL.com player page says 1892. So really, what dates should we take as accurate? Kaiser matias (talk) 03:53, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

It's supposed to be 1892. The book and a bunch of pretty reliable online source say 1892. I think the HHOF has it wrong here, they're the only ones that say he was born in 1889. Maxim_(talk) 12:58, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

As long as you have rather reliable sources. I just saw a bunch of conflicting numbers, and wanted to make sure you didn't just take some random number. Kaiser matias (talk) 00:28, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

The 1888 must have been a typo of mine... I seriously have no from where that came from, unless I copied what was already put in an early revision. Maxim_(talk) 00:30, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Hap Holmes/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Lead

• Why do you need six references for his name and birth details? The first one I checked backed up the info.
  • See the talkpage. The Hockey Hall of Fame got it wrong, and as it's a very important source in the article, I felt I had to use a lot of other source to back the DOB up.
  • PS. if there are too many, feel free to either remove/or suggest removal of some.

• No worries at all. I guessed it might be something like this, but when the first ref I checked was correct, I didn't quite understand the need for the rest of the refs. I'd rather have too many than too few. Peanut4 (talk) 20:29, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

• The lead needs extending per WP:LEAD to sum up the article. I would say who he played for and what years his career was active for a start off.
  • Expanded. Hope it's better now.

Amateur career

• "Holmes played a game for the Toronto Tecumsehs, winning it, letting in three goals against." this sentence is a bit informal; try something like "Holmes played a game for the Toronto Tecumsehs, conceding three goals in a x–3 win."
  • Fixed.

Toronto

• How / why did he join the Toronto Blueshirts?
  • Most likely he was signed by them.
• "in the Stanley Cup final, Holmes won all three games and finished with a 2.59 goals-against average." It wasn't just Holmes who won the games.
  • Please see note 1.
• For three seasons, and one Stanley Cup win, this section is a bit short.
  • Please see note 2.

Seattle

• Why did he leave Toronto for Seattle?
  • He jumped his contract. :p I added that in.
• "In his sophomore season" Is there a wikilink for "sophomore"?
  • Done.
• "in the finals, Holmes posted a 3–1 record with a 2.75 goals-against average." Again, it wasn't Holmes who posted a 3ndash;1 record.
  • Please see note 1.
• Why was he loaned to the Toronto Arenas.
  • In those days, teams only carried one goaltender, so they needed to loan one if their regular one was injured. Or, the Arenas simply needed a goalie as they were an expansion team and Seattle loaned Holmes to them.
• "the series was abandoned tied 2–2–1" I guess this means two wins each, with one tie/draw? I would expand it to say so to be honest, because it's probably not entirely obvious to those who don't follow ice hockey.
  • Done.
• "however, did not wish to accept the Cup by default." This is missing a word, presumably "Montreal did not wish ..."
  • Seattle didn't. Fixed.
• "Hall eventually died in a Seattle hospital." It's not massively important but do you have more details, e.g. a date, about this.
  • Added.
• "The only draw of the series was a scoreless affair; after playing 20 minutes of overtime, referee Mickey Ion called off the game." Why was the game called off?
  • It's at the ref's discretion whether to continue a game that's been a draw after 60 minutes of regulation play.
• "with Holmes posting a 2–3 record with a 3.00 goals-against average." Again Holmes didn't post a 2–3 record.
  • Please see note 1.
• "Holmes played the next four seasons with the Metropolitans, but failed to make the Stanley Cup final." Do you have any more details about these four seasons?
  • Please see note 2.

Victoria

• "posting a 3–1 record with a 2.00 goals-against average in the finals," Again, Holmes didn't post a 3–1 record.
  • Please see note 1.

Detroit

• "as Holmes won only 30 out of his 85 appearances." this should be as "as Detroit won only 30 games during Holmes' 85 appearances" or something like that.
  • Please see note 1.

Playing style

• "As a player, Holmes wore a baseball cap in net to cover his head from spectators from spitting tobacco," I presume this was before players wore helmets?
  • It says so in the paragraph—his bald head was an enticing target to people. Helmets are to prevent head injuries, while the goalie mask is designed to protect the goalie's face as a heavy rubber projectile is shot at him.

Post-retirement

• I think you should include details of his death here?
  • The previous revisions of the article said that Holmes died in Florida while on vacation. I haven't been able to find anything to back that up. Should I add a passing mention in the end when he died?

General

• The playing career section details are concentrated on Holmes' career in the Stanley Cup. Do you have more details about how his teams reached the Stanley Cup and details about seasons when they did not reach the Stanley Cup?
  • See note 2.
• Do you have any details about his early life? Where he was born? How he got into ice hockey?
  • There's really not a lot on him, especially his personal life. That'd be one of my primary reasons that I'm only shooting for GA status with this one, and not FA.

There's an awful lot to do. Particularly the article needs expanding to provide details other then Holmes' Stanley Cup career. I will put it on hold for a week, but the article needs serious attention to get become a good article. Peanut4 (talk) 22:50, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

• Note 1: When a goaltender, anyways in hockey it's referred as so, and in North America, is playing when his team wins a game, it is referred to as a goaltender having won the game, or having posted a so-and-so record.
• Note 2: Well, the teams reached the Stanley Cup by winning their respective leagues. I've added a bit more info on seasons when his team did not reach the SC. To be honest, the four Seattle seasons were downright boring, with nearly-identical stats and results. I've added about 1000 bytes of prose since the start of the review, so I hope I covered that.
• First replies done at 00:41, 29 July 2008 (UTC). Maxim_(talk)

• I'm confused by the statement that he 'won the Stanley Cup four times, with four different teams.' I find the reference to his third win, where was his fourth?
  • His third one was with the Arenas, as he won Cups in 1913–14 (Blueshirts), 1915–16 (Metropolitans), 1917–18 (Arenas), and 1924–25 (V. Cougars). He was loaned around North America in the 1917–18 season, and through two loans, by the Monteral Wanderers and the Metropolitans, he ended with the Arenas. Maxim_(talk) 12:09, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrary section break

At the moment, it is still a fair way short of GA standard. I don't think it has the breadth of coverage necessary, and doesn't appear to be neutral. There's plenty of details on his successes, but less on the less than successful seasons. It needs a lot of work doing. I'll keep it on hold for more text and details to be added. Peanut4 (talk) 19:52, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The article would tend to focus on his four Stanley Cup wins because it's what he's noted for, it's the most important parts of his career and because there's the most info on that. I'd prefer you make less vague suggestions for improvement. And I absolutely do not understand how it is not neutral. Maxim_(talk) 20:19, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree that concentrating on the Stanley Cup wins is going to happen, and rightly so. But at the moment, it appears the rest of his career has been overlooked far too much. Peanut4 (talk) 20:22, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Okie, I'll fatten up the article by describing all of his seasons (although it will rely all on the "stats" ref. Will that be good? Maxim_(talk) 20:25, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Try as best as you can. Remember it's GA not FA, so fair represenation is enough for a pass. At the moment, I think it looks like a fan-based article, rather than one done with a more neutral eye. Peanut4 (talk) 20:28, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I significantly expanded it. Feel free to take another look. Maxim_(talk) 22:42, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Re-review

Lead

• Needs expanding now per WP:LEAD
  • A decent summary of the entire article now. Done.
    • It does need a break. I'll have a look tomorrow, because I suspect there may be a better way of doing it by keeping relevant material together, rather than a simple break half-way through a chronology of his career. Peanut4 (talk) 01:06, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • I'm just putting it out there, but I think the single paragraphs flows well—why split it into two? Maxim_(talk) 02:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Toronto Blueshirts

• I understand your note about goaltenders records but in prose "Holmes won all three games", etc. doesn't make sense. Unless they actively relate to statistical records, it needs changing, because otherwise it doesn't make sense to non-Ice Hockey fans.
  • It's directly related to statistics.
    • Being brutally honest, I simply don't like it at the moment. It looks wrong, and is very unappealing to a non-Ice Hockey reader. GA and FAs really ought to be inclusive to all readers. Peanut4 (talk) 01:06, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • My turn to be brutally honest—I honestly don't know how to address this concern. It currently looks fine to me, and I don't how to fix it as I don't see it as broken... Perhaps it's like regional variation of English: it's how it's said in North America, and not how in the rest of the world. If it's like that, the article should stick status quo, as it's a matter of using Canadian English about an article related to Canada. Maxim_(talk) 02:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Toronto Arenas

• "On January 4, 1918," Why does the reference only refer to the date? Surely it refers to the whole sentence, since the reference says about the loan.
  • Because the first ref gives the date, while the second one gives more general details. The intention was to use two sources, but since both of the are from the Hockey Hall of Fame, I've deleted the second one.
    • There's no need to delete one, if you feel it needs two. Simply put both at the end of the sentence, unless you do feel one is enough. Peanut4 (talk) 01:06, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • One's enough. Maxim_(talk) 02:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

General

• Numbers and their units should have a non-breaking space, e.g. 22 .
  • I notice you've done this. But apologies, it's only for numerals, and doesn't need to be done for 6–7 record, etc. Peanut4 (talk) 23:50, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Done, albeit with some difficulties ;-)
    • A couple more need doing. Basically anything with a normal numeric figure and then a unit, I think it's mainly 3.45 goals-per-game, etc, now. Peanut4 (talk) 00:09, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • Fixed. Maxim_(talk) 02:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
• What does the "see also" section refer to?
  • His contemporaries. It was an idea that suddenly popped into my head. Is it a good idea or not?
    • I'm not a fan because it looks like a random list of players. If they are relevant to his player, they should be linked in the main article. Peanut4 (talk) 01:06, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • OK, I zapped the section. Maxim_(talk) 02:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
• It's a vast improvement. Great work. But I still think the prose section could be brushed up to make it more engaging.
  • PeterSymonds is polishing the prose, as I've edited and created and edited created (...) the entire article so much that I don't think I can pick out problems that well.

Arbitrary section break (2)

• Regarding the lead. A break is needed, otherwise it's a big chunk of text for a reader to wade through, especially at the start of the article. Remember, you need to grab the reader's attention, and it's no more important than the lead section. On that score here are a few suggestions how to work it.
  • The break doesn't need to be in two equal pars. The best place at the moment to break it appears to be after his retirement, and leave his playing style, coaching and posthumous induction to the hall of fame into the second par.
  • I would be tempted to mention his four Stanley Cup wins in the first par. It's presumably one of the biggest things about him winning so many Stanley Cups, hence something like "Harry Holmes was ... goaltender, who won four Stanley Cups."
  • Have a read through the rest of the lead to try trim through some of the less necessary details. The most obvious to me is some of his amateur career. I would change the second and third sentences to: "Holmes played as an amateur for three season with the Parkdale Canoe Club, before he began his professional career in the 1912–13 season with the Toronto Blueshirts."
    • I've actually split it into three paragraphs instead. Take a look. Maxim_(talk) 23:28, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • I'm fine with that. Though if you were to try take this article towards FAC, the first par will almost certainly need some expansion. Though the lead is now great, and it's something to think about in the future. Peanut4 (talk) 23:34, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
• Regarding the one sticking point between us, I still don't like the wording. If I didn't know ice hockey was a team sport, I would say the wording "In the NHA playoffs, Holmes won one out of two games" suggested Holmes won one individual match. I totally understand you're using correct terminology. My only concern whether this is jargon or not. If it's not jargon, it's probably fine. If it oversteps the line of jargon, I think it needs writing in layman's English. I'm not sure this is enough to fail it as a GA, but personally I wouldn't like an FA (and so this is why I'm still divided) to have such wording, which isn't entirely clear to the average reader. I'll let you decide what your own opinion is while you correct the other two queries I have, while I seek a second opinion from another GA reviewer.
• One other quick question. Why is he called Hap Holmes? Peanut4 (talk) 23:15, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
  • It possibly may be short for HapPY Holmes, otherwise it's just a nickname... I haven't found any explanation, but I've found mentions of Happy Holmes. Maxim_(talk) 23:28, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
    • If you can try find a full answer and reference, while it remains on hold, that would be smashing. I wondered the other day what "Hap" meant and forgot to mention it. Peanut4 (talk) 23:34, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
      • I've found mentions of him as Happy Holmes, problem is, what section to stick in? Maxim_(talk) 23:36, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
        • I've just done a google search, and it seems he was nicknamed Happy or Hap Holmes. I'm not sure at this stage it needs a reference. I would try add it as high as possible. Even maybe the first few words of "Amateur career", something like "Harry Holmes, nicknamed Hap or Happy, started playing ..." Peanut4 (talk) 23:41, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
          • Added a mention. Maxim_(talk) 00:04, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrary section break (3)

Hopefully not so much to do now. Keep at it. Peanut4 (talk) 23:03, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

• Replied to concern at 00:08, 31 July 2008 (UTC). Maxim_(talk)

No worries about getting another user to polish the prose. That's often the best way. Peanut4 (talk) 00:09, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

By the way, I'd split the lead into two pars per WP:LEAD. Peanut4 (talk) 00:13, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Problem is, where's the best place to split the lead up? There's no really good place without having disogranized paragraph or separating a few sentences from the end. Maxim_(talk) 00:24, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Second opinion

Resolved

I would like a second GA reviewer to decide on a discussion myself and the nominator have had regarding the sort of lines as stated below:

• "in the Stanley Cup final, Holmes won all three games and finished with a 2.59 goals-against average."
• "In the Stanley Cup finals, Holmes posted a 3–1 record with a 2.75 goals-against average, en route to the Metropolitans' only Stanley Cup win."
• "Holmes played two games, losing one and tying one, ending up with a 1.79 goals-against average."

My own feeling is such statements can be interpreted three ways.

• An Ice Hockey fan, who knows as stated above, that goaltenders' records are used to cite the team's record.
• A reader who understand Ice Hockey but doesn't know the above fact, and so thinks "Holmes won all three games" should read "Toronto won all three games"
• A reader who doesn't understand Ice Hockey and may feel "Holmes played two games, losing one and tying one" that it is actually an individual part of the game, similar to how say team chess games work.

I'm unsure whether such statements are simply terminology or jargon, and whether they are fine to be kept as they are or should be re-written into layman's terms.

Also, this may be a discussion for an FAC submission, rather than GAN nomination. Peanut4 (talk) 23:15, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Note: This is not a second opinion, just my own thoughts on the issue. I personally feel that they should be kept as they are, simply because that's how he played them, that's how his team won. Adding too much context may fill the article with unnecessary information. I write this as a DYK copyeditor, someone who has never played ice hockey, but the correct meaning seemed clear as I was reading. Perhaps brief context could be established (a short explanation of how it's done somewhere, perhaps) but too much may be cluttering. That's just my 2p. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 23:41, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Now, I was wondering that myself somewhere, and so the fact you've instantly made the same suggestion is enough for me. Maxim; can you try add a footnote the first time such a statement is made to explain how ice hockey stats work in connection to goaltenders? Peanut4 (talk) 23:44, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

That's a brilliant suggestion.  Done. Maxim_(talk) 00:01, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Final review

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

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

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

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):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

To be honest, I nearly failed this first time round, but I decided to give you the benefit of the doubt and time to improve the article. The work since has been fantastic. Superb work, both to Maxim and PeterSymonds, you fully deserve this GA pass. And I have also just noticed, the article was merely a stub, just a week ago. Tremendous work all round, very, very well done.

As for taking the article on further, I reckon a bit more research would be needed to try plug any gaps in Holmes' career, and some copy-edit to the text to add some more juice to the stats. Otherwise, if you did want to push this article towards FAC, I would suggest a peer review and maybe a formal copy edit. Peanut4 (talk) 00:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the pass!!! After my vacation, I'm looking at writing the Seattle Metropolitans article. I think doing that will really help this article along. Thanks again for the very exhaustive review (it's bigger than the article itself O_O). Maxim_(talk) 00:56, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Changes to Layout of References

A recent change made to the references section to use shortened notes with full book references in separate sections was changed back to the previous layout. It seems more and more common on WP, when different pages in a book are being cited, to use separate shortened footnotes displayed in an automatically generated Notes section, and then placing the full book citations in a separate References or Bibliography section. See Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Shortened_footnotes, where you can also link to some examples. See also “Style recommendations” at Wikipedia:Footnotes. Like many things in WP, these are suggestions and not commands, but using the approach is more in keeping with that used in academic reports. If other editors feel a split Notes / References approach is not right, another approach for this page, where there is only one book with three pages cited separately, would be to combine the references into one with a pages parameter of 99–101. This would reduce the specificity of the references ever so slightly, but would allow the three separate references to be placed into one within a single References section. Finally, whether these suggestions or the existing approach are decided upon, perhaps more complete cite book references with oclc parameters and 13-digit ISBN numbers could be adopted for the two book references in the article. This was included in the previous edit, but was inadvertently erased when the change back to the single References section was made. The code for the two cite book references is included here for ease of use: {{cite book |title= Without Fear: Hockey's 50 greatest goaltenders |last= Allen|first= Kevin|coauthors= Duff, Bob; Bower, Johnny|year=2002 |publisher= Triumph Books|location= Chicago|isbn= 9781572434844|oclc= 49936232|pages=}} and {{cite book|title=The Official Illustrated NHL History|last= Pincus|first= Arthur|date=2006|publisher= Reader's Digest|pages= |isbn= 9780888508003|oclc= 64344694|location= Montreal|year= 2006}} --papageno (talk) 13:53, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I personally thought that if there are going to be only four footnotes for books, it would make clutter to split it up into References/Notes. That's my opinion on it. As for the better cite book refs, I inadvertently deleted them with the undo function. I'm a bit busy right now (see my talk), so I'm not going to add the right now, but I'm fine with you fixing that. Thanks, Maxim_(talk) 14:25, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

And combining the page references into one reference listing all three pages, ie 99–101? --papageno (talk) 04:53, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Goaltender lost or won

Reference 8 says the somewhat muddled “In ice hockey, when a goaltender is referred to as have won or lost the game when he was playing the game the team lost or won.” Is this edit more what the sentence should mean? “In ice hockey, a goaltender is considered as having won or lost a game if he or she played for any part of the game that was won or lost.” --papageno (talk) 21:10, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

That'd be a bit misleading, as it's not any part of the game. The goaltender who is on the ice for the game-deciding goal gets the win/loss/tie in their stats. Maxim (☎) 21:27, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

How is “In ice hockey, a goaltender is considered as having won or lost a game if he or she was on the ice for the game-deciding goal.” --papageno (talk) 14:47, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Not entirely true see Clint benedicts hhof statistics and Percy Lesuers in 1913. Clint benedict is recorded in 1913 to havae a record of 7-2-1 with 10 gamesplayed according to the hhof. Percy lesueur (same year) has a record of 7-10 18 games played. The ottawa senators have a record of 20Gp 9W and 11L. At least in the NHA this is not always the case It would be interesting to sort this out if it can be. Ottawa4ever (talk) 13:02, 30 April 2009 (UTC)