Wikipedia talk:WikiProject National Basketball Association/References

Expansion

@Bagumba: hey, you've done great work building up a list of top-quality sources for this topic area, thanks. That's only half the battle though; I think it would be helpful to expand this to a more comprehensive and authoritative WikiProject source list that includes everything commonly encountered in this topic area. We can include statements on how reliable they are, and link to pertinent discussions if possible. Some obvious missing entries that come to mind are SI, Bleacher Report, Fadeaway World, and ClutchPoints. Would appreciate any further thoughts or ideas. Left guide (talk) 05:56, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I was just starting with non-controversial stuff and the local newspapers of large cities (still incomplete). As for the sites you mentioned, I generally avoid them (well, past SI is OK), but realize it's a nuanced discussion if a particular writer or subsite is a well-cited expert (e.g. Howard Beck when he went to Bleacher Report, The Ringer, etc). Feel free to expand. There's no WP:OWNership. —Bagumba (talk) 06:47, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Bagumba: ok thanks. By the way, when did SI start to "go downhill" as you like to say? I've seen you mention it off-the-cuff a couple of times, but it's never fully been in context. I think those distinctions would be useful to summarize on this source list. Left guide (talk) 06:53, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

SI: I dont have a specific cutoff, but sometime after Maven acquired them in 2019.[1] For sure, any of their team specific coverage that they labeled as part of FanNation is bloggy and unreliable. I think they now brand the team coverage as "... on SI".[2] They might have kept some notable long-time writers around for a while e.g. Jack McCallum, but I dont know who's still there that might be worthy of an exemption. —Bagumba (talk) 07:05, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Here is a source that FanNation is user generated, and this on its recent rebranding to On SI. —Bagumba (talk) 08:01, 7 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Splitting into bibliography

@Bagumba: I think in a way, I may have conflated and hijacked the purpose of how you originally constructed the page before I ever touched it. I often see WikiProjects with a bibliography page and a separate source list page with reliability classes (with your original construction appearing to be like the former), and I can understand why since it's starting to feel disjointed, messy, and unorganized. That said, do you mind if I split off your original content to a separate bibliography page? Left guide (talk) 08:20, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, the end result would basically be the same as if I had started the source list separately. Left guide (talk) 08:23, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't really basing the format off anything, other than to just start recording things; I figured the fomatting would work itself out. That said, it's still relative small; it seems it might be more editor friendly to keep it all in one place (à la WP:AVOIDSPLIT)? Or can you point to a few examples of those other WikiProjs? —Bagumba (talk) 08:39, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Bagumba: For ice hockey, there's Wikipedia:WikiProject Ice Hockey/Bibliography and Wikipedia:WikiProject Ice Hockey/Sources. For video games, there's WP:VG/RL and WP:VG/RS. For the Japan WikiProject, there's WP:JAPAN/RS and WP:JA/R. Another issue with keeping it merged is that many of the sources are listed as generally reliable without citing any discussions. I simply lumped them that way because I personally trust that you pick good sources, but that alone doesn't sufficiently equate to a consensus applicable to the broader community. I'd like to have a more authoritative "generally reliable" section; for example, ESPN and USA Today have some archived RSN discussions deeming them as such, but then it looks arbitrary here when some entries cite discussions and others don't. Left guide (talk) 09:19, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Bagumba: It'd be nice to have the "generally reliable" sources match WP:GREL:

Editors show consensus that the source is reliable in most cases on subject matters in its areas of expertise.

After thinking further, one alternative could be to keep everything on this one page, and have a "bibliography" header for all of the original sources, and then "generally reliable" for those that can be cited to relevant discussions. Any objections to that? Left guide (talk) 11:45, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

On the one hand, there's lots of de facto reliable sources that aren't at WP:RSP. I guess I was treating this as an essay or WikiProj advice, and anyone was free to contest, modify or just ignore. But I'd be a bit suprised if there was any issue with those major market newspapers. Like any source in an article, I'd prefer to treat anything listed as AGF reliable until it's contested, either with deletion or a talk discussion. We could tighten as needed (so far, there hasnt been a wave of quesionable additions) —Bagumba (talk) 12:31, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

More sources for consideration

Fox Sports
GiveMeSport (GMS)
Last Word on Sport
Yardbarker

In doing some "insource" searching, they seem to be used on many NBA-related articles, so it would help to reach consensus on their quality. For what it's worth, GMS is a property of Valnet, which has been analyzed in depth by the video game project at WP:VALNET; the individual imprints look like a mixed bag of reliability classes, though GMS is not specifically indicated there. I haven't done much searching around the project for discussions on these specific sources yet, but may do so more in the future. Any input or feedback welcome in the meantime. Left guide (talk) 08:23, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'll AGF on Fox Sports (presumably not the concerns at WP:FOXNEWS). I thought Yardbarker was fan generated at some point. At any rate, as non-mainstream, I'd want to at least see evidence of WP:USEDBYOTHERS for the last three before considering further if they're reliable. —Bagumba (talk) 08:36, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Bagumba: Thanks for the reply. I went ahead and labeled Yardbarker as WP:GUNREL per Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 416#Yardbarker.com. Feel free to raise at WP:RSN again if you disagree with that small discussion. Left guide (talk) 10:42, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

RealGM

Seems like an oft-discussed source for this project (1, 2, 3), what's the consensus? Left guide (talk) 12:20, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

So after examining all three of the linked discussions, my reading of consensus is that it's WP:GUNREL. There was one comment calling it "semi-reliable" in passing, but that didn't seem to get any support from others, and I couldn't find any scenarios described for RealGM being a good/useful standalone source. If there's no further input forthcoming, I plan to mark it as GUNREL on this page. Left guide (talk) 12:10, 20 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Slam (magazine)

Is it considered reliable? Left guide (talk) 00:18, 25 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]