Talk:Rafael Nadal

Three titles on three different surfaces in a calendar year

The first time this occurred for approved Major tournaments was in 1913 - Anthony Wilding: Wimbeldon, WHCC, WCCC (also meets the claimed 3 consecutive titles on 3 different surfaces [for Majors]). If this is interpreted as being for the four national championships then it was only effectively able to have been accomplished from there being three different surfaces e.g. 1978 (US Open adopting are courts) so it i non-Sensis like trying to accord a date of 1877 for this purpose. Same issue for the following '1877' record.

Semi-protected edit request on 9 September 2024

in the Residences section, misspelling of word "story" to refer to the amount of floors in a building. Currently spelled "storey" Leon-xd-00 (talk) 21:04, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: BLP is in Europe, so the article uses Brtish English. Declining. ⸺(Random)staplers 22:49, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 October 2024

Change "Representing Spain, he has won two Olympic gold medals, and led the nation to four Davis Cup titles." to "Representing Spain, he has won two Olympic gold medals, and led the nation to five Davis Cup titles." 199.250.3.38 (talk) 13:40, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

Can you provide a source? PianoDan (talk) 16:19, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Bowler the Carmine | talk 19:11, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

Agree it is too long/detailed

I agree with the comment at the top that "This article may be too long to read and navigate comfortably". One of the problems is the sheer level of intricate detail in the "Career" section. Following the recent announcement of his imminent retirement, I wanted to remind myself a bit about the main points of his career, but this plodding, almost week-by-week detail quickly becomes unreadable. For people who want this level there are already "yyyy Rafael Nadal tennis season" articles, so this one can be drastically pruned, I would say. 2A00:23C8:7B0C:9A01:644B:FDA2:2E8F:1874 (talk) 22:25, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Yeah. I think editors are waiting till retirement to severely trim Nadal, Federer, and Djokovic articles. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:29, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 19 November 2024

Could you please add this article from New York Times about Spains loss against the Netherlands in Davis Cup and the subsequent end of Nadals career? And maybe also write a text about the game/career ending in the 2024 segment?

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5933496/2024/11/19/rafael-nadal-retires-tennis-career/ 78.77.209.171 (talk) 23:26, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Shadow311 (talk) 00:23, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

I disagree with the recent cutting summary

This article could probably still be cut by a third! I see no need for individual year headers when we could do with 5 year chunks. The recent summary said "Any more reduction would lose important details and having looked through it thoroughly I do not think this article should be reduced any more." I don't agree with this in the least. It is an admirable start but this and Federer, and Djokovic, Williams, and Murray still need to trim trivial details. This article is bigger than Abraham Lincoln and Charles de Gaulle, way bigger than Wayne Gretzky and Margaret Thatcher, and almost doubles Leonardo De Vinci and Steffi Graf. It's way better, but there is still too much trivia. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:00, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

I disagree. I have removed a lot of trivia from this article, but there still should be some details about Nadal's off court activities. Also I disagree about five year chunks. The one thing I personally think could be reduced to a much shorter summary is the section about football (I don't care about what football matches Nadal made the kick off, but maybe some people do). I would not be prepared to cut this unless I hear other editor's views in support. The philanthropy section could be reduced but, again, I would need to hear some input from other editors about that before doing so. Personally one section I do not like in any player articles is the Legacy section. These tennis articles already list what a player has achieved in other parts of the article, personally I couldn't care less what one great player thinks about another (some greats even say contradictory things depending on who they are talking to), a player's "place in history" and yet another re-hash of their accomplishments. The results speak for themselves. But if one great has this section, so should every other. Records section is fine, though there seem too many trivial records on Nadal's article and if another editor wants to remove some of the more trivial records, then I won't be complaining. One thing I agree on, though, Fyunck, is you mention this along with the Djokovic, Federer, Murray and Williams articles. There is nothing that singles this article out for length now. Also the Lew Hoad article is a longer article. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 23:00, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

You are very wrong about the Lew Hoad article size. Nadal is 402k in size but more important to Wikipedia is 90k of prose and 15k words. Hoad is 179k in size, 70k in prose, at 12k words. It's not even close. Basically what you are saying is that articles such as Graf, Navritilova, Wills, Tilden, Laver, Borg, should be tripled in size to compare with Nadal. I don't buy that for one second. This is an encyclopedia not a novel. I'm not sure who first started breaking their career into individual years but it's done for every player now... even if it's one sentence. And people can chop out whatever they want without your approval... you just did it without others approval. I was sort of waiting till all of them retire to cut them all in half. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:39, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

There is no need to become so aggressive. That is true what you say about Hoad, but there are year summaries on Hoad that are considerably longer than any in this article or Murray's. Some player's careers in the top echelon are relatively longer than others and Hoad's time at the top was short compared to Nadal, but some years are much longer than they warrant on Hoad. This is why Nadal, Djokovic, Federer, Williams and Murray all have longer articles and it is right they are longer because they played for so long with so much success. Actually wikipedia works on consensus and I had already listened to several other editors over the past months talking about cutting article length before I started cutting, but there was never a detailed discussion on how much to cut. If I was acting purely for myself I would cut a bit more out (as mentioned: legacy, football and philanthropy). But I take a pause now to listen to views from as many editors as possible. I have not heard a detailed discussion about what to cut, article sections in general. These could be applied across the board to all articles. One way to remove a chunk of stuff from every all time great article: remove the legacy section. But I won't do this unless I hear some support for it. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 00:26, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

The legacy sections were created as compromises as to where and put water-cooler trivia on greatness. I've never really liked them much except as a place for a couple sentences. I'm not so much on cutting sections as I am to cutting down sections. When I look at 2022 and see stuff like "Nadal returned at the Madrid Open, where he beat Miomir Kecmanović and David Goffin and lost to Carlos Alcaraz. At Rome, he beat John Isner in straight sets, but lost to Denis Shapovalov in three sets despite leading by a set and a break" it is overkill over a twenty year career. These things should be more in line with "In 2022 Nadal lost in early rounds at the Madrid and Italian Opens." Then another shrinking to say "However he defeated Casper Ruud in three sets to win his 14th French Open title and 22nd major title overall." That's how these things should be crushed down. We don't need three paragraphs to say what was won and lost, especially when we have whole separate articles that tell us identical info. Fyunck(click) (talk) 01:17, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

Yes but I take a very different approach to cutting back an already detailed page to going about creating a page myself. A page I largely formed (I don't like people taking ownership of pages) was Segura, that is how I personally create a page (although I would list a little more on a modern great's page as the players enter slams, which Segura didn't play in his peak years). The editor that largely formed Hoad took a very different approach to me, listing every result he found. But I have not cut back on the results sections on Hoad even though I disagree with the length of some years. I take a very cautious approach to removing other people's work, as it is not part of wikipedia editing that I like very much. It takes me a long time whittling down pages (elongated waffle I have no problem removing, facts I am very wary of removing, unless they are elongated non-tennis trivia). The ones you mentioned cutting I don't agree with, as there were two very important matches at 2022 French, Rafa's last slam match with Djokovic and his epic semi with Zverev. You shouldn't assume that readers will go to the yearly article pages. Removing information from the yearly summaries should not be done without a lot of thought. Editors have spent time putting these details on there. I think there is slight overkill about every record being mentioned in the summaries and what records are listed (his record 20th ATP 500, the first time in a season he won this event and that etc.), but maybe some people want to read about all records. There are certain things in this article I wouldn't object to being removed (like minor records, football, philanthropy) but haven't removed myself. That is interesting you don't like the legacy sections. Maybe something should be posted on tennis project page about removing them. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 09:39, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

But that's the huge problem... we are not a book or repository of data results. We are an encyclopedia. When you say that "some people want to read about all records" that should be a big red flag! This is supposed to be generalized info that most people would want to know... not some or few people. We tell our readers the simple facts with a source they can use if they want more detailed info.... we don't supply that intricate detail in the article. Encyclopedias summarize, and the lead section further summarizes the entire prose. When a tennis player has a bio that is bigger than Benjamin Franklin's, there is a problem. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:49, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

This does not list all Rafa's results by a very long way and no one looks at this page if they want to find his round one victory in a minor ATP event (that is much more of an issue with the Murray and Hoad articles than this article, though there are still many results not listed on them). In 2022 Rafa won 2 slams, a stellar year, Murray was a journeyman in 2022 yet his section is as long. You have mentioned non-tennis profiles a few times. I can't comment on US politicians, as I don't have enough knowledge, but one person you mentioned was Margaret Thatcher. I have quite a lot of knowledge on UK politics. Thatcher entered parliament in the 1950s (I believe it was 1959). Her last important political intervention was at a rally in Plymouth during the 2001 election when Hague persuaded her to campaign (her last decade of life 2004-2013 she wasn't in good health and rarely appeared in public). So over 40 years of active regular political activity. In the early years she was a backbencher, not much to say there. Then she was a minister, there was all that "milk snatcher" stuff, but mostly short yearly summaries would suffice. Then there was a 4 year period when she was leader of the opposition 1975-79, so a fair amount to be said there. Then an 11 year span as PM, which could easily have year sections longer than this article. Then she became a backbencher and did little of note, mostly known in those years for criticising John Major and being bitter about how she was ejected from office, she also began writing her memoirs. Then she entered the house of Lords. Then there are summaries on her views, family etc. So I would say her article should in theory should be longer than this is now (whether someone has taken the trouble to add all the relevant details is another matter. Pete Sampras should have a longer page than he does, but people in the past often have shorter wikipedia pages than recent people). I go on number of words, article size in bytes is fairly irrelevant, as this takes into account how many refs there are and legth of refs. And length of any article shouldn't be determined purely by level of fame, it is how many years near the top of the relevant profession, that is why Thatcher is a good comparison to the Big Three. Tennishistory1877 (talk) 12:01, 25 November 2024 (UTC)