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October 6[edit]

baseball strike zone on TV[edit]

When a baseball game is shown on TV, they often show a graphic of the strike zone and where each pitch went in relationship to it. How do they do this - a person decides were the ball went or does equipment? Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 01:46, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Typing "TV strike zone" into Google brings this as the first link. --Jayron32 01:50, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

Thank you! Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 02:25, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ted Williams' book The Science of Hitting, from the 1960s, shows a similar graphic, with little colored squares like pixels and his opinion as to "cold" and "hot" zones, and accompanying averages, ranging from like .250 to .400. If a batter can figure out where his "hot" zone is, he can improve his average. Of course, not everyone can hit like Teddy Ballgame could. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:52, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

When I was playing little league (not very well), I felt that I was a low ball hitter. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 16:54, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If you watch the replays, home runs seem to come on low pitches - right in the wheelhouse, as they say. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:30, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I never hit a home run. But I didn't have the power. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 02:44, 8 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Clean sheet[edit]

"Clean sheet" redirects to "shutout". In America, a shutout generally refers exclusively to a winning team. For example, it would be commmon to say, "LA Galaxy shutout the Philadelphia Union 2-0". But the term generally wouldn't be used if that same game ended 0-0. So I'm wondering if there is a subtle difference between the terms. In Association Football, is each team in a nil-nil draw said to have kept a "clean sheet"? --Joefromrandb (talk) 07:54, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Another issue with the redirect is that this isn't the main thing everyone thinks of when they hear the phrase "clean sheet". I think of "starting from scratch", as in "let's sit down with a clean sheet and work this thing out" (meaning a blank sheet of paper). StuRat (talk) 08:17, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've always ever used "clean slate" for that. Livewireo (talk) 13:39, 8 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think of "clean slate" more as meaning your former transgressions have been forgiven/expunged from the record. StuRat (talk) 14:01, 8 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes Joe, in Association Football a clean sheet refers to not conceding any goals. Goalkeepers in particular are referred to as "keeping a clean sheet" if they don't let the ball get past them. --TammyMoet (talk) 15:37, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The shutout article seems to tackle football, too. Pun intended. --Dweller (talk) 06:42, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

English football and politics[edit]

It seems supporters of many football clubs in continental Europe cleave on political lines. Different clubs in Athens and Rome, for example, may be preferred by socialist or conservative fans. FC St. Pauli has "left-leaning" fans, while other clubs have historical ties to fascism. And closer to home for the English, there are plenty of political aspects to the Old Firm. But I don't often hear about political orientation and English clubs. I could speculate about the supporters of London clubs based on how affluent their neighbourhoods, but maybe someone across the pond could enlighten me. Do any clubs attract disproportionate numbers of Labour, Tory, or Lib Dem voters? I'm primarily interested in Premier League clubs, but Football League clubs will do too. --BDD (talk) 16:30, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not aware of any, but would make the following observations: Tottenham Hotspur has long had a large Jewish contingent among its followers. Chelsea FC is situated in one of the richest boroughs in London if not the UK (Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea) and it wouldn't surprise me to find it has more Tory fans than, say, West Ham United. --TammyMoet (talk) 16:56, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure the Chelsea Headhunters are what you are thinking of when you say Tories, but they are known to have far right links.90.212.157.32 (talk) 17:50, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This fansite does indeed list Conservative politicians Lord Coe, John Major, Peter Bottomley, David Mellor and Ed Vaizey amongst Chelsea fans, but also includes eLabour MP Peter Hain. I used to work with a West Ham supporter who told us about the visit of to Upton Park by a Labour Government minister who was known to be a Chelsea supporter - it may have been Chris Smith but I'm not sure. The West Ham fans sang him that stirring Welsh hymn tune Cwm Rhondda, the only lyrics being "Stick your blue flag up your arse!". Alansplodge (talk) 00:33, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: a variety of source including Nick Hornby say that Arsenal have as many Jewish fans as Tottenham do, or even more. OR I know and unscientific, but I live in North London and know many more Jewish Arsenal fans than Tottenham ones.

On the main question, football was traditionally a working class game, so the fans would have been overwhelmingly Labour Party supporting. However, these days, a variety of factors have radically changed that. I'm not aware of any club, Chelsea included, that has a particular political slant. --Dweller (talk) 06:47, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Millwall F.C.#Supporters and hooliganism has something to say about the alleged far right political views of fans of Millwall. Astronaut (talk) 18:17, 10 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's entirely possible that the hooligan elements of a number of clubs have far-right political views, but even at clubs like Millwall that have a reputation for hooliganism only a tiny tiny proportion of fans are hooligans. That's the case today and was the case even in the 1970s heyday of hooliganism and the National Front. --Dweller (talk) 12:29, 11 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

To add to Dweller's response, like many things in Britain, the British class system outweighs any other political differences. For the majority of its history, football has been regarded as a working class game in England. It did not start out that way. The game originated in public schools, and when the Laws of the Game were codified in 1863, the nascent Football Association was primarily composed of public schools. By the early 1880s, teams from northern mill towns began to gain ground. The turning point was the 1883 FA Cup Final. Blackburn Olympic defeated Old Etonians to become the first working class team to win the cup. No public school team ever made the final again. Professionalism, advocated by working class clubs, was legalised the following year, and with the introduction of the Football League in 1888, the professionals came to dominate.

Rugby union remained amateur (until the 1990s!), leading to a position where football was viewed as working class and rugby as middle class. It could be said that political rivalries did not form because those who might have contested them watched different sports. The existence of rugby league (mainly played in the north) complicates matters a little, but even today it is generally the case that the main sport played in comprehensive schools is football, and in public schools it is rugby.

Today, football in England is much gentrified from what it was 20-30 years ago. Many factors are responsible, but the transition to all-seater stadiums following the Taylor Report into the 1989 Hillsborough disaster is perhaps the biggest. The change in public mood brought about by England hosting UEFA Euro 1996 was another. More indirectly, Nick Hornby's book Fever Pitch is often cited as a bellwether for middle-class attitudes to the sport. Gentrification has affected all major clubs, and has not caused any particular political affiliations to form. However, huge price rises mean the average age of the matchgoing fan has risen, and the proportion of working-class attendees has decreased (see [1] for example). Oldelpaso (talk) 19:35, 11 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Black-and-white film about mischievous schoolboys[edit]

There was a film I saw on television a few years back. It was a black-and-white comedy. I think the main plot revolved around a bunch of mischievous British schoolboys. The one scene I remember featured the boys running a rather elaborate parimutuel betting in class. Their teacher shows up, horrified, and notes: "You didn't include the favourite!", followed by cries of unfairness from the other boys.

What was the name of this film? (If it's any help, I remember the next week the same channel showed Father Brown, but I don't know whether the two films are related or not.) Gabbe (talk) 17:06, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Could be Good Morning Boys with Will Hay. Haven't seen it for years but it fits. DuncanHill (talk) 17:23, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Just started watching it online, and yes, Honest Albert (Graham Moffat, who used to run a pub up the road from my Granny's house), does run a book without the favourite. DuncanHill (talk) 17:52, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that indeed appears to be it! Thank you, I've been pondering about that one for ages! Gabbe (talk) 18:02, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Will Hay was a respected amateur astronomer to boot.[2] Alansplodge (talk) 00:12, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

WWE LIST[edit]

Is there any list on Wikipedia about wrestlers of WWE who have deceased ? 123.201.218.122 (talk) 23:08, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Probably not. We generally don't keep lists of "Dead <whatevers>". If someone dies, they go into categories for say "2012 deaths". You can play around with WP:CATSCAN and see if you get results that you're looking for. Just now I did a search and used Category:WWE for the regular category and Category:Living people for the negative category. I had it look 3 subcategories deep. That came up with just over 1000 pages, though that also includes pages for WWE events and organizations since they are both in the WWE subcats as well as not being in the Living People category. Dismas|^(talk) 00:13, 7 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There is a list of sportspeople who died during their careers page. There is also a section for pro-wrestling. WWETrishMickiefan (talk) 15:30, 9 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]