Talk:History of professional baseball in Allentown, Pennsylvania

Latest comment: 2 years ago by Allreet in topic Reverted change to lead sentence

Breakout from Allentown, PA main page

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I've broken this section out from the Allentown main page to allow for better expansion, organization and inclusion of images. I think this is a great little section, and one of a subject matter important to Allentown's history. Having this as a standalone article will not only serve the function of reducing the size of the main Allentown article, but will hopefully motivate editors to perform some of the enhancements described above. I will leave actual article title up for debate, if necessary... please discuss and change as seen fit. Alphageekpa (talk) 11:18, 11 June 2008 (UTC)Reply

There seems to be a disagreement as to just how much Coca-Cola Park actually cost to build. Other pages say it was USD 50.25 million, you have it as less. Zigwithbag (talk) 14:41, 29 September 2009 (UTC)Reply

Reverted change to lead sentence

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@Keystone18, I reverted your change to the lead for two related reasons. For lack of better terms: a) the change buried the lead (kept the reader from subject) and b) put the cart before the horse (introduced a topic that would normally follow the subject). While these are subjective assessments, there being a million ways to word any opening, they're objective in the sense that as age-old reasons they're fundamental.

IMO, the subject of an article in an encyclopedia almost always belongs at the very beginning: "Thomas Jefferson was a founding father who was a native of Virginia". Not "A native of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson was a founding father". That addresses a). As for b), "A native of Virginia" is at least a general fact of some familiarity one way or another, so nobody is likely to think about it too much. Worse would be a more specific yet obscure fact such as "A member of the First Continental Congress, Thomas Jefferson was..." The unfamiliar here would give the reader pause. So when I read the new lead, I stopped for a brief moment to consider the unique "Allentown Dukes", when I should have been forging ahead to learn the subject at hand.

All this on such a small matter, I know, but far better in most cases to get right to the point unless there's a compelling reason to do otherwise. I would appreciate any of your thoughts if you still feel your change was a substantial improvement. All the best. Allreet (talk) 14:33, 5 May 2022 (UTC)Reply

In re-reading the lead, I noticed somebody else had taken out a very broad fact (number of years) that set the context and elevated the topic. I'm restoring that as well. Allreet (talk) 15:09, 5 May 2022 (UTC)Reply
And yet another thought: The lead could be expanded, should be, to summarize the history that follows. The object, as with most leads, would be to give readers a concise overview so that if this is all they read, they'd have an impression similar to the one a reader would have if they read the entire article. I'm going to work on a condensation but of course I'd welcome contributions from anyone who wants to "take the bull by the horns". Allreet (talk) 15:57, 5 May 2022 (UTC)Reply