2008/12/7 Phil Sandifer <snowspinner(a)gmail.com>om>:
Or: The Continuing Saga of the Disaster That is
Notability
[[Fábio Pereira da Silva]] is a player on the first squad of
Manchester United - the current European club football champions. This
is, by any standard, a big deal. He passes [[WP:N]] trivially,
requiring all of 15 seconds to find multiple independent sources.
Nobody sane would dispute that he is a notable, high-profile figure.
However, WP:ATHLETE says that athletes can only be included if they
compete professionally. he was injured when Man U bought him, and so,
despite being a high-profile and much-covered signing, he has yet to
appear for the squad. He's listed as part of the squad. He has a shirt
number. He's the subject of much media coverage. But he hasn't
appeared on the pitch yet. And because of close-parsing of WP:ATHLETE,
his article was deleted. (Mind you, I dispute the entire notion that
individuals compete in professional soccer. There are no individual
trophies. Teams compete, and he is a member of Manchester United)
Being signed for a big team isn't a big deal if you never play for
them - there are plenty of players that are just there because they
need someone as backup to the backups if lots of people end up
injured. Those players aren't particularly notable. The "must have
played competitively" clause is there to stop those players being
included. So, the player in question isn't automatically notable by
virtue of having been signed by Man U. However, he probably is notable
independently of that due to the media coverage he has got. The
specific notability guidelines for certain professions, etc., say "X
is notable if ..." they do not say "X is notable if and only if ...".
You can be an athlete and qualify for notability for some reason other
than those mentioned on WP:ATHLETE.