Talk:History of baseball in Allentown, Pennsylvania

Breakout from Allentown, PA main page

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)

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)

Reverted change to lead sentence

@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)

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)

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)