Sports with the most posts

[Kevin S]

This is more of an illustration than hard and fast science.

(Or, to put it another way, buggered if I'm reading through thousands of posts on hundreds of threads...)

But, one of the things that prompted me to do this was the forum description:

Razor-sharp analyses of cricket, rugby (posh and northern), darts, er, snooker, baseball, American football, running and stuff, weightlifting, horseracing, cycling, bowls, fishing. And that's just for starters

which doesn't include Tennis.

[Patrick Thistle]

Is there a fishing thread even?

[Kevin S]

No, nothing coming up on the search. Nor weightlifting.

I suggest that Tennis and Basketball would fit the bill better, if Snake is passing by...?

[Janik]

Do we need a caveat about tangents? Thread drift is always a problem.

Less so when a monomaniac is responsible for 75% of the posts.

[Janik]

No, nothing coming up on the search. Nor weightlifting.

I suggest that Tennis and Basketball would fit the bill better, if Snake is passing by...?

Similarly, given that the majority posting about Rugby Union are Welsh, I'm not convinced that 'posh' is the best epithet. Maybe celtic and northern?

[Kevin S]

And here's my attempt at last year's stats:

Sport	Posts (Approx., 2016)
Tennis	2289
Cricket	1776
Cycling	1433
Baseball	1333
Olympics and Paralympics	1262
Rugby U	1011
American Football	679
Rugby League	556
Ice hockey	345
Basketball	300
Golf	184
Speedway	141
Snooker	134
F1 and Motorsport	114
GAA	101
Boxing*	97
Horse racing	66
Handball	40
Darts*	34
Indoor Bowls*	4

Again the starred threads are based on approximations from longer running threads.

Tennis retained its crown, with Rugby Union dropping from second to sixth due to 2015 having a World Cup. The Four Nations helped boost Rugby League, as did the Cubs' historic win in the World Series (edit - boosting Baseball, not RL, that is). We also saw the once-every-four-years mega Olympics thread barge into the top five non-football sports for 2016. Another new entry was Handball, thanks to Levin. And revamping the F1 annual thread to include other codes of car racing helped to improve its post count.

[Kevin S]

Less so when a monomaniac is responsible for 75% of the posts.

Ha, takes one to know one... ;-)

[Various Artist]

Yeah, I thought that was a bit of a harsh comment, until I realised it was the resident monomaniac who'd actually made it...

Meanwhile though, Janik:

Similarly, given that the majority posting about Rugby Union are Welsh, I'm not convinced that 'posh' is the best epithet.

Hey, the two things aren't mutually exclusive you know.

[Various Artist]

Oh, and

* Indoor bowls has a rolling (ha!) thread

*applause*, sir.

[SouthdownRebel]

On the subject of tangents, probably just as well the table tennis/ping pong/wiff waff thread wasn't included - that thread is more tangent than table tennis

[Patrick Thistle]

Similarly, given that the majority posting about Rugby Union are Welsh, I'm not convinced that 'posh' is the best epithet. Maybe celtic and northern?

The sport is posh. Rugby superiority propaganda 101 "We applaud the winners off", "We don't swear at the referee" etc

Loads of oiks watch the boat race on the telly. Doesn't make it a working class sport.

[Ray de Galles]

Total fucking bollocks. I'd like you to have told the crowd I was part of in Rodney Parade last Saturday that rugby is "posh". That's before you get in to how dull and irrelevant bracketing sports as for a certain class is anyway.

This was an interesting thread and Janik's comment a light-hearted aside. If it's going to get caught up in boring shit like this it will be a real shame.

[Patrick Thistle]

You take me too seriously, Ray. You should give my contributions on rugby the same amount of consideration as you do for Janik.

(Where I grew up though, rugby was the sport of private schools and the grasping middle class. Took a girl from Gloucester to teach me otherwise.)

[Ray de Galles]

Alright then, I withdraw the venom of my remarks. I've been keeping quiet about "Rugby U" too!

[Kevin S]

I thought that was preferable to "Rugby Union" - no offence meant. (Though I see I've just flitted between both throughout!)

[ad hoc]

I confess I had no idea that the abbreviation Rugby U offended fans of that sport. Good to know

[Patrick Thistle]

Technically it should be called football of course.

RAY, THIS IS ANOTHER JOKE

[Patrick Thistle]

Back O/T

The redoubtable Kevin S has noted how the Olympics has placed highly in the listing for 2016. However I still think it shouldn't be formally ranked because that is a discussion of several sports including several that have their own threads.

[Ray de Galles]

I confess I had no idea that the abbreviation Rugby U offended fans of that sport. Good to know

Oh, it doesn't at all, though I must admit I've never seen it before.

[Kevin S]

Had a quick look to see what's been going on with the Sport threads in 2017. Sumo could be in line for a top ten (of sports not threads)* - remarkable given the thread started after four of the six Basho had been completed.

Baseball 2017 is going to claim the longest thread I think unless there's much more rugby union or tennis left to play this year.

* Edit, no it won't, I can see at least ten others which are higher

[Kevin S]

Ah, I see there's still Wales v South Africa and European Cup matches to go for rugby union. Baseball's lead may yet be in reach.

[Antepli Ejderha]

The new rugby thread is all ready to go once the European games have been played.

[Snake Plissken]

I suggest that Tennis and Basketball would fit the bill better, if Snake is passing by...?

You suggest new text, I'll change it.

[Kevin S]

Time for a crowd edit. I'll kick off with:

Razor-sharp analyses of cricket, rugby, tennis, baseball, cycling, other sports also called football (American, Gaelic, Aussie and Canadian), running and stuff, horseracing, hockey (with and without ice), cars and bikes going round really fast, basketball, golf, snooker, handball, er, sumo, darts, and indoor bowls. And that's just for starters.

Too much? Even this misses out yer shinty/camogie, the odd swimming thread and some other combat sports, or anything involving boats.

[Kevin S]

OK, I've done a tally for 2017, and the raw data is as below. With it being the current year, it's been relatively easy to see which threads have been active since 1 January and establish how many posts there have been on them. For some sports such as NFL and NBA I've recorded the annual posts - e.g. in the NFL's case that means the 2016 postseason plus the 2017 regular season.

Demerit points for Hockey (Ice), College football and darts for having a lack of clarity about which thread is current when.

I may need to revisit this in the new year as some of them might still move on a little way (unless we pretend the fourth Test isn't happening...?)

Sport	Thread	Posts in 2017
Darts	PDC ('nails at a wall')	18
Tennis	Australian Open	146
Basketball	NCAA	57
Horse Racing	Cheltenham	36
Golf	Masters	31
American Football	NFL (2016 postseason)	231
Snooker	World championships	17
Cycling	Giro d'Italia	303
Tennis	French Open	181
Cricket	ICC CT	157
Cycling	Race Across America	52
Aussie Rules	2017 thread	0
Tennis	Wimbledon	391
Cricket	Women's World Cup	91
Cycling	Tour de France	606
Swimming	World championships	6
Athletics/Para-athletics	World championships	229
Cricket	England v South Africa	335
Basketball	NBA (end of 2016-17)	112
Table tennis	Rolling thread ('wiff waff')	1
Badminton	Rolling thread ('fail')	15
Cricket	Women's Super League	17
American Football	College (Urban renewal thread)	71
Cycling	Vuelta a Espaņa & Tour of Britain	175
Tennis	US Open	357
Tennis	US Open series	8
Cricket	England v West Indies	324
Cricket	County Championship	420
Speedway	2017 thread	78
Cycling	2017 thread	701
Horse Racing	Rolling thread ('Channel 4')	20
Hockey (Ice)	2017-18 thread ('Maroon')	27
Handball	Rolling thread (2016/17)	17
International Rules	2017 thread	4
GAA	2017 thread	102
Basketball	2017-18 thread	16
Tennis	Davis Cup and Fed Cup	52
F1 and motorsport	2017 thread	271
A non-sporting event	MacGregor v Mayweather	56
Sumo	Rolling thread ('How about…')	69
Golf	Open	29
Baseball	2017 thread	912
Rugby League	2017 thread	244
Boxing	Rolling thread ('Pound for…')	53
Cricket	Internationals (rolling thread)	388
Tennis	2017 thread ('…Scottish God')	677
Darts	Rolling thread ('…on Sky')	3
Rugby Union	2017 thread	844
American Football	College (2017 thread)	109
American Football	NFL (2017 regular season)	137
Cricket	Ashes (in progress)	486
Hockey (Ice)	Rolling thread (?) ('Hot Ice')	224