1. Keep your eye on the ball
2. Head in the game
3. Winningest Team, coach, player
4. [Randy Wolf is recovering from] Tommy John surgery.

I was really surprised to see "winningest" in the dictionary, even though it is called "informal." It's a strange word.

Winningest was used yesterday by the BBC!!! Tiger Woods is now the second most winningest Major tournament golfer.

We had a thread about this for a while in 2002; see https://wordcraft.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/74160389...596041821#8596041821

I'm sure there are plenty more, though.

quote:

Originally posted by Graham Nice:
Winningest was used yesterday by the BBC!!! Tiger Woods is now the second most winningest Major tournament golfer.

Is that how they used it? I'd say "the second winningest" rather than "the second most winningest".

quote:

Originally posted by wordnerd:

quote:

Originally posted by Graham Nice:
Winningest was used yesterday by the BBC!!! Tiger Woods is now the second most winningest Major tournament golfer.

Is that how they used it? I'd say "the second winningest" rather than "the second most winningest".

Are you implying that one sounds any better than the other?

quote:

Originally posted by Graham Nice:
Are you implying that one sounds any better than the other?

Or perhaps that one sounds "less not quite right than the other?

quote:

Or perhaps that one sounds "less not quite right than the other?

That's it! Oh, and the word for Less Not Quite Right is LNQR.

OK, I thought of another one (weird sports phrase). When a gymnast lands perfectly at the end of a routine on the uneven parallel bars, they say she "really stuck that landing."

To [really] stick the landing--is the image one of a dart that lands in the bullseye or something?

I thought "stick the landing" means to stand firm when dismounting - as in gymnastics.

Speaking of weird sports related phrases, in Webb City, Missouri, when they discovered that the Boys & Girls Club was occupying an unsafe building, the Mayor declared, "Someone dropped the ball." (from the Joplin Globe)

Sports-related metaphors are sprinkled all over the corporate and political landscape. In fact, there is a book, the name of which escapes me--something like Hardball for Women, which discusses the differences in male and female speech patterns and advises women to use sports metaphors if they want to get ahead in business.

Being a sports fan for most of my life, I honestly can't find anything wrong with "winningest". It sounds a lot better than "most winning". For this same reason, "second most winningest" is completely absurd. Both "second most winning" and "second winningest" are completely acceptable.

I realize where you are coming from when you say that "winningest" is abhorrent, but I've heard it for so long that to me, "most winning" sounds a bit off.

"winningest" is abhorrent

Whyever would somebody say it's abhorrent? Winning is an adjective, and winningest is its superlative form. I think sombody may have dropped the ball in grammar school.

That's the abhorrentest superlativist ball-droppingest remark we ever conceived of.

More superlatives than you can shake a stick at.

Well, from the previous discussion, it seemed like people were really against it.

As for grammar school, they taught me just about nothing about grammar. I learned not to use "ain't", and that's the extent of it.

Well, my defensiveness is coming out, I suppose. I was the first to question "winningest" by saying, "it's a strange word." I hadn't heard of it and was surprised that it's a word. That's all. I am not becoming a prescriptivist, I promise.

Remember, this "strange word" phrase is coming from someone who regularly uses "epicaricacy."

quote:

Oh, and the word for Less Not Quite Right is LNQR.

Yippeeee! As a Scrabble addict, I'm always on the lookout for strange and beautiful stuff like words with no vowels and words with a "Q" but no "U". LNQR works BOTH ways!!! But wait...it isn't listed in the official Scrabble dictionary. Now, how did they miss that little jewel????