OT rant

[Dukeslater21]

When did basketball announcers start saying, "He's great at scoring the basketball." It's among the stupidest phrases out there, and every broadcaster I've heard lately says it. Why? How did it get started? "He's great at scoring." That's it. You can't score without the basketball. "Scoring the basketball" has to go.

And so many people use the equally redundant phrase "end result." Stop it. Please. "Result" is "the end." That's why it's the result.

There are more, but I'll stop with this one. Now that baseball season is upon us, stop with the stupid, pretentious phrase, "He had three RBI." No he didn't. "He had three RBIs." Any initialism is made plural by adding an "s" at the end. It doesn't matter what words the initials stand for, whether those words are singular or plural. All that matters is the long-standing, common sense rule to add an "s" to the end of any and all initialisms to make them plural. So please, it's "one RBI--three RBIs." End rant. Thank you.

 

[JJhawk12]

Not a rant, but " short of the line to gain" has never sat well with me. You mean the first down line ??

And then there was Curt Gowdy , who seemed to have coined the phrase "His future is ahead of him " Yep, probably more likely than behind him

 

[Nitwit]

There was a well respected basketball announcer in Philly who did the basketball microphone in the arena during the 76ers games who always said Times out remaining instead of Time Outs remaining. He may have been grammatically correct but I’ve never heard others use that phrase. Dave Zinkoff was his name and his microphone has been “retired” by the 76ers organization.

 

[airhawk]

When did basketball announcers start saying, "He's great at scoring the basketball." It's among the stupidest phrases out there, and every broadcaster I've heard lately says it. Why? How did it get started? "He's great at scoring." That's it. You can't score without the basketball. "Scoring the basketball" has to go.

And so many people use the equally redundant phrase "end result." Stop it. Please. "Result" is "the end." That's why it's the result.

There are more, but I'll stop with this one. Now that baseball season is upon us, stop with the stupid, pretentious phrase, "He had three RBI." No he didn't. "He had three RBIs." Any initialism is made plural by adding an "s" at the end. It doesn't matter what words the initials stand for, whether those words are singular or plural. All that matters is the long-standing, common sense rule to add an "s" to the end of any and all initialisms to make them plural. So please, it's "one RBI--three RBIs." End rant. Thank you.

How about a player is "first one in the building and the last to leave." They say this about several players. They can't all be the first one in and the last to leave!

 

[Dukeslater21]

Not a rant, but " short of the line to gain" has never sat well with me. You mean the first down line ??

You nailed it. I should have included that one. Like "score the basketball," I have no idea how or why announcers started using the phrase "short of the line to gain" instead of simply "short of the first down," which is what every announcer said for well over a century. "Line to gain" also drives me nuts, so thanks. You get it.

 

[rfgiowa]

What if CAT really spelled DOG.