ESPN's DUMBEST STAT EVER

bigpern: read my post. I didn't say that I couldn't figure out what walk-off home run meant. I said that if you'd never heard the phrase you wouldn't know what it meant.

Also read the part of my post when I said "game-ending home run" not "game-winning home run" as you apparently thought I posted. Big difference.

 

Actually, you'll notice that I pointed out the difference between "game-winning" and "game-ending." I said I have no problem putting "game-ending" in there instead of "walk-off."

I also didn't specifically mean that YOU don't know what "walk-off" means. I worded that poorly and it looks like meant you individually. I was applying it more generally to mean that anyone who can't figure that out is a moron. Obviously you know what it means or you wouldn't have been posting about how stupid it is.

 

Big-time media outlets do that all the time, trying to coin a phrase that could become part of the vernacular. It's a point-of-pride thing I guess. Granted, ESPN tries to do it every few seconds, but just saying that it's not a new concept.

 

Yep, misread your post also, so we're even.

I guess it's just a preference because game-ending home run is more precise than walk-off home run.

 

On the other hand, "walkoff balk" is awesome.

 

Good catch, BYH. But count me among those who don't get the hate for walk-off.

 

That's pretty much it.

Had Vin Scully or Jack Buck coined the phrase, it would be sheer genius.

Hate it if you want, but it is no more slang than "basket catch" or "snow cone" or "wheelhouse" or "hanging" curve or "brick" or "airball" or "Hail Mary" or any of a thousand other acceptable terms that are used.

"Hail Mary" is a precise term? Puh-leeze.

 

Take out wheelhouse and brick and those at least describe what happens in those cases. "Walk off" describes what happens at the end of EVERY inning. The players walk off.

 

They don't walk off after a home run, though.

 

But they wouldn't be walking off after a home run in innings 1-8 or the top of the 9th. They would stay on the field. They only "walk off" after three outs are executed.

Thus, "walk-off home run" means only one thing: A HR that ended the game in the home team's final at-bat . . . before a third out is executed.

 

Call me crazy, but I'd rather explain that the game ended than people are walking somewhere.