Grammar/style .... walked on

[BB Bobcat]

A) Joe Shmo walked on to the baseball team.
B) Joe Shmo walked onto the baseball team.
C) Joe Shmo walked-on to the baseball team.

I couldn't find a specific reference in the AP stylebook, and the dictionary wasn't much help for this sports-specific verb, but my gut tells me that A makes the most sense. Perhaps C. Definitely not B.

What say you SportsJournalists.com?

 

[JackReacher]

D. None of the above.

 

[mrbigles01]

A, but I am basing that on nothing more than a gut instinct of how I would do it.

 

[Versatile]

He walked on, so he walked on to the baseball team.

If he had walked onto the baseball team, he would have trampled his new teammates, which isn't good for first impressions.

 

[reformedhack]

Your best choice is to recast the sentence.

But if I had to use that exact verbiage, I would go with -- and have seen it this way in well-edited publications -- "walked on to the baseball team" (option A).

Option B, using the very specific preposition "onto," denotes a spatial relationship, as in "The missile fell onto the deck of the ship."

Option C misuses a hyphen ... "walked-on" is not a compound modifier.

 

[MightyMouse]

Definitely not B, unless he physically walked on top of the team.

Joe Schmo was a walk-on on the baseball team.

I don't know that the hyphen there translates to C. I think I'd still go with A.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

he was a walk-on with the baseball team.

http://www.yourdictionary.com/walk-on?

 

[writingump]

How about walked on the baseball team?

 

[Thomas Goldkamp]

How about walked on the baseball team?

That's essentially the same as Option B, no?

 

[lone star scribe]

If you really want to stay with the active verb -- "He made the baseball team as a walk-on."

 

[Point of Order]

I think coaches are now insisting that they be referred to as non-scholarship student-athletes.

 

[Versatile]

"He non-scholarship student-athleted on to the team."

 

[BillyT]

I think coaches are now insisting that they be referred to as non-scholarship student-athletes.

And that concerns us how?

 

[mediaguy]

Easiest thing to do is say "joined the team as a walk-on." Awkard to make the noun a verb in this context, strange as it seems.

 

[Point of Order]

I think coaches are now insisting that they be referred to as non-scholarship student-athletes.

And that concerns us how?

It's probably our fault the kid didn't get a scholarship in the first place.