Department of Redundancy Department
One of my many pet peeves is redundancy in language. When I hear people use terms like "ATM machine" and "PIN number," they just sound stupid. I hear the latter often in commercials, which is even worse, because professional writers, editors, agencies and more are involved, and stuff like that still slips by.
So it drives me a little nutty when I hear or see redundant baseball terms. Today, I was listening to the Red Sox home opener radio broadcast on my computer, and I was following along on Yahoo! In the 7th inning, Yahoo! posted this: "D. Ortiz homered to deep right." Well, he couldn't have homered to shallow right.
Another one that I hear all the time that bothers me is "grand slam home run." A grand slam is, by definition, a home run. You can't have a grand slam triple, or a grand slam sacrifice fly. If you hear "grand slam," you know it's a home run. Or you should.
Sometimes less is more.
©2006 Douglas T. Dinsmoor
posted by Douglas T. Dinsmoor @ 8:03 PM
3 comments
3 Comments:
I have to admit I am frequently guilty of the ATM machine and PIN number gaffs. But I was absolutely indignant when I signed on to Boston.com last night to check the headlines and saw this: "Suspect sought in two fatal killings." I have yet to hear of a non-fatal killing.
Mon Apr 17, 04:14:00 PM MDT
Well, Ortiz could have popped to shallow right, had the 1st baseman, 2nd baseman and right fielder have a 3-way debilitating non-error collision that allowed the ball to trickle closer to the line, resulting in an inside-the-park homer to shallow right. Happens all the time.
Also, you can have a Denny's grand slam breakfast at Denny's. Sometimes just to silently laugh at the reaction of fans around me, I'll yell, "c'mon, hit a grand slam!" when the bases aren't loaded.
Thu Apr 13, 02:36:00 AM MDT
RBI's.
Runs batted in's?
All of them?
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