tonight

[Alice Faber]

At 12:15 PM -0500 7/4/2000, Greg Pulliam wrote, ostensibly about tonight:

>I have noticed over the past few years a tendency for baseball
>announcers to refer to afternoons as "tonight."  As in today's,
>"We'll see if (David) Cone is the Cone of old tonight," referring to
>a 1:00 p.m. EDT start on ESPN.  Is this just a case of announcer
>misspeak, or is this a semantic shift that's available only in this
>venue?
>
Disgusting though it is, evening is obviously the unmarked time for a
baseball game. I watch a lot of baseball and have noticed the same
usage, and I believe I've also heard it from players in post-game
interviews (as in "I didn't have my good stuff tonight"). I think
I've also heard back-tracking corrections (e.g., "starting
tonight--er, this afternoon will be..."). It occurs to me to wonder
whether this usage extends to Patriots Day in Boston, when games
traditionally start in the morning.
--
Alice Faber                                       tel. (203) 865-6163
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