a missing "eephus"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Now, now, Larry. The up side is the surprisingly heuristic experience of finding the cross-references yourself. Mmmm, that satisfies !

JL

Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Laurence Horn
Subject: Re: a missing "eephus"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

At 7:36 AM -0700 7/6/05, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>Check HDAS 1. (It's Expert Recommended ! ! ! )
>
>JL

Interesting. Actually I did, but after reading this I did again, and
this time I found it lurking under "ephus". (Several pages away, of
course, and no cross-listing under the ee- spelling.) That wouldn't
have helped with the OED or AHD, but it does help considerably with
HDAS. But in my defense, I'll note that the "ephus" spelling is by
far the rarer: 625 google hits to 4740, 1 (yes, 1) Nexis hit to 204.
And not surprisingly, since the "eephus" spelling proudly wears its
phonology on its orthographic sleeve.

As for antedates, if web sites like the one below are correct in
attributing its "invention" and, presumably, dubbing to Sewell in the
1930s, searching texts for the "eephus" spelling may enable us to
push back the HDAS first cite (1943) considerably. Note that there's
a non-baseball sense of "the ephus", as in "have the ephus
on"--apparently 'have the goods on', and glossed as 'truth', and also
an attested sense as 'gimmick, gizmo', but it's not clear from the
cites whether the latter pre- or postdates the Sewell pitch. In any
case, given the evidence of the numbers, I think "eephus" needs its
own entry.

I will, however, refrain from calling this a lexicographic blooper.

L

>Laurence Horn wrote:
>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender: American Dialect Society
>Poster: Laurence Horn
>Subject: a missing "eephus"
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>>>From today's NYT on yesterday's Yankee game:
>
>The New York Times
>July 6, 2005 Wednesday
>
>SECTION: Section D; Column 3; Sports Desk; BASEBALL; Pg. 1
>HEADLINE: Johnson Delivers Strong Performance on Short Rest for the Yankees
>BYLINE: By TYLER KEPNER
>
>There are bad days at the office, and there are days like the one
>the Yankees inflicted on the Baltimore Orioles yesterday. Before
>Randy Johnson allowed a base runner, the Yankees had 10 runs and 11
>hits, including three homers. The Orioles had made three errors.
>...
>Johnson has mostly hidden his sense of humor since spring training.
>Yesterday's game, however, was such a laugher that Johnson even
>smiled after lobbing an Eephus pitch to Sal Fasano in the third
>inning. Johnson let it go when he noticed catcher John Flaherty was
>confused about where to set his target.
>
>======================
>I'm mostly familiar with references to the eephus, a VERY slow pitch
>with a VERY high arc, in connection with descriptions and films of
>the home run Ted Williams hit off one thrown by the premier
>eephusite, Rip Sewell, in the 1946 all-star game. (No, I wasn't
>there.) In googling the word, I found a very nice description and
>history at http://www.answers.com/topic/eephus-pitch
>which includes The Kid's home run and much more. (I'm not sure I'd
>have called Bill Lee's version--the "Leephus"--a true eephus, based
>on films I've seen of the Sewell pitch. But maybe if you smoked as
>much dope as the Spaceman claimed he did, it would be hard to tell
>the difference.)
>
>I'm sure Dickson has a representative entry for the word. But
>there's absolutely nothing in either the OED or AHD4. To give a sense
>of its frequency, there are 204 Nexis hits (22 from the New York
>Times alone, between 1981 and the present) and 4740 google hits. A
>curiously large number, including today's, use upper-case.
>
>Larry
>
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