"go for the downs"
Bill Palmer
w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET
Fri Aug 27 09:22:00 UTC 2010
Another phrase favord by Ol' Diz was, after a homerun swing which produced
no results: "He had quite a ripple at that one"
Bill Palmer
----- Original Message -----
From: "Garson O'Toole" <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 27, 2010 3:24 AM
Subject: Re: "go for the downs"
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> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: "go for the downs"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Here is some more extracted text from "Ol' Diz", the Dizzy Dean
> biography. It seems that the book does credit Dean with popularizing
> the phrase, but does not positively assert that he created the phrase.
> (Conjecture based on restricted snippet view of the text):
>
> Diz had his own vocabulary, a catalog of phrases that might have been
> well known to his radio listeners in Missouri but was alien to the
> rest of the nation. It was an amalgam of ballplayer slang, country
> expressions, and Diz's own inventions.
>
> An easy play might elicit this: "He reached up for it like he was
> picking an orange off a doggone tree and the man was out." Once while
> watching a young fastball pitcher, Diz, whose arm was still suffering
> the effects of throwing too many fastballs, noted, "Every time he
> throws one up there my arm goes shreeek!"
>
> One of the most famous was, "He's going for the downs," uttered after
> a particularly vicious swing - and usually miss - by a batter.
>
>
> On Fri, Aug 27, 2010 at 2:00 AM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
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>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster: Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject: Re: "go for the downs"
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Now there's a problem -- if Dizzy Dean is credited with saying it, he
>> may have just invented it on the spot.
>>
>> "It ain't bragging if you can back it up"
>>
>> DanG
>>
>> On Fri, Aug 27, 2010 at 1:40 AM, Garson O'Toole
>> <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>> header -----------------------
>>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster: Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
>>> Subject: Re: "go for the downs"
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> Here is an eight example sampling spread across the decades starting
>>> in 1952 of the related expressions: going for the downs, go for the
>>> downs, swinging for the downs, swing for the downs. All examples are
>>> from baseball and all examples are from Google Books. Text is visible
>>> in full view or preview mode except the Dizzy Dean example which is in
>>> snippet view.
>>>
>>> 1952 August, Baseball Digest, Page 7. (Full view)
>>> The way they play him it's silly for him not to hit to right field.
>>> "Of course," continued "Philibuck," qualifying his directions,
>>> "there's a time and a place for it. When you're going for the downs,
>>> when a run means a ball game, then he has to swing for the fence."
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=8DIDAAAAMBAJ&q=downs#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> 1962 September, Baseball Digest, Page 36. (Full view)
>>> He wonders just what to throw next and where to throw it so that some
>>> 160-pound .250 hitter, swinging for "the downs," won't assassinate his
>>> ball game with a home run that would have passed muster with Babe Ruth
>>> himself.
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=lrYDAAAAMBAJ&q=downs#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> 1965 July, Baseball Digest, Page 12. (Full view)
>>> Lower batting averages, for one thing, a result in part of more
>>> hitters going for the downs, swinging for the fences.
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=azIDAAAAMBAJ&q=downs#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> 1969 June, Baseball Digest, Page 16. (Full view)
>>> While I don't like to change my swing, I do at times, according to the
>>> pitcher and the pitch. "For instance, against a sinker-ball pitcher or
>>> a knuckler you just can't be thinking about going for the downs. You
>>> just try to meet the ball as best you can and get a piece of it.
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=izIDAAAAMBAJ&q=downs#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> 1976 January, Baseball Digest, Page 86. (Full view)
>>> More and more batters began to go down to the knob of the bat with
>>> their grip and to swing for the downs with the effort if not the
>>> success of the Babe
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=8TEDAAAAMBAJ&q=downs#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> 1992, Ol' Diz: a biography of Dizzy Dean by Vince Staten (Snippet view)
>>> One of the most famous was, "He's going for the downs," uttered after
>>> a particularly vicious swing - and usually miss - by a batter. That
>>> same scenario might also bring Diz to comment, "Brother, he had a
>>> ripple.
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=a9JtAAAAMAAJ&q=%22the+downs%22#search_anchor
>>>
>>> 2003, The Complete History of the Home Run by Mark Ribowsky, Page 7.
>>> (Preview)
>>> As for "HR" on the scorecard, that was not really in the ballpark yet
>>> - and I mean that literally, since the spacious dimensions of the
>>> ballparks (many of which didn't have outfield fences) made "going for
>>> the downs" produce no more than a fly ball that made the crowd go
>>> "ooooh" but were in reality easy pickin's for good outfielders,
>>> bare-handed and all.
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=NiKyPk3hHyAC&q=downs#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> 2010, 1960 Pittsburgh Pirates: Day by Day: a Special Season, an
>>> Extraordinary World Series by Rick Cushing, Page 344. (Preview)
>>> Clemente had a going-for-the downs swing that he sometimes uncorked,
>>> mostly when the count was 2-0 or 3-0. He'd swing so hard that he'd
>>> seem to come out of his shoes, and he'd spin around like a top before
>>> falling down.
>>> http://books.google.com/books?id=XKoG1vpohL4C&q=%22the+downs%22#v=snippet&
>>>
>>> Garson
>>>
>>> On Thu, Aug 26, 2010 at 11:57 PM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>>> header -----------------------
>>>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>> Poster: Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM>
>>>> Subject: Re: "go for the downs"
>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>> I never heard the phrase before. GN shows some usages in the 70s. I
>>>> would be more likely to use "swing for the fences" or "trying to take
>>>> the pitcher downtown" to mean the same thing -- a hard swing. I don't
>>>> know if "downtown" is the source.
>>>>
>>>> One thought -- for many years, the stadium for the Dodgers' main farm
>>>> team was Delorimier Downs in Montreal. Perhaps there was a
>>>> strategically placed sign?
>>>>
>>>> DanG
>>>>
>>>> On Thu, Aug 26, 2010 at 9:47 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
>>>> wrote:
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>>>>> header -----------------------
>>>>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>> Poster: Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>>>> Subject: Re: "go for the downs"
>>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>
>>>>> At 9:25 PM -0400 8/26/10, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>>>>>>Not only is it not in HDAS, I've never heard of it before.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>How common can it be? Did it once refer to actual place near a
>>>>>>ballpark
>>>>>>called "The Downs"?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I watched Yankees baseball on WPIX for ten years in the '50s and '60s,
>>>>>>and
>>>>>>the Mets on WOR for years after that and never noticed its use.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>JL
>>>>>
>>>>> It's familiar to me, especially as "swing(ing) for the downs".
>>>>> (Maybe The Downs are where all the marbles can be found.) It seems
>>>>> to me it's used mostly as a criticism; a player who ought to be just
>>>>> trying to get on base or hitting a single or a ball into the gap in
>>>>> going for/swinging for the downs is swinging from his heels and
>>>>> likely missing the ball or popping up.
>>>>>
>>>>> LH
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>On Thu, Aug 26, 2010 at 9:17 PM, George Thompson
>>>>>><george.thompson at nyu.edu>wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>>>>>> -----------------------
>>>>>>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>>>>> Poster: George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
>>>>>>> Subject: "go for the downs"
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I recall my father using this expression, to describe a baseball
>>>>>>> batter who
>>>>>>> has taken a very vigorous swing: "he was going for the downs with
>>>>>>> that
>>>>>>> swing." I have just heard Al Leiter say it, on a rerun of a
>>>>>>> Yankees
>>>>>>> broadcast from earlier this month.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> My impression is, that it only refers to a vigorous swing that
>>>>>>> misses the
>>>>>>> ball, or at least, that fails to produce a home run. I have never
>>>>>>> heard it
>>>>>>> in statements like *He went for the downs in the 5th inning, or
>>>>>>> *Batters
>>>>>>> have gone for the downs against him 17 times this season.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I don't see it in OED, nor in HDAS.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> GAT
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> George A. Thompson
>>>>>>> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre",
>>>>>>> Northwestern
>>>>>>> Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>>>>>>>
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>>>>>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>--
>>>>>>"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>>>>>>truth."
>>>>>>
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