reversal or just muddle?

[Dan Goncharoff]

I think "reduce the prospect" is correct.

I also think the "needed" should be "will need".

DanG


On Sat, Mar 9, 2013 at 7:05 PM, Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      reversal or just muddle?
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Here's a sentence from an ESPN report on the Kentucky-Florida basketball
> game that Kentucky won. The context is that Kentucky has had a mediocre
> season and there was some speculation that they may not be selected for
> the NCAA Tournament and would have to win the conference tournament to
> qualify. The rest of the piece appears to suggest that this is no longer
> the case and all that UK needs to do is perhaps win its first game in
> the conference tournament. Then you get to this point:
>
> http://goo.gl/Qh7nP
> > Kentucky's win ended a two-game losing streak and increased the
> > prospect that the Wildcats needed to win the SEC tournament in
> > Nashville to secure a bid.
>
> The choice of "increased the prospect" is what makes it interesting.
> "Decrease the prospect" doesn't make sense to me--would not be a
> legitimate expression for me. Perhaps "reduce the prospect". But this is
> a "prospect" of a speculative negative outcome, so the whole "prospect"
> theme would not make sense. An alternative would be something like "the
> win reduced the pressure on the UK team to win the SEC tournament to
> qualify, as they will likely qualify on lesser accomplishments". But
> that's a complete rewrite of what's there, not merely a correction.
>
>      VS-)
>
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