Some of My Favorite Sports Cliches

Are you beginning to wonder if your team lost to a better team even you they beat you 50-20?

It seems like fewer players, coaches and fans on the losing team "step up" and say they lost to the better team.

At any rate, I promise to write 110 percent of this story. How is it conceivable to give more than the maximum effort available? That idea remains an unsolved mystery. My research, however, has accounted claims as high as 150 percent.

Cliches are a microcosm of sports. Here are more of my favorites:

1) "That'll give the coach more gray hairs."

Some coaches have receding hairlines. They'll probably take any color they can get. Sometimes a coach loses his hair by choice, if losing a bet involves head shaving.

2) "They diagrammed that play perfectly" or "that was the perfect play call."

That should be refined to "executed perfectly."

Doesn't it seem mildly ironic that it is only said when "I-right 34 counter" gains 20 yards but if they same play gets stuffed for a 2-yard loss it's all of the sudden a "dumb play." What about the knucklehead that missed his block?

3) "Touchdown saving tackle."

All tackles made short of the goal-line save touchdowns. How about a quarterback sack? That tackle really saved a touchdown.

4) "He got run over by a freight train."

Good thing they mean that figuratively and not literally because as far as I can tell, no freight train has ever come into a stadium to strike a player.

5) "Now we've got a football game."

Didn't we have one when the week started?

6) "He's a talented young freshman."

All freshmen are young aren't they? Unless there is such thing as a 24-year old high school freshman. Is there something we're not being told?

7) "The stats speak for themselves."

If there's no stat sheet handy, how do we know?

8) "We wanted it more."

So there's a way of crawling inside the brain of your opponent and detecting that you had more desire to win the game?

9) "We were motivated to win because the media picked us to lose."

So what happens when you lose and get picked to win? Does that mean you were motivated to play your worst game of the season? Maybe the team "did not meet its expectations."

10) "We're using what our opponent says as bulletin board material."

What happens when your opponent becomes mute? Then, you can't get quoted "out of context." They can't be "misquoted" either. As long as they are "on the same page."

11) How about when there's a basketball game and a coach calls a time out?

The TV commentator refers to "Coach Johnson stopping the music. The music is actually starting because the band plays.

12) "They need a defensive stop."

Let's hope it's not an offensive stop because that might be a disaster.

13) "He's some kind of player!"

Do you mind telling us what kind of player?

14) "He's a cutter and slasher"

This is most commonly used for basketball. Thank goodness this phase has fallen out of favor with the OJ Simpson murders.

15) "He's got his whole future ahead of him."

There's a peerless incite into the obvious. Aren't all futures ahead? Thank goodness it's not the past that's ahead. When it comes to clichés in the sports world, well, "obviously, there's no question about it."

Cliches can be used "on any given day." You just have to "step up" and bring your "A-game."