| 词源 |
foul ball. A ball hit outside of the fair playing area in baseball has been called a foul ball since the 1860s. By the 1920s the term was being used generally for any useless, inadequate or contemptible person, and specifically for an inferior boxer, a palooka. The great American word inventor and cartoonist T. A. Dorgan is said to be the first person to use the expression in this extended sense. More recently foul ball has been used to mean an outsider. See palooka. |