Colemanballs is a term coined by '' Private Eye'' magazine to describe verbal gaffes perpetrated by sports commentators."TV and Radio Sport's Howlers"
BBC.co.uk, 16 December 2005 ''Coleman'' refers to the surname of the former

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

David Coleman David Robert Coleman OBE (26 April 1926 – 21 December 2013) was a British sports commentator and television presenter who worked for the BBC for 46 years. He covered eleven Summer Olympic Games from 1960 to 2000 and six FIFA World Cups from ...

Background

BBC Midlands

Sutton Coldfield

in fact the broadcaster responsible was a fellow BBC commentator,

Ron Pickering Ronald James Pickering (4 May 1930 – 13 February 1991) was an athletics coach and BBC sports commentator. Biography Pickering was born in Hackney. His father was a sign fixer. He became head boy at West Ham Secondary School (later to become ...

."Olympic Games: Days of abandon and the one grim day they did abandon"

Barry Davies Barry George Davies MBE (born 24 October 1937) is an English retired sports commentator and television presenter. He covered a wide range of sports in a long career, primarily for the BBC. Although best known for his football commentary, D ...

, ''

Independent on Sunday ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'', 8 August 2004 "Coleman retires without a word: it's probably safer that way"
Brian Viner, ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'', 15 December 2000 At the

1976 Summer Olympics Events January * January 3 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force. * January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea. * January 11 – The 1976 P ...

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

, Pickering commentated on a race involving the

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...

n double- gold medallist

Alberto Juantorena Alberto Juantorena (born 3 December 1950) is a Cuban former runner. He is the only athlete to win both the 400 and 800 m Olympic titles, which he achieved in 1976. He was ranked as world's best runner in the 400 m in 1974 and 1976–1978, a ...

, whose muscular build and nine-foot stride contributed to his nickname ''El Caballo'' (the horse)."IOC Profile - Alberto Juantorena"
Olympic.org

Until his retirement,

motor racing Motorsport, motorsports or motor sport is a global term used to encompass the group of competitive sporting events which primarily involve the use of motorized vehicles. The terminology can also be used to describe forms of competition of tw ...

commentator

Murray Walker Graeme Murray Walker (10 October 1923 – 13 March 2021) was an English motorsport commentator and journalist. He provided television commentary of live Formula One coverage for the BBC between 1976 and 1996, and for ITV between 1997 and 20 ...

frequently featured in the column. His excitable delivery led to so many mistakes that they began to be labelled "Murrayisms". Examples include "We've had cars going off left, right and centre", "do my eyes deceive me, or is Senna's Lotus sounding rough?", "with half of the race gone, there is half of the race still to go", "There is nothing wrong with the car, apart from that it is on fire", "That car is totally unique, apart from the car behind it, which is identical", and "The gap between them is now nine-tenths of a second; that's less than a second!". ''Private Eye''s "Colemanballs" column has now expanded to include occasional quotes from sportsmen themselves (e.g.

Frank Bruno Franklin Roy Bruno, (born 16 November 1961) is a British former professional boxer who competed from 1982 to 1996. He had a highly publicised and eventful career, both in and out of the ring. The pinnacle of Bruno's boxing career was winning ...

's "That's cricket, Harry, you get these sort of things in boxing"), politicians ( John Major's "When your back's against the wall it's time to turn round and fight"), and

malapropism A malapropism (also called a malaprop, acyrologia, or Dogberryism) is the mistaken use of an incorrect word in place of a word with a similar sound, resulting in a nonsensical, sometimes humorous utterance. An example is the statement attributed to ...

s from other public figures. In the United States,

Jerry Coleman Gerald Francis Coleman (September 14, 1924 – January 5, 2014) was a Major League Baseball (MLB) second baseman for the New York Yankees and manager of the San Diego Padres for one year. Coleman was named the rookie of the year in 1949 by Ass ...

, a former baseball player not related to David Coleman, became known for similar statements as an announcer, such as, " Rich Folkers is throwing up in the bullpen", and " Winfield goes back to the wall, he hits his head on the wall! And it rolls off! It's rolling all the way back to second base. This is a terrible thing for the Padres."''

Baseball Almanac Baseball Almanac is an interactive baseball encyclopedia with over 500,000 pages of baseball facts, research, awards, records, feats, lists, notable quotations, baseball movie ratings, and statistics. Its goal is to preserve the history of baseba ...

''
"Jerry Coleman Quotes"
6 January 2014. Retrieved on 27 May 2014. In spite of these statements, which earned him the nickname "The Master of the Malaprop", he was honored by the Baseball Hall of Fame with the Ford Frick Award, their lifetime achievement award for announcers.

Books

'' Private Eye'' has issued compilations of ''Colemanballs'' in book form * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Footnotes

{{Private Eye British humour Private Eye 1980s neologisms Speech error Terms for quotations of notable persons

Background

Books

See also

Footnotes