second-stringer
noun
Simple meaning
Someone who plays second string.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
sehkuhnstringerSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈsɛkənstˈɹɪŋɚ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A person who plays second string. A person who is kept on a sports team as a backup in case a "first-string" player is unavailable.
An athlete who plays only when a starter on the team is replaced
A person who is not good enough to be considered proficient but may be useful as a backup.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Typical Use
- Rare
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A person who plays second string. A person who is kept on a sports team as a backup in case a "first-string" player is unavailable.
Used this way, second-stringer is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a sporting use: familiar to anyone who follows the game, and puzzling to anyone who does not.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Sports
- News/reporting
- Everyday conversation
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.