shortstop

See also: short stop and short-stop

English

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker-der.?

Proto-Germanic *skertaną

Proto-Germanic *skurtaz

Proto-West Germanic *skurt

Old English sċort

Middle English schort

English short

English stop

English shortstop

From short + stop.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ʃɔɹt.stap/, [ʃɔɹˀstap̥]

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

shortstop (plural shortstops)

1. (baseball) The infield defensive player that stands between the second baseman and the third baseman.

   The shortstop ranged deep into the hole to make the stop.

   • 2016, Mike Westphal, Cloud of Expectation; Book One: The In America Series, Xlibris, →ISBN:

     “Your father was the best baseball player anyone had ever seen.” Excited but halting, her voice ran on past all obstacles. “We watched him play shortstop, and my father said he was the best, and my brothers too. The Cardinals sent a man down to talk to him about one of their teams.” Like an ancient marineress, she would not let go. She meant the St. Louis Cardinals’ farm teams.

   • 2025 June 11, “White Sox pitching prospect Grant Taylor makes jump from Double-A to perfect major league debut”, in Associated Press‎^[1], archived from the original on 12 June 2025:

     Cam Smith bounced to shortstop on a 100 mph fastball, and Jacob Melton also grounded out on an 86.9 mph curveball.

2. (figuratively) A nimble defender.

   I'll play shortstop when we make our proposal.

3. (gambling) A player who is short of money.
   • 1981, Sam Grafstein, Dice Doctor:

     The shortstops and desperados were not permitted to play in this marker crap game.

Translations

baseball: defensive player between second and third baseman

• Bulgarian: шортстоп m (šortstop)
• Catalan: interbase (ca) m or f
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 游擊手 / 游击手 (yóujīshǒu)

• Czech: spojka (cs)
• Finnish: sortti (fi) (in baseball); polttaja (fi) (in pesäpallo)
• French: arrêt-court (fr)
• Hungarian: beállós (hu)
• Italian: interbase (it)
• Japanese: ショート (ja) (shōto), 遊撃手 (ja) (ゆうげきしゅ, yūgekishu),
• Korean: 유격수(遊擊手) (ko) (yugyeoksu), 쇼트 (ko) (syoteu)
• Polish: łapacz (pl) m
• Portuguese: interbases
• Spanish: campo corto m, parador en corto m, torpedero m
• Vietnamese: chặn ngắn

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Danish: ^{(please verify)} kortslutning (da)

See also

• catcher
• pitcher
• first baseman
• second baseman
• third baseman
• infielder
• outfielder

Verb

shortstop (third-person singular simple present shortstops, present participle shortstopping, simple past and past participle shortstopped)

1. Alternative form of short-stop (to play shortstop).
   • 2012, Robert L. Tiemann, Mark Rucker, Joseph M. Overfield, Nineteenth Century Stars, page 20:

     He captained the Tecumsehs of London, Ontario, (International Association) in 1878; shortstopped for Cincinnati in 1879; stayed out of baseball in 1880; and finished as shortstop for Boston (NL) in 1881.

   • 2017, Brandon Isleib, Playing for a Winner, page 77:

     Managed and shortstopped by George Wright and full of league stalwarts—Joe Start, Paul Hines, and Jim O'rourke—they also had 1-year-old phenom Monte Ward as primary moundsman (teams now generally used multiple pitchers).

   • 2017, Susan Forest, Lucas K. Law, Juliet Marillier, The Sum of Us: Tales of the Bonded and Bound:

     He shortstopped for a few years for the Houston Astros when they won the World Series twice in a row.

2. Alternative form of short-stop (to cause to stop short).
   • 1978, Carol D. Jori, “Container Revolution in Bremerhaven”, in Sealift, page 18:

     They will be shortstopped in the port for lease by the government, then continue their journey by military train.

   • 2006, Oskar Nuyken, Neodymium Based Ziegler Catalysts - Fundamental Chemistry, page 64:

     In the polymerization of BD by Ti-, Co- and Ni-based catalyst systems the polymerization has to be shortstopped at a specific monomer conversion in order to avoid the formation of gel.

   • 2008, Gary Linderer, Phantom Warriors, page 148:

     Although he successfully shortstopped the assault on his two teammates, the enemy soldiers now concentrated their fire directly on him.

Anagrams

• stop short

French

Etymology

Borrowed from English shortstop.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ʃɔʁt.stɔp/

Noun

shortstop m (plural shortstops)

1. (baseball) shortstop

Further reading

• “shortstop”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012

Spanish

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker-der.?

Proto-Germanic *skertaną

Proto-Germanic *skurtaz

Proto-West Germanic *skurt

Old English sċort

Middle English schort

English short

English stop

English shortstopubor.

Spanish shortstop

Unadapted borrowing from English shortstop.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ʃoɾtesˈtop/ [ʃoɾ.t̪esˈt̪op]
• Rhymes: -op

Noun

shortstop m (plural shortstops)

1. (baseball) shortstop

Usage notes

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.