🚀 Gained advantage 🧥 Back parts of coat

coattails

6.0

An advantage gained by being close to someone powerful

noun
/ˈkoʊtˌteɪlz/

: influencia

There have always been side men stuck in the shadows, riding the coattails of greatness.

If McCormick does well, he he may they, there may be some reverse coattails in Pennsylvania.

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Examples

I was sort of riding their coattails in as a junior scholar.
Well, it's it comes up as he holds on to the coattails of your like hard work.
And we just started a conversation at the bar and I grabbed onto his coattails and didn't let go.
If McCormick does well, he he may they, there may be some reverse coattails in Pennsylvania.

Megyn Kelly
They know what the truth is that they're setting Trump up for a landslide victory where his coattails will be enormous.
I owe it to I owe it to you all of the money, all of the all of the success that I've had is all be off the coattails of what you've done.
She at the time was pursuing a music career and didn't want to feel like she was writing a show on Mt VS coattails to that music career.
Many politicians achieve success by leveraging the coattails of popular leaders.
After the successful campaign, several candidates benefited from the coattails of the party's frontrunner.
She rode the coattails of her famous mentor to gain recognition in the industry.

Antonyms

independence

608 3.0

Freedom from control by others, for example when a country is free or a person supports themselves

Idioms

on one's coattails

Informal

1 7.4

Gain an advantage from someone else's success without doing much work

on the coattails of

7.1

Getting success because someone more successful already did the work

on the coattails

7.7

Get success without earning it because someone more famous helped you

Compounds

coattails effect

Specialized

1 8.4

A popular candidate helps other candidates from the same party win votes

Surface Forms

coattails plural

Morphology

coattails = coattail (semi-transparent) = coat + tail + s

The plural 's' is regular, but the figurative sense 'to benefit from association' is an extended idiom not fully derivable from the literal components.

Etymology

The word coattails (meaning the influence you get from a powerful person) comes from the parts coat and tails, the long back parts of a coat. Picture someone 'riding' another person's coattails to be carried into success, and that's why to 'ride someone's coattails' means to gain advantage from them.