off year
1
6.0
- noun
:
año malo
- Last season was an off year for the sports team, as they lost twice as many games as they won.
- rebound from an off year
Examples
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Maybe it was an off year or just a long year, but how will that atmosphere get any word of mouth or other promotion for next year's event?
Blog text (1) -
Anytime we have those sorts of years, we tend to see S&P returns which are vastly negative.
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In presidential years, turnout is around 60% (which is deplorable), but in off years, turnout is an anemic 40% or less.
Blog text (27) -
Although he struggled with his performance, he remains optimistic about bouncing back from this off year.
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Due to economic downturns, the company faced an off year with significantly lower sales than usual.
Synonyms
69
4.4
A period when the economy or business gets worse
10
3.9
A sudden decrease in amount, quality or rate
3
4.0
A drop in amount, level, or quality
Antonyms
How Productive
Surface Forms
Morphology
The sense of a year being 'not normal' or lacking something important is directly suggested by combining 'off' (not normal/absent) with 'year', and parallels constructions like 'off day' or 'off season', so a learner can get a general gist. However, the specific political nuance — that it denotes a year without major elections — is a domain-specific extension that a B1 learner who only knows the constituent words may not reliably infer without prior exposure.
Etymology
Off year comes from the image of a year being off, like a machine switched off after a busy time, so farms or companies do less work that year. That's why it means 'lower productivity'.