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🪣 A bag of sand 🥊 To attack unfairly 🏠 To protect with bags 🕵️ To deceive
to sandbag

to sandbag

3 7.5
To pretend to be weaker to get an advantage later
  • verb
  • /ˈsændˌbæɡ/
  • Informal
: fingir incompetencia
  • All he can see is a lawyer who misappropriated client funds that were due to the government in forfeiture; a lawyer who tried to sandbag his client in ex parte communication with a federal judge to better his own personal interests; a lawyer who lied to judges and other lawyers (the referee's written opinion uses the word "lied" four times).

If they felt like I got slighted, I got gypped, I got sandbagged or or maybe just, you know, I just feel like this person got more and I got less.

Examples

  • The coach warned his team not to sandbag their abilities in front of the scouts.

  • The last time I let a trainer sandbag my expectations about the return to competition of a top horse was in the fall of 2000, when Neil Drysdale all but said Fusiachi Pegasus would be lucky not to need a cab ride from the quarter pole to get through his late-season comeback in the Jerome at Belmont Park, and I believed every word.

    Blog text (18)

  • Listen, you got to sandbag your first parole hearing, because...

    Let's Go to Prison (2006)

  • What gives you the right to come here... ...sandbag me with my past after I've paid my debt to society?

    The Tailor of Panama (2001)

  • And it turned that team into a very hard-boiled, tough bunch that learned to sandbag and play smart almost every minute of every game.

    Blog text (24)

  • So we don't really want to sandbag our cash cow S curve of Facebook ads with the metaverse.

  • Not too many teams will be able to bring 6-7 perimeter players the way MSU did, but there will be some, and those will be games when he may have to sandbag, as he did against MSU.

    Blog text (24)

  • I gather I'm supposed to be worried that Bill Clinton's convention speech, which the Obama campaign hasn't been allowed to vet, will somehow sandbag the president's campaign.

    Blog text (29)

  • Simon Cowell is furious at NBC for trying to sandbag next week's premiere of "X Factor" by adding a Wednesday installment of "The Voice," declaring, "This is a cynical, cold-hearted, unprofessional way of doing business."

    Blog text (3)

  • During the negotiation, he tried to sandbag the other party by downplaying his company's profits.

Synonyms

to railroad
vsto sandbag
  • Informal
24 7.0

To force someone to do something quickly and unfairly

uses trickery or subtle pressure rather than overt quick coercion
to dragoon
vsto sandbag
  • NSFW
1 9.7

To force someone to do something by threats or strong pressure

relies on deception or downplaying abilities instead of open threats
to kick someone when they are down
vsto sandbag
  • Informal
1 6.9

To treat someone badly when they already have problems

pressures or tricks someone, often regardless of their vulnerability

How Deceptive

to sandbag
  • Informal
3 7.5
to mislead
152 3.9

Surface Forms

sandbag infinitive
sandbagged past
sandbagged past participle
sandbagging present participle
sandbags third person singular

Etymology

Sandbag as a verb meaning to hit or attack comes from the old action of striking someone with a hidden 'sandbag', a heavy soft sack used as a surprise weapon. That's why to be sandbagged is to be attacked or treated unfairly, often by surprise.