Does "threw the bum out" mean "threw the (narcotic) drug away"?

Forums: Grammar, Esl, English
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What does "bum" mean here?
1) drug (like marihuana, ice, heroin)
2) a member of a sports team who takes drugs.

Which one?

Context:

Columnist on Braun: Baseball threw the bum out
Benny Sieu-USA TODAY Sports USA TODAY Sports

Milwaukee Brewers left fielder Ryan Braun, who was National League MVP in 2011, was suspended for the rest of the season Monday for violating Major League Baseball's drug policy.

by Christine Brennan, USA TODAY Sports

This is a great day for baseball. The suspension of Ryan Braun is just the beginning of a drug bust of significant magnitude, a painful yet encouraging sign that someday -- perhaps in the distant future, but someday – Major League Baseball will be able to say it is clean, or almost clean.

More:
http://m.usatoday.com/article/news/2576365

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Type: Question • Score: 9 • Views: 1,776 • Replies: 21

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View best answer, chosen by oristarA

@oristarA,

"Bum" here refers to Ryan Braun.

1 Reply

@oristarA,

Interesting question Ori.

I don't usually answer your queries but this one shows how diverse English is.

It is thought that the word bum(American not British where it means "buttocks") is derived from the German word for (bread) loaf . Bummeln.
A bummler was a person in a bread line.

During the Depression the term came to be used for the millions of Americans out of work and criss crossing the US in rail cars asking for help.
The term also became a catch phrase in baseball where the fans would greet a lousy player with the shout "Throw the bum out!"

To "loaf "today is to shirk your duty at work or at home.
And people say: "Can I "bum" a cigarette?" Can I beg a cigarette from you?

0 Replies

@InfraBlue,

InfraBlue wrote:

"Bum" here refers to Ryan Braun.

Why was he treated as a loafer and should be thrown out?

2 Replies

@oristarA,

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/ryan-braun-doped--lied-and-cared-only-for-himself-050550708.html

0 Replies

@oristarA,

Quote:

Why was he treated as a loafer and should be thrown out?

Bum in this content just is just a derogatory term for the baseball player in question with some small historic tied in to referencing to baseball players who playing you do not care for as bums.

Throwing the bum out in the content of a game mean a demand from the fans to replaced that player on the field with another player

1 Reply

@BillRM,

Bill -- please stay off the ESL threads. These are people trying to perfect their knowledge of standard English. Your own use of the language is hard enough to understand for those of us who are already fluent in English. Trying to make heads or tails out of your eccentric grammar and bizarre misuse of certain terminology can only confuse the learner.

3 Replies

@Lustig Andrei,

LOL................

0 Replies

@Lustig Andrei,

I'll add:

This sentence is so garbled

Quote:

some small historic tied in to referencing to baseball players who playing you do not care for as bums.

as to be unfathomable.

And why do you have to devalue my post by using this adjective "small"?

I clearly showed it wasn't" some small historic"

2 Replies

@panzade,

Quote:

I clearly showed it wasn't" some small historic"And why do you have to devalue my post by using this adjective "small"?

To me you did a wonderful job of explaining all the history behind the term and I did learn from your posting myself however in my judgement rightly or wrongly you kind of over did it.

Find myself doing the same thing in relationship to a question touching on technology and burying someone in details that are so details that the answer is not as clear at it should/could be.

Did not mean to degrade your response however.

2 Replies

@panzade,

Bill's written English is so bad his posts are often nearly incomprehensible. It really bothers me when he tries to post on threads that have been initiated by people who are trying hard to learn the language.

1 Reply

@Lustig Andrei,

Quote:

It really bothers me when he tries to post on threads that have been initiated by people who are trying hard to learn the language.

Everyone have a right to make their own judgments on the worth of someone else postings.

0 Replies

@BillRM,

Quote:

Did not mean to degrade your response however.

Ok I misunderstood

0 Replies

I kind of feel bad that oristarA need to put up with all the personal attacks cause by the bad feelings that bleed over from the discussion threads.

It might be nice if we could keep such behaviors off his threads.

0 Replies

@Lustig Andrei,

Quote:

Bill -- please stay off the ESL threads. These are people trying to perfect their knowledge of standard English.

You should definitely not be pointing fingers, Merry Lustig, because you have been one of the greatest purveyors of absolute crap when it comes to describing how English works.

0 Replies

@BillRM,

Quote:

however in my judgement rightly or wrongly you kind of over did it.

Your judgement, as usual is wrong.. I didn't over do it. I gave a Chinese friend a peek into American English etymology as it pertains to a current event in baseball.

Why do you come on these threads and devalue people's contributions?
Are you that insecure?

1 Reply

@panzade,

Quote:

Your judgement, as usual is wrong.. I didn't over do it. I gave a Chinese friend a peek into American English etymology as it pertains to a current event in baseball.

Why do you come on these threads and devalue people's contributions?
Are you that insecure?

I was under the impression you had accepted both my explaining why I said what I said and that I did not mean to devalue anything as I had stated that I found the information in your posting interesting myself.

Now you wish to reopen the issue and filled up this thread with more arguments?

For myself I apologized to oristarA that this nonsense is ongoing in one of his questions threads where it surely does not belong.

1 Reply

@BillRM,

I thought I had accepted your explanation too.

Then i went back and reread your insulting post and realized your explanation was plain old bullshit.

If you feel bad for ol' Ori just don't come on these threads and insult well meaning posters.

Capice?

1 Reply

@panzade,

Sorry but if and when I feel I can or even might be able to add to his understandings of a subject I will continue to do so and just ignore any attacks that others feel they need to launch at me for doing so.

Damn shame that hard feelings generated in other areas are bleeding over onto his threads however.

0 Replies

Throw the bum out has, if I remember and I think I do, a history of usage in baseball. In some of those contexts, who was the "bum" varied depending on who was up at bat.

Re Braun, he is somewhat of a representative of people taken to be users of "supplements" to pump up any of their natural abilities, getting away with it, and working up big number regarding stats in baseball history, which is taken very seriously by many.

All sorts of the rest of us don't want to see things like growth hormones used by baseball batters.
Others seem to think that is all fine, but I think that group may have a select number of fans.

So - that was a reference to the old usage of throw the bum out - to the situation with Braun.

1 Reply

Does "threw the bum out" mean "threw the (narcotic) drug away"?

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