amo, amas, amat

One of the broadcasters for the Ravens-Steelers matchup on Sunday Night Football two weeks ago burst out with this illuminating phrase live on air: "Fair caught!" There was some sort of "at the such-and-such yard line" afterwards, but I have to admit I wasn't really paying attention to anything except that egregious butchering of the English language.

"Fair catch" is a noun phrase. In shorthand broadcaster-speak, "Fair catch at the 20" is perfectly acceptable; the verb, "made", is implied. But the word "catch" in this phrase is never a verb, and saying "fair caught" makes you sound absolutely illiterate. Not all of us who watch football notice this stuff, or care, but some of us actually have a care for the language we speak. Bottom line: the crunch of a helmet-to-helmet tackle may be delightful, but pulling a Jack-the-Ripper on grammar is not.

anno domini

The New York Times' Dave Caldwell reported today that Harvard and Yale have been going at it since 1875, and that Saturday's game was their 126th meeting.

On the very next Sports page, however, the Associated Press acknowledged Lehigh and Lafayette as "the country's oldest rivalry", dating back to 1897. The teams have played each other 145 times to date.

And here I thought age was calculated by years, not by number of games. Silly me.