eight-ball

eight-ball

See also: eightball and eight ball

English

Alternative forms

• 8 ball
• eight ball

Etymology

eight +‎ ball

Noun

eight-ball (plural eight-balls)

1. A pocket billiards (pool) game played with sixteen balls (a cue ball and fifteen object balls) on a pool table with six pockets.
2. The billards ball, almost always black, bearing the number eight.
3. (slang) A portion of cocaine or methamphetamine weighing 1/8 of an ounce, or 3.5 grams.
   • 2003, House of Sand and Fog, 00:43:39:

     (a policeman confiding to a friend) ".. She had welts and bruises all over. So, one night we get called out there again, and I slip down their hallway and stuff two eight balls in his closet. Turns out he was on parole. He goes back to jail, she's safe, and I slept like a baby."

4. offensive slang for black people (because of how in pool the 8 ball is black)
   • 2005, "Creed, OK", Carnivàle episode 17

     When a white fellow gets in the ring with an eight ball the eight ball's got no chance. You see, 'cause they call boxing the sweet science. And that's where your colored just runs into trouble. That's just that science part.
     Yeah, but Joe Louis is a big 'un.

Derived terms

• behind the eight-ball

Verb

eight-ball (third-person singular simple present eight-balls, present participle eight-balling, simple past and past participle eight-balled)

1. (pool) To pot all one's colour balls and then the black ball (or eight-ball) without the opponent potting a single one.
   • 2008, Edward Keating, The Joy of Ex: A Novel

     She whips me in the first game of pool, I do not even get a shot. Eight-balled from the break.

     “Have you been practising?” I ask my sister.

     “Some,” she says, “play again?”

     “One more.”

     My sister beats me at pool in public a second time. I claim some dignity back by potting two of my balls before Tammy sinks the black.

Coordinate terms

• nine-ball

Anagrams

• lightable