buttonhook

buttonhook

English

Etymology

button +‎ hook

Noun

buttonhook (plural buttonhooks)

1. (sewing) A hook used to pull thread through the holes of a button.
2. A hook for pulling the buttons of gloves and shoes through the buttonholes.
   • 1976, Saul Bellow, Humboldt's Gift, New York: Avon, →ISBN, page 370:

     Hustlers used to sell shoes like that to the greenhorns fifty years ago with a buttonhook for a bonus.

3. (American football) A play in which the receiver runs straight downfield, then turns back toward the line of scrimmage.
   • 1988, January 15, “Ted Cox”, in The Sports Section‎:

     Yet the Bears never set up the deep patterns with a turn-in or a buttonhook […]

Translations

A hook used to pull thread through a button's holes

Irish: crúca cnaipe m Italian: please add this translation if you can Plautdietsch: Knoophoake m Polish: haczyk (pl) m Portuguese: abotoador m Russian: please add this translation if you can

Verb

buttonhook (third-person singular simple present buttonhooks, present participle buttonhooking, simple past and past participle buttonhooked)

1. (American football) To perform the buttonhook play.