clothesline

plural clotheslines · alternative UK clothes line

1. A rope or cord tied up outdoors to hang clothes on so they can dry.

   Hang this towel out on the clothesline for me.

   Synonyms: washing line

2. A structure with multiple cords for the same purpose, such as a Hills hoist.
3. CanadaUSinformalThe act of knocking a person over by striking his or her upper body or neck with one's arm, as if he or she had run into a low clothesline.

present singular third person clotheslines · participle present clotheslining · participle past clotheslined · past clotheslined · alternative UK clothes line

1. AustraliaCanadaUSinformaltransitiveTo knock (a person) over by striking them across the neck or upper body with an outstretched arm, mimicking the motion of running into a low clothesline.

   The referee called a personal foul, when he clotheslined the running back.

   2 more examples

   One beast jams out its arm, as if to clothesline me, jagged claws poised to take my head off at the neck. I let my feet fall from under me, throwing my legs forward, praying for some momentum, ducking and sliding, a mad limbo to freedom.

   2014, Jonathan Wood, No Hero, Titan Books, →ISBN

   "I turned around and the next thing I was taken out by this big guy. I'm not sure if he punched me or clothes-lined me," he said.

   2014 February 21, “Ear-bite actor Clive Mantle was like 'big monster', court told”, in BBC News