Meanings
- USnot comparablehobbiesDescribing a sports commentary in which a commentator describes every action in some detail as it occurs, often assisted by a second commentator who provides background information and other comments.
Synonyms: ball-by-ball
- figurativelynot comparableProviding a detailed stepwise description (of how certain events unfolded).
A stripper who works at the New York gentlemen’s club where the Cardi B brawl reportedly popped off gave a play-by-play account of the fracas in a recent radio interview.
2018 September 6, Terry Shropshire, “Stripper tells what happened in Cardi B fight with Offset’s alleged mistress”, in Rolling Out
plural play-by-plays
- UShobbiesA detailed description or analysis of sporting events as they occur in succession, one play at a time.
So I collected a cross section of play-by-plays, definitely not as many as I'd like to collect but enough to feel pretty comfortable with what I was seeing.
2004, Dean Oliver, Basketball on Paper: Rules and Tools for Performance Analysis
Synonyms & antonyms
adjectiveDescribing a sports commentary in which a commentator describes every action in some detail as it occurs, often assisted by a second commentator who provides background information and other comments.
Origin
Cite this entry
play-by-play. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/play-by-play
“play-by-play.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/play-by-play. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “play-by-play,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/play-by-play.
Source: play-by-play on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.