English can be a funny language

[silentC]

I disagree. The word 'miss' does not tell you how close it was. If I kick a ball at 90 degrees to the goal post, then I have "missed by a mile". If it just whizzes by the wrong side of the post, then it is a 'near' miss. I think that an adjective is OK in that context. In some cases it is important to know how close it was, like when a torpedo is aimed at your boat, a near miss is more dramatic.

A tautology is only such if the adjective or adverb is already implied in the noun or verb that is being modified. Free gift is a tautology, as is pierced through. Near miss is not.

It's not an oxymoron either because near does not contradict miss.

People say "miss hit", when they mean someone hit the ball incorrectly, and on the face of it that is an oxymoron. But miss is used in the sense of misfit or mismatch, rather than miss vs hit. Same source probably.

[HappyHammer]

The stereotype of someone from East London, like myself, speaking in rhyming slang is so funny. Much of the more commonly known rhyming slang isn't used anymore and when rhyming slang is used it's usually only a single word as suggested by some above such as;
Whistle = suit
Barnet = hair
Tom = Jewelery
Tin Bath = laugh, commonly spoken as "You're 'aving a large tin one mate"

I've never heard anyone say "apples and pears" just doesn't happen except when Dick Van Dyke did his terrible cockney accent in Mary Poppins total crap.

HH.

[Gingermick]

I disagree. The word 'miss' does not tell you how close it was. If I kick a ball at 90 degrees to the goal post, then I have "missed by a mile". If it just whizzes by the wrong side of the post, then it is a 'near' miss.

And the goal umpire gives you the same result either way. When you get into the colloquial connotations ie did you hit it? 'nearly' means you missed and the adjective near is adjacent enough to the adverb nearly for me to give it a behind in the tautological sense. Of course nearly missed is an entirely different proposition, and I may be drivelling.
So i've just convinced myself you were right. But i like the word tautology and thought I'd throw it in.

[silentC]

But the word 'miss' doesn't imply it was near, so when the coach is deciding who gets the job of kicking conversions, the guy with the near miss will get looked at before the guy who put it in the commentary box

[Gingermick]

This has been interesting, I nearly missed this thread and would have been unhappily disappointed had that occurance eventuated.

[silentC]

This has been interesting

You need to get out more!!

[Gingermick]

I'm designing a subdivision on a block of land that has an average grade of 1 in 3. And it's sheeeeting me.

[jmk89]

Mishit

It is not a combination of miss and hit
It is one word meaning a bad hit - like a cricket shot off the splice: it is a hit but not a good one


Near miss

it was a near miss: it was a miss that was near.
It is not illogical, it is just that "near" qualifies the verb "to be" and "miss" is functioning as an adjective modifying the subject of the verb "to be"

[silentC]

It is not a combination of miss and hit

You're kidding aren't you?

I actually doubt mishit is a word. I believe it is a hypenated word - miss-hit - if anything. "define:mishit" brings up nada but googling mishit gets a few hits - but then don't believe everything you read on the internet.

But regardless there is no doubt in my mind that the phrase (or word if you insist) comes directly from "miss" and "hit", as does misfit (miss-fit - a fit that misses) and mismatch (miss-match - a match that misses).

[silentC]

OK I've looked that one up. mis- and miss both come from the same root: missa- so I will concede your point.

[silentC]

No, I've done some more research on it. The word mishit doesn't exist in any of my dictionaries - including Macquarie and they are fairly progressive about adding new words. So it's either a non-word based on mis-hit or it is a hyphenated word miss-hit. The latter is acceptable, the former plainly not!!

I was wrong about misfit and mismatch though - seems the prefix mis- is at least as old as the word miss.

[echnidna]

could it be mi-????

[jmk89]

No, I've done some more research on it. The word mishit doesn't exist in any of my dictionaries - including Macquarie and they are fairly progressive about adding new words. So it's either a non-word based on mis-hit or it is a hyphenated word miss-hit. The latter is acceptable, the former plainly not!!

I was wrong about misfit and mismatch though - seems the prefix mis- is at least as old as the word miss.

The explanation of Mis- (and why the hyphen does not appear) in the Shorter OED suffices for me; ie it is an adverb meaning "badly" affixed as a prefix to a verb. Mishit means "badly hit". You only need the hyphen if it is a new word - one it is part of the language, the hyphen will go.

[silentC]

could it be mi-????

Yeah that struck me too. The tendency is to want to pronounce it mi-sh-i-t. I'm sure I've never seen it written anywhere, but I just Googled it and got 96,500 hits on it vs. only about 70,000 on "miss hit". Must be an American thing...

[silentC]

The explanation of Mis- (and why the hyphen does not appear) in the Shorter OED suffices for me

So does the OED list mishit specifically?