fall guy
a person who is blamed
TRANSLATION
fall guy = Angeschmierter, Prügelknabe, Bauernopfer, leichtes Opfer, Sündenbock
STATISTICS
IN THE PRESS
"Despite his discomfort, the former star yen derivatives trader for UBS and Citigroup has become globally recognized, some might say, as a FALL GUY for the Libor scandal, which involved myriad actors, including bankers, banks, and even world governments."
Marco Quiroz-Guitierrez — Fortune Magazine (4th August 2025)
—
“Waltz has been seen as a potential FALL GUY, but even before Trump’s public vote of confidence, there were questions about whether anyone would be punished, particularly because it might be seen as a capitulation to Democrats and the news media.”
Brett Samuels & Alex Gangitano — The Hill (25th March 2025)
Did you
know?
fall guy
colloquial noun phrase
- a person who is blamed or punished for something wrong that another person has done
- someone who is punished for the errors of others; scapegoat. Also, a male who is gullible and easy to take advantage of
- a person who is blamed for something bad when others who were also responsible are not blamed
Oxford Learner’s Dictionary, WordWeb Online, Cambridge Dictionary
—
PHRASE ORIGIN
The etymology of "fall guy" is somewhat mysterious, but here's what we know: the term appeared in mass public culture in the U.S. at least by the 1920s. In 1925, it was the title of a Broadway play, "The Fall Guy," by James Gleason and George Abbott, starring Ernest Truex and Dorothy Patterson.
The Broadway play was turned into a crime film by Hollywood in 1930, "The Fall Guy," with the "fall guy" again used by a gangster as an unwitting narcotics courier. It saw widespread use in the crime-dominated film noir era of the mid-to-late 1940s into the early 1950s.
The phrase likely derives from the concept of someone "taking the fall" - being the person who gets caught, punished, or blamed when something goes wrong.
The term appears to have originated in criminal and confidence game contexts, where one person would be designated to accept blame if a scheme was discovered. This matches the 1930 film plot where "Herman plants illegal drugs on Quinlan, who is nabbed by federal agent Charles Newton" - making Quinlan the fall guy.
William Safire promoted a search in 2007 to unearth the definitive origins, but no conclusive etymology has been established. The term's exact birth remains elusive, though its criminal underworld origins and 1920s popularization are well-documented.
The phrase captures the cynical practice of designating someone expendable to absorb consequences while protecting those truly responsible.
—
SYNONYMS
scapegoat, patsy, boob, chump, dupe, FALL GUY, fool, goat, mark, patsy, pigeon, sacrifice, sap, schlemiel, schmuck, stooge, sucker, victim, whipping boy
—
SMUGGLE
OWAD into a conversation today, say something like:
“You can remember ‘FALL GUY’ with the following sentence ‘Falsely Accused Loser who Loses while others escape!’ ”
—
P L E A S E S U P P O R T O W A D
On evenings and weekends, I research and write your daily OWAD newsletter together with Helga—my lovely wife and coaching partner—and our eagle-eyed daughter, Jennifer.
It remains FREE, AD-FREE, and ALIVE thanks to voluntary donations from appreciative readers.
If you aren’t already, please consider supporting us — even a small donation, equivalent to just 1-cup-of-coffee a month, would help us in covering expenses for mailing, site-hosting, maintenance, and service.
Just head over to DonorBox:
Please help keep OWAD alive
or
Bank transfer:
Paul Smith
IBAN: DE75 7316 0000 0002 5477 40
Important: please state as ’Verwendungszweck’: “OWAD donation” and the email address used to subscribe to OWAD.
Thanks so much,
Paul, Helga, & Jenny Smith
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Feedback, questions, new word suggestions to: paul@smith.de
- OWAD homepage, word archive, FAQs, publications, events, and more: www.owad.de
---
- To unsubscribe from OWAD, CLICK HERE
