beer league

American  

[beer leeg] / ˈbir ˌlig /

noun

1. a community sports league, such as for hockey, softball, or soccer, whose members are amateurs of diverse ages and walks of life and play purely for the fun and socializing involved: games are usually accompanied or followed by alcohol and food.

   My dad has played hockey in a beer league for years now, along with accountants, plumbers, and students.

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adjective

1. relating or belonging to an amateur community sports league typically more focused on social activity than athletic prowess.

   Whether at the professional level or the beer-league level, team chemistry is just as important as talent.

   A few years back my beer league softball team lost our sponsor, so we had to come up with a new name.

2. typical or suggestive of a beer league, especially in lacking skill, sophistication, professionalism, etc..

   After a decade of low-end, beer-league uniforms, even hospital gowns would be an upgrade for this major-league team.

   As impressed as I was that my beer-league therapist had delivered a major-league, insightful diagnosis, I was in no mood to discuss it.

   That kind of haphazard management seems pretty beer league.

Other Word Forms

• beer leaguer noun

Etymology

Origin of beer league

First recorded in 2010–15

Example Sentences

Nothing against the Badger State, but the idea of a Mexican chef of Salgado’s caliber setting up on a peninsula jutting into a Great Lake is like Shohei Ohtani announcing he’s leaving the Dodgers to join a Sunday beer league.

From Los Angeles Times

After getting a look at those awful softball beer league uniforms the All-Stars wore Tuesday night, can we all agree to bring back the days when players wore their own team uniforms?

From Los Angeles Times

Beer league and youth racers alike have fewer excuses now that the double, one of The Summit at Snoqualmie’s oldest lifts, has been replaced with a Doppelmayr triple lift rising higher up the mountain.

From Seattle Times

He has the choice of walking away and playing for free in a Sunday beer league in which people won’t call him names.

From Los Angeles Times

Heinicke said afterward, ball cap on backward, a winner for the first time as an NFL starter, as casual as a beer league softball player.

From Washington Post