goose egg

noun

Informal.

1. the numeral zero, often used to indicate the failure of a team to score in a game or unit of a game.

   a pitchers' duel, with nothing but goose eggs on the scoreboard.

2. a lump raised by a blow, especially on the head.

Word History and Origins

Origin of goose egg¹

1350–1400; 1885–90, goose egg for def. 1; Middle English: the egg of a goose

Idioms and Phrases

Zero, nothing, especially a score of zero. For example, Our team did badly, earning goose egg, or My income from writing this year was goose egg. This expression is an Americanization of the earlier British duck's egg. [Mid-1800s]

Example Sentences

Don’t let the scoreboard fool you; it could have been an Orange Lutheran goose egg — so much so that Ellinghouse said he considered the game a shutout.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

As in, the five goose eggs the Dodgers’ once-struggling bullpen put on the scoreboard.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

A goose flew onto the field in the eighth inning of the Dodgers-Padres game Wednesday night — perhaps fitting as the Dodgers laid goose eggs after the third inning.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

I don't know how to put this other than to form a rhetorical circle with my thumb and forefinger signaling a big fat goose egg.

Read more on Salon

No punctures, but a little goose egg on top of her sweet head.

Read more on Seattle Times

Related Words

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