Monday morning quarterback
noun
a person who criticizes the actions or decisions of others after the fact, using hindsight to assess situations and specify alternative solutions.
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Monday morning quarterback
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Monday-morning quarterback
Monday-morning quarterbackA person who criticizes or passes judgment from a position of hindsight, as in Ethel was a Monday-morning quarterback about all the personnel changes in her department—she always claimed to have known what was going to happen. This expression, first recorded in 1932, alludes to fans who verbally “replay” Sunday's football game the next day, the quarterback being the team member who calls the plays.
Monday morning quarterback
Americannoun
Informal.
Monday morning quarterback
British
noun
Monday-morning quarterback
Idioms
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of Monday morning quarterback
First recorded in 1940–45
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Therapy may help you with this Monday morning quarterback.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 10, 2025
"One doesn't want to be a Monday morning quarterback on that," he said.
From Salon ● Apr. 5, 2020
“Everyone wants to play Monday morning quarterback and say, ‘You could have did that, you could have done that,’” Escoto said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 15, 2018
“If you’re playing Monday morning quarterback, you say why don’t you run the clock out and then score,” Luck said.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 11, 2016
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said it's easy for critics to "play Monday morning quarterback" on the training program's slow progress.
From US News ● Sep. 16, 2015
“It’s very easy to Monday-morning quarterback and sit on the couch and tell us what we should have done now that the thing has happened,” he said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 14, 2025
“It’s always easy to sit back and Monday-morning quarterback a case,” he said Thursday.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 30, 2022
The chief added, “I think there are a lot of things that could have happened. Certainly people will Monday-morning quarterback this situation to death.”
From Washington Post ● Oct. 30, 2021
It’s easy to Monday-morning quarterback these things, though, and to be fair to the Post, not only is the unstoppable apparatus top secret, Parscale is a notoriously prickly interview.
From Slate ● Mar. 12, 2019
He said it “would generally be inappropriate” to act as a Monday-morning quarterback on that case.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 24, 2014
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
