noun
Meaning 1
An incompetent or inept person.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: US
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Meaning relationships
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
Phrase guide
sad sack
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
Pronunciation
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Australia: Recorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
noun
Meaning 2
A perennial failure or victim of misfortune.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: US
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Meaning relationships
Synonyms: defeatist, loser
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Meaning 3
someone who makes mistakes because of incompetence
Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Meaning relationships
Synonyms: bungler, blunderer, fumbler, bumbler, stumbler, botcher, butcher, fuckup
Antonyms: none provided
Broader terms: incompetent, incompetent person
History
Etymology
US 1920s. Popularized by Sad Sack, a cartoon character and eponymous comic strip published originally June 1942 in Yank, the Army Weekly, a US Army publication for soldiers, and later syndicated in the US 1940s and 1950s. Presumably from vulgar “sad sack of shit” as cartoonist Sgt. George Baker said he took it from a “longer phrase, of a derogatory nature”. The term originally referred to a well-meaning but inept soldier.