-ball
-ball
combining word
a person who is obnoxious or strange because of what is indicated: oddball/ goofball/ dirtball/ dizzball/ sleazeball
baseball of a specified sort: billyball/ greedball
[1970s+; first sense probably fr 1930s screwball, ”eccentric person,” fr late 1920s name of a baseball pitch, suggesting screwy, ”crazy, eccentric”; second sense fr the kind of baseball played by the teams of the manager billy martin]
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- -basher
-basher combining word a person who har-sses or beats the person or item indicated: j-pan-basher/ f-g-basher/ honkybasher (1880s+ british)
- -bashing
combining form, combining form (informal) indicating a malicious attack on members of a particular group queer-bashing, union-bashing indicating any of various other activities bible-bashing, spud-bashing, square-bashing derived forms -basher, combining_form:in_noun:countable -bashing combining word hating and attacking what or who is indicated: bush-bashing/ f-ggot-bashing/ geezer-bashing/ gringo-bashing/ paki-bashing (esp since late 1950s+)
- -biosis
a combining form meaning “mode of life,” used in the formation of compound words: aerobiosis; parabiosis. -biosis combining form indicating a specified mode of life symbiosis derived forms -biotic, combining_form:in_adjective word origin new latin, from greek biōsis; see bio-, -osis -biosis suff. a way of living: parabiosis.
- -blast
variant of blasto- as final element of a compound word: ectoblast. -blast combining form (in biology) indicating an embryonic cell or formative layer mesoblast word origin from greek blastos bud -blast suff. an immature, embryonic stage in the development of cells or tissues: erythroblast.
- -blastic
a combining form meaning “having a given type or number of buds, cells, or cell layers,” or “undergoing a given type of development,” as specified by the initial element: holoblastic. -blastic suff. having a specified number or kind of formative elements such as buds, germs, cells, or cell layers: epiblastic.