ball up

See also: ball-up

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Verb

ball up (third-person singular simple present balls up, present participle balling up, simple past and past participle balled up)

1. (transitive) To crush or form into a ball shape.

   She balled up her paper in frustration.

   1. (transitive) To form melted metals into balls or lumps to roll them out of a furnace for further use.
2. (transitive, intransitive) To coil up into a ball.

   He balled up his fists, ready to fight.

3. (intransitive) To become ball-shaped.

   Be careful, or the metal will ball up.

4. (intransitive) To hunch over and pull in one's arms and legs.

   Her son balls up in fear whenever there is a storm.

5. (transitive, slang) To ruin or botch.

   Synonyms: balls up; see also Thesaurus:spoil

   The best man balled up his speech, stammering and tripping over his words.

   • 1916, Ring W. Lardner, “Three Kings and a Pair”, in The Saturday Evening Post‎^[1]:

     "They got it all balled up the night I seen it," says Bishop. "The actors forgot their lines and a man couldn't make heads or tails of it."

   • 1967 September 9, Kit Pedlar and Gerry Davis, The Tomb of the Cybermen episode 2, spoken by Captain Hopper:

     It's the fuel pumps. Some character has balled up the lot.

6. (intransitive, MTE, slang) To smoke marijuana.

   Nah bro, I ain't tryna ball up tonight. I gotta focus on my studies.

   • 2018 December 11, @artemnooo, Twitter‎^[2], archived from the original on 9 October 2023:

     someone give those mans snapping themselves balling up on their sc story a hug bro they're just lonely

   • 2020 November 1, @_eLEEvated, Twitter‎^[3], archived from the original on 9 October 2023:

     God I fucking hate weed. I wish I didn't start smoking!!! Shit is an addiction🤢 I'm on my 3rd day sober and I have a loss in appetite, n lower than usual temper. Ion wanna die young lol, and to all my friends don't link me to ball up. Y'all should quit too!but I'll drink tho 😭

   • 2022 May 15, theofficialplushh, TikTok‎^[4], archived from the original on 2023-05-19:

     In Toronto, we literally have balling up rules.

   • 2022 December 23, u/StickyIgloo, “RESTAURANTS TO BALL UP IN?”, in Reddit‎^[5], r/Torontology, archived from the original on 9 October 2023:

     Why would u want to ball up in the restaurant? Smoking and eating dont mix and its better to smoke before anyway.

   • 2023 September 30, u/Eletric_Degle, “I just caught my 14 year old lil bro balling up”, in Reddit‎^[6], r/Torontology, archived from the original on 9 October 2023:

     stop trying to make him quit let him ball up one day hes gonna get so high hes gonna be scared to ball up

7. (basketball, intransitive) To play basketball, especially playing well.
8. (slang, bowling, intransitive) To switch to using a stronger bowling ball.

   Antonym: ball down

9. (skiing, of skis) To become covered in damp snow.
10. (intransitive, of a drill) To produce a lip of debris around the drill hole.
11. (dated, intransitive, transitive, slang, US) To become confused or discombobulated; to confuse (someone).

Translations

to crush into a ball

• Italian: appallottolare (it)
• Spanish: apelotonar (es)

to hunch over and pull in one's limbs