Meaning
Completely unexpected and without warning or apparent connection to what came before, as of a question, offer, or development that catches everyone off guard. Chiefly North American; the related 'out in left field' describes a person as eccentric, mistaken, or out of touch, and 'way out in left field' intensifies that sense. Informal; 'out of left field' is roughly neutral about the surprise, while 'out in left field' mocks the person it describes. Regional use: Chiefly American English.
Origin
American, from baseball, where left field is one of the three outfield positions. The documented record: researcher Ken Liss uncovered the Boston Herald of 8 October 1919, in which sports editor Burt Whitman called a confused baserunner 'out in left field', glossing it as 'the latest slang expression for any one who is loose in the coco' (loose in the head); a Lowell Sun columnist wrote 'way out in left field' days later, so the metaphor was current in New England by late 1919. The 'unexpected' sense arose in the American music trade: Billboard printed 'out of left field' by 1943, and historian Arnold Shaw documented 1949 song-plugger slang calling a surprise hit 'a hit out of left field'. Why left rather than right field is unproven; the soberest suggestion, per the Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang, is that the throw from left field to first base or home is among the longest on the diamond. Folk stories about a Chicago mental hospital beyond the Cubs' left-field wall, or Babe Ruth playing right field, are debunked: the institution was a general county hospital, and Ruth joined the Yankees in 1920, after the phrase was already in print.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- come out of left field
- from out of left field
- out in left field
- way out in left field
Usage Examples
- The question about her first novel came out of left field, but she answered it graciously.
- His resignation arrived out of left field; nobody in the department had suspected a thing.
- The offer to buy the family bakery came out of left field, though the owners had been quietly struggling.