balls

• IPA^(key): /bɔːlz/

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

• (Canada, cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /bɑlz/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔːlz

balls

1. plural of ball

   Can you believe he can juggle six balls at once?

   • (Can we date this quote?) W. S. Gilbert, HMS Pinafore

     When the balls whistle free o'er the bright blue sea / We stand to our guns all day.

2. (vulgar, colloquial) The testicles.

   After that shot, his balls were really hurting!

balls pl (plural only)

1. (uncountable, vulgar, colloquial) Masculinity, particularly strength, courage, and force of will; chutzpah; brazenness.
   • 2007 September 28, Graham Linehan, The IT Crowd, Season 2, Episode 6:

     Douglas: You've got spunk. And balls. And I like that in a woman.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:courage

   He must have a lot of balls to talk to his boss that way.

   He's the guy with the big balls in that group.

   Balls is all that it takes to succeed.

   • 1960, Carlos Fuentes, Sam Hileman, Where the Air is Clear‎, page 80:

     Balls is all it takes to handle these people

   • 2006, Leonardo Padura, Havana Blue‎, page 137:

     “Balls, gentlemen, balls is what you need to win at this game"

2. (uncountable, British, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Commonwealth, Hawaii, vulgar, colloquial) Synonym of bollocks, nonsense.

   That's a load of balls.

3. (UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Commonwealth, Hawaii, vulgar) A balls-up; a botched job.

   Don't make a balls of it!

balls (third-person singular simple present ballses, present participle ballsing, simple past and past participle ballsed)

1. (vulgar, transitive) Speaking or acting with bravado to achieve (something)
   • 1981, Tiny Boyles, Hank Nuwer, William Boyles, A Killing Trade, →ISBN, page 191:

     You're going up to the front door of that mansion and ballsing your way inside.

   • 2009, Keith Brooke, The Accord, page 135:

     The poor fuck is broken-hearted, and he thinks he is ballsing it out really well, but he isn't.

   • 2014, Claire Farrell, Make You: Stake You #2:

     He was ballsing his way through the conversation. For the first time, I caught a glimpse of something vulnerable behind the usual brashness.

2. (vulgar, slang) To engage in sexual intercourse.

balls

1. third-person singular simple present indicative of ball

• balls about, balls around
• balls on
• balls up

balls (not comparable)

1. (slang) Very. Intensifier.

   It is balls cold out there.

• ball on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• testicle on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• courage on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencian) [ˈbaʎs]

balls

1. plural of ball