closer

English

Etymology 1

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkləʊ.sə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkloʊ.sɚ/

  • Audio (US)

    (file)

  • Audio (US)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊsə(ɹ), (General American) -oʊsə(ɹ)

Adjective

closer

1. comparative form of close: more close
   • 1976, Sidney L. Greenblatt, editor, The People of Taihang‎^[1], White Plains, NY: International Arts and Sciences Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 168:

     In the spring of 1938 the Japanese imperialists invaded Yü-tz'u and T'ai-ku in Shansi. Everyone was in panic as the flames of war came closer and closer to Hsiang-yüan hsien.

   • 2013 July 20, “Welcome to the plastisphere”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:

     [The researchers] noticed many of their pieces of [plastic marine] debris sported surface pits around two microns across. Such pits are about the size of a bacterial cell. Closer examination showed that some of these pits did, indeed, contain bacteria, […].

2. Within a shorter distance.

   Come closer, my dear.

Etymology 2

From Middle English closere, equivalent to close (verb) +‎ -er.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkləʊ.zɚ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkloʊ.zɚ/

  • Audio (US), noun

    (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊzə(ɹ), (General American) -oʊzə(ɹ)

Noun

closer (plural closers)

1. Someone or something that closes.

   In our organization, the VP of Sales usually acts as the closer.

2. Someone or something that concludes.

   The DJ chose a fantastic track as his closer at the end of the night.

3. (sales) Synonym of close (“the point at the end of a sales pitch when the consumer is asked to buy”)
4. The last stone in a horizontal course, if smaller than the others; a piece of brick finishing a course.
   • 1852, Notes on Building and Road-making:

     The longitudinal bond of the walls is only 24 inches, or one fourth of the length of a brick of 9 inches, and is obtained by introducing closers 24 inches broad

5. (baseball) A relief pitcher who specializes in getting the last three outs of the game. See Wikipedia:closer (baseball)

   They brought their closer in for the ninth.

Derived terms

• boot closer
• door closer
• file closer

 

Translations

baseball: relief pitcher

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 接近 (zh) (jiējìn)

• Finnish: sulkija (fi)
• French: stoppeur (fr) m
• Japanese: 抑え投手 (osae tōshu), クローザー (kurōzā), ストッパー (sutoppā), 守護神 (ja) (shugoshin)
• Korean: 마무리투수 (mamuritusu)
• Polish: bliżej
• Russian: ближе (ru) (bliže)

Anagrams

• Cloers, Clores, Corles, ceorls, cresol, escrol, sclero-