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TOP > ワードアップ英会話 WORD UP ENGLISH CLASS 日記 > Vocabulary: "underdogs" and "favorites"
The term "underdog" is usually used in sports to mean the team or player which is most likely to lose, and its opposite is "favorite," meaning the team or player most likely to win.
So for example, in NBA basketball, if the Denver Nuggets have a record of 5 wins and 15 losses, and they play a game against the Boston Celtics, who have 13 wins and 7 losses, then Boston will be the favorites (expected to win the game) and Denver will be the underdogs (expected to lose).
There's a popular expression in English:
"Everybody loves an underdog."
This means that people often enjoy cheering for the player who has less of a chance to win, and a classic example of this in sumo would be the popularity of the short and small wrestler Mainoumi, who most people loved to cheer for when he fought against opponents who were almost always bigger and taller than him.