The Fraught Shop

From Dwight Kidder, January 3, 2003:

Over the past season that Joe and I have been watching football together, we've come up with a shorthand for those times when we think what's about to happen is a really bad idea. For example, when you see Tommy Maddox spin out of a possible sack, then try and run with the ball, and then throwing into quadruple coverage. This is usually greeted with the single syllable "fraught", the short form of "fraught with misadventure, fraught with danger, fraught with difficulty." It's not a word like 'ensuing', as Bill Simmons described it (wrongly), as a word that only has one word which follows it. Many words can follow 'fraught', but always they come with 'with', and none of them are good. You'll never see, "Fraught with puppies" for instance. Football just works very well for this: Randy ratio announced, "Fraught!" Detroit gives the ball in overtime, "Fraught!" Cris Carter guarantees Gary Anderson doesn't have enough leg left to kick a field goal "Fraught!" It does become a bit of a game, to call the exact moment where the wheels fell off, where hubris first meets nemesis, and they exchange phone numbers.