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end run

American  
[end ruhn] / ˈɛnd ˈrʌn /

noun

  1. Also called end sweep,.  Also called sweep.  Football. a running play in which the ball-carrier attempts to outflank the defensive end.

  2. Informal.

    1. an evasive or diversionary maneuver.

    2. an attempt to surmount a difficulty without confronting it directly.

end run Idioms  

  1. Evasive action, as in The new department head was making an end run around the old hands who opposed her appointment. This term comes from American football, where it denotes an offensive play in which the ball carrier runs around one end of the opposing team's line. [Mid-1900s]

Etymology

Origin of end run

An Americanism dating back to 1900–05

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

You’ve said you started dancing on TikTok as a kind of end run around the gatekeepers of show business.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 18, 2025

Who made an audacious end run around protocol to give the president some really bad news?

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 16, 2025

The best way to navigate the broken system is to make an end run around the ATS gatekeepers to find a back door into the company by connecting with a human who works there.

From Slate • Oct. 6, 2025

Arizona, Nevada and California contend the Navajo Nation is making an end run around another Supreme Court case that divvied up water in the Colorado River’s Lower Basin.

From Seattle Times • Mar. 17, 2023

The plan amounted to a bureaucratic end run around Brown.

From "The Best of Enemies" by Osha Gray Davidson

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.