scumball meaning (slang): definition, etymology and quotations

scumball

adj

Etymology From scum + -ball.

Slang Sleazy, disreputable, or despicable.

"This kid, your scumball client, also has a rap sheet six pages long. He shot a sixteen-year-old in the back last year and got sixty days on a piss-ass weapons violation because the victim wouldn't testify. […]1996, Barbara Parker, Blood Relations, Signet, published 1997, →ISBN, page 315:
"I can't help it if your uncle and his scumball friends keep crawling out from under every rock that gets turned over in this town."1999, Lynn Emery, After All, Arabesque Books, →ISBN, page 136:

1 more example

Another fifty grand for Shuttles; the scumball business was booming.2006, Jack Kerley, A Garden of Vipers, Dutton, →ISBN, page 288:

noun

Etymology From scum + -ball.

Slang A sleazy, disreputable, or despicable person; a lowlife.

"Answer me. How would you feel if I was the one who might get knifed in the gullet by some scumball?"2002, Iris Johansen, Body of Lies, Bantam Books, →ISBN, page 158:
Recently widowed and still grieving over the loss of her husband, his mother had been an easy mark for a scumball like Jacob. Playing on her weakened emotional state, within two months Jacob had sweet-talked her into marrying him.2006, Peggy Moreland, The Texan's Convenient Marriage, Harlequin, →ISBN, pages 33–34:

1 more example

[…] He thinks 'cause he's stronger he can beat up a woman, strip her of everything she's got, and walk away. And on top of it he doesn't pay his damn hotel bill. That's a man for you — a real scumball."2007, Haruki Murakami, After Dark (trans. Jay Rubin), Vintage International (2007; original Japanese novel published 2004), page 84