Surprisingly, a lot of interesting things came out of pool during the yearlong shutdown around the globe. Players found new ways to compete in a virtual reality. The Ghost became the No.1 player in the world. Fans got to spend countless hours watching players practice “live” in their basements. Records were set in cue raffle sales. (“Razzles” being the term used in social media to skirt Facebook’s rules on gambling.)

Of course, not every trend that developed during the year was a winner. Hands down, the most annoying thing to come out of pool last year was the interminable use of the phrase “in the middle.”

Now, I get it. Every year words and phrases find their way into popular culture. And, without fail, they become annoying over time. The Zoom app catapulted so rapidly into the public consciousness that by the end of the year it became a verb: Zooming.

“Flatten the curve” became the new “Think outside the box.” “We’re in this together” became the new “It is what it is.” We all learned that masks may well become “the new normal.”

Some new terms in 2020 were actually quite useful. “Social distancing” became a convenient excuse for avoiding people you really didn’t want to see in the first place (“herd immunity” also works), and “You’re on mute!” became a battle cry in and of itself.

So, what exactly does “in the middle” mean? And why does it annoy me so?

In truth, it’s nothing more than a cute little phrase that allows players, stakehorses and railbirds to make gambling matches sound bigger than they really are.

“Shane and Dennis are playing a race to 100, $100,000 in the middle!” was the phrase bandied about by everyone in pool earlier this year. Translation, two stakehorses (or two syndicates of numerous sponsors) put $50,000 apiece into a pot. The winner (which could be several “investors” splitting up the money) still only wins $50,000. The match was for $50,000. Period.

How, why and when this phrase became “the new normal” in pool is uncertain. Action king Oscar Dominguez says, “It’s a Filipino thing for sure.”

Doesn’t really matter. It is now used in virtually every social media post that announces or discusses an action match. I guess it shouldn’t be surprising that one-on-one matches became the most talked-about pool topic in the past year, since head-to-head matches was pretty much all a pool player could engage in. So, something like this was bound to happen. But still.

The bigger the number, I guess, the more importance people assume the match has. In truth, most players don’t put up a nickel, yet stand to make 40 percent of the winnings. I’m not discounting the pressure that comes with matches of this nature, but few players walk home broke.

Over the course of time, however, the phrase, employed to generate added excitement, wore out its welcome with me. The term is used today in virtually every match that someone insists on posting in social media. But trying to make a race-to-nine match between a pair of players with 350 FargoRate ratings compelling by boldly announcing that the “live streaming” match has $300 in the middle is a stretch, don’t you think?

All that said, despite its overuse in pool circles, I do find the phrase intriguingly catchy. In fact, I’ve actually started injecting it into my own lexicon.

“Did you hear Phil is getting remarried?” I recently said to a friend. “He’s marrying his new girl Gladys this Sunday, three kids in the middle.”

“I’m going to Morton’s for dinner tomorrow with Pete,” I told another. “$400 in the middle.”

“How about a game of cribbage?” I asked my wife. “Dirty dishes from dinner in the middle.”

I guess I’ll just have to be more open-minded when all these new phrases pop up. I can adapt. Lord knows, we’ve all had to do plenty of adapting in the past year.

And I’ll try to look at things more philosophically than literally.

So, going forward, remember we’re in this together. And to avoid having masks become the new normal, we’ll have to flatten the curve and eventually get to herd immunity…mankind in the middle.