Here's My Theory

You Can’t Verse Somebody

If you’re ever playing a game or sport with a group of people, you are bound to hear at least one person misuse the word verse. Someone will say “hey, can I verse you next?” or “I’ve versed him already, I want to verse someone else.” Each time I hear it, I fantasize a loud buzzer going off and someone saying “sorry, that’s incorrect, but thanks for playing, we have some excellent prizes for you.”

What’s being confused here is the Latin word “versus” which translates to “against” in English. If someone says “next is Team One versus Team Two”, they are correct. What ends up happening is people replace the Latin “versus” with the English “verses”. “Verses” is just the plural of “verse”, which is a line of writing (or a passage from the bible). So unless you want to “line of writing” someone, you’re not making any sense by using the word verse in this way.

I hate to nitpick on grammar, but I really think people just don’t know this, so I hope it helps. You can’t cure stupidity, but ignorance is another story.