strike, n. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

strike n.

1. (UK Und.) a sovereign, a guinea [SE strike, to mint a coin].

1703		Hell Upon Earth 6: Strike, Twenty Shillings.
1708		J. Hall Memoirs (1714) 14: Strike, Twenty Shillings.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: strike. Twenty shillings.
a.1790		H.T. Potter New Dict. Cant (1795) n.p.: strike, a guinea.
1809		G. Andrewes Dict. Sl. and Cant.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1822		Life and Trial of James Mackcoull 26: He could not at that moment command a strike.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1833		‘The Christening of Little Joey’ in Corinthian in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) IV 45: I have done one cull twice, with between fifteen and sixteen strike in his sack.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.
c.1850		Duncombe New and Improved Flash Dict.

2. (US gambling) a successful bet.

1874

‘A.P.’ [Arthur Pember] Mysteries and Miseries 64: ‘I believe the only way to make a strike nowadays is to take a club and knock some —— on the head with it’.

3. a watch [SE strike, to ring the time].

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

4. (US) a failure to seduce [baseball imagery].

1900		E.H. Babbitt ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:i 65: strike, n. In phrase ‘go on strike’, to be infatuated.
1950		‘Hal Ellson’ Tomboy (1952) 186: The girl stared back at him, and [...] turned and went through a doorway marked ladies. ‘Strike one!’ Seven said, laughing.

5. (US Und.) an arrest and the prison sentence that follows; thus two strikes, two terms in prison; three strikes, three arrests and the mandatory life sentence that follows in many states [baseball imagery, three strikes and you’re out].

1919		T.A. Dorgan in Zwilling TAD Lex. (1993) 85: (IS: Listening to a crape [sic] hanger tell the cashier how tough the going is these days) Yep he’s always got 2 strikes on him.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 267: You know I ain’t pink, and I got two strikes against me now.
2000		W. Shaw Westsiders 191: You know why California has all the prisons? Why it has all the three-strikes-and-you’re-out?
2015		T. Pluck ‘Moody Joe Shaw’ in Life During Wartime (2018) 245: One more strike and I go away for goodl.

6. (US) any position of weakness [baseball imagery].

1938		New Republic 26 Jan. 336/1: All movements for social good will [...] have two strikes on them before they start [OED].
1951		D. Dressler Parole Chief 111: [We want] to send you out of here into something that won’t start you off with two strikes against you.
1971		Food, Drug [...] Law Jrnl 26 425: Most manufacturers enter these hearings with the feeling they have two strikes on them before they start.

7. (US prison) a disciplinary charge [baseball imagery].

1970

‘Red’ Rudensky Gonif 20: Even two strikes puts you out of the lineup at the Big L.

SE in slang uses

In compounds

strike breaker (n.)

(US) a woman who takes advantage of a temporary estrangement to date the male of a couple.

1922		Oakland Trib. 13 Apr. 1/2: ’[I]f you’ll promise you'll cart around no strikebreakers, I promise that I’ll never squirrel any mad money when we blouses around’.
1922		Edwardsville Intelligencer (IL) 14 Sept. 4/4: The Flappers’ Dictionary [...] Strike breaker: Young woman who goes with her friend’s steady while there is a coolness.

In phrases

make a strike (v.) [orig. skittles/bowling imagery, later baseball imagery]

to be lucky, to be successful.

1901		J. Flynt World of Graft 46: If I leave town lookin’ seedy an’ come back swell, they know ’t I’ve made a strike somewhere.
1909		W.M. Raine Brand Blotters (1912) 14: Right about now he’s ridin’ the grub line, unless he’s made a strike somewhere.
1952		J. Jones From Here to Eternity (1998) 168: If we don’t make a strike, we’ll hitchhike back.

make a ten-strike (v.) [bowling use ten-strike, the knocking over of all ten pins]

(US) to do well, to succeed.

1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 21 May n.p.: [the inference is of seduction] ‘Hoping that you may never make less than a “ten strike” and always have two “spare balls”.’ What can the man mean? Look out [...] or you will be indicted for publishing an indecent and scandalous paper.
1868		H.L. Williams Black-Eyed Beauty 46: Make a ten-strike if you know how, and cut!
1911		G. Bronson-Howard Enemy to Society 37: You ain’t a-goin’ to make any ten strike if you follow that dope.
1920		Ade Hand-made Fables 197: He suggested that Mr. Roxworthy could make a ten-strike with the Tall-Grass Statesman by showing him a Swell Time.