Trivia about Upset

[GenuineRisk]

Never mind; too good to be true. From wordorigins.com:

<<Upset

One of the legendary origins of sports terminology is that the term upset, meaning an unexpected defeat of one favored to win, is from a classic 1919 horse race that pitted Man o'War, probably the greatest race horse of all time, against an unlikely opponent named Upset.

During his career, Man o'War lost only one race, the 13 August 1919 Stanford Memorial at Saratoga. Man o'War was heavily favored to win, but lost to a horse named Upset. This, the legend goes, is where the sports term upset comes from. Man o'War would face Upset in five other races, winning every one, but this one loss early in his career would be the one to make lexicographic history.

Most lexicographers and etymologists thought the story too good to be true, but no one could disprove it. Sporting usages of upset prior to 1919 just could not be found. Then in late 2002, researcher George Thompson, using the newly available tools of full-text online searching of the New York Times databases, turned up a string of sporting usages of upset dating back to the mid-19th century. Thompson traced the verb to upset to 1865 and the noun to 1877. There are numerous uses of the term in 19th century sportswriting, proving beyond a doubt that it was well-established by the time Man o'War lost his only race. Upset did not father a term, he was just well named.>>