In Reply to: Peter out posted by Catherine on October 09, 2009 at 09:04:
: When punt receivers want the ball to come to a stop, rather than catch it, they say "peter" to alert their teammates. Does this practice originate from the phrase "peter out"?
Terms in sports and games are often widespread orally before anyone thinks to question them or write them down and sometimes the "original" meaning is lost.
A couple of guesses gleaned from the Internet: a peter (penis) is something a football player wouldn't want to touch (evidentally there are some teams that shout "poison" also something you don't want to touch) or it's from "Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater" - I'm guessing because he "couldn't keep her".