head fake

Noun

head fake (plural head fakes)

1. A feint of a player's head meant to confuse opponents by signaling one direction before committing to anther.
   • An effective speed rush will often involve a head fake by the pass rusher. To execute a head fake, the defender takes an aggressive step at the blocker or to the inside or outside of the blocker.2008, Ron Vanderlinden, Football's Eagle & Stack Defenses, Human Kinetics, →ISBN, page 158
2. (broadly) An ostensible direction, motivation, or reason, in contrast to some ulterior truth.
   • And the other thing about football is, we send our kids out to play football or soccer, swimming, whatever it is, and it's the first example of what I'm gonna call a "head fake" or "indirect learning". We actually don't what our kids to learn football. I mean yeah, it's really nice that I have a...2007 September 18, 11:32 from the start, in Achieving Your Childhood Dreams, spoken by Randy Pausch, Carnegie Mellon University
3. (broadly) A misleading movement of the stock market which inverts drastically.
   • The head fake is the pattern that causes support and resistance traders the most headaches. If a market reaches a support or resistance level and immediately reverses, it can be a straightforward move to climb on board in the direction of the reversal.2007, George A. Fontanills, Getting Started in Commodities, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 203