Word.ws English Dictionary

stepping up to the plate

stepping up to the plate is the present participle and gerund of step up to the plate.

Meaning of step up to the plate

Verb

step up to the plate (third-person singular simple present steps up to the plate, present participle stepping up to the plate, simple past and past participle stepped up to the plate)

  1. (US, idiomatic) To initiate action; to assume or take a responsibility.
    • Surround yourself with good people who can reliably step up to the plate and solve problems when they occur.2008 June 12, Beth Stackpole, “The IT pro's vacation planner”, in Computerworld, retrieved 17 Jun 2020
    Synonyms:
    volunteer, offer

Questions about stepping up to the plate

What is stepping up to the plate the present participle and gerund of?
Stepping up to the plate is the present participle and gerund of step up to the plate.

Words near stepping up to the plate in the dictionary

  1. stepping switch
  2. stepping switches
  3. stepping to
  4. stepping up
  5. stepping up one's game
  6. stepping up to the plate
  7. stepping-stone
  8. stepping-stones
  9. Steppingley
  10. steppings
  11. steppingstone

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: stepping up to the plate (page history and authors); step up to the plate (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “stepping up to the plate.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/stepping_up_to_the_plate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.