as in mallet
a large, heavy hammer with a long handle
broke up the concrete using a sledgehammer
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as in heavy-handed
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
as in to cane
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Examples Sentences
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Recent Examples of sledgehammer
Matthew Futterman, The Athletic, 28 July 2024
Many people are up in arms, acting like parent company JLR has smashed a kitten with a sledgehammer.
—James Morris, Forbes, 23 Nov. 2024
Bethany Rodgers, The Salt Lake Tribune, 27 Sep. 2021
The Academy Award winner quickly turned into a sledgehammer pro, getting involved in breaking through walls and ripping out fixtures.
—Vanessa Etienne, PEOPLE.com, 9 July 2021
James Barron, New York Times, 13 Jan. 2020
Should have done steel ball on window, *then* sledgehammer the door.
—Adam Lashinsky, Fortune, 25 Nov. 2019
See all Example Sentences for sledgehammer 
Noun
Fucsovics plays tennis like a carpenter wields a sledgehammer and a handsaw.
—Matthew Futterman, The Athletic, 28 July 2024
Many people are up in arms, acting like parent company JLR has smashed a kitten with a sledgehammer.
—James Morris, Forbes, 23 Nov. 2024
Adjective
And Sundwall said that, in retrospect, state health officials took a sledgehammer approach to mitigating the pandemic, such as school closings in 2020, when the state could have taken a more surgical tack.
—Bethany Rodgers, The Salt Lake Tribune, 27 Sep. 2021
The Academy Award winner quickly turned into a sledgehammer pro, getting involved in breaking through walls and ripping out fixtures.
—Vanessa Etienne, PEOPLE.com, 9 July 2021
Verb
Perhaps the most brazen took place in 1958, when two men sledgehammered the Fifth Avenue display windows in the middle of the night.
—James Barron, New York Times, 13 Jan. 2020
Should have done steel ball on window, *then* sledgehammer the door.
—Adam Lashinsky, Fortune, 25 Nov. 2019
See all Example Sentences for sledgehammer
Recent Examples of Synonyms for sledgehammer
Noun
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The precursor of the xylophone and marimba, a balafon is made by carefully cutting 21 wooden slats into different lengths, fixing them atop hallow calabashes, and striking them with mallets wound with the gum and sap of a rubber tree.Eliot Stein, Rolling Stone, 9 Dec. 2024
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Walker showed me a video of the fingers surviving blows from a mallet.James Somers, The New Yorker, 25 Nov. 2024
Adjective
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Musk’s influence could thus lead to a more heavy-handed regulatory environment for AI in the U.S. There is one problem with all these speculations, though.Rob Toews, Forbes, 22 Dec. 2024
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But what starts as a winking nod at the challenges of parenting ends up a heavy-handed fable about the primacy of human values, with an emphasis on the idea that a gendered role is essential to becoming human.Elvia Wilk, The Atlantic, 18 Dec. 2024
Verb
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Prune the second-year, woody canes off summer-bearing raspberries once a year after the plants fruit.Lauren Landers, Better Homes & Gardens, 24 July 2024
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In the nearly 250 years since its founding, the United States has witnessed its fair share of political violence, from four presidential assassinations to an 1856 caning on the Senate floor to a 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol that left at least five dead.Meilan Solly, Smithsonian Magazine, 17 July 2024
Noun
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In mid-December, confirmation that Lamine Yamal had succumbed to a right ankle knock picked up in the Champions League was a hammer blow for head coach Hansi Flick and his men.Tom Sanderson, Forbes, 6 Jan. 2025
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Like Sonic's own personalized Terminators, the army of Metal Sonics _targets the hero and completely overwhelms him... ...until...a hooded figure wielding a giant hammer bursts out of nowhere and makes quick work of the 'bots.Nick Romano, EW.com, 20 Dec. 2024
Adjective
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Cooper was obsessed with the New World Order and the actions of jackbooted government enforcers against the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas, and white separatist Randy Weaver at Ruby Ridge, Idaho.Andrew Stuttaford, WSJ, 19 Sep. 2018
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Hungary under his rule is far from a jackbooted dictatorship, but its democracy is diverging markedly from that of many of its partners in the European Union.Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post, 6 Apr. 2018
Verb
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Three people were shot and a fourth person stabbed as a fight turned violent inside Terminal 4 about 9:40 p.m. on Dec. 25.Taylor Seely, The Arizona Republic, 28 Dec. 2024
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The home was less than 10 miles from the off-campus residence where Mogen, Goncalves, Kernodle and Chapin were stabbed.David Faris, Newsweek, 27 Dec. 2024
Noun
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Singer uses modern milling techniques to mill from clay and build hard models before the baton is handed off to the engineers.Kristin Shaw, Popular Science, 1 Jan. 2025
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Perhaps Kohli will ponder doing right by India and step aside for a younger teammate to take the baton.Tristan Lavalette, Forbes, 30 Dec. 2024
Adjective
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Assad, while widely seen as an oppressive dictator and accused of using chemical weapons against his own people, was championed as a protector of Shiite Muslim sects, Christian communities, and other religious groups.Timothy Nerozzi, Washington Examiner - Political News and Conservative Analysis About Congress, the President, and the Federal Government, 30 Dec. 2024
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Both the Hatter and the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) get boilerplate tragic origins in a cluttered plot that’s drowned out by the hideous, oppressive visual effects.Josh Bell, Vulture, 20 Dec. 2024
Thesaurus Entries Near sledgehammer
Cite this Entry
“Sledgehammer.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/sledgehammer. Accessed 9 Jan. 2025.
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