How to Use sad sack in a Sentence

sad sack

noun
  • Jones plays Lance, a bit of a sad sack whose wife left him for a more macho lunk-head.
    — Tim Goodman, The Hollywood Reporter, 15 Jan. 2018
  • But the carrier that shadows your commute, and parks by your desk, needn’t be a sad sack.
    — Jamie Waters, WSJ, 22 Nov. 2022
  • To help give your sad sack lunch an indoor picnic flair, swap out your paper napkins for ones of cloth.
    — Lilah Ramzi, Vogue, 24 Aug. 2018
  • Jo sees her best friend being an absolute sad sack and decides to do something about it.
    — Maggie Fremont, Vulture, 11 Dec. 2021
  • Then came a loss to the Habs and another to the sad sack Dead Wings.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 11 Nov. 2019
  • Only sad sacks and lunaediesophobes think Monday is the worst day of the week.
    — Jason Kehe, Wired, 17 Dec. 2019
  • These literal sad sacks have no business acting as your trusty workout bag.
    — Amanda Randone, refinery29.com, 18 June 2024
  • Archiving the past is melancholic by nature, but Schloss was no sad sack.
    — Jamie Hood, Vulture, 15 Dec. 2021
  • Over the course of the series, Guillermo has transitioned from sad sack to badass.
    — Lisa Rosen, Los Angeles Times, 21 Nov. 2022
  • And unlike these five sad sack losers, the Beavers didn’t have to take a plane ride home to compound the misery.
    — oregonlive, 13 Oct. 2019
  • Feeling like a sad sack of coal during the holidays is far from unusual.
    — New York Times, 21 Nov. 2019
  • The series portrays Paul as both an earnest guy with a good heart, as well as a naïve and gullible sad sack who is the butt of the joke.
    — John Benson, cleveland, 28 Dec. 2022
  • Blackwater makes Larry a compelling mix of self-loathing sad sack and volcanic fury about to erupt.
    — Matthew J. Palm, Orlando Sentinel, 18 Sep. 2022
  • Stan is merely the sad sack who can’t stay away, shakily throwing coins into the peep show machine to see her once again.
    — refinery29.com, 11 June 2018
  • Welcome back, to fans and sad sack wasp traps alike, to the craven death pit of greed and egomania that is Succession.
    — Andrew R. Chow, Time, 8 Aug. 2019
  • Stefan, if something of a sad sack, is also a charming big galoot who sincerely believes in love.
    — Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times, 7 Sep. 2022
  • The character is a variation on what Odenkirk plays so well, a charismatic sad sack kicked in the shins by life one too many times.
    — Barbara Vandenburgh, USA TODAY, 26 Feb. 2022
  • In the movie, sad sack Miles, played by actor Paul Giamatti, rages briefly against the grape.
    — Connie Ogle, miamiherald, 2 Nov. 2017
  • But Wright’s turn in particular, as the sad sack who has both a point and his own respectability hangups, lingers in the mind.
    — Alison Willmore, Vulture, 10 Mar. 2024
  • One brother, George (Plemons), is a kindly sad sack who wants nothing more than to find a wife and settle down.
    — Rachel Syme, The New Yorker, 15 Dec. 2021
  • Throw these fragile sad sacks in the recycling bin (or save them for upcoming bad-weather days) and replace them with this year’s models!
    — Madeline Fass, Vogue, 10 Apr. 2018
  • Post Malone, pop’s premier sad sack boozehound, makes his first long-form foray into pure country music.
    — Shaad D’souza, Pitchfork, 16 Aug. 2024
  • On Wall Street, Twitter was the latest sad sack tech stock to impress with fourth quarter earnings.
    — Adam Lashinsky, Fortune, 8 Feb. 2018
  • Shawn Kilgore is Charlie, and mixes the sad sack’s despair with a spark of optimism.
    — Matthew J. Palm, orlandosentinel.com, 6 Dec. 2019
  • For a Hall of Fame pass-rusher who has been properly honored for his accomplishments, this was one sad sack of a move.
    — Gene Frenette, USA TODAY, 15 June 2022
  • In fact, a timeout training video, if some sad sack were sorry enough to film one, could dedicate itself to Thibodeau’s fourth quarter.
    — Fred Katz, New York Times, 30 Apr. 2025
  • Only Bob Odenkirk, who gave a terrific performance as the office sad sack, is in the running for a Tony.
    — Greg Evans, Deadline, 1 May 2025
  • Outie Mark is such a glum sad sack that nonwork scenes tend to drag even after he gets involved with people who claim to have found a way to undo the severance process.
    — Alan Sepinwall, Rolling Stone, 7 Feb. 2022
  • The Chargers are a sad sack organization that will never build a team worthy of a talent like Herbert.
    — Los Angeles Times, 16 Dec. 2023
  • His playful, sad sack persona was in direct contrast to some of the harder core hip hop that had become popular in the late 1980s.
    — Lisa Respers France and Andy Rose, CNN, 16 July 2021

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'sad sack.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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