deaden

“We’d put these special blankets up on the walls to deaden the sound for shooting and it was quiet.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 18, 2026

The truth, however, is the obscure word - meaning "to deaden" - is the name of a police-led training exercise.

From BBC ● Jan. 17, 2024

The biggest is the ball and the size of the stitches, Nathan said, and MLB made slight adjustments to deaden the ball prior to the 2021 season.

From Seattle Times ● Apr. 7, 2023

“Combine that with his ability to soften the hands and deaden the contact,” Annacone wrote, “and you have terrific ingredients to execute that deft touch.”

From Washington Post ● May 27, 2022

I shake my hand to deaden the pain.

From "Landscape with Invisible Hand" by M.T. Anderson

But La Nina pretty much deadens shear, which is “a huge factor” for more storm activity, University of Albany hurricane researcher Kristen Corbosiero said.

From Seattle Times ● May 31, 2022

Lyndall Gordon’s endured a “boredom that deadens the air around my father”.

From Economist ● Apr. 19, 2018

Toradol, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory often used to manage short-term postoperative pain, deadens feeling and inhibits the body’s ability to sense injury.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 9, 2017

But the efforts are often clumsy, flagged with a wink-winking that deadens the gimmick, especially in a classroom scene in which a discussion of Gothic literature turns to name dropping.

From New York Times ● Jun. 29, 2015

It is hardly consoling to remember such a feeling, and so it deadens in our minds.

From "The Once and Future King" by T. H. White

For others, stop-start has deadened the joy of driving.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 3, 2026

It’s pleasant to type on, thanks to each key’s even and clear sound signature, lacking ping or hollowness — though some may find it overly deadened.

From The Verge ● Aug. 30, 2022

The league’s hope was that a deadened ball would cut down on home runs and increase action in the field of play.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 6, 2022

“We cannot remain insensitive, our hearts deadened, before the misery of so many innocent people. We must not fail to weep. We must not fail to respond.”

From Seattle Times ● Sep. 29, 2019

Sirius looked at him, eyes full of concern, eyes that had not yet lost the look that Azkaban had given them — that deadened, haunted look.

From "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire" by J. K. Rowling

The Black Hawk helicopter was ready for take off – its rotor blades slicing through the air in the deadening heat of the Colombian Amazon.

From BBC ● Feb. 3, 2026

The decision still means joy or despair, but the virtual nature of acceptance and rejection, the evidence of no human hand, is a little deadening.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 16, 2026

Likewise, many well-known geniuses like Billy Wilder, Otto Preminger and Fritz Lang, who were chased out of Europe by the Nazis, brilliantly exposed the hypocrisies and soul deadening conformity of mainstream American culture.

From Salon ● Jan. 1, 2026

They were trying to return from popular Emerald Bay to their west side home in midafternoon when eight-foot swells swamped the boat, deadening the engine and capsizing the vessel off rocky Rubicon Point near D.L.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 30, 2025

The ice ball exploded, spraying his entire body with freezing, paralyzing streams of water, weighing down his arms, deadening his legs, squeezing his heart.

From "The Contender" by Robert Lipsyte