I'm Minion Fogarty and this week I have a quick and dirty tip about the plural of RBI and

other such abbreviations.

A meaty middle about the difference between principle that ends with P-A-L and principle

that ends with P-L-E, a tidbit about the origin of the phrase Run of the Mill, and finally

I have some fun news to share about the game show Jeopardy and a favor to ask.

And now on to making initialisms plural.

Okay, I know the NBA playoffs are happening and the Stanley Cup finals are happening,

but the boys of summer are on the field too.

Baseball season has started, so it's a good time to answer questions from listeners who've

asked about how to make an abbreviation such as RBI plural.

It can be confusing since it's the R part run that's becoming plural in Run's bad

adan.

Should it be RSBI or RBI's or something else?

Even though it doesn't make absolute logical sense, you make initialisms in acronyms plural

by adding an S to the end, no matter what part would be plural if you wrote the whole thing

out.

So even though it would be Run's bad adan, you write it as RBIS, RBI's.

In the past, some publications used apostrophes to make acronyms and initialisms plural.

So until a few years ago, it was common to see something like RBI apostrophias or CD apostrophias

for RBI's and CDs in the New York Times.

But today, all major publications and style guides that I'm aware of recommend simply adding

an S without the apostrophe.

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