Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Informal One who is known for achieving excellent results in a profession or field, such as business or politics.
- n. One who is believed to be capable of producing rain, as through magical or ritual actions.
Wiktionary
- n. A native american medicine man who induces rain by rituals.
- n. A person who induces rainfall through scientific methods (i.e. silver iodide cloud seeding).
- n. figurative An employee of a company who creates a large amount of unexpected business, consistently brings in money at critical times, or brings in markedly more money than his or her co-workers, thereby "floating their salaries".
- n. figurative An investor in sick or start-up business ventures.
- n. slang (figurative) An executive or lawyer with exceptional ability to attract clients, use political connections, or increase profits, etc.
- n. baseball, informal A batted ball that is hit very high into the air.
WordNet 3.0
- n. American Indian medicine man who attempt to make it rain
- n. executive who is very successful in bringing in business to his company or firm
Examples
“DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Nancy Pelosi is what you call a rainmaker, and in this election, she made is pour.”
“And the third, who was called the rainmaker, used a bunch of twigs to sprinkle water from a jug down to the ground.”
The Huffington Post: Donna Henes: April Showers: How To Make Rain
“To some extent you're probably right that becoming a rainmaker is the result of a combination of personal and professional traits, hard to find in any group, and particularly unlikely to be found among female partners who are few and far between.”
“As a self-described "rainmaker," Ehrlich's job was to bring in new business, and clients interviewed said they valued his advice.”
The Washington Post: O'Malley stretches truth on Ehrlich lobbyist label, but criticism sticks
“No. 29 'rainmaker' was taken by Nappodol Paothong, who takes about all the pics for Missouri Conservation mag, glad to see his work here too.”
“Somehow all of a open courtesy he perceived in a quarrel remade Furness from a younger hermit who was good during sketch in to a dynamo of energy, many in a indication of what law firms call a "rainmaker".”
“This ad exists because Murtha was a "rainmaker" for the defense industry and only last year was one of the more defiant voices fighting the efforts of the White House and Secretary of Defense Bob Gates to cut funding for Lockheed's F-22 fighter.”
The Huffington Post: Murtha Gets Full-Page Send-Off From Corporation He Constantly Aided
“Maybe this has been said elsewhere, but it occurred to me that the gas tax holiday is a classic 'rainmaker' con.”
Obama's Speech On Economy Is All About McCain -- No Mentions Of Hillary
“I think that's not uncommon and it would be interesting for judges to look into this as it creates an unlevel playing field (I know a guy who was recruited by a course simply to work on getting entries to competition-winning standard - could we be seeing the start of 'rainmaker' appointments focussed not on good teaching but on winning awards?)”
“I can't remember all the details, but I think the head lawyers brought her into the firm as a "rainmaker" (moneymaker), but things backfired when she became more controlling than they were expected.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘rainmaker’.
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Fictional music genres
fudgepunk, whangboogie, electrogush, jizzbilly, glambient, queasy listening, chip shop, baroque'n'roll, prog folk, chemo, riant grrl, blingfolk and 584 more...
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Issues, Risk & Crisis Communication
exigency, pentad, rainmaker, aegis, dialectic, locus, isomorphic, op-ed, SEO, deontology, Anglophone
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a well-cut descriptor
ludicrous, quick, feisty, fresh, scrapper, rainmaker, thought-leader, talkative, arsehole, moron, cavalier, abstruse and 15 more...
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The language of America's Pastime
Don't think baseball has its own language? Listen to a game on the radio with someone who knows nothing about it.
comebacker, forkball, drag bunt, slider, doubleheader, rainmaker, brushback, shoestring catch, screwball, seventh-inning st..., cutoff man, suicide squeeze and 9 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for rainmaker.
reesetee Yep, originally a John Grisham novel, subsequently a movie. Aug 17, 2009
chained_bear Yeah. Wasn't there a movie called "The Rainmaker"? John Grisham novel, something like that? I just remember Al Pacino standing behind some young buck on the poster, looking like the devil himself.
Which I think was the point. Aug 17, 2009
yarb That was the only meaning I was familiar with. It's used in corporate finance to describe the big swinging dicks. Aug 17, 2009
bilby I wasn't aware of the meaning WeirdNet refers to. Aug 16, 2009
john In baseball, a high pop-fly. Apparently. Jul 11, 2008