A good nickname to have, if you're a boxer - Roberto Duran, for
instance. A bad one if you're a baseball player - it implies that your best position is that of designated hitter. Obligatory Elvis Costello reference: maybe his "Little Hands of Concrete" alias comes from the baseball version - he was, after all, King of America at the time, the land of baseball, violence, and cherry pie.

Also used in hockey to indicate a certain lack of touch with the puck. If you couldn't hit an open net with a beachball, you've got hands of stone.

The antonym would be either great hands or soft hands. Now, I've been watching and listening to hockey broadcasts since I was knee high to a grasshopper, and still when I hear a hockey announcer say of a big burly player: "He's got such nice, soft hands" it catches me off guard.

Jaromir Jagr has soft hands. Enforcers like Dave "The Hammer" Schultz usually have hands of stone.

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