They should have paid attention in English class

I'm excited for the NFL to begin again so I can cheer on the 49ers! However, I can't cheer for the grammar gaffes I regularly hear the announcers make. At one of many non-Niner games I watched last season, the commentator offered a candid opinion on why a certain team had lost so many games throughout the season: He thought it was the quarterback’s fault. In fact, he said something along the lines of this: “With a different quarterback, this team could have went far.”

As soon as the word “went” left his mouth, my football brain left the room, and the grammar police took over.

The past tense of the verb “to go” is conjugated as follows:

• I went to the movies.
• You went to the movies.
• He/she went to the movies.
• We went to the movies.
• They went to the movies.

However, the present perfect tense of the same verb is as follows:

• I have gone to the movies.
• You have gone to the movies.
• He/she has gone to the movies.
• We have gone to the movies.
• They have gone to the movies.

The pluperfect (or past perfect) tense is as follows:

• I had gone to the movies.
• You had gone to the movies.
• He/she had gone to the movies.
• We had gone to the movies.
• They had gone to the movies.

Could have gone, would have gone, and should have gone are all correct conjugations as well, as in could have gone far.

That famous commentator isn’t the only public figure to commit this offense. Earlier this year I read a quote from a baseball player who thanked his fans “for supporting me through everything I’ve went through over the last couple of months.” Yikes. Then, a few months ago, I heard a celebrity judge on a reality show open her comment on an aspiring singer’s outlandish outfit with this grammatical gem: “If she would have came dressed…”

If more of these celebrities had paid attention in English class, I could have gone to sleep early last night instead of staying up to write this post!

Palo Alto native Maria Murnane is the best-selling author of Perfect on Paper, It's a Waverly Life, Honey on Your Mind, and Chocolate for Two. She also provides consulting services on book publishing and marketing. Learn more at www.mariamurnane.com.

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