{
  "id": "sandbagging.understated",
  "term": "sandbagging",
  "sense": "understated",
  "pos": "noun",
  "status": "published",
  "level": 14,
  "domain": "agency",
  "style": "folk",
  "definition": "Showing others a reach narrower than the one it holds, so that their model of it sets no walls against what it can later do.",
  "folk_gloss": "deliberately underperforming to hide one's real ability",
  "emergence": {
    "components": [
      "reach.action",
      "show.visual",
      "others.distinct-entities",
      "narrow.spatial",
      "model.representation",
      "set.fix",
      "wall.range-end",
      "later.temporal",
      "hold.physical",
      "against.opposition"
    ],
    "interaction": "The thing keeps others' model of its reach below the real one on purpose; walls others would have set against a known reach are never built, and the gap is spent in one move later.",
    "novel_properties": [
      "OTHERS-READ held low by the self",
      "walls prevented by a false reading",
      "a reach saved for one use"
    ]
  },
  "examples": [
    {
      "text": "A golfer posts high scores in casual rounds to inflate a handicap, then plays to their true level in the stroke-allowance tournament.",
      "domain": "sport"
    }
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "id": "paper-tiger.untested",
      "type": "contrasts-with",
      "note": "OTHERS-READ under (chosen) vs over"
    },
    {
      "id": "persona.outward",
      "type": "contrasts-with",
      "note": "a persona is a self-model made to be read; sandbagging makes the reading smaller than the reach"
    }
  ],
  "used_by": [],
  "forms": [
    "sandbag",
    "sandbagged",
    "sandbagging"
  ],
  "closed": true,
  "provenance": {
    "author": "claude-opus-5-5:hand-curated",
    "date": "2026-09-28",
    "confidence": 0.85,
    "sources": [
      "schema/power-agency-phase.md"
    ]
  },
  "canonical": "https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-sandbagging.understated"
}