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Reader question: Please explain “hot seat” in this sentence: “Here are five coaches who are on the hot seat going into next season.” My comments: This means that those five coaches may, among other things, lose their job some time during the next year, or playing season. Usually when a team coach is described as in the hot seat, you understand that their team has been struggling on the playing field. Expectations from fans and management, which are huge, are not being met. The coach is hence under pressure to turn things round soon. Hence, in short, life in the so called hot seat is not comfortable. To say the least, that is. These days, we mostly hear of people landing themselves in the managerial hot seat, be it a coach of a sports team or a CEO from a struggling business firm. And, tell you what, they’re having it easy. These people in or on the hot seat lose their jobs at the most – and they can often get another job any time soon (and hopefully a better and less pressure-filled one too). But, originally, those on the hot seat faced much worse – death itself to be exact. The original “hot seat”, you see, refers to the electrical chair on which an American prisoner sits before they turn it on and he is executed. So there. Get the picture? Sorry for asking you to visualize the scene but you get the point. | 
