[chops] The U.S. attorney assigned to the case has national security chops

[Ken Blake]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-the-feds-hunted-down-the-pentagon-leak-suspect-jack-teixeira
The U.S. attorney assigned to the case has national security chops.

At first I thought it was a typo, or a truncation or an abbreviation.
But apparently it's a perfectly valid usage of the word chops.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chops
expertise in a particular field or activity

No etymology supplied.

[Ross Clark]

Originally a jazz term (from 1930s), from the anatomical sense (jaws,
mouth area)

- The power of a trumpeter's embouchure (1937-)
generalized to
- A jazz musician's skills (1968-)
and further extended to
- Talent or skill in any field (1990-)
That's from OED. Green has somewhat earlier citations for the second and
third senses.

(Anatomical chap/chop for 'jaw' goes back to the 1500s, but there the
trail grows cold.)

[Ken Blake]

On Sat, 15 Apr 2023 13:50:44 +1200, Ross Clark wrote:

>> No etymology supplied.
>
> Originally a jazz term (from 1930s), from the anatomical sense (jaws,
> mouth area)
>
> - The power of a trumpeter's embouchure (1937-)
> generalized to
> - A jazz musician's skills (1968-)
> and further extended to
> - Talent or skill in any field (1990-)
> That's from OED. Green has somewhat earlier citations for the second and
> third senses.
>
> (Anatomical chap/chop for 'jaw' goes back to the 1500s, but there the
> trail grows cold.)

Thanks for that suggestion as to the origin of he specialist meaning of
"chops", where I guess if a singer has good jaws, then they're a good
singer just as the attorney assigned to the case has national security
skills, aka chops.

Much appreciated as my go-to reference didn't delve into the etymology
and at first, it was saying the lady had good mouthpieces, which was
strange until I looked it up and found that it meant her skills instead.