I know what the phrase “monkey fucking a football” means. But where did it come
from? Was it first used in a book? Was it G.I. speak? Did it come into vogue because of a film?
You do? Because I’ve never heard it before just now. Someone enlighten me, and use this charming phrase in a sentence and explain some situations to which it might pertain.
I’ve usually heard it used to describe somebody doing something in a pathetically incompetent manner. Not even capable enough to really make a mess of things.
The first time I heard it, it was simply “He’s like a monkey trying to fuck a football,” used to refer to a marketing manager who’d been frantically struggling for a week to produce a marketing plan for our company, but had only managed to create a two-page PowerPoint presentation that didn’t have any text beyond the company’s name.
I first heard it in the very early 80’s as “with all the co-ordination of a Monkey F**king a football.”
It goes back further than that, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it has military origins. Sparky Lyle, the Yankee pitcher, mentions in his book, The Bronx Zoo, that Billy Martin would use the phrase in reference to his inept infielders.
it was a common expression in the pre-ww2 Navy and Marine Corps.
It generally meant a person whose grace,agility and dexterity matched those of a pregnant cow-----or even a three legged elephant.
Used it a lot in my service days.
The opposite was to have "more fun than a monkey on a grapevine’------when speaking of the “seagulls” that flocked around every liberty port and station gate.
EZ
When I joined the fire service it was already in use. Imagine a few newbies going through a drill and trying to properly connect hoselines to a hydrant. The body contortions and fumbling would cause someone to invoke the monkeys violating a football comment. 
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. used the phrase “like an armadillo trying to fuck a football” in the book… umm… I forget. It’s the one about the genius twins, maybe “Breakfast of Champions?” Vonnegut did a stint in the Navy in the 40’s.
Google turns up numerous references to hogs, dogs, and frogs.
Used to know a guy who was a sucker for slow-play bets. Used to justify it by saying, “I’d pay [insert amount] to see a monkey fuck a football.”
Vonnegut enlisted in the Army during WWII, was captured at the Battle of the Bulge, and was a POW in Dresden when the Allies razed it.
I’ve heard it used by Harley riders to describe someone riding a “crotch-rocket” style sport bike.
Which, as any Vonnegut fan knows, was the basis for his book Slaughterhouse-Five. (The firebombing of Dresden in particular.)
The origin Billy Martin analogy sounds convincing. The meaning was never truer today. Inemptitude is the most dangerous tool our leaders possess today.
Just as an anecdote, I learned the phrase back in the late 80s as “a pack of monkeys trying to fuck a football.” It just seems all the more chaotic when you think about it that way. I like it.
I don’t remember where or how I learned that phrase, but I picked it up at about the same time as another favorite, “As fucked up as a football bat.” There was a brief period in what I believe was 1986-1987 where I tried to work one or both phrases into almost every conversation. I belatedly apologize to all of my friends of that time.
edit: I also apologize for bumping the zombie here. I haven’t had enough coffee yet and work’s crazy this morning. It’s like watching a pack of monkeys trying to fuck a football.