How to Use what-if in a Sentence

what-if

noun

• With the draft, the what-if game is one that swings both ways.
  — Ira Winderman, Sun Sentinel, 24 June 2024
• Truth be told, what-if’s are the survival brain in action.
  — Bryan Robinson, Forbes, 7 Sep. 2024
• The Lakers are the ultimate what-if team in a conference full of what-ifs.
  — Dylan Hernández, Los Angeles Times, 5 Mar. 2023
• Miller proposed this team on a twitter what-if post: Sock, Ge, Fahey, David.
  — Todd Boss, Forbes, 27 Feb. 2025
• The Giants have made countless trades that were dandies, but the bad ones present what-if scenarios that can be tough for fans to stomach.
  — John Shea, San Francisco Chronicle, 30 Apr. 2023
• Tax season always seems to start off with some kind of quirky, what-if component.
  — Susan Tompor, The Enquirer, 12 June 2024
• Practice the what-if conversation early, when trust is high and stakes are low.
  — Stephan Lendi, Forbes.com, 16 May 2025
• This year, the what-if involves the possible expansion of the child tax credit, which likely would be retroactive to 2023.
  — Susan Tompor, The Enquirer, 12 June 2024
• Another economic what-if: What if the Fed has ended up waiting too long to cut rates?
  — Susan Tompor, Detroit Free Press, 5 Aug. 2024
• Snap out of what-if thinking with thoughtful distractions.
  — Jenna Ryu, SELF, 7 Jan. 2025
• Cochrane, 52, and Porter, 43, turned the breezy online exchange into a what-if conversation.
  — John Branch, New York Times, 23 Jan. 2025
• No need to for either side to expend enormous energy wading through the what-if? free agent market.
  — Jarrett Bell, USA TODAY, 7 Mar. 2023
• For the Red Sox, the opportunity to see Eflin at Fenway carries an offseason what-if.
  — Alex Speier, BostonGlobe.com, 5 June 2023
• This may come in the form of a digital twin of the warehouse that performs what-if analyses of material flows and other systems and processes.
  — Manoj Gujarathi, Forbes, 10 Jan. 2025
• Any postmortem of a tough season-ending loss is going to include some lingering what-if moments.
  — Pete Grathoff, Kansas City Star, 3 Feb. 2025
• On Sunday, new Denver coach Sean Payton responded on the record – not rumor, not speculation, not a what-if story.
  — Mark Inabinett | [e-mail], al, 26 Mar. 2023
• Based on the infamous, 1980s true story of a Georgia bear that died after consuming cocaine thrown out of a plane, the film is basically a feature-length what-if scenario.
  — Craig D. Lindsey, Chron, 23 Feb. 2023
• Filled with bullets, consuming fires and terrific actors like Kirsten Dunst running for cover, the movie is a what-if nightmare stoked by memories of Jan. 6.
  — Manohla Dargis, New York Times, 11 Apr. 2024
• That isn’t to say Burns’ safely declarative dialogue and what-if storytelling won’t spur you to think of your own relationship and matters of fulfillment.
  — Robert Abele, Los Angeles Times, 21 Feb. 2025
• The game will launch with 31 different civilizations, letting players mix and match leaders from various eras to play out fun what-if scenarios.
  — Daniel R. Depetris, Newsweek, 10 Jan. 2025
• The software is designed to run what-if scenarios, aiding in optimizing task assignments.
  — Stack Commerce, Popular Science, 4 Jan. 2024
• Klein has authored articles on Moreno for the online publication Cartoon Research and stresses his career isn’t really a what-if, since Moreno found success.
  — Gustavo Arellano, Los Angeles Times, 28 June 2023
• Beyond that, Ackerman delivers a potent critique of the what-if nature of talking about history in general.
  — Mark Athitakis, Washington Post, 7 June 2023
• The technology also lags the market on scenario analysis and what-if optimization.
  — Lora Cecere, Forbes, 4 May 2023
• Modeling combined with artificial intelligence is now producing tools that allow planners to play out what-if scenarios in their towns.
  — Jen Schwartz, Scientific American, 1 Aug. 2018
• Planning ahead for various what-if scenarios, even unlikely ones, is now a necessary step for policymakers.
  — Foreign Affairs, 28 Sep. 2023
• Not conducting systematic what-if analysis and testing to determine appropriate levels of resiliency in cases of such cyber compromises of BeyondTrust or other key third parties.
  — Davey Winder, Forbes, 2 Jan. 2025
• Playing the what-if game with Nix won’t heal any pain for the Broncos.
  — Nick Kosmider, New York Times, 26 Jan. 2026
• Advertisement Early in the book, Poppy talks about the what-if factor.
  — Shannon Carlin, Time, 9 Jan. 2026
• Acuña to the Royals is the type of what-if move that would've had quite the snowball effect on MLB.
  — Andrew Wright, MSNBC Newsweek, 26 Aug. 2025