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I overheard the word bruiser in a description of a generic Russian businessman with bullying habits. I probably shouldn’t be writing this, considering what it means. And it means ‘a big strong man or boy who looks capable of hurting people’ or, in a more general sense, ‘someone who argues with a lot of force, making other people feel afraid’ (MacMillan Dictionary). Put more simply, it’s somebody who can easily bruise you.
More examples of who it can be used in different contexts:
– What draws people to Mr Mélenchon, though, is less his fabulous promises than his stirring rhetoric and reputation as a no-nonsense anti-establishment bruiser, who has no time for convention (The Economist).
– It is hard to reach old age in Silicon Valley: your technology goes stale, and young bruisers such as Google and Apple kick away your zimmer frame (The Economist).
– The hockey branch of Dynamo, the USSR’s mammoth “sports society,” where Ovechkin played, was never famous for producing bruisers, but Ovechkin’s brutish force makes sense: Russia is a bruiser kind of country now (GQ).
– Belarus bruiser employs British spin for softer image (The Guardian).
Confessions of the Linguistic Spy 