Everybody put their money?

[Purpleborzoi]

Awkward or not, a plural pronoun with a singular subject is grammatically wrong. The whole sentence should be reconstructed if political correctness is the goal.

[Abeille]

If 'everybody' is a singular third person pronoun why is it followed by 'put' but not 'puts'?

[Beeesneees]

You are thinking of two separate tenses:

Everybody put is equivalent to he put, she put, etc.
Everybody put money in the pot when they arrived.

Everybody puts is equivalent to he puts, she puts, etc.
Everybody puts money in the pot once a week.
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Cheers m' dears!

[Abeille]

In your first row of examples you mean 'he and she put', right? The sense of 'everybody' is plural then, isn't it?

In the second, it's practically the same: 'he puts' and 'she puts' is 'they put', hence 'everybody put'. This way it adds up perfectly, I think.

Did I get it right that way?

[Alan]

Hi Abeille,

Remember that 'put' is the past simple and can be used for all persons singular and plural but 'puts' is the third person singular of the present tense.

Alan
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English as a Second Language
You can read my ESL story Present Simple

[Abeille]

I was a fool! It's just Past Simple. 'In the beginning everybody put...' = 'At that time in the past they put...'

[Abeille]

Albeit I have to mention that the article shared by Amy - http://www.crossmyt.com/hc/linghebr/sgtheirl.html - was much to my liking.
No contradictions at all. I absolutely advocate such usage. It is very natural indeed. Why on earth to argue about this matter?
Everybody can choose their way! Doesn't it sound good English? :)