You are using a sledgehammer to crack a nut by firing him for one mistake.
use a sledgehammer to crack a nut
idiomTo use disproportionate or significantly excessive force to carry out an action; to do something overzealously.
Origin
first recorded 19th c.The analogy dates back to at least the middle of the 19th century: see, for example, this quotation from Levi Carroll Judson’s work Sages and Heroes of the American Revolution (1851): “He at once became the nucleus around which a band of patriots gathered and formed a nut too hard to be cracked by the sledgehammer of monarchy.”
Sending a team of ten lawyers to fix a minor billing error is like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
The government's decision to deploy the entire national guard for a peaceful protest was clearly using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
- 01
bust a nut
To ejaculate.
- 02
crack a crust
To make a living.
- 03
crack a fat
To get an erection of the penis.
- 04
crack a smile
To smile, especially while attempting not to.
- 05
crack down
To take harsh action (against), as when enforcing a law more stringently than before.
- 06
crack of dawn
The first moment of daylight; the instant at which sunrise begins.
- 07
crack through
To penetrate
- 08
crack up
To laugh.