bad apple vs malign

bad apple

noun
  • A person who is not wholesome, honest, or trustworthy, especially one who has an adverse influence on others. 

malign

verb
  • To make defamatory statements about; to slander or traduce. 

adj
  • Evil or malignant in disposition, nature, intent or influence. 

  • Malevolent. 

  • Malignant. 

How often have the words bad apple and malign occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )