diff --git a/go/vt/vtgate/tabletgateway.go b/go/vt/vtgate/tabletgateway.go
index b4b8473a32f..98867424770 100644
--- a/go/vt/vtgate/tabletgateway.go
+++ b/go/vt/vtgate/tabletgateway.go
@@ -69,7 +69,7 @@ func init() {
 		fs.DurationVar(&initialTabletTimeout, "gateway_initial_tablet_timeout", 30*time.Second, "At startup, the tabletGateway will wait up to this duration to get at least one tablet per keyspace/shard/tablet type")
 		fs.IntVar(&retryCount, "retry-count", 2, "retry count")
 		fs.BoolVar(&routeReplicaToRdonly, "gateway_route_replica_to_rdonly", false, "route REPLICA queries to RDONLY tablets as well as REPLICA tablets")
-		fs.BoolVar(&balancerEnabled, "enable-balancer", false, "Whether to enable the tablet balancer to evenly spread query load for a given tablet type")
+		fs.BoolVar(&balancerEnabled, "enable-balancer", false, "Enable the tablet balancer to evenly spread query load for a given tablet type")
 		fs.StringSliceVar(&balancerVtgateCells, "balancer-vtgate-cells", []string{}, "When in balanced mode, a comma-separated list of cells that contain vtgates (required)")
 		fs.StringSliceVar(&balancerKeyspaces, "balancer-keyspaces", []string{}, "When in balanced mode, a comma-separated list of keyspaces for which to use the balancer (optional)")
 	})