The well-researched article on home runs covered all the bases. (It was batter than expected.)
@Mike The author traveled to the game by train on a round tripper. If it wasn't well-researched, he would have been knocked out of the park.
My five favorite original clues from last week (in order of appearance): 1. Fictional company known for its duds (4) 2. Some experts of interest? (10) 3. A bit corrupt, perhaps? (4)(3) 4. It's in the eye of the beholder (6) 5. Deal made on the spot? (2)(4) ACME ECONOMISTS DATA ROT RETINA AD SALE
My favorite encore clues from last week: [Ones who have trouble finishing sentences?] (8) [Invasive plants?] (5)(5) ESCAPEES ENEMY SPIES
@Lewis I was very pleased with the ACME clue though I don't think I would have twigged it nearly as quickly if we hadn't just been to see Cotote VS ACME earlier this month!
I thought I knew baseball, but it turns out I don't know JACK.
@Bruce To me, that one is more familiar as a verb than a noun: "He jacked it over the center field fence for his second home run of the game."
Perfect puzzle for last day of regulation baseball season, thank you!
Although the puzzle was Monday level of ease, I was disappointed with the obscure sports themed expressions. I don't mind not "getting " the theme initially but I do like a good aha moment when I finally see it. No aha moment today. :(
@Jeff B MD Same here. I am not a huge baseball fan, but have watched enough to think I know something about the game - but have never heard of any of those terms for a home run. I had absolutely no idea what the theme was.
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! CLAM is in the puzzle today!
This is going to be a tough Monday for some of our international--and even some of our domestic--solvers.
@Steve L That crossed my mind too, but it solved pretty easily as a themeless, so I hope it doesn't cause too much pain. When I was very young, I was very into MLB, but it's been several decades since I've paid attention. I didn't know any of the themers as a reference to baseball, but they were gettable—JACKFRUIT and TATERTOT without any crossings.
@Steve L It's fairly easily gettable even if you know nothing about baseball. I'd never heard of JACK for a homer.
@Steve L I have never seen a baseball game and managed most of the puzzle without issue. What actually tripped me up was the Coconut Girl Scout cookies and the city in Oklahoma. I had no clue and had to resort to a look up.
@Steve L I didn’t know any of the baseball terms, but I was able to solve it pretty quickly anyway. I had to look at the article after for an explanation of the theme.
Despite all the personal testimony in the replies here, xwstats.com says this puzzle is playing out as Hard: 🌎 Global Stats Difficulty Hard Median Solve Time 5:24 Median Solver 4% slower ⚡39% of users solved faster than their Monday average. 7% solved much faster (>20%) than their Monday average. 🐢61% of users solved slower than their Monday average. 16% solved much slower (>20%) than their Monday average.
@Steve L I did it in late Monday/early Tuesday time without understanding anything about the theme. The crosses were gentle enough.
Tricky for a Monday, not just because of an unfamiliarity with baseball, there were some chewier than usual clues in there. I'm always curious about just how much baseball turns up in the crossword (especially former players) which seems to be regarded as relatively straightforward common knowledge when I feel that of the mainline sports it's the one I know the least about. Is it a function of age (we're relatively young,) geography (no MLB team in this my hometown, and I'm always hopeful there will be more hockey in the puzzle!,) the historical but waning reputation of baseball as America's game or something else? Regardless, I was pleased to find dugout referenced in the CANOE context, as historical boats are much more my area.
Daisy, Daisy Give me your answer do I'm half crazy all for the love of you. We’re both mathematicians Logic drives our decisions But fate is sweet Where our lives meet: A Venn diagram built for two.
[Imposing slugger in a tee ball game] TATER TOT
Tight theme set, good enough fill, I had a good time at the crosswords. HAVOC was a good 1-Across, an interesting looking and evocative word.
@Peaty n Oaty Anyone else start off with 'chaos'? Felt jusr right to me until I started on the Downs.
I’m not even remotely familiar with baseball slang (I’m Bri’ish innit), but this was still a very Monday-level difficulty for me. Never knew the themed entries were the starts of terms for HOMERUNs, but I didn’t need to because the clues point to the standard meaning. The hardest section for non-USians is probably going to be the intersections of TULSA with LEADOFF and SAMOAS, but there’s enough around there to get them eventually (AREAS, TEAMS, DOES OK, OATH and MOTIFS were textbook Monday cluing).
@Billy And I was actually waiting for a Brit to balance the Americanism of this puzzle with a good old "innit" 😃 Thank you mate!
@Billy Agree with all that - a nice Monday themeless today. The snaggiest section for me was the south: FGS (???), BLOUSE (didn't know it was especially to go with a skirt), and GO SEE (had it as wOwEE for a while). @Andrzej "Cheers" is Bri'ish for thank you, maybe even "Cheers m8" if you're really getting into it...! 👊
@Billy I would think the very explicit clue for LEADOFF ("very first batter...") would bring to mind a possible and ultimately correct word with just a few crosses, even for the baseball-agnostic.
Well now, that’s a tight theme. I mean, what kind of theme answer could you get with “dinger”, say? Speaking of which, that revealer lands perfectly. I think the cluing was perfect for Monday, where there was just enough non-obvious to get the brain involved, in general. In other words, instead asking for the opposite of “white”, say, today the puzzle asked for the opposite of “liability”. Plus, there was the grinner, with the BANANA/ARROW quote, and a trio of lovely answers in HAVOC, MOTIFS, and BOX SET. Good to see you again, Helen, after a four-year absence. This was a lovely way to LEAD OFF the week. Thank you!
Well we got our share of baseball and baseball-adjacent clues today (Im looking at you, dugout). I’ve listened to a lot of baseball games and never heard any announcer call “he hit a JACK” or “he hit a TATER”, but I’ll take your word for it. Yeah, I think our overseas contingent and our cricket loyalists will still be able to muddle through this. We keep seeing echoes of old themes, BANANAs seem to be on lately, and I was wondering if we were back in the FORTIES with TATERTOTS. Nice Monday!
@SP I've read/heard people talk about a player like, "He had two jacks yesterday." Tater is an old-school term.
@SP - For the record, I have heard the word JACK used on baseball broadcasts. I am looking forward to the Brewers jacking some hits deep into October, especially at Am Fam Field.
@SP You’ll hear the announcer say “Back to back JACKS” when 2 consecutive players hit a home run.
For years, I paid individually for various Times subscriptions to avoid one thin dime of my money going to sports. I detest the lingo, the violence, the sexism, the gambling, all of it. I cannot express how much I resent sports emphasis in word puzzles intended for a general audience. There are so many subjects covered in these puzzles about which I know nothing, about which I enjoy learning. Sports will never be one. Please keep these for your niche game areas and spare the rest of us.
@Muzzy First of all, I do respect how you feel and I'm also not a huge sports person either. I actually have a lot of issues with big money sports. This was absolutely not a favorite theme of mine. But how many sports puzzles, that are seriously like kind of all about sports are there!? Not a lot. Once in awhile there's a Star Trek themed puzzle, which I'm over the moon about, and others aren't, so what if sometimes there's a sports puzzle!? You didn't even need to know the sports stuff to solve this particular puzzle. There have been themes about Mario Brothers, Shawshank Redemption, escape rooms, art, etc etc .. Not every puzzle is going to resonate with each of us individually. And that is completely okay!! I mean, if you hate all the puzzles, that's one thing, but if you occasionally hate a puzzle because it has too many sports references, then just move on to the next day.
@Muzzy You *do* realize sport is one of the few things the average person actually knows quite a bit about, right? A sports one is exactly the kind of theme best suited for a general audience. Now, vindictive hatred of all sports, that's quite niche indeed. Do you really believe you're in the majority here?
@Muzzy not sure if you're a real person when you say 'I can't express how much I resent sports etc etc' you are expressing your feelings. take a chill pill and learn a few new words - thankfully Will & CO as I like to think of the crossword team at the Times doesn't force too much sports and arcane trivia into our heads. words with meaning that are not slang and insider talk are always best.
@Muzzy you think the amorphous concept of "sports" benefited financially from this puzzle?
@Muzzy You won’t get a lot of agreement here, but you’re absolutely right. It’s annoying how much useless sports knowledge I’ve accumulated from these puzzles. No idea how people could get excited to watch the same game over and over for their whole lives, never mind the ethical issues of supporting brutal, brain-damaging sports like football or boxing.
@muzzy Your hatred of sports due to gambling, CTE, etc… are valid reasons why you avoid them. Unfortunately big money industries will have corruption, and things like injuries are going to go hand and hand with sports. But you can say that about any of the other big industries. Should there never be a movie theme because of the rampant sexual assault in Hollywood? Or if you use Mario as an example should video games be excluded because call of duty promotes violence and can cause addiction (esports has its own plethora of issues). Is it all sports? Track and field? Or only the ones that you have deemed unworthy of being enjoyed?
@Muzzy "Please remove this general topic from all puzzles intended for a general audience because I don't like this general topic." Funny stuff!
Obviously the theme was a huge mystery to me, so the puzzle solved like a themeless, and I had to rely on crosses to get quite a few entries. I've only recently encountered JACKFRUIT for the first time - there was a piece on it in The Guardian, how it generally is quite tasteless unless you prepare it right. I just looked it up and learned it has very little protein - why would it be a *meat* replacement then? Apparently in Polish it's called "owoc chlebowca" ("fruit of the bread tree") and it's only sold as a snack: I saw a packet of dried jackfruit strips it at the supermarket last week.
@Andrzej It sounds like it should be able to drive the Millennium Falcon
@Andrzej Jackfruit is not the same as breadfruit, though they are closely related.
@Andrzej Often "meat replacements" are used to approximate the texture of meat. This is especially true of recipies where the flavor mostly comes from the seasonings.
@Andrzej jackfruit subbed in for beef makes an excellent crock pot “beef” stew.
"San Francisco ballplayer" for GIANT. How depressing. Still. If you want to know why I stopped watching baseball long before HOME RUNS were called JACKs and maybe even before they were called TATERs, which I don't remember either -- I stopped watching baseball when the evil Horace Stoneham, N.Y. Giants owner, stole my beloved team from under my nose and shipped it off to San Francisco. There is no disillusionment as profound as the disillusionment of a young child and I have never gotten over it. Never. Rant over. I enjoyed this puzzle and appreciate the almost complete lack of names. A smooth and nicely made Monday.
@Nancy Same sadness here except the DODGERS for me. I became a Mets fan for a bit, but it wasn't the same. Now that we live in the Boston area I have lots of people to root AGAINST the Yankees with (in fact I'd better!) but not the same either.
@Nancy I was bummed when Atlanta stole the Braves from Milwaukee. Then I remembered Milwaukee stole the Braves from Boston...
I love the synchronicity of this puzzle running the day I watched Mike Krukow retire from the broadcast booth in San Francisco. Especially because there was a magic 63-across GIANT in there. Baseball clues are the reason I have loved crosswords for the past 35 years, because my grandma would ask 10-year-old me for help with the sports clues. As a vegetarian who enjoys jackfruit and a Giants fan who loves Kruk: “Grab some pine, meat!”
Today’s crossword was not cricket.
Holy Cow! A Monday puzzle served nicely crisped up, just as TATER TOTS should be.
Seems quite a few non-US people disliked the theme. Personally had no issues with it. Firstly, it added a bit extra into what is usually a pretty boring puzzle, and secondly, even though I know little about baseball terms, they were all easily 'guessed' with the intersecting answers.
@Hitch as a huge baseball fan, to be honest I completely forgot about the puzzle even having a theme by the end. Had to go back and look, and the connection seems... tenuous. Shrug. Can't win em all
Today’s poem made from words in today’s puzzle sometimes a day a/ summer’s song will hit the radio the apple will fall baseball baseball all before like for the very first time like time before star wars before all time d/ going by the door cracked the sound of ashes clothes in the fields look to the shallow places see the a/ edge open go home, bro, ok?… go home
Either this was harder than a normal Monday or my brain is off today. I'm from the UK and don't know baseball but some of the other clues were also harder than they should have been.
@Gareth Baird Nothing is too hard for we Scots! Mind what you say! * I have the Ancestry report to prove it...
@Gareth Baird No True Scotsman would have any trouble with this puzzle. ( had to do it)
The answer ALL TIED suggests that only one side could be tied.
At 54D, I’d have said to SCAN something was the opposite of reading it carefully.
@N.E. Body SCAN can go either way: <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scan" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scan</a>
Sadly the theme went over my head as I'm unfamiliar with all of the slang terms for home run, but that didn't stop me from finishing the crossword, thankfully. It was a pretty good Monday puzzle otherwise.
Haven’t had such little fun on a Monday since my colonoscopy.
May I please have your attention for today's announcements: Top of the news, the Monday puzzle is brought to you by Will Shortz, constructed by Helen Chen, commented on by Sam Corbin — and dedicated to Steve L.! ;-) Will I have been the only one who had to get the themers from the crosses? AccordIng to the supergroup Asia, ONLY Time Will Tell: <a href="https://youtu.be/AWs8SbT4__E?is=foMvuH-9ZLPqhkVi1" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/AWs8SbT4__E?is=foMvuH-9ZLPqhkVi1</a>
A bit on the slow side for a Monday, but managed to work it all out. One 15 letter answer that dawned on me this morning was: JUMPINJACKFLASH And... yep, it's been an answer in 4 puzzles. And... there was one more puzzle find that I'll put in a reply. ...
@Rich in Atlanta As threatened: A Sunday from March 2, 1969 by Betty Leary with the title: "Guess Who." Some sample across answers: JACKINTHEBOX CHEAPJACK EVERYMANJACK But then... two 23 letter down answers, placed symmetrically on opposite sides of the puzzle: JACKBENIMBLEJACKBEQUICK NOPLAYMAKESJACKADULLBOY Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=3/2/1969&h=3d" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=3/2/1969&h=3d</a> ....
As a lifelong lover of baseball, I enjoyed this one so, thank you, Helen! With the AL East Wild Card Series beginning tomorrow night, I'm going to risk entering the lion's den by simply shouting, "Go Red Sox!"⚾️😉
As someone who has seen armadillos up close and personal when they decided to burrow under my barn, I can say that they have scutes and not scales. There are so many creatures with legitimate scales that could have been used for cluing instead.
@Kevin FWIW, recent article about armadillos moving north: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/14/us/armadillo-ohio.html" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/14/us/armadillo-ohio.html</a>
@Kevin Agreed. Plates, armor, scutes. Not scales. Pangolins would be the scaly mammal.
Poor Midge URE, who never became known enough in the US to be a clue for the NYT crossword, although he was very popular in his native UK in the 1970s and 1980s. He's probably best known in the US for producing and co-writing with Bob Geldof the song, "Do They Know It's Christmas?," which inspired other charity records such as "We Are the World."
@CC Midge URE! A blast from the past! "Answers to Nothing" <a href="https://youtu.be/kWx90OQhnl8?si=CKWofHMLhH8aIFh6" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/kWx90OQhnl8?si=CKWofHMLhH8aIFh6</a> got a decent amount of radio play here, along with "Dear God" and his cover of Bowie's "The Man Who Sold the World", but I guess he's still pretty obscure for many solvers.
@CC Love Midge Ure. Saw him with Ultravox at the height of their fame with ‘Vienna’, then again years later (maybe 10 years ago?) on his solo acoustic tour. Like the rest of us, those razor sharp cheekbones have gone, along with his hair, but his voice is as strong as ever.
On this, the saddest day of the year, the first day after the end of baseball’s regular season, I appreciated the good timing and spirit of this puzzle.
@Matt Why would a season end in September, of all months? The weather is still fine for outdoor sports, people are generally back from holiday - isn't this the perfect time for the season to go on?
@Matt The saddest day only if your team didn't make the playoffs.
Well, I know absolutely nothing about baseball or its slang, but was still able to do crossword. Good Monday.
Maybe I'm the only one who thinks EELY is nonsense and has no place as an answer. INURN too, though I saw another comment about that . Everything else was fine, but those were shoehorned in my book.
@J I doubt you're the only one. But let's make a distinction between "nonsense" and simply words that are less common in real life than in crosswords. Crossword constructors need to use words with common letters more often than their normal frequency because they work with potential crossing words, and may be the best way to populate a particular section of a puzzle. These words are commonly called "crosswordese." EELY is an example of this, but it's a real word: <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/eely" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/eely</a> Similarly, INURN is a legitimate word, too: <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/inurn" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/inurn</a> If you're new to crosswords, it's understandable that you might be indignant about rare words being used on a supposedly easy day, but hopefully, you'll get more used to how words are chosen for the puzzles. If you're not new to crosswords, you're just stubborn, as words like these have been used since Day 1, and aren't going anywhere.
@J I wonder if there's ever been a puzzle when someone somewhere didn't say "_____ is not a word and has no place in a crossword puzzle". You might as well just say, "I didn't know the word, so it must not be a word."
OFF TOPIC Recently I have been working my way through some of the more challenging puzzles in the archives. Today I came across a puzzle that really floored me, and I thought I would pass on the recommendation. It is Sunday, January 30, 2005. I don't want to say too much about it, but I found it to be both challenging and ingenious in its conception. I have a feeling it is probably quite renowned among the serious puzzle community, but it was a real discovery for me. I hope that others will appreciate it as well.
@Andrew, thanks for the rec. Will report back…
Huh, I've been watching baseball games since the '70s, in three different time zones,* and I think the only one of these terms I've heard associated with a homer is BLAST. *shrug* * Pittsburgh (my hometown team), Chicago (during college), and San Francisco (my current home).
I also lived in West Virginia for much of my childhood in the 70s and 80s, about an hour's drive from Pittsburgh, and watched Pirates games on TV or listened on radio during that time. Back then, Pittsburgh was the "City of Champions". Long before the Onion headline, "Pittsburgh Pirates mathematically eliminated from Major League Baseball" :-D
One and done. No lookups. Yea! I'm not sure about all of the baseball lingo but BOMBSHELL is a film about the #Me Too Movement. Based on reality, it stars bigwig heavy hitters Margot Robbie, Charlize Theron and Nicole Kidman. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6394270" target="_blank">https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6394270</a>/
Always nice to see my favourite Groucho Marx quote. Always makes me laugh.
@Selective Walrus I had heard this line long ago but never knew its origin. Whether Groucho actually said it seems open to question, based on my Google search. That said, I understand the speculation that it could well have been he, having regard to a classic line that Dr. Spaulding came out with in Animal Crackers: “One morning, I shot an elephant in my pyjamas. How he got into my pyjamas, I dunno.”
This played out like a themeless for me. The only term I was familiar with was TATER, but that didn't stop me from enjoying Helen's creation. Unrelated to the baseball terms, which I don't know JACK about, it seemed a little chewier than the average Monday puzzle, and I'll never complain about that.
Fun fact, SAMOAS are also called Caramel DeLites, depending on which factory they come from.
A sports theme puzzle. God DOES listen!! Cheers and Happy Monday folks!
I couldn't avoid baseball when I was a kid, starting right around the time the Dodgers left Brooklyn, because my dad and younger brother were really into it. Still, I wonder if terms like TATER, BOMB, JACK and BLAST existed back then. I did get very excited when the new Mets team was formed, but after I left home, my exposure to baseball and interest in it also left. Still, it was easy to infer all the answers from the crosses. Coulda been worse - at least it wasn't a football theme.
@Times Rita Blast did. Mel Allen would help shill for sponsors by calling home runs, "Ballantine Blasts."
Huh, never heard of "tater" as slang for a homerun but still a fun theme/monday puzzle. Cheers!
And, way off topic, but a current event led me to wonder about a possible tricky clue for something that's happening currently. And.. what I was thinking of has been an answer in three puzzles, but never clued as I wondered. Anyway, that answer... NOREASTER See if you can think of the clue I considered. ...
@Rich in Atlanta "Sorry Rich, I won't be able to visit Christmas, Valentine's Day NOREASTER"
Def didn’t get the baseball references
I knew exactly zero theme answer starters to refer to home runs; i.e., jack wasn't the only thing I didn't know. Baseball is the only spectator sport I've watched a fair amount of on TV and have attended a few games in person. (How I got some very nice photos of Barry Bonds.) But none of that experienced help me here. To be so dumbfounded by a Monday puzzle is a rare experience for me. Thank you, Sam, for spelling it out.
A very quick one today, despite being dominated by completely unknown sports references. Still an easy fill with the crosses. Onwards.
Here I am, seeking enlightenment! I've heard all of those words/phrases (out of the mouths of commentators) EXCEPT for JACK. Even a person who watches "Major League" every season and listens closely to Bob Uecker has heard just about every moth-eaten descriptor for a big hit...but not that one, methinks. (If I'm wrong, you-know-who will be on it like a duck on a Junebug.) Except for the "See..." clues (C'mon, it's Monday, guys!) this was a neat puzzle, and I enjoyed it....especially after the Saturday college football overdose (PhysDau + DHubby, at times watching 2 games at a time, thanks to modern devices...) In a small house, there's nowhere to go....
@Mean Old Lady I have occasionally heard a commentator say "He really jacked that one" after a long hit. Not sure of its origin. Go Broors!
Always thought SCAN meant give a quick read, the opposite of the meaning here.
@Nobis Miserere See my adjacent reply to Abby Carr.