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Shook one's defender, in sports lingo / THU 2-27-25 / Apt surname for Scarlett / X-communicates? / Pants in which you may carry a pen / 2000s HBO series about a polygamous family / Bark beetle's target
Thursday, February 27, 2025
Constructor: David Steinberg
Relative difficulty: Easy to Easy-Medium
Theme answers:
- BLUE JEANS (18A: Pants in which you may carry a glove)
- BIG LOVE (8D: 2000s HBO series about a polygamous family)
- TROUSERS (23A: Pants in which you may carry a pen)
- GOT OPEN (4D: Shook one's defender, in sports lingo)
- JODHPURS (48A: Pants in which you may carry a key)
- MICKEY (37D: ___ Mouse)
- CORDUROYS (53A: Pants in which you may carry a phone)
- PERSEPHONE (35D: Greek goddess of spring)
Big Love is an American drama television series created by Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer that aired on HBO from 2006 to 2011. It stars Bill Paxton as the patriarch of a fundamentalist Mormon family in contemporary Utah that practices polygamy, with Jeanne Tripplehorn, Chloë Sevigny, and Ginnifer Goodwin portraying his wives. The series charts the family's life in and out of the public sphere in their Salt Lake City suburb, as well as their associations with a fundamentalist compound in the area. It features key supporting performances from Amanda Seyfried, Grace Zabriskie, Daveigh Chase, Matt Ross, Mary Kay Place, Bruce Dern, Melora Walters, and Harry Dean Stanton.The series premiered in the United States on March 11, 2006, following the sixth-season premiere of the HBO series The Sopranos. Big Love was a success for HBO, running for five seasons before concluding its run on March 20, 2011. (wikipedia)
• • •
The theme was super-easy as rebuses go, largely because the theme clues tell you what is going to be in the rebus square. You are told your pants might be carrying a PEN, a GLOVE, etc. So for me, MICKEY and PERSEPHONE, which already pretty easily clued, were total no-brainers, as I fully understood the theme at that point, and the clues on both those answer just handed me huge chunks of those answers (KEY and PHONE, respectively). But even though it was on the simple side, the puzzle was still fun. I was genuinely curious to see how the pocket gimmick was going to play out, and the results were really impressive. Also impressive—the grid is not loaded with gunk. Lots of short answers, but never once did I feel like I was wading through crosswordese sludge. There's ordinary and common stuff here and there, but SRTA was about as bad as it got, and that's not that bad. The theme is so charming that the short fill hardly seemed to matter. You can get away with a lot when your theme is great. But this grid didn't actually get away with anything—the fill is legit solid. Everywhere. So beautifully and smoothly crafted. I know it probably looks fairly ordinary, the short stuff, but I cannot tell you how hard it is to get your boring-ass fill to come out smooth and not lumpy. Just to get it to inconspicuous is a real feat of craftsmanship, one that most constructors just don't take the time to bother with. But David (despite not even being 30 yet), is an old pro, a longtime editor himself, so solving his puzzles ... I always feel confident that I'm in good hands.
I cringed a little at TEEN DAD (40D: Certain young parent)—not sure why, just weird that it's a concept at all (same with TEEN MOM, frankly). It just sounds like a bad / exploitative reality show (which TEEN MOM actually is) (it's a whole ****ing MTV franchise, an empire even: Teen Mom 2, Teen Mom 3 ... Teen Mom: Young Moms' Club!?) (I remember when MTV used to show music videos; good times). Was not sure how I felt about the clue on REDD (62A: Apt surname for Scarlett), but now I think I like it. "Scarlet" is a word meaning "red," so ... double the last letter on one, double the last letter on the other! "Apt!" I don't really love that the clue for REDD contains "Scarlett" when one of REDD's crosses is, in fact, SCAR, but who's going to notice this but me? People are going to be too distracted by the wackiness of the whole REDD clue concept to notice the SCAR cross (I mean, probably). The only answer besides REDD that (kinda) slowed me down was CENA, which I wrote in as CERA, despite having been over the CERA / CENA distinction before. I mean, look at them side by side, there's no mistaking them for one another, but as mere tetragrams ... man they are near-identical twins. CERA is the lanky comedic actor who has been in a ton of movies, and who played George Michael Bluth in Arrested Development. John CENA ... is a pro wrestler. Though like CERA, he is also an actor. So ... yeah, I'm never going to keep these names straight. My cross to bear.
 |
| [CERA] |
 |
| [CENA] |
- 10A: Pupil: aperture :: ___ : diaphragm (IRIS) — embarrassing how long (comparatively) it took me to get this, which is to say embarrassing that I didn't get this almost instantly. "Diaphragm" had me thinking some completely different part of the body was involved. I didn't know we were staying in the eye.
- 1D: X-communicates? (DMS) — as in "communicates on the app owned by that Nazi-saluting piece of shit El*n M*sk." The app stupidly and confusingly known as "X" (née Twitter).
- 47A: Matches or watches (SEES) — "Matches" in poker, "watches" with the eyes.
- 64A: Herb with a silent H (THYME) — easy, but might be slightly confusing to Americans, for whom "Herb" itself has a "silent H."
- 25D: Bad comment to hear from your surgeon ("OOPS!") — this should not have made me laugh but it did. Also, if I'm hearing any comments from my surgeon, something has gone drastically wrong.
Happy Thursday! It's cocktail night for me, so I will be enjoying a Manhattan and all its various components (58D: Manhattan component = RYE). See you next time.
[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]
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50 comments:
Easy, although I liked it somewhat less than @Rex did. No overwrites, no WOEs but the same confusion as OFL with CErA/CENA at 16A. I didn't get that the U's were "POCKETS" (35A) for the rebus words until I got the revealer. Perfectly serviceable Thursday.
Clever. Lived it!
Thanks, David.
Oops! LOVED it, not “lived” it. 😂
“How are they going to make this work with Yale and Princeton?”
Question when receiving the wrong drink order.
Response to the question “How much do you enjoy the artist behind Purple Rain?”
Never caught on to the trick, and barely understood it after the explanation.
MAMOA & RAO works as well as MOMOA & ROO. Naticked
Truer words have never been spoken about El*n M*sk.
Fun Fact: John Cena is also a rapper!
Loved this puzzle. When I was at BLUEJEANS and GLOVE I was thinking Billie Jean/Michael Jackson/One Glove... it's funny how your mind works when you are sussing out a theme. Never have I ever heard of JODHPURS. And I am positive I will not remember the spelling for the life of me. Does anyone know if it has ever appeared int he NYTXW before? Anyhow, great puzzle
It’s interesting to watch the evolution as they drift away from traditional crosswords into a more multi-media experience. It will be interesting to see what the puzzle is like in five or ten years - they could go in all different directions , with elements similar to Jeopardy with Video Clues and Daily Doubles. Also a “buy a vowel” option might be a welcome feature (I’ll bet it would be popular on weekends). I’m going to (actually I already do) miss the traditional, old-school style Crossword Puzzles.
Loved this puzzle--easy enough in the non-theme areas to build the support around them so that you could start to see what was going on. It is true that once the revealer was clear, that the rest was pretty easy. But that was why I could do it in 18 minutes and not 45! I actually had buCKETS before POCKETS but obviously POCKETS belong on pants much better, so that became clear soon enough. The long downs were great; remembering how to spell JODHPURS was challenging. Thanks! Finding things that would belong in a pocket to rebus in the other direction--very creative!
Cringed when I first saw the layout. So many threes usually means a terrible solve but I agree with Rex. This held up beautifully and I genuinely loved the gimmick.
Only place I got stuck was jodhpurs which I had never heard of and I didn’t grok tact for delicacy so hav the j and c of Joyce as d and l for Doyle and just sat there trying to figure out what it could be!
Huh??
What are JODHPURS? I’ll Google it but the Southeast and center were tougher than necessary. We make “Pot Roasts” where I’m from. Never ever have I heard of a BEEF ROAST.
Great puzzle today. Like OFL, thought SRTA was the only dud. I got slowed down in the S/E as I had never heard of JODHPURS .
Almost an ideal Thursday -- one where everything is inscrutable until you figure out the theme, then suddenly it all makes sense. I say 'almost' because I've never heard of BIG LOVE, so a slight ding for that.
But everything else is great. Notice - and I speak to the NYT editors here - that there are no other 'U's in the grid besides the theme 'U's. That is the attention to detail that has been too often missing of late.
Wonderful puzzle - early week easy but loved the trick and the overall elegance. Agree with the big guy that the fill is so super slick that working it was effortless. Helped that I knew JOHDPURS cold. Walked the Mall yesterday afternoon and thought about the majestic ELMs and how much longer we’ll have them.
Highly enjoyable Thursday morning solve.
James JOYCE wrote streams of consciousness books
Print version didn’t have the pictures in the clues, but rather the actual word that was to be inserted into the “pocket,” which seemed a bit weird. Puzzle was fun once I caught on.
I couldn’t figure out how to enter the rebus to get the puzzle accepted as finished. I tried both the “u” before and after the pocket object but neither worked. I looked in your post for some direction but ended up losing my streak using reveal. Bummer.
Fucking bullshit. Let me know when you publish my comment.
I was buoyant after coursing through this high-quality feel-good creation.
OMG-SO-CLEVER.
• Coming up with the idea that the letter U can represent a pocket. Where did that come from? Genius!
• Going from that to a puzzle whose theme is items in pants. What a leap!
HOW-DID-HE-DO-THAT?
• Finding four types of pants that not only contain the letter U, but contain lengths that fit the requirements of symmetry.
• I don’t ever remember a rebuts puzzle where I didn’t actually have to write the rebus or its first letter in, where I could simply imagine it. Is that not expanding the envelope or what?
Plus, a grid so junk-free that it makes me calm just to look at it. Sweet cluing – I loved being misdirected by [Matches or watches], where I was thinking nouns, not verbs.
And lovely serendipities. A backward SERA, echoing that answer from yesterday’s puzzle. The cross of WOO and a backward AMOR.
Not only was I buoyant after solving, but I will be buoyant again when I see your name atop a puzzle, David. Thank you for a splendid outing!
JODHPURS was one of those fun "that can't possibly be right" words that had me flailing for a good five minutes until I finally gave up and googled it.
Liked the puzzle. Thanks David and Will. As the granddaughter of a Survivor I am very sensitive about anyone who would make that salute and I don’t think Elon Musk did that. Here’s what I do know for a fact: Elon Musk visited Auschwitz-Birkenau on January 22, 2024. This private visit took place before he attended a conference on antisemitism organized by the European Jewish Association in Krakow, Poland. During the visit, he was accompanied by his young son, as well as by Rabbi Menachem Margolin, and Holocaust survivor Gidon Lev. Musk laid a wreath and participated in a memorial ceremony at the site, which was a former Nazi German concentration camp where over 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, were killed during World War II. Pretty sure he didn’t give a Nazi dog whistle salute a year after that visit. It was just an awkward gesticulation used as a desperate attempt by his political opponents to vilify him.
Today is a day I would have bought a vowel, Johnny. My last letter in was the O in GOTOU/OSHEA, a bit of a Natick for us non-sporty types, what with the rebus and all. Had to run the vowels to get there. An otherwise excellent Thursday, however. Always glad to see David Steinberg’s byline.
No banana?
A perfect Thursday puzzle in my book! I struggled a bit with “Big Love”. I kept thinking “what is a Bi-Glove? Is it like a bivalve?”. Finally got it and then happy music!
I “solved” this but had absolutely no idea what was going on. Thee little images might have helped but they don’t exist in AcrossLite. But it always gives me a warm feeling when Rex likes a puzzle.
Not my favorite puzzle. The concept was fine once it made sense, but there wasn't any joy in figuring it out. I've never heard of BIG LOVE or JODHPURS, and GOT by was my first entry for 4-down, because is had no idea who OSHEA is so there was no indication that the O should be there.
It wasn't until MICKEY that is realized the theme clues actually contained part of the down answers (KEY, PEN, etc.) but by that time the gimmick had lost my interest.
There are also some non-theme answers I didn't love: what the heck is an INNER planet? ICE SHOW? That sounds like a made up descriptor for figure skating. Don't love the Mormon brainwash party of polygamy and TABERNACLE. And the biggest problem: ODOR is not a property of sulfur -- sulfur is odorless.
Ultimately, it seems like a clever and well-constructed puzzle, but it just didn't play very well. I do like that we are still getting echoes of pwnt in the cluing of OWN.
Natick, maybe. But no, the A does not work.
Y ALE?
PRINCE? TON!
My NYT app didn’t have the pics until I’d finished and then they showed up in the U pockets.
Agree with Rex, less forgivingly, on Redd (c’mon…a hypothetical last name; how about Fred Sanford’s portrayer Foxx?) and unequivocally (sorry, Rachel) on El*n M*sk, re both nazi salute and consummate POS.
Another subtle part of the theme that I liked is the wording of the clues. Like: “Pants in which you [that is, “U”] may carry a glove.”
So was this actually a rebus or not? I had GLOVE, PEN, PHONE in those squares (this was way too easy for a Thursday, btw), but when I got to the revealer, I figured they wanted the letter U in them instead. Finished the puzzle successfully without any rebuses. I’m guessing it would have worked if I’d filled in the rebuses, but don’t know. Did anyone fill in U/GLOVE, etc.? Amazed that Rex liked this one. There was no challenge other than figuring out how to fill in the “rebus” squares.
Hey All !
More after solve animation stuff. Nice pictures whoever did that.
Embarrassing that it took me until looking back at MIC(KEY), and seeing KEY in the clue, after going over the Themer clues repeatedly. I was thinking KEY was in all the U's at first. But that didn't work. I was like, "What is GOTOKEY?" Finally saw the "pen" in that clue, said, "Hmm, if I put in PEN ... Yes! GOT O(PEN)!", and looked at the other clues, seeing what was being "carried", and gave myself a Do'h slap.
I knew David would be back. He had said he was going to stop constructing to focus on his Editorship. Can't keep a good puz maker down. Nice to see you again.
+1 - ROO. Har.
Nice, easy, clean tricky ThursPuz. May as well go back to sleep, as your day is now complete.
Happy Thursday!
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
I think technically the difference between pot roast and beef roast is the cut of meat and how it’s cooked. But where I’m from, the general term is beef roast, and it’s only called a pot roast if you cook vegetables in the pan with the meat.
Solved the puzzle quickly, but it never came up as "finished." What letters were I supposed to put in the rebus squares? Nothing seemed to work.
I found this very easy, but struggled to understand the theme. I finished with nothing but U’s in the grid and wondered why the downs were gibberish. Finally - after staring long enough - I finally saw PERSEPHONE. Then felt a little foolish upon seeing how easy and obvious those squares were. But it never once occurred to me that the actual answers would be right there in the clues. Enjoyed the puzzle otherwise but something about that just seems inherently wrong.
Imaginative puzzle. Solve was a bit trance in that the NE went fairly quickly, then the SW, followed by the NW and last the SE—almost like four mini-puzzles. Don’t know where I heard or read JODHPURS but somehow got it phonetically, tho got the U only from the theme. Never heard of Big Love, but it made sense as an answer after getting the revealer. In our area in NY there is a magnificent ELM that neighbors from miles around keep alive by funding shots that prevent the Dutch Elm Tree disease from taking hold.
Really enjoyed this theme -- Rex said what I would have said.
Other randomness:
-- I will never ever ever ever remember how to spell JODHPURS. Johdpurs? Jodphurs? Ack!
-- Weird to see the rebus components spelled out in the clues. It works quite well in this case, but I wonder if he ever considered using phrases like "hand covering", "writing implement", "lock opener" and "mobile device" in the clues.
-- Interesting clue for OSHEA, since his same-named father is better known as Ice Cube and has rapped at many a concert that might be termed an ICESHOW.
-- WEAVE >> SCORE. As a sports nut, I slapped my head on this one.
-- Not a fan of ATERAW or TEENDAD; both felt forced.
-- David Steinberg is an amazing force within crossworld. May he remain so for another, oh, 50 years.
The actual content of the pocket as a rebus -- so PEN, PHONE, etc. For me at least
The letter U
Un padre adolescente comió un asado de carne en el tabernáculo.
Heckuva tuff puzzle. Even after completing it I kept trying to grasp how the theme works. When BIU showed up early, I knew the downs would be useless in the solve and like @Nancy says, if the answer doesn't make sense, the trick is in the clue. But today it's in the horizontal clue. Very tricksy this smelly hobbitses. By the time I cobbled POCKETS together I realized it was no help either. Lotsa groping around in the dark for me. Lotsa fun.
I spent a silly amount of time looking at pictures from the town of Jodhpur where the pants originated. Beautiful blue city.
I had a poor experience with Ryder, so I am a Penske man.
Super gunk-free outing, but with eight names, it probably felt gunky if you didn't know them. Luckily only O'Shea was new to me and the crosses gave him up quickly.
People: 8
Places: 0
Products: 2
Partials: 2
Foreignisms: 1
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 13 of 76 (17%) {wonderful, just wonderful!}
Funnyisms: 2 😕
Uniclues:
1 Discard from my burning love.
2 Work pants with a really big loop for a hammer.
3 Oh no, sad one was amused.
4 How the young man carrying a baby scored the winning touchdown at the church barbecue.
5 Career path for Olympic skaters ... ha ha.
6 Tree with bad breath.
1 SOOTY BLUE JEANS
2 THOR TROUSERS (~)
3 OOPS, EMO VEERED (~)
4 TEEN DAD GOT OPEN (~)
5 ICE SHOW ... PSYCH
6 INNER ODOR ELM
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Awkward conversation starter on the third date. BOOTS, OK? I'M KINKY.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Your last sentence seems to be the point you really wanted to make, which is of course your right. But how can anyone be "pretty sure" about what Musk thinks or does? Face it -- none of us have any idea what's going on in his head -- "mercurial" doesn't even begin to describe the way he rolls. If that's why you like him, fine, but your argument in this case might be more convincing if he didn't have AfD leadership on speed-dial or tend to double down on any idea that he blurts out (verbally or on X) no matter how extreme it may come off to many reasonable people, including those who might otherwise appreciate what he brings to the table.
I was happy to read in the comments that the clues on apps had pictures, which would have made this a lot more fun. My print version had the actual words that appeared in the answers, which was odd. I wasn't until MICKEY that i grudgingly accepted that the "key: in the clue was the KEY in the answer. Really? Yes really.
Didn't remember BIGLOVE until I put the GLOVE in and OSHEA was a total no-know but otherwise no real problems.
The worst comment I've heard from a surgeon was not OOPs, but "that was a doozy", my eye doc's comment on why he couldn't fully repair my detached retina. Not what you want to hear.
The POCKETS stuff was inspired, DS. Too bad it Didn't Show up on my print out, but thanks for a reasonable amount of fun.
I was happy to read in the comments that the clues on apps had pictures, which would have made this a lot more fun. My print version had the actual words that appeared in the answers, which was odd. I wasn't until MICKEY that i grudgingly accepted that the "key: in the clue was the KEY in the answer. Really? Yes really.
Didn't remember BIGLOVE until I put the GLOVE in and OSHEA was a total no-know but otherwise no real problems.
The worst comment I've heard from a surgeon was not OOPs, but "that was a doozy", my eye doc's comment on why he couldn't fully repair my detached retina. Not what you want to hear.
The POCKETS stuff was inspired, DS. Too bad it Didn't Show up on my print out, but thanks for a reasonable amount of fun.
How is JODHPURS not the WOTD
The Nazi thing is so used up and boring.
I figured out the theme piecemeal. First I noticed that there was a downs-only rebus (not knowing OSHEA didn't help, I had GOT by for 4-D); then I noticed, eventually, that all the rebus squares were Us. Still later did I get POCKETS, and noticed that you could imagine a U to be one; but for some reason it never occurred to me that the clue told you what to put in the pocket in a straightforward manner -- a PEN, a GLOVE, etc. And this even though I was wondering why PERSEPHONE wouldn't fit. Finally I had a little Eureka! experience with that PHONE, and it all fell into place. (Except for figuring out that it was JODHPURS, not JODphURS. I really admired the boldness of including that word at all, where the other pants were so much more common.
eyeS before TABS, ATE out beforeo RAW, causes before REASON, but that was all minor. I amazed myself by knowing it was Jason MOMOA (only from crosswords). So, a nice crunchy puzzle; I'd expect no less from young Mr. Steinberg (I guess he's in his late 20s by now, but that's still "young" to me.)
Ability to adapt in life to change can take us only so far, as the young’s will learn much sooner than they even imagine, given Moore’s law… I, too, wish for the pleasures of the traditional puzzle—surely the NYT could offer both? Another revenue stream in the stormy seas?
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