Monday, November 1, 2021, Fiona Taylor

I thought I'd get a jump on the Monday puzzle review while watching Sunday Night Football. I did it as a sort of prevent defense because I have a busy day tomorrow, but, coincidentally, the puzzle theme turned out to be apt. The clue for the revealer is "Org. that's home to the ends of 20-, 32-, 41-, and 52-Across" and the answer is NFL. Those ends  endings of each two word phrase is the name of a football team: PHONECHARGERS, GUMMYBEARS, HASHBROWNS, and TREASURYBILLS, none of which are playing the game that's in our media area. I couldn't help thinking that the full phrases are humorous if applied to the teams. The Phone Chargers sound like a farm team, the Gummy Bears and Hash Browns are having a bad season, and the Treasury Bills are on a roll. Just joking, of course, - I don't want any of the ends to get defensive!

There's lots of bonus sports material - UMP, TREYS, TEE, SKATER & RINK, and LOGO squeezes in one more NFL team - so much so that one might be tempted to call encroachment. 

I got off to a false start with a guess of 'gotit' for 1-Across ("'No need to say it again'"). That answer lead me to guess 'iran' for "'Toe' of the Arabian Peninsula" (I often run afoul with geography clues, sadly). However, getting WISEGUYS for "Smart alecks" at 5 Down made me realize the correct answer to 1A was IKNOW, which forced a fourth down conversion from 'iran' to OMAN, which opened the way to forward progress across the grid.

There were no more fumbles as I worked toward completion. Some of the clues did make me think about assorted slant options in clue choices. Some examples are SIRE as a horse instead of a monarch, STIR as an action instead of the pokey, GOTHS as high schoolers rather than an East Germanic Tribe, and ETAS arrival times rather than Greek letters. I guess it all depends on the game plan.

The only C/AP that seemed a little out of bounds for a Monday was UMIAK "Inuit boat." And I call foul on "NNW's opposite" (SSE). BAH.

Better plays were "Group of criminals" (GANG), "Some angels ... or some newspapers" (HERALDS), and both words in the C/AP "Melee" (FRAY) are nice. 

In the southeast, ALLAS, CLERK, and ESSES made a nice tight end.

~Frannie.