New York Times, Tuesday, March 30, 2021

ALEX: Our original idea for a revealer was ONE NAMED SINGERS. But when we added EMINEM, we weren't sure if he'd be considered a singer. Brad suggested MONONYM, which is more interesting and also avoids this categorization problem. Luckily, either potential revealer was a happy length (since 7's and 15's are the easiest to work with in the center row).

Theme entries from the cutting room floor: TRAGIC HERO, CAMDEN YARDS, GRADE LEVEL, TRUST IN GOD.

Editorially, the team had to get rid of some of our trickier clues to shape the difficulty level for a Tuesday, but I like the replacements. And, after several rejections, I'm happy to have made it in.

BRAD: Surely by now, some NYT puzzles have gone to press that were submitted using the online portal. But this dates back to the snail mail era; Alex and I actually worked on two puzzles together over the December holidays of 2019 and sent them in separate envelopes. Fast forward five months. To our surprise, they were both accepted on the same day, a few hours apart (watch this space for No. 2). "This may never happen to either one of us again," I said.

Debut! And with Brad!

Brad Wilber is such a great guy and the former editor of the Chronicle of Higher Education's crossword, which sadly ended a few years ago. He was perfect for that job since he's an incredibly smart person who can pull out terms like MONONYM that are not only interesting but accessible. I have a terrible time keeping those -NYM terms straight, but the MONO prefix makes this one easier.

Will Shortz is extremely picky about "hidden words" themes these days because they've become overdone. Today's features one incredible find, EMINEM in MINE MINE MINE! Some solvers might wonder if that phrase is legit, but those solvers don't have kids.

The other discoveries aren't as mind-blowing because four-letter hidden words aren't as impressive. It does help if there's a rare(ish) letter like a K, and SPIN KICK is a vivid phrase. CARBON OFFSET is a modern term. It's harder to hide ENYA than you might think. Still, these three don't have the wow factor of EMINEM's six letters.

I also want a perfect revealer for hidden words puzzles, and while MONONYM does describe what's going on, it doesn't give a rationale for hiding the names. MIDDLE NAMES would sort of do it, but that doesn't get at the one-nameness. I don't think there is a perfect revealer, unfortunately, which is a ding on this theme concept.

Another approach was to disguise one-named singers.

I appreciated the huge number of clever or fun clues. My favorite was [Body part where a shoe goes]. Probably like most everyone, I filled in FOOT, especially when the middle OO worked fine. Fun head-slap when I realized it referred to a horse's shoe.

A couple of rough patches in the grid, a bit of ELEV HELI, and SLUE is tough vocab. I've learned SIENA from crosswords, but if you haven't traveled to Tuscany, that might be a head-scratcher. Fair crossings for everything, though, and some might appreciate learning something new.

Not my favorite hidden words puzzle, but that EMINEM find was fantastic.