New York Times, Thursday, May 9, 2019

Will/Sam rejected my first iteration of this puzzle. They said the idea was creative, but they balked at the reveal (which was SIDESWIPE), rightfully calling it "stretchy." They also said it would be too tough for solvers because the theme answers were asymmetrical. I replied with a counter-proposal: What if, in addition to bringing the theme answers to symmetry, I changed the reveal to OFFSIDES? They said it sounds much better in theory, give it a shot, but no guarantees.

Thus this puzzle was born and tempered, and after a bit of further burnishing under excellent care, may it bring to many a lovely solving experience.

I made the first iteration a year and a half ago, yet just last week I woke up with the thought that SPLIT ENDS might also have worked as a reveal. Or maybe that's stretchy too.

Thursday tricksiness, OFFSIDES indicating that six answers are to be interpreted without their first and last letters:

BALONEY

SKETCHY

I FORGET

TANGELO

UP EARLY

SO THERE

Some good findings, SO THERE -> OTHER my favorite. SO THERE is a fun phrase in itself, and the reparsing required to make O THER into OTHER made it even more interesting. UP EARLY was good too, although UP EARLY isn't as snazzy as a saucy SO THERE.

Two stuck out to me as not as good: KETCH in SKETCHY and ANGEL in TANGELO. Neither KETCH nor TANGELO registered in my head as real words, at least not as quickly as ALONE / BALONEY.

It's easy enough to find entries that become other entries when the first and last letters are lopped off — a quick python script of about 10 lines does the trick. So I'd have liked something extra to elevate the theme more. Some possibilities:

• Longer entries (which would have helped them stand out better in the grid, too)
• Every one of them requiring re-parsing
• The same letters being lopped off the front and/or end
• Lopped-off letters spell out something appropriate

That last one would likely have been tough if you used all the lopped-off letter, but you could certainly spell out something with the first letters.

As it was, I kept wondering what BY / SY / IT / TO / UY / SE might lead to. Seemed too random, not tight enough, if you allow for the first and last letters to be anything whatsoever.

Some fun clues helped to entertain. ANTS as creatures on every continent except ANTartica. A light YEAR going a long way. And what the heck might [Verses versus verses events] be? Ah, poetry SLAMS! That's clever.

The gridwork was good, nothing that slowed me down too much, just some SEL STET NEURO AS YOU. Considering the constraints of having seven themers — shortish, but still seven — it's a decent result.

Some solid themer finds, but with an extra element as listed above, this could have been a real standout.