"Out Of Bounds" - December 13, 2019

A place to discuss the weekly Wall Street Journal Crossword Puzzle Contest, starting every Thursday around 4:00 p.m. Eastern time. Please do not post any answers or hints before the contest deadline which is midnight Sunday Eastern time.
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MajordomoTom
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#221

Post by MajordomoTom »

I liked the mechanism, even if I misapplied it and got the "wrong answer" of BART STARR.

I "only" used 9 of the out of bounds fields, not thinking I needed to use all of them to find the PAGEANT level answer.

I'll keep practicing. Still plowing through the one stars in Mr. Gaffney's tasty book.
"Lots of planets have a North", the Ninth Doctor.
MikeMillerwsj
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#222

Post by MikeMillerwsj »

EdStrong wrote: Mon Dec 16, 2019 5:35 pm
MikeMillerwsj wrote: Mon Dec 16, 2019 1:22 pm A brilliant and challenging contest! We had 1613 entries,with an unusually low 63% were correct. We suspect a lot of solvers got the right side's message (NEW YORK GIANTS) but not the left side's. (ELEVEN FROM THE) We had an enormous showing (152) for Lawrence Taylor, another Giant on two Lombardi teams with a retired number. (Is that a PAGEANT? Not quite?) Plus lots of other guesses for players with those distinctions on other teams, starting with BART STARR (121!) and including PEYTON MANNING (28), JOHN ELWAY (17) and Bob Griese (15).

Congratulations to this week's winner: Karen Graber of Niskayuna, NY!
Mike, was “ELEVEN FROM THE NEW YORK GIANTS” considered a correct answer?
Our randomly selected winner had Simms, so we didn't encounter this question. I think we would not have considered this correct--you need one more step to get to the actual name. (For those of us, like me, who didn't happen to know who #11 was, Google helped!)
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Jazzvibist
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#223

Post by Jazzvibist »

BarbaraK wrote: Mon Dec 16, 2019 2:30 pm
Jazzvibist wrote: Mon Dec 16, 2019 2:01 pm Before tackling MG metas I often wait until a couple of pages of comments appear on this site. If there is a preponderance of references to “Mr. G,” I don’t usually spend any time on it, which is what happened this week (and was justified since I never could have come up with Phil Simms’ name absent searching the Internet). This time I could kick myself for not having at least spent some time on it, even though I would have stopped even had I solved it, because Matt’s construction is mind-bogglingly brilliant.
Just to give proper credit, this one was by Mike Shenk, not Matt.
Thanks Barbara (sorry Mike). Unfortunately, as my friends and family can attest, senior moments like this one are becoming a way of life for me.
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Al Sisti
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#224

Post by Al Sisti »

Yeah, LT was my initial thought (at that point, all I had was " ___ From the New York Giants"). But for once, I beat my haste into submission until I sussed out the first word.
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MajordomoTom
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#225

Post by MajordomoTom »

MikeMillerwsj wrote: Tue Dec 17, 2019 10:24 am
Our randomly selected winner had Simms, so we didn't encounter this question. I think we would not have considered this correct--you need one more step to get to the actual name. (For those of us, like me, who didn't happen to know who #11 was, Google helped!)
Ahh ... you've answered one of the prior questions ... you don't take the correct answers and pull a winner from the pool, you pull someone from all of the submissions, see if they have the correct answer, and if so, you have a winner, else you pull another and see if they're correct, etc.

Thx,
Tom
"Lots of planets have a North", the Ninth Doctor.
FKelly
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#226

Post by FKelly »

Bird Lives wrote: Mon Dec 16, 2019 6:57 am Does anyone else remember the very clever "Doctors Without Borders" puzzle that appear in the NYT a few years back? Same idea.
https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=1/7/2016,
Not really the same idea. If the clues had been for the entries that extend beyond the grid (as in the NYT puzzle), there would have been no ambiguity to the answers. As it was given, other answers are possible as many have noted. An unambiguous answer is possible.
I had L TAYLOR or LAWRENCE TAYLOR. L TAYLOR is found from the entry intersecting with OFFSIDES at the 2nd F, the F for PAYFOR. The LT are OFFSIDES by one relative to the PAYFOR column and the letter, L, at square 56, his retired number, which is OUT OF BOUNDS on the simulated football field in the grid is brought into play for the F in PAYFOR. Thus, we have
OUT OF BOUNDS.PNG
L TAYLOR, an unambiguous answer that makes use of 56 his retired number, OFFSIDES and OUT OF BOUNDS. LT was arguably a more important player for the New York Giants than Phil Simms. As others have pointed out, Simms didn't even play in Super Bowl XXV with Jeff Hostetler at QB for the Giants. Simms had a broken foot in the 14th game of the 1990 season against the Buffalo Bills and missed the rest of the season. Hostetler even beat out Simms for starting QB at the beginning of the 1991 season.

If Simms "helped to win twice" the LOMBARDI trophy, he did did so cheering on Hostetler from the sidelines during their 2nd Super Bowl win.
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Hector
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#227

Post by Hector »

FKelly, that is both (a) ingenious, and (b) a perfect example of when I know I am on the wrong track.
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