Today’s NYT Connections Answers Explained

Connections – Yellow Group

🟨 canoodling (FIRST BASE, MAKING OUT, NECKING, TONSIL HOCKEY)

These are all synonyms or metaphors for kissing. TONSIL HOCKEY specifically refers to French kissing.

FIRST BASE refers to the baseball-inspired “running the bases” metaphor for sex. You can use your imagination as to what second base, third base and a home run mean (or just read about it on Wikipedia).

Connections – Green Group

🟩 five-sided things (HOME PLATE, JEANS BACK POCKET, SCHOOL CROSSING SIGN, THE PENTAGON)

I think we need some visual representation for this group.

HOME PLATE is the last base that a baseball player has to touch to score a run:

A JEANS BACK POCKET typically has two slanted edges at the base rather than a straight, horizontal one:

SCHOOL CROSSING SIGN is one I had to look up, because I wasn’t too familiar with it:

THE PENTAGON is a five-sided building in Arlington County, Virginia, that serves as the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense:

Connections – Blue Group

🟦 unexpected places to be "out of" (LEFT FIELD, NOWHERE, THE BLUE, THIN AIR)

If something is “out of LEFT FIELD," “out of THE BLUE” etc, it’s unexpected. In WWE, Randy Orton’s RKO finisher is often delivered as a surprise (i.e. from “out of NOWHERE”). It still amazes me just how well the last one in this video worked:

Connections – Purple Group

🟪 ending in candy brands minus "S" (BURGER KING WHOPPER, FILM NERD, MEMENTO, PITCHER’S MOUND)

These refer to:

• BURGER KING WHOPPER > Whoppers
• FILM NERD > Nerds
• MEMENTO > Mentos
• PITCHER’S MOUND > Mounds

Connections – Red Herrings

FIRST BASE, HOME PLATE, LEFT FIELD and PITCHER’S MOUND are all features of a baseball field.

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I’ll be back with another set of NYT Connections hints and answers tomorrow, as well as another edition of this one, all going well. You’ll be able to find both of those on my Forbes author page when the time comes (following me there helps me out too!). As for the weekend editions of my NYT Connections hints and answers column, I’m currently doing that via my newsletter, Pastimes.