NYT Daily Crossword - Friday, October 16, 2026

A crunchy Friday themeless debut from Adam Shapiro! THINGS I MISSED: 9A - not only an important figure in Cuba's independence movement but also the author of the poem that forms the lyrics for the famous patriotic song "Guantanamera" 27A - apparently still in use by some athletes as a stimulant (!) 42A - not used to play electric violins but rather electric guitars (!!) 49A - oops... Bullwinkle says "hey Rocky", not "yo Rocky"; this was definitely from the Rocky movies, which I clearly don't remember very well 3D - in a linguistic context, this could refer to a word like "firefighter" (as opposed to "fireman"), but it's often used rhetorically to describe physical characteristics, among other things 7D - apparently also of Montana 27D - officially Doctor Ivo Robotnik 30D - a political allegory written in the horror genre, not a combination you see very often