Note : Make sure to complete today’s NYT Connections before reading further! We’ll be getting into spoilers for today’s game pretty quickly. If you need some help to complete the grid, you can find my NYT Connections hints and answers column for today via my author page .

Hey there, Connectors! Welcome to my deeper dive into today’s Connections answers. The idea behind this is to help clear things up for anyone who isn’t sure how today’s groups fit together.

If I’ve missed any red herrings or misunderstood something, let me know via email or on Discord . I don’t typically look at X or check the comments here.

I’m going to assume that you’ve already beaten today’s game. We’re going straight into spoiler territory here. So, consider this your one and only warning .

Here are today’s NYT Connections answers explained (and any red herrings I spot) for Monday, August 24:

Today’s NYT Connections Answers Explained

Connections – Yellow Group

FEATURED | Frase By Forbes ™

Unscramble The Anagram To Reveal The Phrase

🟨 fish (MULLET, PIKE, SOLE, TANG)

The category title has us covered here. They’re all fish!

Connections – Green Group

🟩 principal (ARCH, CHIEF, MAIN, PRIME)

Ditto. These are just synonyms for the primary person, animal or thing in a given group.

🟦 pro-wrestling lingo (FACE, HEEL, JOBBER, KAYFABE)

I’m very much in my wheelhouse here.

In pro wrestling, a FACE (or babyface) is a hero and a HEEL is a villain. I’ll spare you the etymology of those.

A JOBBER is a wrestler who loses the vast majority of their matches.

KAYFABE is the concept of the staged elements of pro wrestling being presented as real. As an example, a FACE and a HEEL who are feuding on-screen may be friends behind the scenes, but they might not travel together between shows, so as to maintain KAYFABE.

I could talk about this stuff all day. I even wrote a song called “Breaking Kayfabe” in my youth.

Connections – Purple Group

🟪 letter homophone plus tennis term (BESET, DESERVE, EX-LOVE, EYELET)

  • BESET > b + set
  • DESERVE > d + serve
  • EX-LOVE > x + love
  • EYELET > i and let

Connections – Red Herrings

Parts of a shoe formed the main red herring today – SOLE, ARCH, HEEL and EYELET.

If you’d like to chat about today’s game of Connections and just about anything else with me and a very lovely group of people, you can do just that in our Discord community . We’d love for you to hang out with us.

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 .