Monday's New York Times puzzle solved: March 12, 2018

My time: 5:09, not bad.

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John R. O'Brien gives us a look at a concept that seems surprisingly abstruse for a Monday, characters with ONE / EYE.  These are: POLYPHEMUS (which I knew right off the bat, but hesitated to put in because of its relative obscurity), SAMMY DAVIS JR, JACK OF SPADES, and BAZOOKA JOE (what's his story, anyway? how'd he lose his eye?  was it a bazooka-related accident??)  I loved this theme --- it's right up my alley: a combination of genres brought together by some random similarity. 

Did you know that MODEL TS were called "tin lizzies?"  Apparently this nickname for all the Ts comes from one race-winning car that was so named.

"Parts with irises" is UVEAS.  The uvea is the pigmented layer of the eye, comprising of the iris, ciliary body, and choroid.  It delivers oxygen to eye tissues.

I really thought ESAI Morales (of La Bamba fame) had come up for me before, but I don't see him in the archives.  Anyway, I often mistakenly think his name is *ERIK Morales, who is a boxer who won titles in four different weight classes.

Likewise I could have sworn that I'd looked up this song "ERES Tú" before, but again, zero results in the archives.  Performed, by the band Mocedades, it won the Eurovision Song Contest in 1973.

For "blood-related" I put *HEMIC but it's HEMAL.

I never knew that SUMO was originally part of a Shinto ritual.  But it makes sense.  "The canopy over the sumo ring, called the dohyō, is reminiscent of a Shinto shrine, the officiator is dressed in garb very similar to that of a Shinto priest, and the throwing of salt before a bout is believed to purify the ring."

Totally new to me: that Saint JEROME was known for translating the Bible into Latin.  He did this around 405 AD.

More esoteric fill for a Monday: COZEN, a word that even I, a word guy, was unsure of for "cheat."

ELSA Lanchester was an English actress who appeared in twelve films with her husband, Charles Laughton.

I always get tripped up on architect EERO Saarinen.  I never remember if his name is *EENO or what, which is exactly what I said on September 24, 2017, when he last came up.

So yeah, that's a lot of new or uncertain stuff for a Monday.  There were a few hints I MIST the first time through.  But I could have done VERSO...