Jeopardy watch....

Well, this may be premature, but we may have another superchamp on our hands right now. Today was only his second win, but there are signs and a history that suggest he may be hard to beat.

He won over $41K in his first game.

He says that at some point in time he competed in a competition called 'Mr Smarty Pants,' and that he won said competition, which included both Ken Jennings and Brad Butter. Aside from this guy, only the IBM computer has done the same.

Obviously somebody could have a hot game and hit all the DDs and beat this guy, or he could have an off night, but I get the feeling that he is likely to have a pretty impressive run.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by rsvman

Well, this may be premature, but we may have another superchamp on our hands right now. Today was only his second win, but there are signs and a history that suggest he may be hard to beat.

He won over $41K in his first game.

He says that at some point in time he competed in a competition called 'Mr Smarty Pants,' and that he won said competition, which included both Ken Jennings and Brad Butter. Aside from this guy, only the IBM computer has done the same.

Obviously somebody could have a hot game and hit all the DDs and beat this guy, or he could have an off night, but I get the feeling that he is likely to have a pretty impressive run.

---

I honestly thought the same thing after his first game Wednesday night. Compared to recent contestants, even the multi-day winners since 21-day champ Cris Pannullo, he had a noticeable confidence and a seeming lack of any "weak spot" category that all but the best players usually have. We'll see how it plays out with a larger sample size.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by pcal6vb

I honestly thought the same thing after his first game Wednesday night. Compared to recent contestants, even the multi-day winners since 21-day champ Cris Pannullo, he had a noticeable confidence and a seeming lack of any "weak spot" category that all but the best players usually have. We'll see how it plays out with a larger sample size.

---

I was a bit surprised to see Yogesh lose on Monday. He appeared to have a strong knowledge base and all of his personal anecdotes seemed to be (not-so) humble brags about how good he is at trivia (won 2 HS quiz bowl state championships vs James Holtzhauer, beat Ken Jennings at something called "Mr. Smarty Pants", etc). For the first time ever, I checked out reddit/Jeopardy! and learned that Yogesh is apparently well known in the "quizzing world".

Yet, all of four of his games were pretty competitive and he entered Final Jeopardy trailing twice. I suspect that he wasn't very good with the buzzer timing. On Monday, in particular, he seemed visibly frustrated as he was frantically smashing the buzzer while another contestant got to answer. More evidence that the game isn't just about how much you know.

My foray into reddit/Jeopardy! world also informed me that Thursday's episode will feature Troy Meyer, another (even more?) prominent figure in the quizzing world. Apparently Troy has been the top US finisher in the World Quizzing Championships and is a multi-time champion of a popular online quiz community called LearnedLeague. It will be interesting to see how he does.

Interesting idea about the buzzer timing. I thought he'd be better, but his last two wins were struggles. He's no James Holzhauer.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MChambers

Interesting idea about the buzzer timing. I thought he'd be better, but his last two wins were struggles. He's no James Holzhauer.

---

Somebody on Reddit speculated that the guy who looked like he was auditioning for a Bee Gees cover band was probably the best with the buzzer as he seemed to dominate the low dollar clues that all three contestants probably knew.

By the way, the guy with the fabulous hair posted on Reddit to clarify his oddly told story about foiling a pickpocketing in Prague. I was taken aback by the original story as I never expected to hear a Jeopardy anecdote which included the phrase "my mom hand her hand down some guy's pants".

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by House P

Somebody on Reddit speculated that the guy who looked like he was auditioning for a Bee Gees cover band was probably the best with the buzzer as he seemed to dominate the low dollar clues that all three contestants probably knew.

By the way, the guy with the fabulous hair posted on Reddit to clarify his oddly told story about foiling a pickpocketing in Prague. I was taken aback by the original story as I never expected to hear a Jeopardy anecdote which included the phrase "my mom hand her hand down some guy's pants".

---

Yes! We were thinking/hoping that he misspoke, but you would think that they would have edited that out if that were the case. How exactly does that scenario happen when you are being mugged?!?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by aimo

Yes! We were thinking/hoping that he misspoke, but you would think that they would have edited that out if that were the case. How exactly does that scenario happen when you are being mugged?!?

---

R. Lee Ermey was her instructor at boot camp. She was just reaching for his gun.

no hand in trousers, but there was a fist in a face when a guy in the Barcelona metro tried to grab my wife's purse.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by budwom

no hand in trousers, but there was a fist in a face when a guy in the Barcelona metro tried to grab my wife's purse.

---

And a Russian in your drawers?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by aimo

And a Russian in your drawers?

---

yep, indeed he was, though I wasn't in them at the time, fortunately.

I can't believe they had a question about farts last night.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by aimo

I can't believe they had a question about farts last night.

---

That show was a wipeout. The returning champion was so much better (trivia & buzzing) than his competitors. Still the RN had a chance when he hit both late DDs. He should have gone for a true DD on the first one and given himself a chance to beat a much stronger foe.

odd young man from Vermont beats the Troyster

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by budwom

odd young man from Vermont beats the Troyster

---

Hard to decide what’s the most annoying aspect of that guy. His crazy fast talking. The way he contorts his mouth. The weird eyes. Whole face and personality - very punchable. Get him outta here !

Yogesh getting flack for "trashing jeopardy" now...saying it's not a real quiz show and is a "glorified reality show" and is responsible for "real quizzing" not being popular/allowing racists to thrive in it.

He throws out an analogy that Jeopardy is to quizzing as Holey Moley is to golf.

He concludes:
"Jeopardy! is a fun show but putting it on a pedestal is an objectively bad thing. It's bad for the future of quizzing. It's bad for women and POC who want to be treated with the same level of dignity as their White male counterparts. It is fundamentally incompatible with incentivizing the next generation of quizzers to excel, and it is fundamentally incompatible with true social justice."

Some are calling him a sore loser, but he says he had those thoughts before going on the show (and he did win three times). Regardless, he definitely went off on a rant on social media.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Bluedog

Yogesh getting flack for "trashing jeopardy" now...saying it's not a real quiz show and is a "glorified reality show" and is responsible for "real quizzing" not being popular/allowing racists to thrive in it.

He throws out an analogy that Jeopardy is to quizzing as Holey Moley is to golf.

He concludes:
"Jeopardy! is a fun show but putting it on a pedestal is an objectively bad thing. It's bad for the future of quizzing. It's bad for women and POC who want to be treated with the same level of dignity as their White male counterparts. It is fundamentally incompatible with incentivizing the next generation of quizzers to excel, and it is fundamentally incompatible with true social justice."

Some are calling him a sore loser, but he says he had those thoughts before going on the show (and he did win three times). Regardless, he definitely went off on a rant on social media.

---

He is getting trashed on all of the Jeopardy boards for his arrogance and attitude. With quotes like this I can understand why. Good riddance. I hope he is not on the second chance tournament.

I keep meaning to add Ray Lalonde to these tables. According to the J! Archive and The Jeopardy Fan, he won $388,400 in his 14 episodes.

Name	Episodes
Ken Jennings	75
Amy Schneider	41
Matt Amodio	39
James Holzhauer	33
Mattea Roach	24
Cris Pannullo	22
Julia Collins	21
David Madden	20
Jason Zuffranieri	20
Ryan Long	17
Matt Jackson	14
Ray Lalonde	14
Seth Wilson	13
Austin Rogers	13
Arthur Chu	12
Jonathan Fisher	12

Name	Winnings
Ken Jennings	$2,522,700
James Holzhauer	$2,464,216
Matt Amodio	$1,519,601
Amy Schneider	$1,384,800
Cris Pannullo	$749,286
Mattea Roach	$562,983
Jason Zuffranieri	$534,496
David Madden	$432,400
Julia Collins	$429,100
Matt Jackson	$413,612
Austin Rogers	$413,000
Ray Lalonde	$388,400
Ryan Long	$300,400
Arthur Chu	$298,200
Seth Wilson	$267,002
Jonathan Fisher	$248,100

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by tommy

Hard to decide what’s the most annoying aspect of that guy. His crazy fast talking. The way he contorts his mouth. The weird eyes. Whole face and personality - very punchable. Get him outta here !

---

He reminds me of a past champion, Matt Jackson. I wonder if this champion is on the spectrum?

Sorry to see Troy go. He was a little odd, but I warmed up to him after a few days. Seemed genuinely nice.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Bluedog

Yogesh getting flack for "trashing jeopardy" now...saying it's not a real quiz show and is a "glorified reality show" and is responsible for "real quizzing" not being popular/allowing racists to thrive in it.

He throws out an analogy that Jeopardy is to quizzing as Holey Moley is to golf.

He concludes:
"Jeopardy! is a fun show but putting it on a pedestal is an objectively bad thing. It's bad for the future of quizzing. It's bad for women and POC who want to be treated with the same level of dignity as their White male counterparts. It is fundamentally incompatible with incentivizing the next generation of quizzers to excel, and it is fundamentally incompatible with true social justice."

Some are calling him a sore loser, but he says he had those thoughts before going on the show (and he did win three times). Regardless, he definitely went off on a rant on social media.

---

He didn't seem all that happy when he was playing, but I assumed it had to do with his buzzer issues. I don't get the race and gender issues, but maybe I am missing something. Probably should not veer off to that topic, for fear of PPB issues.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MChambers

He reminds me of a past champion, Matt Jackson. I wonder if this champion is on the spectrum?

Sorry to see Troy go. He was a little odd, but I warmed up to him after a few days. Seemed genuinely nice.

---

Kind of reminds me of Mattea. Therefore, I hope he does not last long. Really annoying, and it's hard to understand him. I wonder if he will slow down and enunciate better in the next match? I imagine the powersthatbe will say something if the judges have trouble understanding him.

And Yogesh had an attitude from the get-go. Not surprised by his comments now.