Short Takes: Thursday, October 19
Season 40, Episode 29 / Production No. 8954
Champions Wildcard is dead. Long Live Champions Wildcard.
The first of the four Champions Wildcard competitions featuring Season 37 & 38 contestants (“Spades”) finished up last night; congratulations to Josh Saak on claiming the $100,000 grand prize and the Tournament of Champions berth!
Living dangerously
Lucy Ricketts took the $50,000 prize as first runner-up, but she did execute a “mini-Clavin,” unnecessarily putting at risk her lock position over Sam Stapleton in third. I’ll explain below:
Sam Josh Lucy
Day 1 (A) 15200 25200 14200
Day 2, pre-Final (B) 5000 22000 11600
Subtotals (A+B) 20200 47200 25800
Maximums (A+2B) 25200 69200 37400
Entering Final Jeopardy! in last night’s game, Lucy sat $600 above what Sam could have achieved by doubling up. So a wager of $599 or less would have assured that Sam could not pass her. Betting $5,000 put $25,000 of otherwise assured money into play — though of course, the matter was mooted by Sam’s $0 bet and joke response.
The refs do call it when it happens
Failing to properly phrase in Double Jeopardy!, that is. Clue 29 (correct response “Apollo”) saw that. It’s at least the 12th time in the last ten-plus seasons that such a violation has been penalized. And as the rules clearly state, with the exception of the Daily Double, responding not in the form of a question is not a violation in the Jeopardy! round — hence Lucy not being penalized on “golden rings” in Tuesday’s game.
On to the next
Champions Wildcard 2 (“Diamonds”) begins today; same format as Spades. Part of this next field of 27 are two of the Season 37 Second Chance winners from the start of this season, Hari Parameswaran and Jilana Cotter; as well as Isaac Applebaum, the fourth-place finisher in the 2022 Jeopardy! National College Championship who didn’t advance to the final as the lowest-scoring winning semifinalist.
Two further 27-player brackets, “Clubs” and “Hearts,” will follow, taking us out to December 18.
About that…
Going into the second commercial break, Ken said “Sam will be selecting first when the last Double Jeopardy! of Jeopardy! Champions Wildcard begins…”
A misleading statement, and surely he knew that. There will be forty-two more Double Jeopardy! rounds in Champions Wildcard. But hey, maybe “it makes sense from a narrative perspective” — but I think “it's treating the audience like they're less intelligent than they actually are.”
And finally…
The clue just before that statement — the last clue of the Jeopardy! round — caused embarrassment for the players and attention on social media, the perception being that they stood and stared at a very easy one.
The text of that clue mentioned “rights” and “opportunities.” Given shifts in thought in certain strands of activism in the last few years, I wondered if the clue might have played easier had the word “outcomes” been included instead. As I go to finish this up, it occurs to me to check whether this was a “recycled” clue — and indeed it was, from a game in March 2004.