Leifer
Senior Member.
Winning Jeopardy contestant James Holzhauer finally lost his dominating streak of success, in the US game-show "Jeopardy".
He was about one (1) win away to break the all-time record set in 2004 by Ken Jennings of
Conspiracy reactions were like this....
...and others claiming there some "inner deal" between him and Sony (the show's corporate producers/owners).
But Holzhauer rebutted and disputed the various conspiracies in several social-media posts, stating that in order to win the final question at all (mathematically), was to hope that fellow contestant Emma, got the answer wrong. But she got it correct.
Holzhauer:
He was about one (1) win away to break the all-time record set in 2004 by Ken Jennings of
Conspiracy theories immediately arose on social media, when Holzhauer only bet $1399 in "final Jeopardy" (the last question)...instead of betting more (if not his whole pot), because his rival player and librarian Emma Boettcher was already ahead money-wise, at the time of the Jeopardy final question. Plus, he knew about Emma's college under-grad thesis was about Shakespeare....the topic of the "final question".(wikipedia) Jennings continued to win and eventually set a record of 74 wins before he was defeated by Nancy Zerg in his seventy-fifth appearance. Jennings's total winnings from the program amount to $3,022,700, which includes $2,522,700 won in his initial appearances and an additional $500,000 for his second-place finish in the Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions. In addition, at the end of Season 20, he set a one-day record of $75,000, which would later be broken by Roger Craig, and even later by James Holzhauer.
Conspiracy reactions were like this....
...and others claiming there some "inner deal" between him and Sony (the show's corporate producers/owners).
But Holzhauer rebutted and disputed the various conspiracies in several social-media posts, stating that in order to win the final question at all (mathematically), was to hope that fellow contestant Emma, got the answer wrong. But she got it correct.
Holzhauer:
In Holzauer's last Jeopardy's episode, it seems every contestant played it mathematically correctly, or smartly....“I knew I could only win if Emma missed Final Jeopardy, as there was no way she wouldn’t bet to cover my all-in bet,” Holzhauer told The Action Network. “So my only concern was getting overtaken by third place, and I bet just enough to make sure of locking him out. Betting big would have looked good for the cameras, but now I turn my straight bet (Emma misses) into a parlay (Emma misses and I get it right).”
https://ftw.usatoday.com/2019/06/jeopardy-james-holzhauer-conspiracy-theories-after-loss
So Emma's bet on the final question.... was meant to cover (beat) Holzhauer's... even if he bet his whole pot.... which she did.
Contestants in Boettcher’s situation almost always bet enough to beat the second-place contestant if the latter wagers everything. So Boettcher, predictably, wagered $20,201 — enough to guarantee she’d win the game if she answered correctly, preventing Holzhauer from beating her by risking everything.
Holzhauer undoubtedly knows how Jeopardy! contestants bet, so he knew he was extraordinarily unlikely to win if both he and Boettcher got the final. As such, his $1,399 represented the smart play.
https://ftw.usatoday.com/2019/06/why-james-holzhauers-small-final-jeopardy-bet-made-total-sense
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