The other day watching Jeopardy I could not believe my eyes and ears. The defending champion had just answered the penultimate question correctly and taken a 400 dollar lead. His reward was the second Double Jeopardy question. I do not remember the category but he chose to risk $3000. Why in the world would anyone bet more than $300 in this situation regardless of the category? Can former contestants explain this one? Does the time pressure make you so nervous that you cannot think straight?
By betting $3000 he took a chance of being in second place for Final Jeopardy and even if he had been given the answer in advance it would not increase his final total for he still had to get the FJ answer correct and would not risk more in FJ than enough to beat the second place contestant by one dollar.
Did he simply have a brain freeze or am I missing something? He, in fact got both questions correct and won the game.
Perhaps he was very confident in his knowledge of the category. If there was a medical question, I’d be tempted to bet it all and have a runaway before Final Jeopardy, which I may know nothing about.
Given normal Jeopardy! scores, a $3000 bet at that stage of the game is a little hard to understand, though. In that situation here is no reason to make that bet; either you’re just further ahead but not twice as far, or you’re behind. There’s no strategic difference between a $400 lead and a $3400 lead, unless the scores were AMAZINGLY low for the end of the game. $3000 couldn’t have made it a runaway.
I agree betting everything for a shot at a runaway victory (well, I’d leave a hundred bucks; I’m not finishing with 0) is worth it if you have total command of the category. If I get on and that situation comes up and the category is “Baseball” or anything to do with Canada (Canada-related categories on Jeopardy! are child’s play for a Canadian) I am betting it all. I’d have a 99.5% shot at getting it right, which is a far better deal than a small lead with the unknown quantity of Final Jeopardy.
My guess it, given how often one sees illogical bets, that it was nerves.
That $3000 wager might have put him out of reach of Player 3, making sure that player Player 2 has to bet something and get it right and put the leader in position to win in case it is a “Triple Stumper” Final Jeopardy
Final Jeopardy Betting strategies are discussed at Jeopardy archive betting calculator.
Some people are just big betters. A few months ago there was one of them. I remember he had a HUGE lead with one category left, got the daily double and either risked it all or a very large amount. He got it right and effectively, won the game at that point…but if he got it wrong he probably would have lost. But that had been his strategy all week. Lots of big bets. Still though, at that point, he should have been a bit more conservative.
Here’s something else I saw, that even though I caught it from home, in the heat of the moment, the players likely didn’t catch it.
One question left, $2000
The scores were (not exactly, but this is how it worked out):
Player 1: $1000
Player 2: $7000
Player 3: $15000
Player 1 rang in and got it right, thereby guaranteeing herself a third place position. If she had held back there was a chance player 2 would answer correctly, and bring his score up to more then half of player 3 so they both would have been forced to make ‘real’ wagers. She at least could have made it up to second place.
She may have had a higher score to begin with and had a shot at first, I don’t remember, but either way, by grabbing the last question, she sealed her fate. But, like I said, in the heat of the moment, she’s not likely to notice that.
I was also surprised by that bet. He may have been confident about the category, and I think people are also just conditioned by what they see on Jeopardy- they almost always bet a thousand or two or three or four thousand and people rarely make conservative small bets like that. So maybe it’s force of habit.
It was a close game, and I admit… George’s strategy eluded me. He didn’t bet enough to put the game away if he was right, just enough to put himself out of the lead if he got it wrong.
He probably should have played it safe- but he got the answer right and the Final Jeopardy answer right too, so it’s really moot now.
My guess is, George had to make a split second decision and didn’t give enough thought to his wager.
Astorian, Since you were on the show, I am sure you have a tape of the show. How much money did each player have?
And BTW, I DVR Jeopardy! and listen to it to all asleep at bedtime. Depending on how tired I am, I make it all the way through or fall asleep sometime during DJ.
I made it through all the way through this one and deleted it as soon as it finished. I pushed play and then rolled over and never realized it was you. I saw the Jeopardy thread after I deleted it.
I don’t remember the exact amounts, but right before George picked the final Daily Double (which was the last clue on the board), in the category CAVES, I definitely had 12,000. Jody had just over 14,000. And George had about 15,000.
So, under the circumstances, a 3,000 bet offered no real benefit for George (he’d STILL have to get the final answer right to win), and a BIG risk. As it turned out, if he’d gotten that Daily Double wrong, Jody would have been the champion, since all three of us got the final answer right.
The two leaders before the Double Jeopardy question had 15,400 and 15,000, I believe. What drew my attention was Alex telling the leader that he had just taken the lead, so I immediately assumed he would bet only a minimal amount. When he said 3 thousand I almost blanked my blank.
This occurs frequently and I never understand why. One player will be completely out of it and their only chance is to get the other two close enough that they will each be forced to bet virtually everything in Final Jeopardy (and possibly get the answer wrong.) Despite this obvious fact the third place contestant continues to ring in, eliminating any chance for second place to catch up.
Anyone can bet up to the highest question value amount for the board, regardless of the amount of money they have. You don’t need to be at zero or negative. If you have 200 you can still bet 2000.
Of course, those who have more money than the highest question value can bet up to whatever they have.