This site usually has results up before noon CDT.
Ahh, yes of course! Oops! :smack: Thanks for that correction, pulykamell. But my point is that he did not get the usual sling-shot boost from the first round’d DD.
Thanks again for that. 
In a ESPN interview, James said that she just kept beating him to the buzzer.
Emma Boettcher hadn’t seen James play. Her episode taped before his had aired on television. It’s interesting that she had independently developed a similar game strategy.
She’s off to a good start. I wouldn’t draw too many comparisons to James until she wins at least 10 games.
Her winnings today were quite good, but less than what James usually raked in.
Yes, clearly, that was part of the perfect storm of events to bring James down.
Are you sure she hadn’t seen him play? That contradicts what Alex explicitly said.
I did clock that she noticeably bristled when Alex stated the assumption that her “bet the farm” DD move was in imitation of James. She obviously wants to get credit for knowing what’s up on her own.
Yeah, that’s certainly how it looked.
Here’s a different take on the buzzer thing. If they are going to make that aspect so important, why not let the audience see what they are doing? Maybe have it be something where you have to slap two big buttons a couple feet apart in quick succession.
Ack. Let’s try that link again.
I suppose it depends on what values of “kept beating him to the buzzer” means. James still had buzzed in first the most. He was first on the buzzer 42.11% of the time; Emma was first exactly one in three times (33.33%), and Jay was 24.55% of the time.
So, perhaps she “kept beating him to the buzzer” as in, he couldn’t completely dominate buzzer play like he has before (his average was 57% first on the buzzer overall), but he definitely beat her to the buzzer most of the time. That said, he didn’t beat both of them to the buzzer most of the time.
I wonder how much Jay, clearly a strong player himself, affected all this? In theory, you would think that a better path to beating James would be to be good like Emma but then have a weak third player. But I guess it all depends on whether Jay beat James to the buzzer on crucial clues where James was faster than Emma.
The press is reporting her episode taped before James episodes had aired.
Maybe she was in the audience and saw a game during taping?
Thanks to those who explained James’s FJ betting strategy. Still not sure I get it, but what the hell, I’m mathophobic.
Agreed on both counts. But she otherwise looked like she was playing like James tonight - going along the bottom rows and then jumping around looking for DDs.
Clearly she didn’t think highly of what Alex said. But then again Alex says some awkward things when social visiting with the contestants.
I was ***on ***Jeopardy!
Railer13 is still right, though. James’ betting strategy was correct.
Emma Boettcher won’t last very long.
[Moderating]
The reason we are discussing Holzhauer is because of his knowledge and reflexes. He’d still have done well on Jeopardy no matter how he looked (as, for that matter, would Boettcher). So comments like this (directed towards either sex) aren’t really appropriate.
Then again, who does?
James did a man’s job!
Reading through James twitter timeline is interesting.
He also bet the amount he did so that if Jay, the third-place player, bet everything (he didn’t), James would remain above that total, and so come in second instead of third, which he did.
It earned him an extra $1,000. Peanuts in the face of nearly $2.5 million, but a grand is a grand.
I’m annoyed at people, including reporters, like the one in the article Darren Garrison linked to, who say that James’ FJ bet was “uncharacteristically low,” as though it were a mistake or a sign that he was throwing the game. It was only uncharacteristic because he had almost always had a commanding lead going into FJ, and had rarely if ever been in second place. It was precisely the correct bet for his position:
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If both he and Emma were right, he couldn’t win, because Emma would bet enough to beat his all-in bet, which is exactly what she did.
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If he was right and Emma was wrong and bet as expected above, he won.
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If he was wrong and Jay was right, he definitely got second instead of third.
Honestly, the most shocking stat I discovered during James run is that in the 16 years since they removed the 5-day cap, only 8 players have won 10 or more games.