Tuesday, April 24, 2018 Game Recap and Discussion [SPOILERS]

[Archivists]

Game Recap for Show #7747, 2018-04-24

CONTESTANTS
Alyssa Abel, a bookseller from Waupaca, Wisconsin
Randy Mathews, a fragrance specialist from Houston, Texas
Kate Jovin, a social worker from Somerville, Massachusetts (whose 1-day cash winnings total $28,799)

OPENING REMARKS
Alex: Thank you, Johnny. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Kate won big yesterday, but she was forced into wagering a lot in Final Jeopardy! by our champion, Kristin. Randy and Alyssa, we are happy to welcome you to the program. And I wanna wish all of you good luck. Here we go. Let's take a look at the categories.

JEOPARDY! ROUND CATEGORIES
TWIN PEEKS (4/5)
WORLD LEADERS (4/5)
STATE CONSUMABLES (4/5)
MOVIE TITLES IN FOREIGN LANDS (5/5)
ALL GOOD THINGS (4/4, including 1 correct Daily Double)
MUST COME TO AN "N" (5/5) (Alex: "N"--the letter "N"--will be at the end of each correct response.)

THE RIGHTS & THE WRONGS
Randy: 12 R (including 1 DD), 0 W
Kate: 11 R (including 1 rebound), 0 W
Alyssa: 3 R, 1 W

Clues revealed: 29
Triple Stumpers: 3
Jeopardy! Round Potential Lach Trash: $3,000



SCORES AT THE FIRST BREAK
Randy: $4,000
Kate: $2,800
Alyssa: $200

CONTESTANT INTERVIEWS



Alex: Welcome back. The first player we introduced on our program today, Alyssa Abel from Wisconsin, participates each year in a national novel writing contest.

Alyssa: Yes.

Alex: So you've written a lot of novels, then.

Alyssa: Yeah, well, I've started a lot of novels.

Alex: Ah. Oh.

Alyssa: The goal is, every November, you're supposed to write 50,000 words. I've made it about halfway maybe four times. But I've got a lot of good starts on novels.

Alex: Have you gotten a lot of good reviews from the people who put this contest on?

Alyssa: Well, the thing is, they don't actually read them. They just count the number. It's more about the output than, you know, the actual quality of the writing, so...

Alex: Right.




Alex: Randy Mathews, fragrance specialist.

Randy: Yes, sir.

Alex: Who bought his dream car when he was only...

Randy: 13.

Alex: Tell me which car.

Randy: It was a '65 Mustang.

Alex: Ooh, hello. How were you able to afford a Mustang at the age of 13?

Randy: Well, I had already had a job, and my dad made me make a deal with him, that I'd pay him half my paycheck until it was paid off. And then it was mine.

Alex: How long did it take you to pay off the car?

Randy: About two years, but in that time, I was able to work on it, learn how to do everything on it. And it was fantastic experience.

Alex: All right. I'm sure it was.




Alex: Kate Jovin is our champion, ladies and gentlemen. She is from Massachusetts. And her go-to first date was not what most people would consider to be a good thing. What was it?

Kate: Well, one of the great things in my area is Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge. It's one of the first really well-designed garden cemeteries. And it's a really good place to take a first date because number one, if they're not okay with someone who's weird, gotta weed 'em out right away. And there's lots to look at, you can pick a favorite name, you know, there's lots of great names from the past. And it must've worked, because my boyfriend and I had our first date there, and we're still together almost two years later.

Alex: All right. Good for you. That's great.

JEOPARDY! ROUND DAILY DOUBLE
Randy found the Daily Double on the 29th clue. Kate had $6,600, Randy had $6,000, and Alyssa had nothing in the bank. Randy wagered $2,000.

ALL GOOD THINGS $800: Founded in 1971, this voluntary medical group has been doing good works globally ever since
[The end-of-round signal sounds.]

TRIPLE STUMPERS IN THE JEOPARDY! ROUND
STATE CONSUMABLES $1000: Double-talk name of Ohio's state native fruit, seen here

TWIN PEEKS $1000: Last name of twin British playwrights Anthony & Peter, seen here

WORLD LEADERS $1000: Yoweri Museveni, in power in this East African land since 1986, says he planted bananas & has to stay to see them bear fruit
(Alex: Less than a minute now.)

SCORES AT THE END OF THE JEOPARDY! ROUND
Randy: $8,000
Kate: $6,600
Alyssa: $0

[Archivists]

DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND CATEGORIES
LITERATURE ON THE MAP (4/5, including 1 correct Daily Double)
THEY'RE IN THE BAND (5/5)
ADVERTISING (4/5)
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE SIGNERS (3/5, including 1 correct Daily Double)
SUPER HEROIC TERMS (4/5)
A WORD IN YOUR EAR (4/5)

THE RIGHTS & THE WRONGS
Randy: 10 R (including 1 rebound and 1 DD), 2 W
Kate: 8 R (including 1 DD), 1 W
Alyssa: 6 R, 0 W

Clues revealed: 30
Triple Stumpers: 6
Double Jeopardy! Round Potential Lach Trash: $10,400



FIRST DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND DAILY DOUBLE
Randy snagged the next Daily Double on the 20th clue. Kate had $12,600, Randy had $15,200, and Alyssa was at $2,800. Randy wagered $1,800.

LITERATURE ON THE MAP $1200: "Kite Runner" Amir lives in the Wazir Akbar Khan district & takes part in the kite competition, all in this city

SECOND DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND DAILY DOUBLE
It was Kate who snatched up the last Daily Double of the game on the 28th clue. Kate had $14,600, Randy had $15,400, and Alyssa was at $5,600. Kate wagered $900.

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE SIGNERS $1200: He's better remembered for signing an infamous redistricting bill while governor of Massachusetts

TRIPLE STUMPERS IN THE DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND
ADVERTISING $1200: Marketing guru Jonah Berger says this 3-word person-to-person interaction works 10 times better than traditional ads
(Randy: What is face to face?)

A WORD IN YOUR EAR $2000: I predict you will know this 7-letter word for the visible part of the outer ear

LITERATURE ON THE MAP $2000: (Sarah of the Clue Crew shows a map of Chicago on the monitor.) In Chicago, there's a big economic difference between the mansion where Bigger Thomas worked & his family's apartment just a few blocks away in this novel

SUPER HEROIC TERMS $1600: This term for a villain's minion or underling once meant a highland chief's right-hand man
(Randy: What is... a majordomo?)

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE SIGNERS $2000: A statue of Charles Carroll, the last surviving signer, represents this state in the U.S. capitol
(Alex: We have less than a minute now.)

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE SIGNERS $1600: 2 Benjamins signed for Pennsylvania, Benjamin Franklin & this noted physician

SCORES ENTERING FINAL JEOPARDY!
Kate: $15,900
Randy: $15,800
Alyssa: $5,600

FINAL JEOPARDY! CATEGORY
AFRICA

VENUSIAN MONOLOGUES/MARTIAN CHRONICLES
Four-fifths for first place. Shore's Conjecture.
Kate: Wager $15,701 to cover Randy. If you feel like using Shoretegy, try wagering $4,501.
Randy: Your score is within 4/5ths of Kate's, so wager between $201 (venusian) and $4,599 (martian), beating Kate's maximum safe bet of the difference between your scores while still covering against a doubled score on Alyssa's part.
Alyssa: There's no way you can cover a rational wager by Randy, but if Randy decides for some reason to wager everything, you can eke out a win on a Triple Stumper if you wager no more than $5,400.

FINAL JEOPARDY! CLUE
Markers for this geog. designation are on Lake Victoria's Lwaji Island & at Mbandaka in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

FINAL SCORES
Alyssa: $5,600 - $5,599 = $1 (What is the equat) (2nd place: $2,000)
Randy: $15,800 + $4,200 = $20,000 (What is the equator?) (New champion: $20,000)
Kate: $15,900 - $15,900 = $0 (What the center of Africa?) (3rd place: $1,000)

Total Potential Lach Trash: $13,400

GAME DYNAMICS


CORYAT SCORES
Kate: $16,200, 19 R (including 1 DD), 1 W
Randy: $14,000, 22 R (including 2 DDs), 2 W
Alyssa: $5,600, 9 R, 1 W
Combined Coryat: $35,800

BATTING AVERAGES
Randy: 23/60 = .383
Kate: 19/59 = .322
Alyssa: 9/58 = .155
Team: 51/63 = .810

MISCELLANEOUS INTERESTING CLUES
TWIN PEEKS $200: The infamous Kray twins were among the last to be locked up in this London prison

TWIN PEEKS $400: In 1950 two brothers set up McWhirter Twins Limited to sell facts to newspapers; soon, they created this record book

TWIN PEEKS $600: The American Castro brothers, twins Joaquin & Julian, are big in this state's politics

TWIN PEEKS $800: The Quinn twins of Canada, better known by these two first names, want you to know everything is awesome

WORLD LEADERS $600: In 2017 31-year-old Sebastian Kurz said danke as this country made him one of the world's youngest leaders
(Alyssa: What is Germany?)

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE SIGNERS $800: Alphabetically, these cousins were the first 2 signers

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE SIGNERS $400: Brothers Richard Henry Lee & Francis Lightfoot Lee were 2 of the signers from this state
(Kate: What is Georgia?)

CORRECT RESPONSES
Doctors Without Borders
pawpaw
Shaffer
Uganda
Kabul
Elbridge Gerry
word of mouth
the auricle
Native Son
a henchman
Maryland
Benjamin Rush
the Equator
the Tower of London
the Guinness Book of World Records
Texas
Tegan and Sara
Austria
John and Samuel Adams
Virginia

[theFJguy]

FINAL JEOPARDY! CATEGORY
AFRICA

FINAL JEOPARDY! CLUE
Markers for this geographic designation are on Lake Victoria’s Lwaji Island & at Mbandaka in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Kate Jovel: 15900-15900=0
Randy Mathews: 15800+4200=20000 (New Champ)
Alyssa Abel: 5600-5599=1

Correct response:

Spoiler

equator (Kate – center of Africa) (Alyssa – equat)

Daily Doubles
Randy: 6000+2000
Randy: 15200+1800
Kate: 14600+900

Coryats
Kate: 16200
Randy: 14000
Alyssa: 5600

Combined: 35,800

Scores at the end of the Jeopardy! Round
Kate: 6600
Randy: 8000
Alyssa: 0

[MarkBarrett]

Nice work by Randy with the light pen:

Spoiler

I have a recollection of seeing the bird pattern on Kate’s outfit on a previous contestant, but I can’t recall if it was another dress or a necktie. Anyone recall?

Spoiler

With a $100 difference going into the FJ! round there were lots of points in the game that could have mattered for whether Kate or Randy had the lead for the FJ! round. It turned out not to make a difference with Randy right and Kate wrong for the FJ! clue.

Kate’s FJ! clue wager worked out well for Alyssa to get the second place prize as a nice consolation for having the right idea on the clue and not quite completing her response. My response was wrong and in the same area as Kate as I wrote, “geographic center.”

My thinking that two difference places want to claim the distinction made little sense and I do not have the geographic IQ to picture where the places lie for the obvious answer. The clue’s wording was long as is, so I cannot beg for the clue to have added a third place that may have helped me see where it was going.

[Bob78164]

This game is a draw for the Strong Form of Shore's Conjecture. The second-place player bet "small." --Bob

[Bamaman]

One place claiming to be the equator doesn’t make sense to me. I said the source of the Nile.

I have a friend who was a missionary in Uganda. She posted a picture of her on Facebook with her and an Ugandan gentleman standing on the equator. There was this structure of a circle with a line through the middle and they were on opposite sides.

[StevenH]

I got FJ after about 10 seconds, but I struggled to parse it at first.

[BigDaddyMatty]

Coryat: 33,400
44 R/2 W
DD: 3/3
FJ:
LT: pawpaw, word of mouth, auricle

It seems that my limit for consecutive (regular-play) FJ! correct responses is 14. This is the fourth time I've hit that mark, only to crash and burn on #15. The writers threw this one right past me. The only response I could muster was the lame "waterfall."

"TV band" for $2000? I know it was 50 years ago, but still(s).

Bigger Thomas = Native Son is a Pavlov I couldn't pull today.

Kate's wager on DD3 was sub-optimal. It's nice that she wagered to take the lead, but it would have only taken a second to count that there was only $1,200 remaining on the board and adjust her wager accordingly. Slow it down and think it through.

[RobW]

FINAL JEOPARDY! CATEGORY
AFRICA

FINAL JEOPARDY! CLUE
Markers for this geographic designation are on Lake Victoria’s Lwaji Island & at Mbandaka in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

The writers threw this one right past me. The only response I could muster was the lame "waterfall."

Yes, a tricky one to parse for me too - I took that wording to mean that these were the ONLY markers. (so I also floundered trying to think of a relevant waterfall)

If they had instead deigned to phrase the clue as

"Two markers for this geographic distinction..."

I think I could've had it.

I can quibble about clumsy or misleading syntax, but supposedly the writers aim for a FJ clue that at least one player gets and at least one player misses. By that measure, I wonder if they might consider this one a perfect "1.5 get" clue?

[TenPoundHammer]

Randy was fun.

State Consumables was tough. I had no idea on any of them. Cranberry = MA, huh?

Hated the first Twins categories because both of them had part of the response in the clue. It's not Stupid Answers, writers.

Ran the Band category.

All but Baby Driver in Movies. Of course a recent movie trips me up. Also all but auricle in Ear.

Any reason I should know those Lees were from Virginia? I saw no TOM in the clue at all.

Can't say I've heard of Harvey Mudd before, so "N" for $200 flew over my head.

"Geographic designation" was completely tripping me up. I couldn't think of anything that could qualify.

[Ironhorse]

I went with head of the Nile for FJ. I thought the Congo made more geographical sense but eliminated it because the word "Congo" already appeared in the clue.

This was all around a terrible game for me. I was pleasantly surprised to see Alabama Shakes get a mention.

[threearruda]

I went with National Heritage Sites. The equator never once crossed my mind. Read the clue, dummy!

Poll request for I predicted Kate would go all-in from first place.

It's nice to see people enjoying themselves and having fun, that's what the game should be all about. Even so, I feel this whole cast of characters shtick is starting to get overdone.. makes me appreciate recent champs like Gilbert, Rachel and Rob a little more! Nevertheless, congrats to Randy on his win and a good game overall.

Nice work by Randy with the light pen:

Spoiler

I have a recollection of seeing the bird pattern on Kate’s outfit on a previous contestant, but I can’t recall if it was another dress or a necktie. Anyone recall?

Spoiler

Agreed on both counts. Can't wait to see what Randy does tomorrow. I felt like the pattern is something Rachel Lindgren might have worn but I just skimmed through her highlight montage and got nothing (unless it was her Game 6).

[BobF]

Darn it, went with Prime Meridan ending my streak of 11 consecutive "regular game" FJs.

Was able to sweep signers thanks to the facts that

Spoiler

I live in Carroll County Maryland a few miles from the old Charles Carroll school and my grandmother's sister married a descendant of Dr. Rush.

ETA: I like the champ's enthusiasm, I hope by the next time I watch (likely Thursday or Friday) it doesn't grate on me.

[goforthetie]

Gotta say, that is a very poorly written FJ.

[heppm01]

For Randy's DD I said The Partridge Family. I don't recall the wording of the clue - was there something that leads one to the Monkees instead?

Yes, I had to read the FJ clue a few times to grasp what they were shooting for. Briefly considered some sort of "geographic center" but once the light bulb went off that two points describe a line it was just a question of which line: equator, tropic of capricorn or prime meridian. I had a rough idea that the line ran E/W so eliminated the meridian. Decided to go with the more obvious remaining choice and it paid off.

[Golf]

Kate's wager on DD3 was sub-optimal. It's nice that she wagered to take the lead, but it would have only taken a second to count that there was only $1,200 remaining on the board and adjust her wager accordingly. Slow it down and think it through.

If she had 30 minutes to make a wager, do you think it would have been optimal? After her FJ wager yesterday?

[MarkBarrett]

For Randy's DD I said The Partridge Family. I don't recall the wording of the clue - was there something that leads one to the Monkees instead?

It's Tuesday, so it's the fast day for the Archive: 437 hopefuls, including Stephen Stills, auditioned to join this TV band

No get for me, but I guess for J! purposes auditioning for a TV band is The Monkees?

[cheezguyty]

I have a recollection of seeing the bird pattern on Kate’s outfit on a previous contestant, but I can’t recall if it was another dress or a necktie. Anyone recall?

Spoiler

Both Kate and her outfit bear some resemblance to Betsy Knudson and the one that she wore in her second game:

Spoiler

[NoName84]

First thought on Final was the source of the Nile, but I switched to the correct response in time.

[MarkBarrett]

I have a recollection of seeing the bird pattern on Kate’s outfit on a previous contestant, but I can’t recall if it was another dress or a necktie. Anyone recall?

Spoiler

Both Kate and her outfit bear some resemblance to Betsy Knudson and the one that she wore in her second game:

Spoiler

Wow! You are good! Thanks. That's the one. I have been looking through my photos of winners that I send to The Jeopardy! Fan and the closest I just found prior to seeing your post was Jenny Rhodes on Feb. 2:

Spoiler