Thursday, January 16, 2014 Game Recap & Discussion [SPOILERS]

[Archivists]

Game Recap for Show #6754, 2014-01-16

CONTESTANTS
Stacy Meyers, a graduate student of education from Fredericksburg, Virginia
Gudrun Juffer, a law clerk originally from Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Sarah McNitt, a study abroad adviser originally from Ann Arbor, Michigan (whose 2-day cash winnings total $15,800)

OPENING REMARKS
Thank you, Johnny. Thank you, ladies. And welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to another half-hour of answers and questions. How many correct responses will we get from Stacy, Gudrun, and Sarah? Let's start finding out. Here we go. Here are the categories for you.

JEOPARDY! ROUND CATEGORIES
CEREAL CHARACTERS (5/5)
BEETHOVEN (4/4, including 1 correct Daily Double)
WHAT'S YOUR SIGN, BABY? (4/5)
NO VOWEL BUT Y (5/5)
A NOVEL CATEGORY (3/5)
THROWN OF GAMES (3/5)

THE RIGHTS & THE WRONGS
Sarah: 11 R, 2 W
Stacy: 8 R (including 1 rebound and 1 DD), 1 W
Gudrun: 5 R, 1 W

Clues revealed: 29
Triple Stumpers: 5
Jeopardy! Round Potential Lach Trash: $4,200



SCORES AT THE FIRST BREAK
Sarah: $2,400
Gudrun: $2,000
Stacy: $1,600

CONTESTANT INTERVIEWS



Alex: A graduate student of education, Stacy Meyers. All right. You have a dog?

Stacy: [ chuckles ] Yes, I do.

Alex: What kind of dog?

Stacy: I have a dachshund, which is also known as a wiener dog.

Alex: Yep.

Stacy: And...

Alex: So, wait a minute. I just want our audience to take a moment now and try to imagine what the best name for this little dog would be. Now tell us.

Stacy: Well, the best part of it is, my last name is Meyers...

Alex: Yep.

Stacy: ...So I named him Oscar Meyers... [ laughter ]

Alex: There it is.

Stacy: ...The wiener dog.

Alex: There it is, huh? [ applause ] Yes. Okay.




Alex: Gudrun Juffer is a law clerk originally from Wisconsin, and you played rugby in college?

Gudrun: I did. Yeah. And then, also, again when I moved to China. I played in Shanghai for a while.

Alex: They have a rugby league for women in China?

Gudrun: They do. The competition is limited. We ended up having to go to Seoul to play another team. So, there's not a lot in Shanghai, but we did play.

Alex: What position did you play?

Gudrun: I played 8 in college, which is --it's the back of the scrum.

Alex: Yeah.

Gudrun: Glamorous.

Alex: [ chuckles ] There's nothing glamorous about rugby. Not at all.




Alex: All right, Sarah McNitt is our champion, and we're fortunate to have her with us today because she could have been arrested in England many years ago at Westminster Abbey for doing what?

Sarah: When I was 2 years old, I stole a spoon from the gift shop at Westminster Abbey and then continued my crime spree by dancing on the altar at Winchester Cathedral. [ laughter ]

Alex: Two-time felon, in other words?

Sarah: Yeah.

Alex: One more, and you're gone. You know that? Okay.

JEOPARDY! ROUND DAILY DOUBLE
Stacy found the Daily Double on the 29th clue. Sarah had $4,400, Gudrun had $2,200, and Stacy was at $2,800. Stacy wagered $1,000.

BEETHOVEN $800: With angry strings & gentle keyboard, piano concerto no. 4 evokes this mythic musician calming the Furies with song
...
[End-of-round signal sounds.]

TRIPLE STUMPERS IN THE JEOPARDY! ROUND
A NOVEL CATEGORY $800: Frederic Henry, the protagonist of this Hemingway novel, is in the Italian ambulance service during WWI

WHAT'S YOUR SIGN, BABY? $1000: A St. Paddy's Day baby, you're the 12th & last sign of the zodiac, yet you're first in my heart

A NOVEL CATEGORY $1000: In a much lighter vein than "Gone Girl", there's "Where'd You Go," this French-sounding first name

THROWN OF GAMES $600: In craps, you need a pair of 4s to throw 8 this "way"

THROWN OF GAMES $800: 354 wins did not overcome the controversy as this ex-red Sox pitcher didn't make the Hall of Fame cut in 2013
(Gudrun: Who is Pete Rose?)
(Stacy: Who is Curt Schilling?)
(Stacy: Who is Mark McGwire?)

SCORES AT THE END OF THE JEOPARDY! ROUND
Sarah: $4,400
Stacy: $3,800
Gudrun: $2,200

[Archivists]

DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND CATEGORIES
SCIENCE FICTION MOVIES (4/5)
THE FLY (1/2)
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (5/5)
BLADE RUNNER (3/4, including 1 missed Daily Double)
METROPOLIS (3/5, including 1 missed Daily Double)
"IN"CEPTION (4/5)

THE RIGHTS & THE WRONGS
Sarah: 8 R, 0 W
Stacy: 7 R, 2 W (including 1 DD)
Gudrun: 5 R (including 1 rebound), 2 W (including 1 DD)

Clues revealed: 26
Triple Stumpers: 4
Double Jeopardy! Round Potential Lach Trash: $4,800



FIRST DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND DAILY DOUBLE
Stacy snagged the next Daily Double on the 19th clue. Sarah had $10,800, Gudrun had $3,800, and Stacy was at $10,600. Stacy wagered $1,000.

BLADE RUNNER $800: In a Tennyson poem, Bedevere is asked to make a run with this & fling it "into the middle mere"
(Stacy: I don't know.)
(Alex: He's asked to throw [*], the sword, into the sea.)

SECOND DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND DAILY DOUBLE
It was Gudrun who snatched up the last Daily Double of the game on the 21st clue. Sarah had $10,800, Gudrun had $4,200, and Stacy was at $9,600. Gudrun made it a True Daily Double, wagering $4,200.

METROPOLIS $800: In 1890 the population of this U.S. city bordering Mexico was 16,000; today it's 1.3 million
(Gudrun: What is San Antonio?)

TRIPLE STUMPERS IN THE DOUBLE JEOPARDY! ROUND
THE FLY $400: Unlike most other insects, true flies have this many wings; some have wingbeats of up to 1,000 times a second

"IN"CEPTION $400: A system for paying for a sofa in fixed amounts at specified intervals is this plan

SCIENCE FICTION MOVIES $2000: 1962's "La Jetee", about a man sent back in time to avert apocalypse, was remade as this numeric Bruce Willis film
(Gudrun: What is The Fifth Element?)

METROPOLIS $2000: You'll be let down if you go to this South American capital for a mountain view, but there is the Palacio Salvo

SCORES ENTERING FINAL JEOPARDY!
Sarah: $13,600
Stacy: $10,400
Gudrun: $1,200

FINAL JEOPARDY! CATEGORY
SHAKESPEARE

VENUSIAN MONOLOGUES/MARTIAN CHRONICLES
Three-quarters for first place. Shore's Conjecture.
Sarah: Wager $7,201 to cover Stacy, but no more than $11,199 so as not to fall behind Gudrun's doubled score. If you're a fan of shoretegic wagering, you might risk $4,801.
Stacy: You ought to wager between $3,201 (venusian) and $4,000 (martian), thereby safely covering a $0 bet by Sarah.
Gudrun: Too bad for you, Gudrun, your score is less than Sarah's score minus Stacy's score. Unless they both commit an egregious wagering error, you've no hope of moving into first place. Wager as much as you desire, but remember, you'll have better chances of advancing to second place if you have a larger sum left over on a Triple Stumper.

FINAL JEOPARDY! CLUE
This 5-letter name appears 7 times in Shakespeare titles, more than any other name

FINAL SCORES
Gudrun: $1,200 + $1,100 = $2,300 (What is Henry?) (3rd place: $1,000)
Stacy: $10,400 - $7,600 = $2,800 (What is Romeo) (2nd place: $2,000)
Sarah: $13,600 + $4,000 = $17,600 (What is Paris? Henry?) (3-day champion: $33,400)

Total Potential Lach Trash: $9,000

GAME DYNAMICS


CORYAT SCORES
Sarah: $13,600, 19 R, 2 W
Stacy: $11,200, 15 R (including 1 DD), 3 W (including 1 DD)
Gudrun: $5,400, 10 R, 3 W (including 1 DD)
Combined Coryat: $30,200

BATTING AVERAGES
Sarah: 20/58 = .345
Stacy: 15/60 = .250
Gudrun: 11/59 = .186
Team: 46/63 = .730

MISCELLANEOUS INTERESTING CLUES
A NOVEL CATEGORY $400: (Kelly of the Clue Crew delivers the clue.) From London's Reform Club to the first stop in Egypt, across India, then on to Yokohama, to the
penultimate stop in New York, here's the route taken in this Jules Verne novel

CEREAL CHARACTERS $1000: First name of the leprechaun mascot of a popular cereal
...
(Alex: Yes. [*] Charms.)

WHAT'S YOUR SIGN, BABY? $200: You're impulsive! audacious! intemperate! & your glyph, said to represent ram's horns? nice!
(Sarah: What is Capricorn?)

THROWN OF GAMES $1000: The pole in this Scottish athletic toss seen here
can weigh 80 to 180 pounds

THE FLY $800: The common housefly has up to 4,000 of these vision-enhancing facets in each compound eye

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND $2000: The German statue seen here
shows this Holy Roman Emperor
and Third Crusade starter

BLADE RUNNER $400: Good for runs on icy surfaces, this footwear has a blade whose front is called a toe pick
(Stacy: What are ice skates?)
(Alex: What kind?)
(Stacy: figure ice skates?)
(Alex: That's it, [*].)

BLADE RUNNER $1200: This title of a 2006 Annette Bening movie flies in the face of a parental admonition about blades
(Stacy: What is Don't Run with Scissors?)

BLADE RUNNER $2000: In the "ring" cycle, this hero runs to the rescue with his sword Notung
...
[End-of-round signal sounds.]

CORRECT RESPONSES
Orpheus
A Farewell to Arms
Pisces
Bernadette
the hard way
Roger Clemens
Excalibur
San Diego
2
installment plan
12 Monkeys
Montevideo
Henry
Around the World in Eighty Days
Lucky
Aries
caber toss
lens
Barbarossa (or Frederick I)
figure skates
Running with Scissors
Siegfried

[jeff6286]

Shakespeare
This 5-letter name appears 7 times in Shakespeare titles, more than any other name.

Spoiler

What is Henry? Stacy said Romeo. (forgot about the history plays, she sighed)

Sarah McNitt: $13,600+$4,000=$17,600...now a 3-day champion with $46,000
Stacy Meyers: $10,400-$7,600=$2,800
Gudrun Juffer: $1,200+$1,100=$2,300

[chalupabatman786]

I know that a lot of Jeopardy fans know very little about sports, but guessing that Pete Rose and Mark McGwire were pitchers is inexcusable.

Also, was it just me or were the metropolis questions too easy for DJ?

[sarah0114]

Somehow even though I had an extra long time to look at it, the "pitcher" part didn't click and I went, "Baseball scandal? Mark McGwire's a guy who wears red. Maybe he plays for the Red Sox." Which should not have been enough to convince me to ring in, so I don't know why I did.

I'm glad that's over. I have been dreading that clue/response for months.

[jpr281]

I had no idea that San Diego proper bordered Mexico, so I went with El Paso even though I was pretty sure the population isn't over a million there.

Also surprised no one got Monte Video.

As much as Shakespeare comes up, FJ should have been an instaget for most.

[wallzy41]

Red Sox pitcher screamed Curt Schilling to me(as secretary of the School's baseball team)... forgot Clemens had originally been part of the Sox. D'OH!

No chance on FJ! tonight. Stuck on Romeo and stayed there the whole 30s.

[Golf]

Oh I'm sure Alex will get roasted on social media for laughing at the women's lack of baseball knowledge, no matter if the comment was completely accurate or not. Pete Rose and Mark McGwire as pitchers? Oh my. I mean, it's one thing to not know, but to make those kinds of guesses?

And the previous clue about craps, 100% chance of a TS.

Anybody get in vino veritas solely from Val Kilmer's quote in Tombstone?

DD in a 2nd row clue and wager $1k? Brilliant. On the flipside, nice to see 3rd place make it a TDD, always gotta root for players who actually try to win.

I'm glad that's over. I have been dreading that clue/response for months.

Um, you haven't been dreading your FJ wagers for months?

I honestly don't know what to say. Sure, I know what I've been saying in front of my TV, but am pretty sure that wouldn't be appropriate here.

Yeah, in the end one can say (at least) three time champ, but..... ugh.

[econgator]

No chance on FJ! tonight. Stuck on Romeo and stayed there the whole 30s.

Pretty much me, too. "Well, it's not Romeo, so ... ummm ... errr ... ummm ... still not Romeo ..."

[skullturf]

For me, the only Red Sox pitcher coming to mind in those few seconds was Curt Schilling, but I really should have come up with Clemens. As for Montevideo, it didn't click with me right away, but I think I would have had time to ring in. And I had some qualms about San Diego -- knew it was near the Mexican border, but wasn't sure whether it literally touched it.

FJ meshed perfectly with what I know about Shakespeare and what I don't know. My Shakespeare knowledge is passable, but needs improving. There are some plays I know enough about, and others I don't.

One thing I can never keep straight is all the historical plays and all the Henrys. Which one had three parts? Which Henry was "Hal"? Which Henry was "Bolingbroke"? I don't know those things. I do know that the play "Richard III" has the "winter of our discontent" stuff and the "my kingdom for a horse" stuff, but that's pretty much all I know about Shakespeare's histories.

Fortunately, my surface-level knowledge that a ton of Shakespeare history plays have "Henry" in the title was all I needed.

[Leander]

Rummaged around the Tragedies for a few seconds and the said, of course the History plays, and got the answer immediately.

[econgator]

One thing I can never keep straight is all the historical plays and all the Henrys. Which one had three parts? Which Henry was "Hal"? Which Henry was "Bolingbroke"? I don't know those things. I do know that the play "Richard III" has the "winter of our discontent" stuff and the "my kingdom for a horse" stuff, but that's pretty much all I know about Shakespeare's histories.

Henry V = St Crispin's Day speech/Band of Brothers
Henry IV = Bolingbroke

That's what I know

[lisa0012]

I greatly enjoyed the DDs today. Particularly the first, because today I was listening to a podcast on King Arthur. The newest episode at Stuff You Should Know. Check it out.

I thought of Romeo, couldn't think of why his name would be popular, and jumped right to Henry.

Congrats Sarah!

[lieph82]

I'm glad that's over. I have been dreading that clue/response for months.

Um, you haven't been dreading your FJ wagers for months?

I honestly don't know what to say. Sure, I know what I've been saying in front of my TV, but am pretty sure that wouldn't be appropriate here.

Yeah, in the end one can say (at least) three time champ, but..... ugh.

Missing an easy clue that a majority of viewers/friends/family know is embarrassing, and I'm sure people get razzed for it. A much, much smaller percentage of the population understands game theory in general and Jeopardy! wagering theory in particular, and if you win the game, your friends and family won't tease you about a poor wager that didn't end up mattering, even if they realize the wager was poor. I would wager that the vast majority of contestants who make poor wagers on the show do not know, to this day, that they wagered poorly, and thus they have nothing to feel bad about. Ignorance is bliss. If she didn't consider wagering strategy before, and she ended up winning at least three games, why would she dread seeing her FJ wagers? Her wagers don't make her look stupid to her friends, family, and the general viewing population--only to certain members of this board and very acute viewers. The only place where she's going to get razzed for it is on board, and I think she's been sufficiently embarrassed here at this point. We've seen multiple contestants come on the boards and say that they didn't even realize that "wagering strategy" was something to be concerned about until they started lurking here after their tapings. Do any of the Jeopardy! preparation books out there have chapters/sections on wagering strategy? Maybe that's something to look into.

[KeithAR2002]

The only place where she's going to get razzed for it is on board, and I think she's been sufficiently embarrassed here at this point. We've seen multiple contestants come on the boards and say that they didn't even realize that "wagering strategy" was something to be concerned about until they started lurking here after their taping. Do any of the Jeopardy! preparation books out there have chapters/sections on wagering strategy? Maybe that's something to look into.

Thumbs up to you. I could not agree more. That was a pretty uncalled for post to Sarah, IMO. No need to be rude to contestants when they come on here... they've done better than most of us on here.... The Wheel of Fortune equivalent of jboard prohibits rude or disrespectful comments to contestants that come to the board, precisely because they want contestants to feel like they can be active in the community without getting blasted for any mistakes they made on the show. I really wish the same rule applied here. IMHO, it's fine to give constructive criticism about gameplay, but no excuse to be rude. The mods on the Wheel board even edit posts that are rude or offensive towards a contestant for their gameplay. Can we all please be a little nicer to the contestants that show up here? If Sarah gets a bunch of harsh comments about her wagers, etc, she might just leave and never come back. That goes for any future contestants that may make mistakes. I know my post count isn't high, but I come here everyday and read the discussions. Most are so nice to the contestants that come here, but there are the select few that can be very harsh and rude for any little mistake the contestant made.

Anyway that's just my two cents... even if I'm not a big poster here.

[BADuBois]

Fun fast-moving game for me, even though as a Red Sox fan I groaned at the replies to the Roger Clemens question.

Congrats to Sarah for being a three-time champ. Quite an accomplishment!

As to the discussion of wagering and such, before I went on the show, I did a lot of studying on-line and in other books about wagering and the formulas you should use and after a while, my head hurt. Really, it's one thing to calmly think about wagering strategies while sitting on a couch with a remote and a beer... it's a whole 'nother thing when you're on stage and the lights are on and ohmyGod Alex is right over there...

As an English major, FJ was an Instaget. And I thought I heard the second-place player, the one who wrote in Romeo, mutter something or talk when her wager was show, and keep on talking. Sarah, or anybody out there with good ears, know what she said?

[Vermonter]

Many players make stupid mistakes. Hell, I didn't buzz in when I had a clue that asked for a black Supreme Court Justice and someone had already guessed Thurgood Marshall. (I was, in my defense, too busy laughing at another player's response of Antonin Scalia.)

It's hard up there under the lights, and most players are already embarrassed just having to relive the awkward moment after months of waiting. No need to give them a hard time here.

As for wagering, on the other hand ... there's no time pressure. Sarah, any insight on why you've been consistent with 4,000?

[Vermonter]

Also, I enjoyed the "Chess" reference - at least I hope it was intentional - under the $400 clue in Metropolis.

[econgator]

And I thought I heard the second-place player, the one who wrote in Romeo, mutter something or talk when her wager was show, and keep on talking. Sarah, or anybody out there with good ears, know what she said?

*nod* There was another time I heard her mumble something, too.

[ElendilPickle]

Good job, Sarah!

Roger Clemens was an instaget for me, as was FJ. Henry IV, parts 1 and 2; Henry V; Henry VIII; and...Henry VI?