Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

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seaborgium
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

TenPoundHammer wrote:Lowest win by a two day champ? I swear I saw someone win their first game with a three-digit total, then get the third-place $1,000 in their second episode.
What you describe is a one-day champ. http://www.j-archive.com/showplayer.php?player_id=4568 Here's one of two examples (I can't remember who the other is; just search for another time someone answered this for you).

Lowest two-day total I know of is $2,600 (pre-doubled) in Sid Moore, Jr.'s first two games. Both times he was in a close second with third locked out at $600. (He won two more games and got up to $16k, but lost his fifth game when he went into a triple get FJ trailing by $100, after wagering a tiny amount on a DD moments earlier.)
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by opusthepenguin »

seaborgium wrote:Lowest two-day total I know of is $2,600 (pre-doubled) in Sid Moore, Jr.'s first two games. Both times he was in a close second with third locked out at $600. (He won two more games and got up to $16k, but lost his fifth game when he went into a triple get FJ trailing by $100, after wagering a tiny amount on a DD moments earlier.)
Bummer for Sid. I notice the $200 Shakespeare clue in that game is: "ON APRIL 23, 1616 SHAKESPEARE DIED IN ENGLAND & THIS GREAT WRITER DIED IN SPAIN". The factoid they're looking for has been around the block and used to be a favorite of mine.
Spoiler
They're looking for "Cervantes," of course.
But sadly, it appears to be incorrect. The writer who died in Spain died on April 22. His death just wasn't recorded until the following morning. I really wish the old guy could've hung on. He ruined one of my favorite geek trivia questions. It goes like this: Shakespeare and [the writer named in the above spoiler] both died on April 23, 1616. Which one died first? And the answer is: [the writer in Spain] ... by about 10 days. It's not nearly as fun to point out that he died on April 22, eleven days before Shakespeare died on April 23.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by whs1990 »

[quote="OldMole51"]I have no idea whether anyone keeps track of this sort of thing, but I think I might be the first player to have ever officially lost one day and then be called back to play another day (since if I recall correctly my return appearances were right around game #100).

So your return and 5-day run aired 1/25-1/31/85, right after Paul Boymel became a 5 time undefeated champ?
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

The random FJ feature on J! Archive led me to Katie Sunseri's third game, and I clicked forward and found she was beaten in her next game by Jason Block. Jason lost in his fifth game to Mark Eckard (they were tied entering FJ and both bet it all, but Jason got it wrong). So that's a 5xer who defeated a 4xer who defeated a 3xer. Are there any longer sequences of successive champs winning one more (or fewer) game than the last?

edit: I remembered 3xer Vik Vaz defeating our 4xer Rex Kramer; Vik Vaz in turn was beaten by Adam Weinstein, who won one more game after that. If Vicky Stanton, who defeated Adam, had only been a 1xer, we would have had 4-3-2-1. Or if Rex, Vik and Adam had had the same runs one game earlier, then Rex would have beaten Maria Wenglinsky and we'd have had 5-4-3-2.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

seaborgium wrote:I came up with another: lowest single-day (winning) total in a regular game by a future UToC participant. Except for a handful of ToC winners, all UToC players who first appeared in a regular game were 5x champs (or better) who averaged at least $9,680 per game (in pre-doubled dollars). So I'm looking for people who managed to make up for low totals. The lowest I know of is $2,800 for Michael Arnone. Actually, he's also got the second-lowest I've found: $3,300. (He made $6,100 in his first and fifth games, and $48,399 in between those, including $24,999 in his third game.) Michelle Clum is third with $3,799 in her first game (she made up for that with $18,000 in her third).
I just came across Paul Gutowski's $3,199 in his fourth game.
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MarkBarrett
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by MarkBarrett »

Brian Wangsgard won $1400 in his fourth win.

Brian: 2400 - 1000 = 1400
Lynn: 6200 - 6000 = 200
Jeff 6900 - 5501 = 1399
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by Bamaman »

MarkBarrett wrote:Brian Wangsgard won $1400 in his fourth win.

Brian: 2400 - 1000 = 1400
Lynn: 6200 - 6000 = 200
Jeff 6900 - 5501 = 1399
After the game, did he point at his score and say, "See, Lynn, this is what you should have bet."?

His bet foretold what he'd wager in his next game. Do you have his other game scores? Did any of them end in a similar matter?
seaborgium
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

MarkBarrett wrote:Brian Wangsgard won $1400 in his fourth win.

Brian: 2400 - 1000 = 1400
Lynn: 6200 - 6000 = 200
Jeff 6900 - 5501 = 1399
Wow! Reminds me of Pam Mifflin's third game.

Edit: Or non-ToCer Mike Hodel's first win. (I was in the studio on the following taping day and saw his losing game, alongside Doug Hicton and Meredith Robbins.)
seaborgium
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

Michael Shutterly may have missed out on the ToC by $201 to Ron Trigueiro, and Doug Antoniazzi may have missed out on being the 1998 ToC alternate by $2 to Bob Willoughby, but Sara Wilkinson missed qualifying for the 2011 ToC by a nickel!

In a similar fashion, Lisa Klink fell a Buck short of being a superchamp.


P.S. While pulling up the Klink link, I found another "distant third hunkers down in FJ to win on a TS" game, done by Phil Klinkner.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by TenPoundHammer »

Random thought. Have they ever had players with the same LAST name compete against each other?
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by cheezguyty »

TenPoundHammer wrote:Random thought. Have they ever had players with the same LAST name compete against each other?
That was mentioned a few pages back: viewtopic.php?p=48555#p48555
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by MarkBarrett »

Bamaman wrote:
MarkBarrett wrote:Brian Wangsgard won $1400 in his fourth win.

Brian: 2400 - 1000 = 1400
Lynn: 6200 - 6000 = 200
Jeff 6900 - 5501 = 1399
After the game, did he point at his score and say, "See, Lynn, this is what you should have bet."?

His bet foretold what he'd wager in his next game. Do you have his other game scores? Did any of them end in a similar matter?
Brian Wangsgard #1:

9300 + 9300 = 18600
1300 + 1299 = 2599
Brian 11400 + 8000 = 19400

#2
Brian 6800 + 5399 = 12199
1400 + 0 = 1400
6000 + 3100 = 9100

#3
Brian 11100 + 5499 = 16599
2800 + 0 = 2800
1200 + 1200 = 2400

Alex commented that Brian was still way ahead of Chuck Forrest, so of course Brian got the $1400 win in the next game.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by TenPoundHammer »

"Wangsgard" would be a good brand name for a condom.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by Paucle »

TenPoundHammer wrote:"Wangsgard" would be a good brand name for a condom.
"What number Wangsgard do you use?"
seaborgium
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

TenPoundHammer wrote:"Wangsgard" would be a good brand name for a condom.
He played in the ToC with Bruce Cox and Joel Sacks.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by MDaunt »

opusthepenguin wrote:
seaborgium wrote:Lowest two-day total I know of is $2,600 (pre-doubled) in Sid Moore, Jr.'s first two games. Both times he was in a close second with third locked out at $600. (He won two more games and got up to $16k, but lost his fifth game when he went into a triple get FJ trailing by $100, after wagering a tiny amount on a DD moments earlier.)
Bummer for Sid. I notice the $200 Shakespeare clue in that game is: "ON APRIL 23, 1616 SHAKESPEARE DIED IN ENGLAND & THIS GREAT WRITER DIED IN SPAIN". The factoid they're looking for has been around the block and used to be a favorite of mine.
Spoiler
They're looking for "Cervantes," of course.
But sadly, it appears to be incorrect. The writer who died in Spain died on April 22. His death just wasn't recorded until the following morning. I really wish the old guy could've hung on. He ruined one of my favorite geek trivia questions. It goes like this: Shakespeare and [the writer named in the above spoiler] both died on April 23, 1616. Which one died first? And the answer is: [the writer in Spain] ... by about 10 days. It's not nearly as fun to point out that he died on April 22, eleven days before Shakespeare died on April 23.
Because one country was on the Gregorian calendar and the other on the Julian?
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by Woof »

MDaunt wrote: Because one country was on the Gregorian calendar and the other on the Julian?
Yes, Spain and most other Catholic countries adopted the Gregorian reforms in the 16th C, whereas England didn't adopt it until Sept. 2, 1752 (which was followed by Sept. 14 :D ), long after Shakespeare's death.
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by seaborgium »

It's not exactly an obscure record, but it's obscure enough that I don't have a way to find out who some of its holders are: highest single-day total of the season. I have the following:

1: Elise Beraru, $23,800
2: Harvey Becker, $25,400
3: ? (The highest archived single-day score is $16,000 by Tim Casey; I doubt it's the season's record)
4: Kevin Frear, $27,800 (beating out Bruce Naegeli's $26,600)
5: Garrett Simpson, $25,500 (Frank Spangenberg's Wikipedia article lists him as the previous season's biggest one-day winner)
6: Frank Spangenberg, $30,600
7: Mark Born, $29,400
8: Jerome Vered, $34,000
9: Mike Boyd, $21,601 (Jerome's Wikipedia article lists Mike as the following season's biggest one-day winner)
10: ? (The highest archived single-day score is $18,801 by Tom Lakeman)
11: Steve Chernicoff, $24,700 (beating out Matt Handel's $23,400 the very next game)
12: Michael Daunt, $27,400 (edging out Karl Coryat's $26,100)
13: ? (The highest archived single-day score is $19,601 by Peter Braxton, one of a few 2x champs any one of whom could have made the 1998 ToC if they'd just gotten their third FJ right)
14: John Skelton, $31,000 (in Dan Melia's fifth game, he could have safely attempted and achieved $33,200, but he shot for and got $24,000 instead. But then, John could have safely gone for $34,199)
15: Mark Whittinghill, $17,799 (only two games in the season are unarchived, and the winning totals of those games can be figured out to be smaller than this)
16: Doug Lach, $32,400
17: Michael Arnone, $24,999
18 pre-doubling: Ramsey Campbell, $20,000
18 post-doubling: Jeff Goldfarb, $39,999
19: Brian Weikle, $52,000 (edging out Myron Meyer's $50,000; Myron could have won $73,999 with the maximum safe wager, but Brian had less than half Myron's leeway)
20: Ken Jennings, $75,000
21: Ken Jennings, $55,099
22: Maria Wenglinsky, $46,600
23: Jennifer Gotcher, $40,001
24: Larissa Kelly, $45,200
25: Kevin Joyce, $49,699
26: Ryan Chaffee, $41,600 (the only one to achieve this record from a pre-FJ second place position!)
27: Roger Craig, $77,000
28: Joon Pahk, $50,800
29: Helen Juvonen, $40,801

Hey cool, I just realized I've met five people on this list. Anyway, seasons 3, 10, and 13 are the ones I can't make a definitive statement about. (Well, I can't really with the Wikipedia stuff either, but the fact that someone did makes me a little more confident about them.) I could see the $19,601 figure for season 13 holding up (particularly since the season is much closer to complete), but I'm less sure about the other two. (What were John Cuthbertson's totals? He certainly could have won $82,400 over his five games without clearing $18,801, but if someone did it, he's my prime suspect.)
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by rmfromfla »

(Cue the Smurfs theme music, please.....) :lol:

John Cuthbertson game #1 --- $18,400
2 --- 12,000
3 --- 16,000
4 --- 18,000
5 --- 18,000
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Re: Trivia about Trivia: Obscure Record Holders

Post by MarkBarrett »

My source is the Ray Richmond book This is Jeopardy!:

Season 3 Doug Molitor $17,600
The book does not list the day high scorer for season 9
Season 10 Steve Ashworth $21,200
Season 13 Peter Braxton $19,601
Season 15 Jeff Krause from Military Week whose $18,000 was doubled to 36K

The book ends at Season 20 and either agrees with others you listed or did not list those not mentioned.
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