Sometimes it’s not about playing hard. It’s about playing smart. And never has there been a game show where that is truer than on Jeopardy!.
If you’re anything like me, and I like to think you are, you’re utterly obsessed with the long-running US series hosted by the incomparable Alex Trebek.
The past few weeks have been some good-ass Jeopardy time, with the record-setting journey of the eccentric and entertaining Austin Rogers playing out over 13 magnificent episodes.
But just because the champ is no longer the champ, it doesn’t mean the show isn’t interesting anymore. So while Rogers spent over two weeks racking up insanely high scores by actually risking money on Daily Doubles unlike every other coward on the show, we now officially have the inverse of all that with this staggeringly low-scoring game.
With Final Jeopardy approaching and two contestants locked on $13,200 apiece, two-day winner Manny Abell looked done and dusted sitting way back in third on just $1,000.
And then, the unthinkable.
Sometimes a dollar goes a long way! 💵 Head over to #JBuzz for more on this moment: https://t.co/91ZLtoYmpI pic.twitter.com/5CbxtielYF
— Jeopardy! (@Jeopardy) October 18, 2017
One dollar. A one dollar win.
Fran and Carlos there full-on Prisoner Experimented themselves by assuming the only way to beat the other would be to bet the entire house. And when everyone coughed up the answer, that left Manny – now the smartest man alive – as the winner of the episode with just one single, solitary dollar.
That’s a fluke win of Stephen Bradbury-proportions; sit well behind the pack, and wait till everyone else falls down.
It’s only the second time in Jeopardy history a one-dollar win has been pulled off. Back in 1993, a moustachioed Trebek presided over the first-ever single dollar win, with returning champ “Darryl” scoring the coup.
‘Course Darryl entered into that Final Jeopardy well in front, managing to stagger over the line by the skin of his teeth. Manny, on the other hand, glides over the finish line with both hands in the air after passing all his opponents who are flat on their ass.
Remarkably, there has been one worse result in Jeopardy history: A three-way tie of $0 in 2016, meaning everyone leaves and has to face Trebek with a belt on the way out (probably).
Jeopardy, folks. It’s a hell of a time.
Sorry, what is a hell of a time.
