Tuesday, July 21, 2015
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I’m wondering if the lack of alcohol in my system is causing my math abilities to misfire this evening.
Let’s start by giving you the scores. Scott made it a game at the end by nearly running the final category.
|
Scott Lord |
Eliza Thompson |
Jake Smith |
| 13,200 | 6,200 | 22,800 |
Tonight’s Final Jeopardy! category is:
| HISTORIC NAMES |
Scott can only win if he gets it right and Jake misses, so I’ll skip right to the overall calculations:
| Scott |
Eliza |
Jake | |||
| 13,200 | 6,200 | 22,800 | |||
| FIRST-ORDER | SECOND-ORDER | COVER ZERO | |||
| min | max | min | max | min | max |
| 9,600* | 3,600 | 9,600 | |||
| 10,400 | |||||
If I’m Eliza, I just throw down a goose egg and hope Scott misses.
And how did our players fare?
What actually happened
| Scott | Eliza | Jake | |||
| 13,200 | 6,200 | 22,800 | |||
| 13,200 | 6,200 | 3,500 | |||
| 26,400 | 0 | 19,300 | |||
| min | max | ||||
| 13,200 | 3,601 | 9,599 | |||
| 10,399 | |||||
Whoops! I stand corrected: Jake would have lost by $100 had he gotten it right.
You see, people: this is why you always wager everything if you have to get it right to win.
Had Scott gone for the normal “Hey, let’s win by a dollar if Jake bets nothing!” wager of $9,601, he (1) won’t win on the double get and (2) will leave $3,599 on the table in the event he does win the game.
But he played it right, so Scott now has a two-day total of $55,401.
The Final Jeopardy! clue
| HISTORIC NAMES |
| IN 1909 THIS OXFORD STUDENT SURVEYED CRUSADER CASTLES IN THE MIDEAST; A FEW YEARS LATER HE RETURNED FOR LESS PEACEFUL ACTIVITIES |
[spoiler]Who was T.E. Lawrence?[/spoiler]
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I think Jake, like Julia Collins in her “Clavin” game, took the hundred the wrong way by mistake (in this game’s case he subtracted when he should’ve added, and vice versa in Julia’s example). In the famous Brian Weikle case you cited it was a number penmanship error that led to his very costly mistake.
I’m curious why you gave Jake’s wager a gray rather than a red. It was an irrational and risky wager, but it was not a wager where Jake “doesn’t even give himself a chance to win.”