Jeopardy and Long-Running Champions

If because of the holidays you've been missing your nightly dose of Jeopardy, you might return to it and find that the world hasn't changed all that much for Amy Schneider, a computer engineer manager from Oakland California, who has anchored herself in the champion's lectern now for over 20 days and is due to take home at least over $800,000. She's in rare air. Her totals change each  day, ever upward.

My guess is long-running champions are good for ratings. I know when they had that two-week hiatus of "Professors Championship" I tuned out most nights. Boring.

But when the lights go up on the Alex Trebek stage and the introductions are made, there's Amy, a stout 40ish woman who if you look closely has a small nose ring attached to her left nostril. Well, she is from California. Doesn't Governor Gavin Newsom admit to having pierced nipples? TMI?

To me, Amy is at the upper range of age that Jeopardy contestants usually clock in at. There are never any contestants who are septuagenarians for instance. They can't get past the audition with TV show and song title clues that they know nothing about. When those categories come up, I'm ignorant.

The host Ken Jennings tries to create some drama, but Amy clicks off the answers like sinking the break ball in pool. She then proceeds to run the table, leaving the other contestants marooned at the lecterns vainly trying to buzz in, to no avail.

Buzzing in is the key. No wasted motion. Amy doesn't play a tactical game by diving for the high value questions first. She starts at the top, and runs her way down. Sometimes you forget there are other contestants present.

And before you know it, she has amassed a sizeable margin. Her Daily Double bets are modest, and she generally sinks the 9 ball at the end by getting the Final Jeopardy answer right.

Only once last week she could have been caught when she overplayed her final bet. Had she gotten Final Jeopardy wrong and the other contestant was right, she would have been out of there.

The other contestants are so dominated by her that you wonder how they got on the show. We don't really know exactly when they have filmed these segments, but one of the questions yesterday involved knowing that Kathy Hochul was New York's first female governor.

Since Andrew Cuomo only resigned in August, paving the way for Ms. Hochul's succession, we know at least that there is some relative freshness to when these segments are filmed.

None of the three contestants identified the Hochul question correctly, but that was somewhat understandable since Amy is from the West Coast. But why the dunce in the middle, who was billed as being "from Brooklyn" didn't know the answer is beyond me.

But with Milennials, there  is a vast difference in being "from Brooklyn" (read living there; moved from somewhere else) and actually being from Brooklyn—like born dere, ya know?

Ken Jennings has pointed out how infrequently Amy misses the Final Jeopardy question. He says she's batting the best at it of all contestants he ever had the experience to work with. But for the most part, she doesn't even need the Final question to seal the deal. The other night she stood pat, bet nothing, but knew the answer anyway.

Because the buzzer means everything, you don't really know if the other contestants don't know the answer, or are just not able to out finger press the champion.

Amy's 21 day total now has her over $800,000—rare air indeed. It will be interesting to see if she can end the year still as the champion.

You just don't know. She might turn out to be the Eveready Bunny—GOAT.

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