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Ken Jennings can't lose on Jeopardy!!
- Thread starter Doctor Q
- Start date
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jackieonasses
macrumors 6502a
The money that he bet on the Final jeopardy was questionable also, such a weird number... he did it on purpose.
aloofman
macrumors 68020
wdlove said:
Jeopardy usually does air on Mondays on ABC stations, but AFTER Monday Night Football on the west coast. There's a gap between the local postgame show and the late local news, and Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune usually air then. At least that's what they seem to do in the L.A. area.
Remember that both game shows are syndicated, so they aren't network shows.
You guys do realize that he'll pay about 40% of this in taxes, and as a Mormon he is required to give 10% to his church - so he gets about a million and a quarter - which is still VERY nice. It's cool to see someone with a brain get something good out of it once in a while.
Mechcozmo
macrumors 603
Think about this:
He has $2.1 million. After taxes, say, $1.6 million. 10% to the church.
$1.5 million, aboutish. Place that in a bank on 10% interest. You get 100,000 bucks a year. Keep on working for, say, $45,000 a year. But live off of only your annual salary. Eventually, after 10 years of (extremely) simple interest you have $2.5 million. Retire and live off of the interest.
Ken Jennings has got it made... If you can't follow my math I'll explain more but that is the basics of it. Lucky smart bastard... 😀
He has $2.1 million. After taxes, say, $1.6 million. 10% to the church.
$1.5 million, aboutish. Place that in a bank on 10% interest. You get 100,000 bucks a year. Keep on working for, say, $45,000 a year. But live off of only your annual salary. Eventually, after 10 years of (extremely) simple interest you have $2.5 million. Retire and live off of the interest.
Ken Jennings has got it made... If you can't follow my math I'll explain more but that is the basics of it. Lucky smart bastard... 😀
quackattack
macrumors 6502a
Mechcozmo said:
10% interest? wow, i must be at the wrong bank.
good thought though. gotta love perpetuities. anytime you invest that much you are going to be in good shape.
FelixDerKater
macrumors 68040
Ken said he's not planning to quit his job as a software engineer, but maybe to work a little less.
I think he lost fair and square. He looked just slightly shocked when Nancy, his opponent, got the Final Jeopardy question right, since he then knew he had lost (even if she bet nothing, because he'd have less than she started with after his bet). It occurred to me that Jeopardy! is the only game show I can think of where the contestant knows who won before the emcee or audience does.
Ken followed a logical strategy (as always) on his last bet. He bet $5,601, which if he gotten the question right would have given him $20,001, which is one dollar more than the amount Nancy would have had if she bet her whole earnings ($10,000) and gotten the question right (giving her $20,000).
He bet $3,000, $5,400, and $4,800 on his Daily Double questions (he ran into all three of them). He won the first and lost the second and third. If his first bet had been higher and/or his 2nd and 3rd bets lower, for a total of more than $5,600, he would have won the game even without getting any more questions right. Since his total at the time of the first Daily Double was only $4,600 (less than $5,600) and his 2nd and 3rd Daily Double bets were each under $5,600, he would have lost even if he bet 100% on the first Double Jeopardy, unless he also lowered either or both of his other two Daily Double bets.
It's the end of a mini-era and it was fun for me to be paying attention to the news and watching the show now and then as it happened. Now we can go on to the next cultural event of trivial importance!
I think he lost fair and square. He looked just slightly shocked when Nancy, his opponent, got the Final Jeopardy question right, since he then knew he had lost (even if she bet nothing, because he'd have less than she started with after his bet). It occurred to me that Jeopardy! is the only game show I can think of where the contestant knows who won before the emcee or audience does.
Ken followed a logical strategy (as always) on his last bet. He bet $5,601, which if he gotten the question right would have given him $20,001, which is one dollar more than the amount Nancy would have had if she bet her whole earnings ($10,000) and gotten the question right (giving her $20,000).
He bet $3,000, $5,400, and $4,800 on his Daily Double questions (he ran into all three of them). He won the first and lost the second and third. If his first bet had been higher and/or his 2nd and 3rd bets lower, for a total of more than $5,600, he would have won the game even without getting any more questions right. Since his total at the time of the first Daily Double was only $4,600 (less than $5,600) and his 2nd and 3rd Daily Double bets were each under $5,600, he would have lost even if he bet 100% on the first Double Jeopardy, unless he also lowered either or both of his other two Daily Double bets.
It's the end of a mini-era and it was fun for me to be paying attention to the news and watching the show now and then as it happened. Now we can go on to the next cultural event of trivial importance!
quackattack
macrumors 6502a
Mechcozmo said:
uh hum. Trust me, there is a HUGE difference.
1.5 million compounded annually, over 10 years.
11% = 4.2 million
10% = 3.8 million
7% = 2.9 million
6% = 2.6 million
I see a small difference...... What you didn't account for is compounding. It can make all the difference in the world when it comes to interest. You can't value investments with simple interest and huge interest rates. Right now you would be lucky to get even 6% unless you were willing to take on alot of risk, not wise for a retirement plan.
Looks like I just did my homework too... 😀 Still alot of money, no matter how you slice it.
~Shard~
macrumors P6
Mechcozmo said:
How much of a difference?! I'll assume you're not very well versed at all in Finance... 😉 QuackAttack hit the nail on the head with compounded interest. You need to take that into with various other account factors, it's not as simple as you made it out. 1% can make a large difference depending on the circumstances, trust me, I see it in investments all the time.
Mechcozmo said:
Sorry, but I found this really amusing - why would you make a statement like this? Your example was trivial, there is no need to make it sound more complicated than it is - and you weren't even accurate with your numbers. If you want to do the math, that's fine, but it's rather silly to make a statement like the above when you're stating the obvious - you're making it sound like what you did was complicated and we may not be able to follow your complex formulae. 😉 That's like me saying, "To calculate 9+8*7, you actually have to calculate 8*7 first, then add it to 9 - if you can't follow my math I'll explain more but that's the basics of it".
Just found it amusing, that's all, thanks for the chuckle. 😉 😎
jefhatfield
Retired
It was a setup!
Anybody who has followed Kens reigh as champion would know this was a set-up. Ken is known for his educated guesses and he would never have guessed "Fed Ex". His brain analyzes the question and the clues and he would have automatically weeded out "Fex Ex" because of the "white collar clue". That was the easiest Final Jeopardy question ever. I knew the answer (and I haven't known many answers at Ken's level of play), My husband knew the answer and he has only been in this country for 5 years and his country does not file income tax. They made the question easy enough for the average person but Ken didn't know the answer. Come On! I always knew that at Final Jeopardy time, if anybody knew the answer, then Ken knew it too.
I often wondered how his reign as champion would end. It was obvious that no average person would beat him. Alex asked him on one episode after he surpassed the 2 million mark if he wanted to continue playing. What kind of question is that to ask the champion. It sounded more like, "are you ready to retire yet?" On another show Alex stated that there would not be a "Jeopardy of champions" next year if nobody defeated Ken. The future of Jeopardy was at stake and politics had to come into play.
It became even more obvious of the set-up when the new champion lost yesterday with only $2 left. Her opponent had $14,000. I always said that whoever beat Ken would have started this whole thing over again because they would have found another genious. Ken lost in a way that would let everybody know that he was throwing the game. I have no doubt about it.
I'm sure he had to sign a non-disclosure of the details with the show but I hope his negotiations about his departure gained him at least twice the money that he made answering all those questions.
I had to post late because I had to register to gain the right to post to this board. But "setup" was my immediate thought and I had to speak my peace somewhere.
Anybody who has followed Kens reigh as champion would know this was a set-up. Ken is known for his educated guesses and he would never have guessed "Fed Ex". His brain analyzes the question and the clues and he would have automatically weeded out "Fex Ex" because of the "white collar clue". That was the easiest Final Jeopardy question ever. I knew the answer (and I haven't known many answers at Ken's level of play), My husband knew the answer and he has only been in this country for 5 years and his country does not file income tax. They made the question easy enough for the average person but Ken didn't know the answer. Come On! I always knew that at Final Jeopardy time, if anybody knew the answer, then Ken knew it too.
I often wondered how his reign as champion would end. It was obvious that no average person would beat him. Alex asked him on one episode after he surpassed the 2 million mark if he wanted to continue playing. What kind of question is that to ask the champion. It sounded more like, "are you ready to retire yet?" On another show Alex stated that there would not be a "Jeopardy of champions" next year if nobody defeated Ken. The future of Jeopardy was at stake and politics had to come into play.
It became even more obvious of the set-up when the new champion lost yesterday with only $2 left. Her opponent had $14,000. I always said that whoever beat Ken would have started this whole thing over again because they would have found another genious. Ken lost in a way that would let everybody know that he was throwing the game. I have no doubt about it.
I'm sure he had to sign a non-disclosure of the details with the show but I hope his negotiations about his departure gained him at least twice the money that he made answering all those questions.
I had to post late because I had to register to gain the right to post to this board. But "setup" was my immediate thought and I had to speak my peace somewhere.
aloofman
macrumors 68020
polly said:
What's with the conspiracy theories? If you had been paying attention, you'd know that he won several close games that could have turned out differently if he'd missed one daily double or a few other questions. One of his strengths was in making educated guesses because nobody can know everything about everything. Some of those wins -- as he himself admitted -- were helped by luck. Eventually chance wasn't going to be on his side. He claimed that he didn't think of "H&R Block" as an answer because he always does his own taxes. That's a pretty good explanation.
As for the whole "preserving the Tournament of Champions" thing: nonsense. The show was getting 20% better ratings than normal and the TOC didn't get those kinds of numbers. As has been discussed earlier in the thread, the drama and competition are what keeps the audience coming back. In the 1950s, game show scandals ruined a whole generation of TV producers and today's TV bigwigs can't afford to damage a cash cow like syndicated game shows. They have no incentive to jeopardize that by rigging games.
Mechcozmo
macrumors 603
How did you tell?~Shard~ said:
~Shard~ said:
Glad to be of service. Did I at least make a point?
And if you want really amusing, check out the conspiracy theory below your post and above here...
EDIT: Wow, a ton of people quoted me... did I need to pull out a flame extinguisher?
I just saw Jeopardy where some girl won two nights in a row. Alex Trebek goes, "Only 72 more wins to beat Ken Jennings".
LOL
LOL
Here's something interesting. Looking back through the thread, I see that this post was made September 8th. I learned from the newspaper yesterday that the show where Ken lost was taped September 7th. So we had timely and correct information as soon as anyone. If only MacRumors could get insider reports as accurately for Mac news!
It's my opinion
I agree that there were a few other ligitimate times when Ken could have actually lost but he came out on top. It is my opinion that this was not one of those times. It was Kens choce to continue playing or not. Ratings were high but I am sure they had probably been higher at some points during his campionship. Those ratings wouldn't have lasted forever. Jeopardy was successful because of its long time dedicated viewers -- and many of those were complaining or tuning out. Check out many of the post on this list. Many were just trying to hang in there to see the day he lost.
aloofman said:
I agree that there were a few other ligitimate times when Ken could have actually lost but he came out on top. It is my opinion that this was not one of those times. It was Kens choce to continue playing or not. Ratings were high but I am sure they had probably been higher at some points during his campionship. Those ratings wouldn't have lasted forever. Jeopardy was successful because of its long time dedicated viewers -- and many of those were complaining or tuning out. Check out many of the post on this list. Many were just trying to hang in there to see the day he lost.
