Joey DeSena could have missed his personal Jeopardy! viewing celebration as a result of he was too busy taping his Champions Wildcard episode, however he was positively available to share within the enjoyable with followers after his victory on Thursday’s (January 16) episode.
DeSena, a growth engineer from North Carolina, competed within the fourth evening of the wildcard video games alongside North Carolina lawyer Eamonn Campbell and Washington-based software program engineer Mehal Shah.
He and Shah made it one thing of a horse race all through your entire recreation. Within the first spherical, he earned $6,200 to Shah’s $6,600 (and Campbell’s $2,800) — thanks, partly, to him wagering all he may, $1,000, on the Each day Double when he discovered it immediately. (He accurately guessed that Galileo was the one who instructed a papal tribunal in 1633, “I abjure, curse & detest the aforesaid errors.”)
Then, within the Double Jeopardy! spherical, he and Shah had been each aggressive with their Each day Double wagers, and it paid off for every. First, Shah doubled his $7,800 by accurately guessing that Huntsville was the Alabama metropolis with the memorabilia-stacked house and rocket middle. Then, DeSena netted $11,000 by remembering that the Pope’s public recommendation for the 2024 U.S. presidential election was to select the lesser of two evils.
Heading into Last Jeopardy, Joey DeSena had $24,000, whereas Mehal Shah had $19,600 and Eamonn Campbell had $9,600.
Surprisingly, the final clue proved to be a triple stumper, the place they had been all three on the identical web page. Within the class “Timber,” all three contestants thought laurel was the reply to, “Order Arecales, this tree will get its title from Roman instances; a leaf from one was positioned in a victor’s arms after a contest was received.” It didn’t matter, although, thanks to every of their wagers. Campbell misplaced all of it, whereas each DeSena and Shah wagered nothing, which implies regardless of if all of them received it proper, the order wouldn’t have modified.
In the long run, it was DeSena who punched his personal ticket to the semi-finals by incomes $24,000, with Shah simply behind him at $19,600 and Campbell at $0.
On Reddit, DeSena addressed a number of points associated to the episode. He first wrote that his colleagues within the recreation had been “super opponents (and extra importantly, nice folks)” who he loved enjoying Contact with and watching The Princess Bride throughout their shared sequestration.
He additionally revealed that he was unaware of Shah’s prior declare to fame — that’s, boasting the document for the very best Each day Double wager of the season — including, “I’m tremendous glad I didn’t.” In line with DeSena, it was Shah’s boldness in his personal wagering that prompted him to do the identical. “I don’t know why I wager a lot on that Each day Double in Double Jeopardy — however hopefully it made for good TV. I feel Mehal’s huge wager proper earlier than that received me spooked, as was probably his goal.”
DeSena additionally revealed that even Ken Jennings was stumped (pardon the plain pun there) by the Last Jeopardy clue and that the “Lorelai” he was giving a shoutout to in his Last Jeopardy reply was his four-month-old daughter “in order that she may see it years sooner or later and smile.” D’aw.
Maybe essentially the most touching little bit of DeSena’s checklist of post-game tidbits was this one: “Bonus tidbit about my ‘piece of aptitude’: the Navy pin I wore throughout this recreation belonged to my father. He died nearly precisely 10 years in the past. Sadly, we had been by no means notably shut, however did bond anytime we watched Jeopardy collectively. He was at all times so proud after I answered a clue accurately as a child, and inspired me to by no means cease studying – this was my little means of paying tribute to him on the Alex Trebek Stage. I made it, Dad.” What a narrative!
Elsewhere within the Reddit thread, followers critiqued the sport in some very intriguing methods.
One individual, for instance, slammed the present for “randomly placing tremendous straightforward clues within the $2000 spots … ‘Accelerates a chemical response’ = catalyst final week and now ‘inclination of a line in math’ = slope.”
One other consumer took main concern with the framing of the Last Jeopardy clue, writing, “As an ecologist, I’m actually irritated by FJ. Palm timber aren’t in reality timber, making an already-difficult query nearly unimaginable. The quiet reference to arms was the one hyperlink to the precise reply and that’s very weak imho.”
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