A Jeopardy! winner took to Reddit to express sympathy for his opponent, revealing the ‘deeply unfortunate’ mistake that saw her plummet to last place on the show, ending her run with a negative sum of money after a series of incorrect answers.
But while many contestants on the show are often lambasted for their poor performances, recent champion Nam Nguyen spoke out to defend one of his challengers, revealing that she was at a grave ‘disadvantage’ because she had left her glasses backstage.
Nam, a playwright from Ontario, came out on top in the Jeopardy! episode that aired on Monday, April 22, beating reigning champ Marko Saric, as well as challenger Elly Trickett.
The first-time player took home $26,999 – even after getting the Final Jeopardy! answer wrong.
Nam Nguyen, a playwright from Ontario, took to Reddit to point out that his opponent, blog and podcast editor Elly Trickett, had been at a disadvantage prior to taking the stage
Elly had forgotten to put her glasses on for the first part of the game – and ultimately wound up $800 in the hole, which also disqualified her to play Final Jeopardy!
He’d luckily only bet a fraction of his winnings going into that last round, which let him easily beat the second-place finisher Marko Saric.
Math professor Marko had also gotten the final answer wrong, but bet most of his nearly $15,000 score, and wound up with a mere $1,199.
Meanwhile, in third-place was Connecticut-based blog and podcast editor Elly, who was ineligible for Final Jeopardy! after winding up in the red, with -$800, after the previous round.
But, as Nam explained, Elly’s performance had been thrown off by a simple mistake prior to the game.
‘Elly forgot to put on her glasses due to stress at the top of the game, which was a deeply unfortunate disadvantage for her that I was really sad to learn about at the break,’ he wrote on a Reddit thread recapping the match.
He later noted that she’d put them back on by the end of the game after ‘said break,’ but only after she’d slipped into the red.
At one point early on in the game, Elly was up to $1,000.
But a series of wrong answers saw her score plummet.
One prompt, under the category Booked in Books, read: ‘In this nonfiction book, Helen Prejean writes to “Elmo Patrick Sonnier … Death row, Louisiana State Penitentiary.”‘
To this, Elly answered: ‘What is The Green Mile?’
Nam claimed he was ‘really sad to learn about’ Elly’s oversight of forgetting her glasses
The Green Mile is in fact a work of fiction by Steven King.
The correct answer, which Marko got right, was 1993’s Dead Man Walking, a book penned by Roman Catholic nun Sister Helen Prejean that argued against the death penalty after she’d come to know death-row inmate Elmo Patrick Sonnier through an outreach program.
Another prompt asked the contestants to name the city artist Diego Rivera’s ‘industry murals’ are on view in, dropping the hint that the local museum is abbreviated as the DIA.
Elly buzzed in to guess Dallas; in fact, it was Detroit, with Marko getting it right again.
The Final Jeopardy! question, which Elly wasn’t allowed to take a stab at due to her negative score, put forth the category of: ’20th CENTURY AUTHORS.’
The prompt read: ‘Best known for a novel, she wrote at least 6 full-length plays & collaborated with Moms Mabley on a 1931 Broadway revue.
The correct answer was Zora Neal Hurston, famed as the author of 1937’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.
Marko had guessed Sylvia Plath (though he gave a defeated shrug as his answer was revealed, seemingly aware he was wrong); Nam had wagered $1,201, and put down Lorraine Hansberry.
Monday night’s game was far from the only wrong-answer drama that Jeopardy! has seen.
Last summer, one contestant drew ire after guessing Napoleon in response to a Final Jeopardy prompt that specified the category as ‘government official.’