Let's say you're on 'Jeopardy!' and you're absolutely routing your two opponents. You have $40,000 going into the final round, while one of your opponents has, let's say, $15,000. You're guaranteed to move onto the next day, but the final category comes up and it has something to do with baseball, which is your favorite sport. How much — if anything — do you risk?It's at this point where most people usually tell me that they'd risk just enough to ensure that they would win even if they got the question wrong.
And it's at this point that my response to those people is always the same: "You'd be crazy to leave free money on the table. I'd bet the whole thing."
The person then responds by calling me an idiot while I try to back up my reasoning.
To help you out, the link includes the last ten baseball-specific Final Jeopardy! questions, which just served to convince me that I should play this one conservatively -- because if you can't go 10/10 on them it's not worth the risk.
I got eight out of ten, which was far worse than I thought I'd do. If it were my first day, and I thought I was lucky to get to $40k, then it might make sense to bet it all at 80% odds (expected value=$64,000 vs. expected value $46,000 from conservative strategy). But if my expected value for the next day, and the next day after that, etc., added up to more than $18,000 -- which I'm arrogant enough to think it might -- then it's a fool's errand to bet it all. Especially since the baseball questions got far harder in recent years.
ReplyDeleteOf course, as a white male Jewish lawyer from Washington, DC, I have no chance of ever getting on the show.
Also: very nice Fed Jur baseball joke FTW. I miss David Currie.
ReplyDelete9/10. Had no idea on #1.
ReplyDeleteI got 7/10 and think that if I'd taken the time to think about it, I'd have gotten two of the other three. So: three were easy to me and would have been guaranteed winners for me, two were maybes depending on whether I was feeling comfortable out there or not, and one (#1) I would not have gotten. I say: take the win and live to play another day. The winner has a good chance of winning the next day, because s/he is already warmed up, comfortable, and confident.
ReplyDeleteI likewise had no idea on #1. I got the rest, but the Alleghenies one definitely took me longer than 30 seconds.
ReplyDeleteBut, if you respond correctly, you get to play again the next day, regardless of how much you bet. So, you're actually looking at $64k plus 80% of your expectation from future shows. The difference between going for broke and playing to stay alive is then ($18k - 20% of future winnings). In other words, you have to think you'll make at least $90,000 on future shows to justify playing conservatively.
ReplyDeleteThat number goes down pretty quickly if you're less sure, but if you're 80% sure you'll know the question, I can see the argument to go for it.
I got 9 out of 10, but I'm not sure how I'd have possibly known the first one.
ReplyDeleteI also got 7/10, missing both Braves questions. Given that you did well enough to win once, plus the advantage of buzzer timing, you've got a 50% expected return on the next day, and probably 20% of 2+ more days. That's a lot of future earnings you are risking, so I determined that you better be 95% sure of the catagory. So when my wife was going to be on Jeopardy we talked about this situation and agreed the only catagory for her to risk it all was "American Civil War". In retrospect though, I'm not sure there is any catagory that is really a 95% case, sometimes they only barely graze the topic.
ReplyDeleteApparently, I know nothing about baseball unless it's the 1986 Red Sox.
ReplyDeleteOk, until I clicked thru on this story, I had no idea that such a thing as the j-archive existed. I guess I won't be needing any other distractions for the next few weeks... (And, for the record, I got 8/10 of the baseball questions, including #1, only because I actually saw that episode.)
ReplyDeleteI did get all 10 right (although whether I could have gotten #3 out in time is a good question.) But I do know a ridiculous amount of baseball info.
ReplyDeleteTo answer the hypothetical, if it was my first day, I almost certainly would not. But if I've already got some money in the bank, on baseball I might.
Well, this link provided the answer to your previous question, what are we doing to while away the time during the Snopocalypse. My son and I (mostly him) just spent over an hour reading baseball questions from the J! archive. He got most of them (I got a bare few), but missed enough to convince him that risking it all is not a bright idea.
ReplyDelete6/10. Take the money and run. I might wager more on "American Presidents" or "State Capitals" or something like that.
ReplyDeleteSomewhat related:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.slate.com/id/86351/
This, of course, demonstrates the importance of being in the lead (and ideally a runaway lead) going into Final. Up until that point, Jeopardy! is a game about breadth of knowledge. If you're solid across the board with a few blind spots, you can do very well in the first two rounds. Heck, even if one or two categories fall into your blind spots, you still have a decent shot of having a solid game. Once you're in final, the game changes to depth in what can be a pretty narrow category, and if you hit a blind spot there, you're screwed.
ReplyDeleteSee also Millionaire, where if you hit a blind spot question, you can't move forward to higher levels (that's been changed a bit with the "switch the quesiton" lifeline, but not overall).
Of course, you could make your brain hurt by reading all the various "laws" and "rules" for wagering strategy listed here: http://www.j-archive.com/help.php#coryatscore/
ReplyDeleteWhen looking at Final Jeopardy wagering strategies, it seems to me that most of the time, the category will have very little influence on what you wager. It's only if there's a choice in strategy (like, say, you're in 2nd place and can EITHER go for the win if the leader gets FJ wrong OR you can protect 2nd and wager enough to prevent 3rd beating you if you get it wrong, but you don't have enough money to do both) that category might influence how you bet.
Well, I figured there might be "rules" for wagering already out there, but I blogged about it anyway. If you really are 80% sure you'll get the question, you'd be foolish to only bet $10k, but if you're less sure, the risk gets pretty big pretty fast.
ReplyDeleteI hit 7/10, but was disappointed there wasn't a Jim Rooker question after I chuckled at the headline.
ReplyDeleteI got seven of 10, which makes me think I'd get no more than six out of 10 if I actually had to deal with the pressure of answering the questions on camera. I had no idea on the first one and am embarrassed that I didn't figure out the second one. I'd never go for broke in that situation out of fear I'd end up like Cliff on Cheers.
ReplyDeleteI would ask Cliffy what he would do.
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J. Bowman is correct. I am ashamed.
ReplyDelete