Why Can’t Cable News Anchors Win On Jeopardy?

by Steve Krakauer | 1:16 pm, February 19th, 2010

» 9 comments

MSNBC host Chris Matthews appeared on last night’s episode of Jeopardy, and despite a valiant comeback, he fell short, losing to Charles Shaughnessy of Mad Men.

Add Matthews to the list of cable news anchors who can’t pull out a victory on the long-running quiz show.

Here’s how FishbowlDC described the performance:

For once, the chatty host was on the receiving end of rapid-fire answers. He apparently knows his President Obama trivia and his South American geography.

Matthews finished the first round with just $400 and was in third place, but worked his way back into contention with a strong Double Jeopardy. But he finished 2nd.

Last year two CNN anchors performed much worse: Wolf Blitzer and Soledad O’Brien finished in third place during their appearances. It got the New York Post to snarkily declare:

CNN should consider banning its anchors from appearing on “Celebrity Jeopardy” after the humiliating defeats of Wolf Blitzer and Soledad O’Brien.

Matthews did pretty well, but the journalism profession is in dire need of a Celebrity Jeopardy win over the Hollywood elite.

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Chris Matthews, CNN, Hardball, Jeopardy!, msnbc, Soledad O'Brien, Wolf Blitzer

timzank

“He apparently knows his President Obama trivia and his South American geography.” Wow, what a surprise. My guess is he knows where Obama’s birth marks are.
AikidoJoe

Because they aren’t as smart as they, and their rabid followers, think they are. Plain and simple.
Moderate

Glad to see him lose. He frequently infers that he is very intelligent and well read.
dhg

It goes to show you what happens when these people don’t have writers,researchers and staff to do all the work that makes them look good on air.

They are only really good at looking good on air,that’s why they have the jobs they have.It doesn’t really take much intelligence to be on camera and use other people’s work to look good.
writer

I’ve heard that when auditioning for the show, you have to have brains and personality. How did Chris slip through the cracks?
libra blue

Anderson won on Celebrity Jeopardy Power Players on May 11, 2004 against Maria Bartiromo and Kweisi Mfume. He supposedly taped an appearance on this season’s Celebrity Jeopardy.
sueNaustin

Have there been any Fox News anchors as participants in Celebrity Jeopardy?
Facebook User

hahahah-Is that a trick question? THEY READ TELEPROMPTERS. They are idiots who can’t do anything else.
writer

Maybe Chris lost because there was a question about Obama and he got distracted by the tingling down his leg.