Jeopardy! Host Ken Jennings Tells Chris Wallace One of His Rivals Will Spend The Afterlife in Satan’s Eternal Torment
Jeopardy! host Ken Jennings told CNN anchor Chris Wallace that his onscreen rival James Holzhauer will spend all eternity in the company of Satan’s minions — but in a lighthearted way.
Wallace interviewed Jennings for this week’s edition of his Max series Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace — now available exclusively on Max, and no longer airing a weekly highlights version on CNN.
In one exchange, Wallace asked about the “edge” he detected in the onscreen relationship between Jennings and fellow super-champ Holzhauer:
WALLACE: Am I crazy or is there a bit of an edge in your rivalry with James Holzhauer or Jeopardy James? It seems like there’s a little bit of an edge there.
JENNINGS: The thing you have to understand about James is he decided at one point in preparing for the show that Jeopardy needed a villain, I think. He’s a pro wrestling fan. And he understands that it makes a game exciting when the audience has a rooting interest. And he puts on this persona as an over the top larger than life villain. I think in real life we get along great. Um, so for TV, we are mortal Jeopardy enemies, and he likes playing that up.
WALLACE: Okay, what is your strategy on betting on Daily Doubles and Final Jeopardy?
JENNINGS: This is the thing that James Holzhauer really changed about the game you know, he brought a sports gambler sense of analytics. He had run the numbers and realized that Daily Doubles historically have like a very high completion percentage like 80% conversion on Daily Doubles. Whereas Final Jeopardy is much harder, 50%. So what you want to do is get your chips on the table for those Daily Doubles, find them at all costs and make big wagers then, so the game is put away later.
WALLACE: One thing I never understand about the Daily Double is somebody is behind. And now it’s the Daily Double and they could take the lead and they don’t take the lead they don’t bet and it always strikes me that you got to go into Final Jeopardy in the lead because if, if you don’t know the answer, you’re probably gonna lose anyway. But if you do know the answer with the lead, (you can’t lose) you can’t lose.
JENNINGS: In general, I think you’re right. People bet too conservatively, particularly on Daily Doubles and I think it’s because they’re not used to that sum of money. You have to ignore the amount of money, this is house money right now. These are numbers on a board, you got to do the mathematically correct thing. And not what feels like a safe financial decision.
Later in the interview, during a discussion about Jennings’s book “100 Places to See After You Die Or A travel guide to the Afterlife,” the subject of Holzhauer’s Final Destination came up and Jennings kept up the act:
WALLACE: Very good. So I have to ask you, not to get too heavy. What do you think happens?
JENNINGS: You know, I’m ready for anything. Obviously, there’s no evidence for any of these afterlives, and the most likely answer is probably nothing at all. But as an optimist, and I guess, especially as a writer, that seems like such a disappointing ending to the story // and personally, I would like to see answers. My personal dream afterlife is one where you get to ask the universe, anything, you know? ‘What did happen to Amelia Earhart? Why did the dinosaurs go extinct? Which, what girls in seventh grade actually liked me and I never got up the nerve to find out?’ You know, all the things in your life you never get to know.
WALLACE: Sort of, eternal Jeopardy and hopefully not James Holzhauer there to do it. Finally…
JENNINGS: No James is in the other place for sure.
WALLACE: He’s down below huh, with the pitchforks and oh, that’s not good.
JENNINGS: That’s right.
Watch above via Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace.
