8 Secrets to Winning on Jeopardy
Figure out which grip works best for you, but stay relaxed. This player looks as though she's ready to strangle the buzzer.
1. It’s All in the Thumb, or Index Finger, or …
Knowing the answer outright or being able to figure it out quickly are important, of course, but perhaps the most important skill is mastering the buzzer. You can know every single fact in the universe, but if you mis-time ringing in, it does you no good.
You cannot press the buzzer until Alex finishes reading the clue. Too early and you’re locked out for a quarter second—an eternity in Jeopardy time. Too late and someone else will beat you to it. During a pre-taping practice session, we were advised to wait for the last syllable of the last word to start ringing in. I don’t know if that actually works timing-wise, but it is good advice to keep you from hitting the button when you actually have the answer—sometimes only midway through Alex’s reading of the clue.
Some people never get it. They’re the ones you see repeatedly—and often futilely—pressing the buzzer multiple times. Or else they’re the apparent wallflowers who seemingly don’t know the answers but really just can’t press the buzzer at the correct moment. Getting the timing down is crucial. Once you get the hang of it, you can approach a Zen-like state where your timing is second nature and all you have to think about is solving the clue.
That, by the way, is why I wish the Jeopardy producers would go back to limiting repeat winners to five games only, as they did until 2003. Yes, I understand the excitement (and potential ratings draw) of a champion on a long streak, but it’s really unfair to so many contestants to put them up against someone who has mastered a key skill of the game—timing the buzzer.
Based on all this, do you think you have what it takes to be a Jeopardy champ? Coming up, I’ll reveal secrets behind the game and what to expect as you try out.
Wish you’d published this a few months ago! I’m currently waiting/hoping for a phone call (maybe as early as this week) following my audition in Philly in late March…
Good luck!
OK but tell me they don’t give you a practice round or six in many of the same categories you see on the show.
Josh,
You do get practice before taping starts, but the categories in the practice rounds are not the same as any of the “live” categories.
Been there and done that – one-day champion, 20 Jan 2012.
Jeopardy is a daily must in my grandparents’ home. I watch 2-3 per week with them. I saw the Lord’s Supper one – and I got it wrong because of “Acts” (and looked it up afterward). I didn’t get to see the next day, so I didn’t know if they mentioned the wrong clue or not. But I KNEW it was screwy!!! Thanks for the affirmation!
I should have tried out for the college one – I knew enough extra crap as compared to my peers then. Now, I’m more average… sigh.
Actually, they corrected the answer (and gave the champ the additional money) in a short correction taped later and added to the same show the mistake occured on. The Acts reference was to an “upper room” but, obviously not the one of the Last Supper.
In my experience, it would have been better to have been able to sleep the night before!
I recall an experimental category that the producers/writers tried, and what an abysmal failure it was: Stupid Answers.
They would provide an answer, and there were many correct questions, and typically 1 incorrect question. As an example:
“Air France is NOT the official airline of this country.”
The correct question could be ANY country but France. The poor contestants were buzzing in and providing the 1 incorrect question. After watching their brains almost lock up trying to figure out the new pattern, Stupid Answers was retired after only 1 live tryout.
Marco
Actually, I’ve seen them use “Stupid Answers” several times. You’re right, though: it confuses the hell out of the players.
“8 Secrets to Winning on Jeopardy?”
Simply make sure you’re playing against Wolf Blitzer, Chris Matthews, or Soledad O’Brien.
Excellent comment, truly a winning strategy.
Tom -
I’d love to know what you think would be an appropriate percentage range of correct answers on the practice test for you to recommend trying out? Limiting myself to 5 seconds per question, I got 46 out of 50, which doesn’t seem too shabby, but that’s with no living competitors, so I figure more in the 96-98% range would probably be necessary for a successful run on the show.
35 correct of 50 questions is the cutoff – or, it was in the spring of 1989, when I tried out for the show.
Answering the questions is only part of the audition. They also pick based on
p.c. conditions. They need a certain number of women, asians, blacks, weirdos, etc….. I aced every test given, made the last cut of the tryout (in Chicago, at the downtown Marriott) and got the “dear contestant” notice. Same thing happened for Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
I can just hear the producers discussing who to pick. Do you really want a 50 year old white guy who lives in a really expensive zip code?
Mr. LeMans
In our case, (a USO show in the Philippines) they took everybody who passed the test and ran us through a “demo show”. The test checks for your knowledge; the demo is a gauge of your enthusiasm and showmanship. You can be a genius, but if you’re as stiff as a board during the demo, you won’t be selected.
Maybe they don’t want people with bad attitudes. Just sayin’ …
What is “who gives a crap?”
That is correct.
ANSWER: This stuff on PJM
QUESTION: What is “out of place”?
Before my friend was set to appear on Jeopardy!, we held a mock game and used retractable ballpoint pens as buzzer analogs. First audible “click” after the question got to answer.
The big surprise for me (http://www.j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=496) was that there is a lighted rim around the board; the light goes out when Alex finishes the answer. If you press the button before the light goes out, you’re locked out for what SEEMED like forever. You as the viewer never see the lighted border around the board.
And EVERYTHING depends on the categories! My opponents had categories that favored them; I _stunk_ at those categories. But it was still fun!
There are still a few books out there that offer help from past champs. I used them to prepare for my 3-day stint on the show in 1994. But like Tom, I studied a lot of stuff (state facts, presidential facts) that never showed up on the board. I’m a professional musician, and in three days, there was only ONE music-related question. But I got a big-money question right because of a picture I had seen in a book a week or two before the taping.
The first two days, nobody got the final question right. The third day, one guy got it right and won. Seven years later, I was on MILLIONAIRE (and won $64K). Within a month, the guy who beat me on Jeopardy! was on with Regis and won $2 million. Grrr.
Thanks for the advice. Maybe someday I’ll get to use it.
I went through the selection process twice.. once here in Honolulu.. and once in LA
Both times I made it through to the end.. got to shake Alex’s hand..and was told the usual.. “Don’t call us… we’ll call you.”
Nobody ever called.. really don’t know why.
Hey, I used to live in the LA area and tried out every year after the syndicated version with Alex Trebeck came out. Made the final cut every time. On the sixth year I finally got the call. Keep trying – it can happen.