JEOPARDY! Endgame
March 24th, 2009
Larissa Kelly played an excellent game in the finale of the Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions, but at the end she lost to Dan Pawson, who played an even better game. Larissa has had a couple of months to get over her disappointment, but for her fans the loss still stings.
Every so often somebody appears out of nowhere and catches the public’s fancy. One example is Joe the would-be plumber, who turned out to be a fake in the first degree. Another example — a smaller and quieter one, who is no fake — is Larissa Kelly. A genuine American Sweetheart, Larissa is instantly likable, charming and disarming, and she’s somebody who most people just naturally want to root for. Larissa is the ultimate girl you want to bring home to meet your mother.
Congratulations to Dan Pawson for his victory, and congratulations once again to Larissa Kelly, whose place in Jeopardy! history is assured. Thank you, Larissa, for the inspiration of setting such high standards for yourself, and for meeting them. You’re obviously headed for further success, but everybody needs a little luck too, so best of luck to you, Larissa.
I live near Boston, and since Dan and Larissa are both from the Boston area, in this video of the deciding game in the tournament I’ve left in a commercial for Massachusetts tourism.
Filed under: All Posts, Larissa Kelly
7 Comments Add your own
1. amurel | March 25th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Sorry, but I REALLY don’t get the Larissa love. Obviously she’s very, very bright. No problem there. But my husband, 22-year-old daughter and I all found her thoroughly annoying — my husband wouldn’t even watch the final games because she was on. We couldn’t stand the way she shook her signaling button as though she wanted to strangle it. We all thought her smile seemed utterly fake.
Larissa looked “sad”? Larissa looked like a bratty kindergartner! Let’s hope her graciousness and maturity catch up with her intellect. She’ll have a much better chance of being TRULY successful in life. And the way she stood with Alex, Dan and Aaron at the end, with her arms folded and her head down like a sulky five-year-old? Please!
2. DOuG pRATt | March 25th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Perhaps it’s a matter of personal background. Larissa has written a science fiction story that’s available online. I attended my first Sci-Fi (or SF or, now, SyFy) convention when I was fifteen. There’s a certain personality type that connects with this sort of thing.
For lack of a more widely accepted term, I’ll label Larissa a nerd. Larissa’s mannerisms are familiar to me.
Larissa is headed for a career in academia. That’s where the very, very bright part comes in. The characteristics that you consider to be annoying may perhaps not make Larissa ideally suited for a career in business, but she’s an excellent match for an intellectual setting, in which she will undoubtedly be outstanding.
3. amurel | March 25th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
I’m not at all unfamiliar with nerds, geeks or wonks. I understand that Larissa may have personality best suited to academia. But none of that excuses the fact that, especially at the very end, her demeanor was just plain rude.
4. DOuG pRATt | March 25th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
I’m trying to see why you feel that way, but my perception is entirely different. I feel that Larissa holds herself to a high standard, was devastated by what she felt was a stupid mistake, and she was simply replaying the scene back in her mind. It’s what I would have done.
But I am admittedly prejudiced in Larissa’s favor, due in part to the fact that Larissa keeps setting new records for activity on my web log. These were the March traffic numbers as of a few minutes ago:
Unique visitors – 9006
Total hits – 206483
Bandwidth – 73.79 GB
5. Patrick | March 25th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
I agree with Doug entirely… but I just don’t understand how someone can say the buzzer handling was annoying. She wasn’t this extremely competitive during the regular season- you just have to remember this is the championship of championships for Jeopardy! If for some reason when you rang that buzzer and you weren’t called, in such an esteemed event, I wager you’d be a little excited too and do your damnest to get called. When it looked like she was trying hard to get rung in, I thought maybe something wrong with the system itself- but in some occasions Dan or Aaron just rung in faster- if they got the question incorrect, then Larissa was right on top of it.
Sorry, but if we continue talking about her mannerisms, which is ridiculous, then I feel it’s only fair to bring up Aaron- whose reaction when someone else is buzzed in, whether he thinks its harmless or not, is in fact rude. He stated, “I just want to see who buzzed in” – dude? There’s only two people other than yourself, especially when you’re in between them, you can’t tell your left from your right? Nevertheless, his reaction is unsportsmanlike. Larissa’s behavior doesn’t compare to Aaron’s, the latter which is after the fact and unnecessary- the former which is an intention to get rung in first and simply a result of a very competitive person- nothing wrong with that.
You have to understand too, she probably knew before and during the game that while Dan is very bright, he’s also *extremely* fast on the buzzer and is reported by Alex as being the faster of the three when he knows the question. It appeared to me that she had trouble getting rung in on time or rung first. I would also wager that when the system detects that two people rang in *exactly* at the same time, then the system doesn’t pick someone- but waits *again* until they buzz in again- which is why we see them repeatedly buzzing in. Therefore, I think people’s reaction to Larissa is illogical and unwarranted, considering too many variables.
6. DOuG pRATt | March 26th, 2009 at 10:57 pm
What I wonder is how often are the buzzer buttons tested and replaced? The testing should ensure they all operate identically. Are they built on some sort of military grade switch? How many actions are they rated to handle before failing?
7. Dan Pawson, CMC ‘03&hellip | March 28th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
[...] can watch the surprisingly addictive episodes here (part 1, part 2); highlights include a $22 double jeopardy and two decisive final rounds. If you’re really [...]
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