Here’s today’s Final Jeopardy (in the category Historic Geography) for Thursday, May 26, 2022 (Season 38, Game 184):
A 1946 speech declared the terminuses of the Iron Curtain to be port cities serving these 2 seas
(correct response beneath the contestants)
Today’s contestants:
John Seroff, a performing arts publicist from Brooklyn, New York
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Tory Waltrip, a senior account manager from Seattle, Washington
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Ryan Long, a rideshare driver from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (9-day total: $173,301)
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Andy’s Pregame Thoughts: Philadelphian Ryan Long is now at nine victories! Players are 13-3 in the past going for win #10; will Ryan become the 14th player to win at least 10 games? Both Tory and John will want to stop him.
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(Content continues below)
Correct response: What are the Baltic and the Adriatic?
More information about Final Jeopardy: (The following write-up is original content and is copyright 2022 The Jeopardy! Fan. It may not be copied without linked attribution back to this page.)
“From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.” That is the quote from Winston Churchill’s famous 1946 speech that took place at Westminster College in Fulton, MO, when he spoke about the rise of the Russian sphere of influence; in fact, many Russian historians date the start of the Cold War to this speech. The International Churchill Society has the full text of the speech, also known as “The Sinews of Peace”.
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Game Recap:
Jeopardy! Round categories: The United Nations; That’s My Boy!; Let’s County Up That State; Aviators; The Silent Consonant In…; Sneakers with Jacques Slade
When the category says “The Silent Consonant is…”, you need to response with a single consonant. Unfortunately, Ryan took a couple of incorrect responses in that category—giving the full word—before he remembered that. He was still very dominant on the signalling device, though, and held a lead at the first break, despite those incorrect responses. The incorrect responses continued after the break, including on the Daily Double for Ryan, who sat third after Single Jeopardy and got to pick first in Double.
Double Jeopardy! Round categories: Historia Española; Allusions of Grandeur; Numerical Book Titles; Movie Co-Stars; Big Animals; Ends in “Ette”
The “Game Dynamics” graph over on J! Archive is certainly going to be interesting today! Incorrect responses continued to be the story of the day, with Ryan’s total reaching seven by the end of Double Jeopardy. (12 Triple Stumpers, 13 incorrect responses, and the Jacques Slade category being all-video certainly contributed to the three unplayed clues today. Still not Mayim’s fault.) However, Ryan did run MOVIE CO-STARS for a crucial $6,000. Meanwhile, John got to play the last Daily Double, and his bet for the lead was a good idea. Unfortunately, John got the clue incorrect and dropped out of contention. Meanwhile, Tory got the last clue before the end-of-round signal incorrect, leading to Ryan having a runaway after Double Jeopardy, with scores going into Final being Ryan at just $10,000, Tory at $4,600, and John at $3,000.
A difficult Final Jeopardy today saw a Triple Stumper; Ryan stood pat again in Final and is now a 10-day champion with winnings of $183,301, becoming the 14th player in Jeopardy! history to reach double digits. He’ll go for win #11 tomorrow!
Looking to find out who won Jeopardy! today? Here’s the Thursday, May 26, 2022 Jeopardy! by the numbers:
Scores going into Final:
Ryan $10,000
Tory $4,600
John $3,000
Tonight’s results:
John $3,000 – $0 = $3,000 (What is Greenbrier + Tennessee)
Tory $4,600 – $2,000 = $2,600 (What are the Black Adriatic & Caspian Seas?)
Ryan $10,000 – $0 = $10,000 (What are North + Baltic?) (10-day total: $183,301)
Scores after the Jeopardy! Round:
John $3,000
Tory $2,600
Ryan $1,600
Opening break taken after: 14 clues
Daily Double locations:
1) THE UNITED NATIONS $600 (clue #19)
Ryan 3600 -1000 (Tory 2000 John 2000)
2) NUMERICAL BOOK TITLES $2000 (clue #13)
Ryan 12000 -2000 (Tory 2600 John 5400)
3) ALLUSIONS OF GRANDEUR $1600 (clue #22, $8400 left on board)
John 6600 -4000 (Ryan 9200 Tory 5400)
Overall Daily Double Efficiency for this game: -105
Unplayed clues:
J! Round: LET’S COUNTY UP THAT STATE $800
DJ! Round: HISTORIA ESPAÑOLA $400 ENDS IN “ETTE” $400
Total Left On Board: $1,600
Number of clues left unrevealed this season: 78 (0.42 per episode average), 0 Daily Doubles
Game Stats:
Ryan $13,000 Coryat, 22 correct, 7 incorrect, 48.15% in first on buzzer (26/54), 1/1 on rebound attempts (on 3 rebound opportunities)
John $7,000 Coryat, 13 correct, 4 incorrect, 25.93% in first on buzzer (14/54), 0/2 on rebound attempts (on 7 rebound opportunities)
Tory $4,600 Coryat, 7 correct, 2 incorrect, 14.81% in first on buzzer (8/54), 1/1 on rebound attempts (on 6 rebound opportunities)
Combined Coryat Score: $24,600
Lach Trash: $15,200 (on 12 Triple Stumpers)
Coryat lost to incorrect responses (less double-correct responses): $12,600
Ryan Long, career statistics:
240 correct, 40 incorrect
9/12 on rebound attempts (on 34 rebound opportunities)
43.44% in first on buzzer (245/564)
7/13 on Daily Doubles (Net Earned: $14,000)
6/10 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $16,240
Tory Waltrip, career statistics:
7 correct, 3 incorrect
1/1 on rebound attempts (on 6 rebound opportunities)
14.81% in first on buzzer (8/54)
0/0 on Daily Doubles
0/1 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $4,600
John Seroff, career statistics:
13 correct, 5 incorrect
0/2 on rebound attempts (on 7 rebound opportunities)
25.93% in first on buzzer (14/54)
0/1 on Daily Doubles (Net Earned: -$4,000)
0/1 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $7,000
Ryan Long, to win:
11 games: 57.321%
12: 32.856%
13: 18.834%
14: 10.795%
15: 6.188%
Avg. streak: 11.343 games.
Today’s interviews:
John was invited to the Sesame Street set by Big Bird and Oscar.
Tory almost got kicked out of a Celine Dion concert for singing too loud.
Ryan once ate escargot in Montreal.
Andy’s Thoughts:
- I am still not aware of any game where all three players bet $0 in Final Jeopardy. It’ll happen eventually. (Yes, I’m slightly disappointed.)
- $183,301 is now 22nd all-time in terms of regular-play winnings on the show.
- Link to the box score: May 26, 2022 Box Score
Final Jeopardy! betting suggestions:
(Scores: Ryan $10,000 Tory $4,600 John $3,000)
Ryan: Bet between $0 and $799 and enjoy win #10! (Actual bet: $0)
Tory: Standard cover bet over John is $1,401. Whatever you do, you should probably limit your bet to $1,599, so as to make sure John has to get Final correct to beat you for second place. (Actual bet: $2,000)
John: If Tory bets to cover you, she falls to $3,199. You need to bet at least $200. (Actual bet: $0)
Contestant photo credit: jeopardy.com
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Hmm… Do they still teach that? The Cold War was still going on when I was in school, so we got to listen to the Iron Curtain speech.
Current FJ streak: 3W
There’s now a museum there in Fulton commemorating this. Most folks don’t know the speech was there so driving on 70 across Missouri, I’ve had some confused questions from fellow passengers when they see the billboard and ask why the museum is there.
Winston Churchill was so prolific one could do a “fantasy” Jeopardy! show just about his life and his famous quotes and speeches
Keep up the good work Andy! Really liking the Final Jeopardy betting suggestions you added… I pay far more attention to them now than I did previously, especially in close non-runaway games.
Keep up the good work Andy!
Poor Ryan has obviously run dry on anecdote material. (I remember Amy saying her first or second thought, after losing, was, “Thank heaven I don’t have to come up with any more anecdotes.”)
I agree that the betting analysis is a wonderful addition Andy’s made to the site. I also really appreciate the anecdote synopses. I’ve always FFed right through them (unless I really liked the champion), but now that I know what the players are going to say, I can stop and listen to the ones that pique my interest.
I learned about the cold war in school and from playing red alert on my computer which dealt with the Adriatic snd baltic sea plus the iron curtain. Still Churchill should have made this a dead giveaway too.
Except that Churchill wasn’t part of the clue. Unless the contestants could have read Andy’s additional information about Final Jeopardy weeks ago when the episode was recorded, how would they have gotten that “dead giveaway”?
You are absolutely right. If the clue had actually said the ports (or maybe just the Baltic and the Adriatic) with the response to be who said it, I would have GUESSED Churchill, but [for the actual presentation of this clue] even if someone remembered that Churchill was who said it, they might not remember the port cities or the seas. Actually, for a lot of people, including me, it would not have helped had the clue attributed the statement to Churchill in Fulton, MO. [I minored in History in college and I swear I never heard or read about this, but that does not surprise me as that would have been about 25 years later and I bet OUR textbooks were that out-of-date. Giving the college the benefit of the doubt, it might have been covered in a course I would have had if I had MAJORED in history. But maybe our professors were jealous of Westminster College (in a next-door state) 😉]
Another boomer here for whom the answer was instant. However, I’m VERY glad the clue asked for the names of the seas and not the port cities themselves.
And I echo the appreciation for Andy’s expansions into game recap and analysis plus the discussion of wagering strategies. Each expansion adds to Andy’s workload, but also adds much to the enjoyment of the site.
And that’s a good thing, since we’d have gotten bogged down in Szczecin vs Stettin pedantry.
or the silent consonants in the names of those port cities…
Good one!
Did John explain what message he was sending with “What is Greenbrier + Tennessee”?
Yes, he said that it is his hometown.
Thanks, Eric, I assumed that, but it could have been where a friend of his lives or something. I particularly wondered because I have several slight ties to there myself.
Really wouldn’t hurt to give an explicit instruction that the response should be a single letter in the “The Silent Consonant in…” category, imo.
Also, isn’t “Jordans” in place of “Air Jordans” a common enough usage that John should’ve at least got a prompt to be more specific?
I agree with your first statement, but think it at least should have been explained after completion of the first misunderstood clue. [What I mean by “completion”, was NOT between the first wrong response and anyone else trying it, but before allowing anyone to pick another clue, or at least as soon as someone else picked one from that column but before it is revealed.]
I feel like I don’t know enough about such shoes to strongly opine on that one, but my inclination is to agree with you.
She did say the question was “What is ‘N’? That’s the silent letter in hymn.”
That was said after the first attempt at the category, the second attempt was Ryan guessing numb with Tory following up correctly with B and Mayim explaining (again) that they were looking for the silent letter.
it seems like they always explain what it means when a letter is in quotes in the category header. so they should also explain what they’re looking for in categories like this one. (even if the explanation is edited out of the TV broadcast due to time, so at least the contestants know the format for responses in that category).
But on the other hand, not explaining it encourages them to play the game in the intended fashion of starting at the top of the board and working down.
That’s an interesting FJ question, though on the difficult side.
I think it is wonderful that Ryan is doing so well in Jeopardy. He seems like a down to earth person. I hope he continues to win.