Described here at ESPN.
We've been enjoying the fantastic James Holzhauer, and yesterday, he had a worthy competitor, Alan Levin. I'm glad James won, but it was great to watch Alan almost get him.
Over at WaPo, Charles Lane writes "Jeopardy!’s James Holzhauer is a menace":
... Holzhauer’s streak reflects the same grim, data-driven approach to competition that has spoiled (among other sports) baseball, where it has given us the “shift,” “wins above replacement,” “swing trajectories” and other statistically valid but unholy innovations.Lane's essay went up yesterday just after Levin made his thrilling challenge, but obviously was written before. Bad luck for Lane! Ha ha.
Like the number crunchers who now rule the national pastime, Holzhauer substitutes cold, calculating odds maximization for spontaneous play. His idea is to select, and respond correctly to, harder, big-dollar clues on the show’s 30-square gameboard first. Then, flush with cash, he searches the finite set of hiding places for the “Daily Double” clue, which permits players to set their own prize for a correct response — and makes a huge bet. Responding correctly, Holzhauer often builds an insurmountable lead before the show is half over.
Dazed and demoralized opponents offer weakening resistance as his winnings snowball....
[T]his professional gambler from Las Vegas does not so much play the game as beat the system. What’s entertaining about that? And beyond a certain point, what’s admirable?...Are you buying the baseball analogy? I like baseball well enough, but I have no opinion on whether the "grim, data-driven approach to competition... has spoiled... baseball." If it has, then is what Holzhauer is doing the same kind of grim spoilage? It seems to me that Holzhauer has plainly demonstrated a strategy to rack up much higher numbers, and it's exciting and available to other players. It requires taking a big risk early on, but you only get in a position to take that risk if you pick up a few of those $1000s in single Jeopardy and then hit the Daily Double. Yesterday, it didn't work because the show was wily enough to put the Daily Double at the $1000 level and it was the first square chosen. And Levin made some Jamesesque moves and nearly beat him. Is that like "data-driven" baseball?
Of course, Holzhauer’s strategy could not work without his freaky-good knowledge of trivia, just as baseball’s shift requires a pitcher skilled at inducing batters to hit into it. The old rules, though, would have contained his talent within humane channels....
If you enjoy watching nine batters in a row strike out until the 10th hits a homer, you’re going to love post-Holzhauer “Jeopardy!”
IN THE COMMENTS: rhhardin says:
Actual base running in Jeopardy would be good. A ball would come in somehow.I answer:
A model for a TV game show with a running component was "Name that Tune." They'd play a tune and the contestants had to name it, but instead of hitting buzzer to get the chance to give the right answer, you had to run across the stage and pull a cord.I found a full "Name that Tune" show on YouTube. You can see the contestants in ridiculous action here (scroll to 6:00 to see the actual running):
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Teams used a shift against Ted Williams. It’s not new.
Hitters need to adjust. The best ones do it.
Same with Jeopardy
Not just baseball - similar approaches also being taken with basketball and football. As McCullough said, the good players and coaches adjust. Which then leads to potential counter-adjustments.
The key to Holzhauer's success is getting the answers right. The rest of his strategy is details in comparison.
On baseball, I agree that data driven moneyball has been bad for the game. Baseball is at heart about pastoral romanticism. There's a lot more going on than hit and catch (one of the problems with televised baseball is the people producing it don't seem to understand the game and can't focus on the right things). Watching a scrappy team turn patience, hustle, and a couple singles into a run is far more exciting than watching two strike outs and a home run.
I haven't been watching, but it sounds like it would be nice to see someone model critical thinking and rational decisions to the point where watchers know it isn't just random-ass luck.
I don't remember anyone complaining during one of the kids Jeopardy tournaments when one young man kept making Daily Double bets that would result in his score ending in 69. Same sort of thing, just a different goal.
Data analysis hasn't "spoiled" baseball, but it is perverting it.
The cry of the stupid columnist: "You're doing it wrong."
How dare he think!
Our JV basketball coach was also the algebra/trig teacher.
He started the first practice telling us we had about 7 possesions per quarter, our success rested in what we did with each possession. Possessions that did not result in a good shot opportunity was a negative -1 on the score board. We did not understand what he was telling us. After 2 games he had stats using his scoring system, tied to the quarter by quarter score.
Big numbers are amazing, almost God like in their revelations.
The pitching in baseball overall has just gotten better. The average fastball is 6 mph more than 30 years ago and there is more movement on the ball. A lot more strikeouts. Also a lot more relief pitchers. Complete games are very rare these days.
But hitters can adjust and the best ones have.
"teams need to adjust" yeah, but the point is, what if the "adjustment" makes the game suck?
Like, the excitement of games is in the gameplay, not merely Scoring A Lot Of Points, and it's not like Jeopardy has teams that you can build a community around to create a secondary activity derived from the game itself. People go to Red Sox games for the experience of Being A Red Sox Fan, not because the game is exciting (they'd have to go to a Dodgers game for that, HA HA HA *ZING*). You just don't get that with a TV game show that has individuals as contestants who (mostly) don't return week after week.
Like, that's the thing--he's boring to watch. Same goddamn thing every time -- clear out the high-dollar clues, get a big Daily Double, everyone pretends they're doing something for the next 20 minutes of airtime and then that's it. Congratulations, dude, you broke Jeopardy. And there's no real strategy to beat him other than to do exactly what he does, only better; be faster on the buzzer and get more answers right.
I kind of think we're going to see a change where the contestants are required to go down the categories in order -- that is, you can't start with the top-dollar clue, you HAVE to start at $200 and work your way up. You can switch categories but you have to go with the lowest-amount question in that other category. Trebek already said he hates people jumping around the board so I imagine he'd be good with this change.
It is an interesting social phenomenon where some decry the concept of winning and the successful strategies to achieve it. We say we like a winner, but only to an extent. If someone becomes a dominating winner they become the target of those who would have some mythical equality in winning.
Take, for example, the New England Patriots. For every fan basking in their success, there is a disgruntled sports writer and followers who bemoan their approach.
I don't watch Jeopardy, although last week when I happened to watch I noted that no contestant knew the answer "What is Plebian" and for that I judged them all wanting.
Last week there was a young woman who would've won had the current champ not been there. Timing is everything.
Actuall base running in Jeopardy would be good. A ball would come in somehow.
Yah. He still needs the knowledge and the quick timing on the button. That's what I recall about Jeopardy! - it matters less if you know the question if you can't beat your opponents on the button.
Analytics destroyed the Steinbrenner model of winning. It hurts if your system is dumb. Sorry Jerry Jones...
The Belichick model of winning is extra fun, especially when your opponents have no idea how you're beating them.
calculating odds maximization
I get a boner when they talk dirty like that.
The way I see it this is all a distraction from the real question as to why the second and third place contestants don't get to keep their winnings.
After all, they call them "dollars", not points, all the way up and through Final Jeopardy!
Dollars, unlike points, cannot expire as worthless because of finishing place in a competition.
Why is this not fraud or theft?
The big fear I have is that Jeopardy will become politically correct. It has already been dumbed-down with too many television show-related questions.
John said...We say we like a winner, but only to an extent.
If all I care about is who won, then I'll check ESPN.com in the morning. If I watch the game, I want to see solid heads up play. I want some tension and excitement, I want athleticism.
The power moves are death to all that makes a sport worth watching. (This is why I hated the Williams sisters--tennis is one of the few sports that women do better than men and the Serena and Venus ruined it by bringing male-style power play into a graceful game.)
It's funny how every piece about Holzhauer always leads with "well he's a professional gambler."
It's like how everybody who marveled about Charles Van Doren's success in Twenty One (Quiz Show) always said, "well he's a college professor."
I know a few people who play trivia at a very serious competitive level. Any one of them could have cleaned Van Doren's clock, without the cheating. Whether it's Homeric oral poetry, a spelling bee, or Jeopardy, rapid recall of knowledge in a constrained system (every system is constrained some how) is something many humans are quite capable of.
Data-driven baseball allowed the Cubs to win the World Series.
Read "Moneyball."
Survivor was hyped as an exciting tv show about outdoor skills, survival in group settings, and action. Turns out, a fat naked gay guy gamed the system, and made the game into something else.
Ditto this. It's a trivia pursuit game.
And yes, baseball was more exciting in the days of small ball and passion.
People who weren't paid to watched then.
For every fan basking in their success, there is a disgruntled sports writer and followers who bemoan their approach
Several years ago it was the Baltimore Ravens players whinging about the Patriots embarrassing them. Take a fuckin knee on first down if you don't like it...
They could start throwing out answers like "It's how many seas a white dove must sail before she can sleep in the sand" or "It's how many years the cannon balls must fly before they are forever banned". (It's already common knowledge how many roads a man must walk down.)
Like, that's the thing--he's boring to watch. Same goddamn thing every time -- clear out the high-dollar clues, get a big Daily Double, everyone pretends they're doing something for the next 20 minutes of airtime and then that's it. Congratulations, dude, you broke Jeopardy. And there's no real strategy to beat him other than to do exactly what he does, only better; be faster on the buzzer and get more answers right.
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No sport in the game.
Like hunting from tree stands, after baiting.
The pitching is not better. They just throw harder and use relievers like Kleenex.
It is excruciatingly painful to watch all of the nibbling, walks and HBP’s at all levels. Especially if you’re behind the plate. Painful I tells ya!
Seinfeld was like that too.
A silly tv show about nothing, week after week after week.
After enough years, it showed. You missed substance.
Real people, passion, characters.
“Moneyball” was bullshit. The A’s did slightly better than the year before because they had three excellent (And cheap!) rookie pitchers.
Defense is ruining sports!
The challenger was Adam Levin, not Alan. He’s the son of a high school classmate. I never did understand why on Jeopardy contestants would go down the columns. You’d think there’d be a small advantage to jumping around among categories, since the person choosing knows what he’s going to pick but the opponents are a little less prepared to get their heads into the right context.
"Actuall base running in Jeopardy would be good. A ball would come in somehow."
A model for a TV game show with a running component was "Name that Tune." They'd play a tune and the contestants had to name it, but instead of hitting buzzer to get the chance to give the right answer, you had to run across the stage and pull a cord.
The old rules, though, would have contained his talent within humane channels
The thing about James Holzhauer and baseball Sabermetrics is both are successful within "the old rules". The only thing they changed was how people act within those rules. Indeed, the only way to thwart these endeavors would be to change the rules.
I kind of think we're going to see a change where the contestants are required to go down the categories in order
That's the point: You can't stop people from using their brains by playing rationally. But you can change the rules to keep the game fun.
The same with baseball: "Moneyball" hasn't ruined the game, but to the extent it's resulted in more strikeouts, fewer balls in play, then the smart response would be to tweak the rules somehow to counteract that. Shrink the strike zone, enforce time limits between pitches (on both hitters and pitchers), and so on.
It's also true of the stock market: An "efficient" stock market means you may as well throw darts at the stock pages. Maybe that takes the fun out of speculating, but there's nothing to be done about it.
I don't know that I care for it, but I doubt anyone else will work as hard as Holzhauer did to prepare himself for his venture on Jeopardy.
When I read "Jamesesque", for a second there, I thought you meant Bill James.
Who won the popular vote? I think that’s what matters most.
"That's the point: You can't stop people from using their brains by playing rationally. But you can change the rules to keep the game fun."
You can change the rules to make the game better for the spectators. It's amazing to me how perfectly sized the baseball diamond is, but you could make the distance between home plate and first base a bit shorter and get many more hits if that's what amuses people.
Here's a time line of rule changes in baseball history.
They lowered the height of the pitcher's mound in 1969. Presumably that was to make it more fun (less dominated by pitching).
There was a time when you could get a runner out by throwing the ball at him and hitting him. I think I'm remembering reading that somewhere.
BTW, "jeopardy" is a term in baseball.
There was a time when you could get a runner out by throwing the ball at him and hitting him. I think I'm remembering reading that somewhere.
Yes, I think that was a 19th century thing.
There was a time when you could get a runner out by throwing the ball at him and hitting him. I think I'm remembering reading that somewhere.
What was when I was 6.
Who won the popular vote? I think that’s what matters most.
If you do a search on Charles Lane and popular vote; you'll find that he wrote an op-ed to tell popular vote people to quit whining, because Trump won using the old rules. So Lane is committed to the old rules.
I'm an advocate of no mound. Who they hell came up with the idea of a mound in a playing field?
Charles Lane will wink at Dems cheating to get the candidate elites want but somehow a person who smartly plays the game of Jeopardy is ruining it.
Lane’s a smart idiot. It’s a disease that afflicts most D.C. pundits, the opposite of idiot-savant.
"Data-driven baseball allowed the Cubs to win the World Series.
Read "Moneyball.""
By the time the Cubs won the World Series in 2016 EVERY team was data driven. So this is false.
And there's no real strategy to beat him other than to do exactly what he does, only better; be faster on the buzzer and get more answers right.
Isn't this exactly how players compete to win using the traditional strategy?
Charles Lane, who I like generally, is a spoil sport of the I-Had-To-Walk-Ten-Miles-To-School-When-I-Was-A-Kid-Both Ways variety.
Last night's episode was dramatic and awesome. There is tension and energy, last night especially. The challenger had no choice but to bet almost all because he new James would.
I'm loving this streak. If we are going to use baseball analogies I'd say this resembles a no-hitter.
Now that we’ve gotten rid of all of the show orchestras have their successors gone on to Spotify fame?
They can’t be music teachers since we’ve gotten rid of school music classes. I’d suggest they’ve joined worship teams but church attendance is down?
A model for a TV game show with a running component was "Name that Tune."
A better model was Treadmill to Bucks from the book The Running Man. Contestants with various heart conditions answer questions while running on a treadmill. Get a question wrong, and the treadmill speeds up.
"And there's no real strategy to beat him other than to do exactly what he does, only better; be faster on the buzzer and get more answers right."
Yes, that's the entire point of the game. There's no strategy to beat the Red Sox except to get more men on base and score more runs.
The Indians choked away the 2016 Series. Gave it away with both hands.
Kris Bryant and Aroldis Chapman aren’t moneyball players. The game hasn’t changed much. The pitching is just better.
Very few hitters can do what Aaron Judge does. He’s a good hitter. So the high strikeouts are worth it for a guy like him and Khris Davis. They also have good speed so the walks are advantageous for them. They can run.
But there are hitters like Michael Brantley who make contact and have some pop. You are going to see more guys like that. The hitting is starting to catch up to the pitching again.
The point of a game is winning, so whatever legal maneuvers you employ are acceptable. But if the game is being played as entertainment for others, interest fades after a while if it's dominated by one team or one player. That's why parity is a concern in the NFL and MLB.
Start taking Holzhauer’s winnings out of Trebek's paycheck and see how long the streak lasts.
Foray, or raid, might have been a better word than venture.
Anyway, Holzhauer's success is due to critical analysis of the target and hard work and preparation before setting forth on the venture.
“... Holzhauer’s streak reflects the same grim, data-driven approach to competition that has spoiled (among other sports) baseball, ....”
Petty little mediaswine at WaPo manifesting the “Tall Poppy Syndrome.”
".....be faster on the buzzer and get more answers right."
Now, that right there is a novel idea. Surprised the other contestants have not stumbled upon it.
interest fades after a while if it's dominated by one team or one player. That's why parity is a concern in the NFL and MLB.
Fans actually love sports dynasties like the Yankees in the 50s, or the Celtics and Green Bay in the 60s. But apparently not so much if it seems to be by a loophole that really changes the game.
In baseball, a lot of the successful teams pre-moneyball instinctively understood it anyway. Earl Weaver knew that bunting was usually stupid, and that a three-run homer was a lot better than a bunch of singles and stolen bases. The Yankees understood the value of walks and not making outs.
The article was written by a very jealous man with limited knowledge and no chances to win a game show.
"His idea is to select, and respond correctly to, harder, big-dollar clues on the show’s 30-square gameboard first."
Isn't "harder" relative? If you know all the answers, no question is hard or harder.
Lane: Wait till the socialists took over the country, James. All contestants and non-contestants will get a share of your ill gotten loots.
Isn't "harder" relative? If you know all the answers, no question is hard or harder.
Yep. For me, any question I know the answer to is an "easy one" and I am surprised if contestant does not know answer.
And, if they do know answer, that simply means they are very intelligent, just like me.
And if I do not know the answer, it is a stupid question, anyway.
A little OT, but an interesting thought I had especially after the previous post on the media complaining about how Trump is challenging them.
Is Trump the James Holzhauer of politics (and media)? Has he broken the established "rules of the game" previous to 2016? Jeb Bush was playing the old rules, that served his brother so well. Siphon up the big money donors, establish your religious bona fides for the base, and freeze out the competition.
Trump saw a weakness in the rules of the game and approached it a different way. A successful businessman has to be something of a gambler. Which politicians are typically not.
Which of the current DNC field is a gambler?
I haven’t owned a television for twenty years, but if I did the only reason I would watch Jeopardy would be to see something strategically innovative like this. Even when the show was young in the mid-1960s it seemed ancient and boring.
"Are you buying the baseball analogy?"
No. I have a lot of respect for Lane, but he is just wrong in this essay. A good game to play allows for innovation- the Jeopardy guy is showing you the innovation. Opponents will have to adjust to this- someone will beat him at his own game- or will put him under enough pressure that he will miss one of the Daily Doubles twice in a row.
The baseball analogy fails because the game always goes through cycles like this- but the opposition always finds adjustments to counter the previous strategies, and memories are short.
The key to Holzhauer's success is getting the answers right. The rest of his strategy is details in comparison.
That's not how I read his interview with ESPN. He lays out his strategy pretty plainly.
1. Control the board (buzzer)
2. Control the high dollar values.
3. Hunt for the daily double and bet it all. Even if he loses, his opponents can't get that money now.
Google ICM theory for poker. It's similar.
And this isn't a new strategy for Jeopardy, but it is the most successful implementation of it I have seen (I have watched the show off and on for over 40 years). Even the show's producers are going to change things up on him- you will probably, at some point, see all the Daily Doubles put on the last line so that he gets them early rather than later after building a stack to bet allin with.
You can't control the board or the high dollar values if you don't get the answers right and your opponents do.
When you think about TOC play usually all three contestants know the answer most of the time. The key to victory lies in timing the buzzer, controlling the board and the DDs. Right answers are both essential and de minimis.
I've been following baseball analytics for 35 years. It's not unanimous, but there's a significant opinion now that the analytic approach has led to strategies that aren't entertaining, like the focus on homers and walks and the parade of increasingly faceless relievers.
I've watched one full game with the Jeopardy guy and part of another. His strategy has been used by others - lots of folks have gone to the bottom of the board first or hunted around for the Daily Doubles. What was different for them was that they'd answer a question, then lose control of the board on the next question. This guy is just very fast* and focused and has, to me, a freakish range of subjects that he knows a a lot about.
One thing I've wondered is to what extent his opponents have seen him. Do they get to watch tapings of previous games? I've been told that they made a larger than usual backlog of episodes because Trebek is going in for cancer treatments. You can see how people who are expecting to feel their around the board for the first few minutes can be overwhelmed after falling $8,000 behind by the first commercial
*He doesn't seem to just blindly click in, assuming he'll know the answer.
Contestants last night beat him on the buzzer more than usual. Is the game being rigged against him? Milli second delay built in? Lower # gauge wire with higher resistance? Micro wave interference?
Russians?
absurd, you can complain about the data driven baseball game all you want. But how can you not appreciate the fireball pitchers throwing 98-104 mph with incredible movement and nasty breaking balls. The incredible defensive plays we see on a daily basis from elite athletes now playing in the field rather than the portly out of shape players we used to see all with a giant wad of chewing tobacco. The only players that are affected by the shift are the slow lumbering left handed hitters that other than the fact they can hit the ball far have no other talent in the game, most of them relegated now to DH.
A buddy of mine one a bunch of money on the collegiate version of Wheel of Fortune. He had a system that really wasn't all that complicated. You just choose the letters that are most common in the English alphabet. You still need to be able to solve the puzzle though.
"Contestants last night beat him on the buzzer more than usual. Is the game being rigged against him? Milli second delay built in? Lower # gauge wire with higher resistance? Micro wave interference? Russians?"
I often wonder about that. Not about the Russians, but about the reaction time on thoss buzzers. I've seen contestants who seemed to beat their opponents to the draw, when it comes to buzzing in, but they'd be standing there, frantically thumbing the buzzer with no result. Or so it seemed.
I was a contestant on Jeopardy! in the mid-90's. (I came in second by $2 to an IRS agent from DC, but I won a couch and a stereo system as consolation prizes!)
Each person had to do well on a fairly broad and technical written trivia test just to be in the general contestant pool, so everyone knew lots of trivia.
The biggest factor for me (and I'm assuming for lots of other contestants) was the buzzer. You've probably noticed that no one ever buzzes in and interrupts Alex Trebek while he's reading the clue. What the television viewer can't see is that the contestants' buzzers are locked until a light comes on behind Trebek when he finishes reading the clue. If you try to buzz in too early, your buzzer is penalized with a half-second delay when the light comes on. Thus, you have to listen to the clue and think of the right response while waiting for that little light to come on and then buzz in immediately afterwards. My hand-eye coordination is not great, and it was a real disadvantage. James has great reaction-times on the buzzer, in addition to his trivia knowledge and statistical gambling skills.
Bilwick said...
I've seen contestants who seemed to beat their opponents to the draw, when it comes to buzzing in, but they'd be standing there, frantically thumbing the buzzer with no result.
Your eyes aren't playing tricks. That's exactly what is happening.
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