Ken Jennings has found himself in hot water with Jeopardy! fans once again. This time, it’s for the ultimate sin: accepting an incorrect answer in the final Jeopardy round in a recent episode.
Jennings Accepts Seemingly Incorrect Answer
At the conclusion of last Wednesday’s episode, the final Jeopardy clue read, “It’s the geographic word in the title of a Robert Burns poem about “the mountains … covered with snow … the straths & green valleys below.”
Contestant Evan Dorey simply wrote “Highland” as his response. Jennings quickly accepted the clue, saying, “‘My Heart’s In The Highlands‘ is the name of the poem.”
Check out the moment for yourself in the video below.
Fans Call Out Jennings For Ruling
However, fans were quick to notice that Dorey’s answer did not have the “s” at the end of the word. These fans were quick to call out Jennings for accepting an answer that appeared to be incorrect.
“I’m confused,” one user wrote on the social media site Reddit. “If a FJ contestant gives a singular name though the correct title is plural, it’s accepted. But if they write that singular and are starting to add s when time runs out, it isn’t?”
“Little confused by that myself,” another added in agreement. “I thought if the answer was a word in a title, the answer needed to be the title word, not a version thereof.”
“Crazy ruling,” a third Jeopardy! fan wrote. “They shouldn’t be giving credit for similar words. The clue asked for a word in the poem title. Highland is not in the title.”
One Reddit user, however, defended the ruling.
“My interpretation of this ruling is: If the clue specifically wanted the full title and he wrote ‘My Heart’s in the Highland’, that would be incorrect,” this person explained. “But since they just wanted the word rather than the full title, they’ll take singular or plural.”
Related: Ken Jennings Slammed By ‘Jeopardy!’ Fans For ‘Robbing’ Contestant After Messy Answer
Dorey Admits He ‘Got Lucky’
Dorey himself even got in on the action in this thread in an attempt to explain himself.
“I’m pretty sure the longest 10 seconds of my life were me trying to figure out whether I should put an ‘s’ at the end of Final,” he recalled. “I didn’t know the poem so I pretty much had the same debate that raged in this thread against myself.”
Dorey went on to say that the debate in his mind was between “Highland” and “Highlands.”
“Which to go with? I figured with FJ, they can’t ask me to be more specific, so less is more and I’ll leave the judges to decide, and this time I got lucky,” he admitted. “They didn’t have to stop and confer; it pretty much played out as you saw it so they must have anticipated that potential answer.”
Related: ‘Jeopardy!’ Host Ken Jennings Forced To Apologize To Female Contestant For ‘Problematic’ Clue
Jennings More Vulnerable Than Ever On Jeopardy!
This comes at a difficult time for Jennings. Indeed, his future on Jeopardy! is currently more uncertain.
Last month, sources told The Mirror that Jeopardy! producers are no longer sure if they want to keep Jennings on as the host of the game show.
Executives have reportedly noticed that ratings on Wheel of Fortune have spiked in the weeks since Ryan Seacrest took over as host from Pat Sajak. This has led them to become curious as to whether they could make the same thing happen with Jeopardy!
Jennings is vulnerable to being fired at all times, as he surprisingly does not have a long-term contract for the $4 million hosting gig on Jeopardy!
“Of course Ken wants to do this for the next twenty years, but he’s going to have to get comfortable with only being renewed one or two years at a time for the foreseeable future,” another source previously explained. “Sony is keeping him in the hosting job but they are also keeping their options open.”
This latest backlash fans likely won’t help Jennings when it comes to staying on Jeopardy! longterm. Only time will tell if he is able to keep his job as host!
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