A fan was perplexed when their dad claimed to be better than most Jeopardy! players. Others weighed in about how to test the theory.

A Jeopardy! conversation left a fan questioning their father (
Image: Jeopardy!)

While one fan was visiting their family for the holiday season, their dad made a major Jeopardy! claim which rocked the house.

On Reddit, the fan explained: “I’m home for the holidays and my dad claims to be ‘above average’ in Jeopardy. He’s definitely more knowledgeable than me but I asked for clarification… above average among fans of Jeopardy? No, my dad claims to be above average among contestants that appear on the show!”

To put their dad to the test, they watched an episode together and counted up his responses. “In one round of a recent episode, I paused after each prompt so he could answer and he got 8 of 26 questions for that round. He claims it was a bad round for him which could be true,” they wrote.

From there, the user debated what it truly meant to be “above average” at the game show. After all, they understand that buzzing technique and “knowing when not to buzz in” is key. However, they claimed, “You have to also be able to respond to prompts accurately and quickly.”

They wondered how to measure ‘above average’
They asked for help to “measure how theoretically good / bad” their dad is against real players. Of course, Reddit was happy to give some advice.

A fan offered: “It’s unconfirmed but widely believed that applicants must get at least 70% right on two different tests (Anytime and Zoom-proctored). Proportionally, a contestant would be expected to know at least 42 of the 60 clues across both rounds. If he can get 45 or 50 correct in one game, that’s probably better than average.”

“You’re [sic] dad is wrong, but this isn’t a hill to die on, let him enjoy trivia,” said another fan while others came up with a specific solution. According to Jeopardy! diehards, the best way to measure a trivia ability is to take a look at Coryat score. J! Archive defines this as, “a player’s score if all wagering is disregarded. In the Coryat score, there is no penalty for forced incorrect responses on Daily Doubles, but correct responses on Daily Doubles earn only the natural values of the clues, and any gain or loss from the Final Jeopardy! Round is ignored.”