This is a downbeat on ninety seven to one. The Freak coveray lot your
Goday, Happy Friday, Big weekend planned is We're gonna hanging out to Kessler
tonight for the Silver Skylarks single release for Power Moves performance by Large Professor Well
Action over at the Lady Love Lounge tomorrow night as well. If you gonna
hang out with some of your freak friends, we will be out and a
bounce this weekend. Right now though, joining us live on the Free hot
Line as man by the name of Jared Watson. Jared is going to be
participating in the Jeopardy Tournament of Champions next week. His episode will air on
Monday night. Wherever you find your Jeopardy watch it there. Jared is from
Greenville, Texas, which is considered part of the Metroplex in my estimation.
And Jared joins us now, Good morning, Jared, How you doing man?
Oh doing fantastic? Thanks for having me so you and I I am
an I'm an archive nerd, and I went and found the episodes that got
you here, so it looks like they aired in June June first, second,
fifth, and sixth four Big Wins You Took Down Deborah and Harrison and
Annabelle and Sylvia and Ava and many others on your path to greatness. Three
time champion see the season thirty nine. I'm looking at the number they have
you compiled at fifty six thousand dollars plus and described as a quality control specialist
from Greenville, Texas. So, and here you are now the Jeopardy Tournament
of Champions. What in the world is going through your mind? As all
this has happened? Just madness, Like every aspect of this has just been
madness from start to finish. It's something that I've dreamt of doing my whole
life, obviously, but it never registered to me that it was something because
that could actually happen, and yet it did. So how does this work?
Is this? Was that your first time on a game show? Are
you someone that had wanted to go on game shows? Are you just someone
who dominates trivia? Knight and your friends are like, dude, you kind
of got it all down. You should consider doing this? Is that how
this comes about? So? I mean, trivia was always something that was
really something that I loved my entire life, and I think it is something
that you either love or don't. But Jeopardy is the only Dan show that
I've ever really wanted to be on. I mean, of course I've watched
sin shows my whole life, but Jeopardy was always always the one, the
special one to me. So it would kind of kind of be Jeopardy above
to me. Have you watched any of The Floor on Fox starring Rob Low,
Okay, I've seen promos for it, and you know, once,
once it's all, thing is over, I mean, I could open my
horizons up a little bit. But it's always been laser focused on Jeopardy for
me. That's funny. Kevin brings it up because we're all kind of enamored
with the Floor and it's ridiculous, but it's entertaining. It brings me to
this, you know. And I'm sure you probably played a lot of Jeopardy
at home watching it on TV along with the contestants, and the thing has
got to be, like, you're probably really good on your couch. How
different is it once you were there on set and the pressure of the timing
to not only activate your your button at the appropriate time, but then the
pressure of the clock ticking for you to get the answer right and have the
proper recall it just they added, pressure has got to make it near impossible
to even get the answer out sometimes. How much different is it from doing
it on stage than it is on your couch. I think it's one of
those things where if you think about what you're doing for any length of time
at all, you could just be completely lost. I mean you kind of
have to just kind of go into survival mode and just do fast you can,
because yeah, like it, because just being there with the cameras and
the crew all around you, and you know, you're in makeup on stage
with the life and if you think about any of that at all other than
just the clues and the responses you're toast. Was there any Is there any
particular strategy that you employed or or somebody you talked to beforehand to kind of
help you, you know, block out that other stuff and just focus,
you know, and relax and be in that moment and answer the questions and
rely on your your knowledge and instincts. Was there any kind of particular strategy
involved that got you prepped for that well? I mean, I would definitely
say over preparation is going to serve you very well in jeopardy in whatever form
works best for you because there are there are tons and tons of strategies out
there or you know what to study, how to study, how to time
the buzzer. It's been Believe me, I bought a lot of it,
so I have a pretty big sampling of it all. Yeah. Sorry,
this is Jared Watson from Greenville, Texas. He's doing the Jeffary Tournament of
Champions on Monday. Okay, so can you tell me how this works?
You won three games or four games in a row? Right? Yeah?
I won three three games? Is that what it takes to qualify for the
Tournament of Champions now? So the way it has worked in the past is
winning five games automatically qualifies you for the Tournament of the Champions. And at
the beginning of this year they said that everyone that had won score games was
also going to go to the Tournament Champions. And then they announced these champions
wild card tournaments that were new for this season to where every player that has
won at least one game would get a chance to come back and compete for
a spot in the tournament the Champion. So and that had actually been announced
in between my my appearances, So I was I knew one way or another.
I was probably going to come back in some form, but I assumed
it was for the champions wild Cards. So then, unbeknownst to me,
Jeopardy reached out to CBS eleven in Dallas and said, Hey, can you
come on and do an interview talking about your experience on Jeopardy? And I
was like, oh, yeah, sure, yeah, I'll come on.
Do you ever put on grout, show marks, glasses and show ups at
freaks who drink events and just rack up bar tabs? You know? The
funny thing is, I think I look kind of generic enough that I really
don't get recognized or bothered too much out in the world. I just kind
of looks like a big ball guy. I mean, I'm joking, I'm
joking, but do you ever play Do you ever get up get together with
your friends as the ringer for their trivia group and play in like these fun
little bar trivia games and stuff like that. I mean, I am planning
on going to DC this summer for just like a failed vacation, and I'm
definitely planning on meeting up with some of my other Jeopardy contestant friends and going
and beating up on some unsuspected trivia mortals. That sounds so fun, fun
your brain. Yes, Jared, I have a couple of specific questions about
Jeopardy itself because I play at home and I think I read fast and that
gives me a little bit bit of an advantage. And I always wondered,
are you just audibly getting the clues or can you read along when they pop
up? Good question. So the way that works is the board is the
way that you would picture it at home, Like the clue appears on the
spot on the board, on the screen, on the board where the dollar
amount was. So it actually kind of is an advantage or a disadvantage depending
on your situation of being able to read that from across the room. People
typically don't have problems with that, but you know, if you've got eagle
eye vision, I think you do have a little bit of an advantage there
because it's just as big as that TV monitor basically, But you get that,
and then you also get the host reading the quote. So could you
read them when they popped up? And are you reading ahead of the host
voice and giving you a millisecond advantage? Oh? Yeah, No, that
that's critical, Like it's as quickly as you can read it, read it,
because that just gives you that much more time to process that you try
and figure out what the response should be. So and every millisecond counts on
differenty for sure. My second question is that Jeopardy features some incredibly smart people,
but whenever they have to either write their name or write their answers and
Final Jeopardy, they look borderline illiterate. How hard is it on some like
curved screen and whatever writing implement they give you, Is it just impossible to
write legibly? Yeah? Well just imagine, you know, like you ever
go to like a checkout counter or something and you have to like sign your
name for a credit card or something like that. Yes, it's basically like
that, where you are trying to make something legible, and when you're writing
the name at the beginning of the episode, they can give you a couple
of crafts at it. It didn't come out the way you want. But
yeah, when you're writing Final Jeopardy for one, you got you got thirty
seconds start to finish anyway. Yeah, so you're just trying to get it
out as fast as you can. But yeah, it's that's that's one of
the underrated difficulties of being on the show Jeopardy. Do you turn thement?
Old champions can test it? Jared Watson of Greenville, Texas joining us now
on ninety seven to one the Freak. This is a question that I bet
is on a lot of people's minds, and it's probably question that's been answered
a million times, but I want your perspective on it. What is the
ultimate strategy for buzzing in? And what are the penalties? How does the
whole buzz in method work? Because I've heard that if you hit it once
or or if somebody hits it, you're locked out. Or if you hit
it before the answer or the answer is given, you're locked out. Kind
of run us through that whole process, and what is your specific strategy if
you can disclose that? Okay, So the way it works is you have
to wait until the host reads the entire clue before you can buzz in.
And what people don't see watching at home is there are actually rows of lights
on either side of the game board that light up when it's time to buzz
it, and if you buzz it before that life comes up, you're locked
out for a quarter second, which doesn't sound like a lot of time,
but it's plenty of time for your opponents to buzz it incredible. And there
are two distinct schools that thought about the buzz and strategy is one is to
try and time it off of the host and like try and get it to
where when he reaches the end of the word, you buzz in. And
the other strategy is to wait and look for the lights. Probably hard to
look at the light when you're reading the question, though right it can be.
But I did find that waiting on the lights was the strategy that worked
for me. And I think I'm kind of in the minority on that because
I think people just try and time the voice. But I have to say
that waiting on the lights really did work for me, and it made a
big difference. Actually, in the first game that I had, my very
first game, I was getting locked out basically the entire first round because I
was buzzing into early. I was trying to time the voice, but switching
it up and waiting for the lights that is kind of what was the turning
point for me to come back and win that game. Do they have a
technical assistant that realizes that's what you're doing and we'll come up and advise you
and say, Jared, you're hitting the damn button too early. Layoff,
bro. He did actually almost exactly that, maybe not quite in those words,
but they did come up and say, hey, Jared, and you
are coming in a little early because they want everybody to do as well as
they can, and they don't want the technology to be the reason that you
succeed or fail, So they want everybody to do their best stuff on stage.
You every really can't say enough for how well they treat us from start
to finish in this whole process. This is a Jared Watson. He's gonna
be on Jeopardy Monday night and the Tournament of Champions. He's from Greenville,
DFW guy here now Jared, I'm Kevin. That's Danny, And now Mike
is a he's a wealth of knowledge too, like he knows a lot of
random trivia. And I just want to throw this out here because I have
your like from the past games that you won back in season thirty nine last
year. The final Jeopardy question. I'm going to ask Mike this and just
see if he gets it, just to see because I think Mike, Jared,
well, it's not Jared's already answered. He won by answering this.
I've told you before I'm good at teen jeopardy. Well, let's see.
I excel is dunking one year olds. I dominate a teen jeopardy. I
don't do adult jeopardy. I don't play this. In Jared's first victory,
though he won on the final jeopardy, was this question the capital my country
names? Okay, okay, Islamabad. Islamabad is the capital of this Islamic
Republic of Just no, it wasn't Islamabad. I'm gonna use my lifeline and
I choose Jared. Jared, do you remember how you won episode one?
Of course? Oh? Yeah, it's that is that is the capital of
the country of Pakistan. He's the Islamic Republic. He's like, not only
do I remember it? I know it. Don't you remember when they were
chasing Yeah, I do have a little story about that. When I was
on the plane back from Jeopardy, I was just looking at because I have
a bunch of h digital flash cards that with my study material, and one
of the cards that popped up on the plane was in my world capital's deck
was Pakistani's Lamba Bat and I took a screenshot of it. It was like,
Ah, that is the card that just won me fourteen thousand dollars,
and so I had to kind of commemorate that. That's so great. I
have a friend who was on who wants to be a millionaire and burn in
his head forever the question that got him yeah, and the ones he had
to burn a phone, a friend and everything on. So I imagine for
you it's both sides, either ones you missed or hell, the ones that
won you the game. You are not that you would have forgotten them otherwise,
but you're going to have those things locked in forever. Oh. I
still anytime Nato comes up in any context, that was the clue that bounced
me out on my fourth game, I still feel a little bit of like,
uh yeah, just hearing about it. How okay, So when you
when you finish and you've accumulated your your your winnings, you know you're winning
total. How do they pay you? Do they give you one of those
gigantic checks? Do they venmo you cash apt? How does that work?
How do you how do you finally get paid? They act they mail you
a a paper check. It just shows up in your mailbox, and is
it for the amount that you want or they already take out a FIKA and
all that other crap too, So they they deduct California State tactics. But
other than that, they pay you to pull them ount and they leave it
to you to claim it determine what that means for you as far as tastes.
That's awesome. That must have been a fun day at the at the
mailbox. Huh you take that out well? And another thing was it was
when I found out that my credit union will accept a digital deposit for the
amount of that check, so I actually have to keep it and then I'm
gonna frame it once this is all over. Oh that's cool. I think
that's when you take to the bank and wink at the teller. Oh that
yeah. I got that on MERV. Griffin sent me that. I called
him ahead of time and it was like, this is going to sound really
weird, but I was contestant on the game show and I have to check
and I would really like to keep it, and they're like, just just
do an online deposit. Take a picture of it. Jared, have you
ever met anupama? Do you know anupama? I can't see that. I
do. She is one of the very famous Jeopardy fails where it was a
sports thing. We talk a lot of sports and they asked for something and
she gets the team and the wrong sport. I mean, you know,
Jeopardy fails. I imagine you're trying to avoid becoming on a Jeopardy Fail reel
as much as you're trying to win these damn things. Yeah, well and
I do. I definitely got on one because I said that the capital is
the still A teams was Tokyo. Well we all know that it's Houston,
of course, Jared. So look we're all Metroplex. Uh, normal men
here, normal innocent men here. And this segment is sponsored by Alamo Draft
House Cinema, five locations in the Metroplex, and you can get tickets to
see Demolition Man with the Speakeasy at ninety seven one the Freak dot Com.
But another thing they also have at Alamo Draft House Cinema is a trivia night.
And we've been kind of kicking it around, like, hey, one
Tuesday night or whatever night it is, go over to the bar and let's
have a little trivia action. And I think I think it would be awesome
if you just like, we'll we'll pick up your tab. I'll even burst
you for gas money. I don't care. You walk in through the doors
with the downbeat on Trivia Night. We strutting there in slow motion and we
smoke everyone because we got the secret weapon. What do you think you know?
Joined forces with the downbeat on Trivia Night at Alamo draft outs. You
had me pick up the tab? All right? Yeah man, this is
genius. This is like getting Scottie Shuffler on your scramble team. Yes,
kids cheating and I love it. Let's go, well, it'll be fun.
We could even challenge. We'll say the night in the location and people
can come in and challenge. Come take off, you beat us, we
give you a prize. You beat us with Jared, then it's off college
baseball tickets. Just gonna be us three looking at our phones and Jared just
crushing, slamming home runs everywhere. Let's me shut up. Unless the category
is what was it last night? Brands of bass guitar strings? Yeah exactly,
might I might get to actually have a have an offering. I would
actually do really well in that category. But what is your what's your night?
You got the Tournament Champions again. This is Jared Man. He's gonna
be on the Tournament Champions Monday. What's your nightmare? Realistic Jeopardy category?
What's your dream and nightmare? If they're popping up? So I think my
dream category is anything to do with like rock music before the year two thousand.
Okay, Danny okay? Jared told me I used to listen to the
Eagle back in the day. Okay, right on? Okay, So I
did. Yeah, it was my favorite station growing up, and we ran
him off at the format. Sorry, stick around, Jared, Gota gotta
move with the time. But my nightmare category, well, actually I'd had
a nightmare category in my very first game, which was an entire category that
was just about fashion, and that's about as far from my skill set as
you can get. So I kind of got that out of the way early,
thankfully. That's fascinating. I could whip Jared with questions all day.
I do have one, yeah, real quick, so I don't recall.
I'm honestly, I don't know what you look like. I'm gonna look you
up and see if I've seen you in your in your appearance previously on Jeopardy,
did you ever get to clear the entire line of clear category before and
if so, that's got to be a pretty good feeling when it's just like
bam bam, bam bam bam aced it. Yeah. So the funny thing
about that is is I did run the category in my last game, and
it just kind of came and went because it didn't get commented on them.
They might stop and do a pause or anything like they do often when a
contestant runs a category to the point that I didn't even realize that I did
it until I went back and watched the game. It's like, hey,
wait, I got all five of those. They didn't do anything, So
that's cool. Man. Well, Jared, best of luck. I've got
your numbers. So don't think that we're going to be strangers. We're going
to be reaching out. He's just saying yes to be nice. He's not
showing up to listeners coordinate a team and try to like, we have a
prize. If they can knock us off, they would get a prize.
Yeah that's good, that's good bit, and then they can get whatever ringer
that they want. That's what. Yeah, that's wacky radio stuff. Mat
just have a feeling that that Jared's going to block your number after this is
over. What's possibly should Vikey and I both did? Jared will be watching
you on Monday night. I'll say it this way. Best of luck the
tournament champions. In our business, we say retro good luck, retroactive good
luck. Yeah, I retroactive. Good luck to you, my man,
Jared, you're the man. Hey, what's the capital of Lithuania? Oh?
Billion? Damn right, it's that's good. This guy's my guy.
All right, hold on, no, no, all right, Jared?
What what brand of bass guitar strings did James Jamison famously wear and and use
and never change? Oh? Dang? Is it like? Maybe? Oh
I'm sorry, Jared, you're gonna have to go home and you lost all
your money on that daily double. No, it would be Labella Labella flat
Wallace. Yes, yes, so if that comes up on Monday, yep,
you've got got that in your hip to go. Since Danny bullet him,
Yeah, now he's not even to shut up. Question ruin a radio
bit be a question? Jared? Is the final Jeffrey music drive you and
saying do you hear it? Twenty four hours a day? I will say
that it was something that was like in my head the entire night after I
won my first couple of games, Like I was walking down to dinner and
I was just like in my head, I was like stretting down the streets
like skipping. That's so great. What a fun visit with you, man,
cool dud, Jared, real, good luck, thank you for joining
us, and uh yeah, don't do no, he's really going to block
your number, all right, good luck, Jared. Tournament A Champions Monday.
This man is representing us on Jeopardy. Thanks for your time, Jared,
Thank you so much. Go get him big dog representing the Metroplex and
you can come meet him sometime in the future, probably if we do this
bit. Come next to got some freaky new joints for you, Got some
birthdays talkbacks, a big blast off to head to the weekend. Next To
ninety seven won the free