Tag: cashmoney

The Jeopardy! GOAT: As if it could’ve been anyone else

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It took just four nights out of a possible seven, but the long-awaited answer was finally given its question: the Greatest Of All Time Jeopardy! Contestant?

Who is Ken Jennings?

Ultimately, I’ll admit that I was rooting for Jeopardy James Holzhauer to win it, partially because of likely recency bias, but also because he’s a known baseball stat geek, and he plays the game with such reckless abandon that a known gambler should play, that it’s hard to not become a fan.  But I do also remember the summer of 2004 when Ken Jennings emerged on the scene and it seemed like every single day after work, he was at the podium with a $15,000+ lead.  He would end up winning 74 games in a row and raking in over a million dollars in the process, and I’m pretty sure it was decided then that he was, at least unofficially, the greatest of all time.

But unofficial doesn’t ever count in the grand spectrum of things, plus not to mention that in several of the follow-up specials and tournaments, Jennings often times fell short of winning some major crowns, and was dually humbled when IBM’s Watson AI wiped the floor against him (and Brad Rutter).

Regardless, as most people know the narrative, the emergence of Jeopardy James meant that Jeopardy! finally had a third worthy contender, and with the declining health of legendary host Alex Trebek, there was no better time than the present to embark on the long awaited matchup to decide, who is the GOAT of Jeopardy?

Frankly, with no real disrespect to Brad Rutter, but he didn’t belong in this.  His run as a Jeopardy champ was nearly 20 years ago, and despite the $4 million+ he’s raked in through repeated tournaments and follow-up appearances, there was no way he was going to hold a candle against a savant like Jennings or a gunslinger like Holzhauer.  It was no more evident than through the four episodes of the GOAT shows, where Rutter finished last in every single match, and repeatedly wiped out and finished with 0 points after Final Jeopardy; if he was even allowed to play, as in, not being in the negatives.

Although he was a class act the whole time, gracefully singing the praises of his competition as well as honoring Alex Trebek, when the day was over, his presence made the entire GOAT tournament a two-man race.  I would’ve seen someone like Arthur Chu or Julia Collins in the third spot; I know they don’t stack up in terms of wins or earnings, but based on the way Rutter performed, it’s hard to imagine that they’d have been any less inconsequential.

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Not really much of a punishment

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When the revelation broke out that the Houston Astros had developed a method to steal signs over the last few years, capitalizing on them en route to a period of great success, including one World Series championship, I figured nothing substantial was really going to come from it.  The evidence was pretty substantial and the fact that an active player snitched, it was a pretty foregone conclusion that the Astros were going to be busted for “cheating.”

Now I say cheating with quotes, because when the day is over, I don’t particularly think of stealing signs as cheating.  It’s a part of every day baseball, except the Astros just took it a little bit further with technology; it’s still a collaborative effort for players to identify and decipher signs, and then figure out ways to relay information without the opposition realizing it.  Yes, the Astros went a little bit further, utilizing a discreet live-feed camera and people banging on a trash can in the dugout tunnel, but I don’t really think it’s that much different than a baserunner on second relaying to the batter that a changeup is coming by pretending to yawn or scratch his junk.

Regardless, because baseball, among many other entities, has a revolving door of a moral compass, it was inevitable that the Astros were going to get punished for their perceived misgivings.  But the thing about punishments in professional sports, is that they never really amount to anything that would stop anyone from doing them again.  When the New England Patriots were accused of utilizing deflated footballs, or video taping the opposition’s sidelines, they got some fines and were penalized some draft picks; a few players like Tom Brady were suspended for a few games.  But no Super Bowls were rescinded, and nothing happened to strip the Patriots of any of the six championships they’d won.

There was little reason to believe that something similar wouldn’t happen to the Astros, and just like that, such was the precise punishment: a $5 million dollar fine, which they try and make sound severe, but in an industry that rakes in billions, is a drop in the bucket for any MLB franchise.  They make 8-12 times that from profit sharing alone.  Plus they were penalized a few draft picks, which were inevitably going to be poor ones, because of their success over the last few years.

The 2017 World Series remains completely intact, and the Astros will always be recognized as those champions until the end of time, regardless of the fact that there were probably trash cans banged on when the Astros slugged five homers in game 5, which was one of the most exciting baseball games I’d ever seen in my life but that’s besides the point.  The bottom line is that in spite of the cheating allegations, the Astros are charged some fine that’s basically pennies to them, docked some draft picks that have a way higher chance of flaming out and then going to go work for Lowe’s than making it to the big leagues; but the championship they won that coincided with the supposed cheating, well that’s fine.

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Greatest or not, Jeopardy James changed the game

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Man, that was some good Jeopardy! last night.  I felt like a black guy watching the NBA slam dunk contest at certain points of the consecutive matches, like whenever any contestant went all-in on a daily double or Final Jeopardy and got the question right.  And to think there are several more nights of this, I think it’s safe to say that there are at least two more solid nights of some solid Jeopardy! entertainment to be had.

Ken Jennings may have taken the first win of Jeopardy! GOAT tournament, and could very well  win it all; but I think it’s safe to say that when the smoke settles “Jeopardy James” Holzhauer is still the one who really changed the game.

It didn’t take a lot of time to see that from the very start, the contestants started with the high-dollar answers, a staple of the Holzhauer tactic, with the ultimate objective being finding the Daily Double(s), and then going all-in to either run away with the game, or crash and burn trying.  This was definitely not something that either Ken Jennings or Brad Rutter did in their previous runs, but by virtue of Holzhauer standing at the podium next to them, forced them to adapt.

Basically what it boils down to is that if you don’t play like Jeopardy James, there’s little way to actually beat Jeopardy James.  Contestants are forced to clear the Daily Doubles and wipe out all of the high dollar answers so that he can’t build any bank, because he’s so good at the game that he can win any game where he’s capable of remaining in striking distance.

Both Jennings and Rutter played a Holzhauer game where they sniffed out all the high dollar questions first, and unfortunately for Jeopardy James, between the two of them, they basically found every single Daily Double in the two matches of the night.  Rutter, who was there solely on his legacy from 19 years ago, found 3-4 of them, and blew it and zeroed out each time, and it’s painfully evident that in spite of his imprssive lifetime earnings through Jeopardy, he really has no place being in this tournament today.

It was a clear two-horse race between Holzhauer and Jennings; I think most assumed that would be the case from the start.  But even Jennings admit to being out of his comfort zone when he bet his entire 3,800 on a Daily Double, and you could see the immense relief in his face when he happened to get it correct.  But it no more clear the importance of playing like Jeopardy James than in the first match’s Final Jeopardy where all three contestants going all-in on their wagers, with Jennings getting the win solely based on him building a strong lead in the first two rounds.

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Not art + design

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Because every gym on the planet is seemingly contractually obligated to be airing ESPN on at least one television, I saw this story about how the coach of the Cleveland Browns was spotted wearing this t-shirt that said “Pittsburgh started it,” as commentary over an incident a few weeks ago where the Browns’ Myles Garrett and the Steelers’ Mason Rudolph got into a scuffle ending with Garrett ripping Rudolph’s helmet off of him and swinging it at his head.  Garrett has been suspended indefinitely by the NFL for basically assault, and Rudolph was fined a bunch of money for remarks that supposedly started the whole incident which may or may not have been racist.

But this isn’t a post about the incident, because when the day is over, I really don’t give two shits about an organization that somehow thinks organized dog death fighting is a lesser crime than kneeling during the national anthem.   No, I’m more incensed over the fact that on the aforementioned t-shirt, is an actual signature on it from a supposed “art + design” company as if printing a t-shirt with three words in the Garfield font (Cooper Black) is remotely anything considered art or design.

This is the kind of shit that really makes me jaded towards the creative industry as a whole.  A bunch of hacks out there that take the most low-effort bullshit, slap a logo or take credit for it, and call it “design.”  And when challenged, comes a deluge of bullshit about minimalism or simplicity.  And then there’s legions of like-minded sheep who think it’s the most innovative idea in the world, and then it goes viral and people actually benefit from it.

Amazingly, the “company” that signed this shirt that I could easily plagiarize in 2 seconds, appears to be an actual company that actually makes all sorts of Cleveland-centric apparel and merch, almost all of which is 78,000% more creative and contains actual design than Pittsburgh Started It.  But because they’re an actual company, they do have the audacity to try to monetize their low-hanging fruit, and to no surprise at all, are selling these bullshit shirts for $28 a pop.  But realistically, even if it was some individual who calls themselves a studio, they’d still try to sell them for $35, because they’re broke-ass poor and trying to capitalize on going viral.

Naturally, people are buying them because they clearly have way too much money.

Either way, if I had more than 0 readers, I’m sure I’d inevitably be accused of being jealous that someone out there is making money on such a low-budget idea.  And they’d be entirely right, because I would love to make actual money on such little effort.  Why the fuck can’t something controversial and nationally known happen for an Atlanta team, that I could easily make into some sort of meme, call it design and cash in on?

I try not to wish death unto others

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

As we get older, sometimes we try to be a little more cognizant of the things we say, even in knee-jerk reactions or the heat of moments.  When I was a moody teenager who hated everything, I was pretty quick to wish death unto others, for the most minor and inconsequential of circumstances.  Cut me off in traffic?  I hope you blow a flat and crash to your death.  Take my parking space?  I hope you become collateral damage to an MS-13 drive-by.  Beat me in Street Fighter by chip damage?  I hope you have heart attack and keel over you fat cheap fuck.

Yeah, death is a little bit extreme when it comes to momentary lapses in judgment of gauging the value of life.  I’d really be kind of disappointed if I ever wished death unto another human being, and then it actually happened.  And although the chances of such are microscopically minuscule and would obviously be the perfect storm of freak circumstances and not because I mentally wished it upon them, it really does make me think twice about even absent-mindedly, wishing death unto others, especially for overall trivial matters.

These days, I just wish diarrhea unto people who piss me off.  Like, really bad liquid shits, that alter an afternoon, or ruin a night’s sleep; just a temporary dull pain with inconvenient side effects.  It seems like an adequate amount of comeuppance to mentally wish to inflict on other human beings who piss me off.  Take too long to order at Willy’s?  Clog up the self-checkout at Publix?  Aggressively whip around four lanes of traffic to ultimately end up one car length ahead of me?   Be the shitheads sitting in row 25+ on a flight that rushes up to row 23 to get off ten seconds sooner, and ruin the entire deplaning process?  Yeah, I wish diarrhea unto all these asshole motherfuckers.  The more severe shits depending on how insufferable their actions are.  One really bad episode, or nuclear shits that come back several times.

However, there are admittedly still some instances where my frustration bubbles over, and I still fantasize about some horrific death occurring, as much as I don’t really want to admit it.  One is very specific, to when the perfect storm of human beings all spawning on every single toilet in the gym/office when I really have to go; seriously I rarely feel as enraged as I do when I feel the need to relieve myself, but every single stall in the numerous bathroom options I have are all occupied, regardless of the fact that it’s sometimes very early in the morning at times in which I deliberately choose to workout, banking on the early time reducing the amount of people that are present.

The last time this happened, I wanted to a meteor to fall onto the building.  If I can’t use a crapper, then nobody should. 🙁

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Profit ≠ Championships

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I feel like I’ve been in a little bit of a writing rut lately, but at the same time I never like to go too long without having written something at all.  When times like this, I tend to fall back onto topics that are easy for me to ramble about like wrestling, or in this case, baseball.

No, it’s not about the Astros and their cheating scandal, although it seems very foreboding for the franchise, due to the overwhelming amount of evidence that backs it up, not to mention the fact that former pitcher Mike Fiers literally tattled on them to the press.

I was reading this article about how a current president, CEO and investor stooge-slave of the Atlanta Braves, Mike Plant, is all optimistic about the future of the Braves and their future success, and as is often the case whenever I read bullshit like this, it makes my eyes roll, but at the same time, it occasionally inspires words to formulate in my head, and then through my fingers and then into a word doc.

Of course Plant is going to say a bunch of optimistic shit to quell investors.  Why would he say stuff like “ehh, the Braves are going to be a perfectly adequate .500+ team, but realistically speaking we don’t have the pitching to compete in the playoffs, nor the talent to carry us beyond the NLDS?”

Instead, he extols the positive bean counts of how well the attendance and television ratings were, and the sponsorship revenue, and the overall profits that the organization is raking in, but not turning around and spending on the team itself.

Somewhere along the lines, the Braves appear to have forgotten that success isn’t really measured in spreadsheets and profit, but in championship banners and Commissioner’s Trophies; and that succeeding with the latter typically results in massive successes with the former.  I would wager money that the Cubs blowing open the bank in 2016, the Astros ponying up in 2017, the Red Sox spending like they always do in 2018, and the Nationals paying their pitchers what the Braves spent on their whole team in 2019, result in way more ROI than the Braves have done, playing it safe and by their completely unnecessary corporate spending limits.

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Oversaturation shouldn’t result in shortchanging everything

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

More often than I’d like to admit, I run into the scenario where I sit down with the intent to watch television, but then burn 30 minutes solely looking for something to watch, before deciding that what I do want to watch will exceed the time of day in which I want to be getting ready for bed.

Primarily, I use a Piss4 or XBONE to watch television, and between two consoles, I typically am skimming through Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, WWE Network, HBO Go, ESPN, TLC Go, or whatever network app the sports game I want to watch is airing on.  And then there’s PLEX where I’m connected to two different servers chock full of content that may or may not overlap with the shit available on all other mentioned media options.

The wife and I haven’t even plunked down for Disney+ yet.  That’s another trillion hours of content available if and when we do.

Needless to say, it’s easy to burn all my time searching for something to watch instead of actually watching something, because when the day is over, and I know that I’m far from the only person who feels this way, but there’s just too much god damn content out there, and not enough god damn hours in any day to watch all of it and actually stay on top of things.

Whether shows are being churned out, or acquired from overseas and distributed in America, it seems like every single time I turn on the television, there’s always a whole bunch of new shit that’s available to watch, and all I can really do is [add to list] everything and then continue browsing titles and watching previews in hopes of finding things that are so compelling, they’re capable of breaking the browsing cycle and be watched immediately.

But most of the time, things are just [added to lists] and then never get watched, not without a tremendous amount of effort and determination.

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