James Holzhauer hilariously owned Pat McAfee over Jeopardy! GOAT debate

Good point, Jeopardy James.

The Jeopardy! The Greatest of All Time tournament is officially underway as game show greats James Holzhauer, Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter compete in a special series to determine who is truly the best of the best.

Jennings — who holds the record for consecutive games won with 74 — won the first match in the opening hour-long episode of the GOAT tournament Tuesday. A match is the combined score of two regular games, and the first player to win three matches will be crowned the Jeopardy! GOAT.

He won the first game, and Holzhauer won the second. But with their combined points totals for the first match, Jennings is on top after beating out Holzhauer by a ridiculously slim margin with 63,400 points versus 63,200. (Rutter gambled big on Daily Doubles and lost, finishing the first match with 10,400 points.)

Holzhauer has been trash talking his competitors on Twitter and even made a joke at Rutter’s expense during the first match. He’s clearly having fun with the tournament, which taped in December, and poking fun at his experiences.

And his sass game was strong Wednesday when he hilariously owned ESPN analyst and former NFL punter Pat McAfee, who was offering his support to the professional sports gambler.

Good point.

While all three contestants certainly have loyal fans, Holzhauer has an advantage when it comes to recency bias with Jennings and Rutter first appearing on the show in 2004 and 2000, respectively. He dominated the game like no one ever has, and whether or not you think he’s the GOAT, he undeniably changed Jeopardy! forever with his strategy.

His 2019 Jeopardy! run reignited the GOAT debate and led to this special tournament — which could be as short as three matches or as long as seven — which was specifically designed to crown the best of the best.

So regardless of whether casual fans, diehard viewers or McAffee think Holzhauer is the GOAT, if he doesn’t win this tournament, he’s officially not.

Here’s a same of Jeopardy James’ tweets reacting to the first match:

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