Ranking Jamie Ding's Run Among The Jeopardy Greats Part 1: Why Eight Was Often Enough on Jeopardy And Where Jamie Compares to Them

 

 

In terms of bringing out great Jeopardy champions Season 42 already has last year beat.

We started the season with Paolo Pasco who won 7 games and over $195,000 before being defeated by Steven Olson who himself would join Paolo in the 2026 Tournament of Champions. Paolo would earn a bye into the semi-finals en route to the most dominant performance by any Jeopardy champion in the Finals of the Tournament of Champions in its new format, running away with three games in spectacular fashion in an extraordinary appearance.

Just before the eligibility requirement for the 2026 Tournament of Champions ended fans were greeted by the arrival of the next Jeopardy super-champion fourteen game winner who won $373,999 during November and then on December 1^st met defeat.

Now a month after the postseason came to an end a new Jeopardy great has entered the list of great Jeopardy players and while he is not yet a super-champion he is quickly entering the discussion of so many that we have been privileged to witness in the post-Trebek Era. As yesterday he managed his eighth victory I feel it is time to discuss his place in Jeopardy lore. Because even his run stops before he gets to double digits – and if he does I will discuss him at great length on Friday  -  Jamie is setting himself up to be a force to be reckoned with. Like Harrison it's impossible to imagine him not getting a bye into the semifinals of the 2027 Tournament of Champions when his run ends and since he's already second in both games won and money so far, its worth talking about him now.

If 11 games is where discussion of super-champion status has become in the post-Trebek era, 8 games is where being considered a truly great Jeopardy player was ever since the five game limit was removed at the start of the 2003-2004 season. Indeed when Tom Kavanaugh won eight games at the start of 2006 it was the third-place total in terms of games won behind David Madden and Ken Jennings until Dan Pawson surpassed two years later.

Between Tom Kavanaugh's run in and Arthur Chu officially taking third place with 11 wins in 2014 only five other players managed to win eight games. I've mentioned some of them in previous articles but for the record here they are again:

 

Dan Pawson, 9 wins $170,902

Tom Nissley, 8 wins, $235,405

Jason Keller, 9 wins, $213,900

Drew Horwood, 8 wins, $138,100

Ben Ingram, 8 wins, $176,534.

 

Dan and Ben both went on to win the Tournament of Champions in 2009 and 2014 respectively and have been invited back for multiple special tournaments multiple times in the years since including the first Jeopardy Invitational Tournament in 2024.  Jamie Ding at this point has won $222,203 which puts him considerably ahead of everyone save for Tom.

Its one of those oddities of gameplay how Jeopardy played out between Arthur Chu ushering in the modern super champion in 2014 and James Holzhauer essentially permanently defining it  in 2019 that there were six players who won eleven games or more but no one who won exactly eight games. We had quite a few seven game winners and Buzzy Cohen managed to win 9 games in 2016 but no one managed exactly eight. In the 2019 Tournament of Champions, the last ever hosted by Alex Trebek Ryan Fenster, Josh Hill and Kyle Jones all won seven games which was tied for second behind Holzhauer in games won.

In the truncated 2019-2020 season as I've written Jeopardy saw three female eight game champions between December of 2019 and February of 2020: Jennifer Quail, Karen Farrell and Mackenzie Jones. Jennifer was the most successful of the three, finishing as 1^st runner up in the 2021 Tournament of Champions and a semi-finalist in the first Jeopardy Invitational Tournament.

In Season 38 we saw three players who managed to win eight games or more: Stephen Webb, Hannah Wilson and Ben Chan. The latter has very quickly become one of the greatest Jeopardy champions of all time finishing a runner-up in the 2024 Tournament of Champions. We saw Isaac Hirsch come up with 9 games in 2024 and we all saw Laura Faddah make a certain kind of unfortunate Jeopardy history.

Since most of the eight day players of note had their moment in the post-Trebek its worth comparing Jamie Ding at this point in his run with them. I'll leave out Laura Faddah because, well, we all know why:

 

Jennifer Quail: $228,800

Karen Farrell: $159,603

Mackenzie Jones: $204,808

Stephen Webb: $184, 881

Hannah Wilson: $229,801

Ben Chan: $227,800

Isaac Hirsch: $195,389

Jamie Ding: $222,203

 

As someone who remembers all of the players on this list as some of his favorites to watch even among the era of super-champions it's hard not to consider Jamie at the level. Some of them were far more dominant in their original runs then Jamie has been to this point (I'm thinking of Hannah and Ben in particular) but they fit the same overall pattern: running away with several games but never by as big a margin as so many super-champions or constantly playing in tense exciting games where they're often fortunate to get a win, usually by being ahead at the end of Double Jeopardy and responding correctly in Final Jeopardy.

Of course Jamie hasn't been at the level of Tom Nissley, who ranks among the all time greats. And while he's played brilliantly in all eight games he's still behind where two of the all time greats were after six games.

 

Larissa Kelly: $222,597

Roger Craig: $230,200.

 

Of course as anyone who's watched Jamie's run knows there's an excellent reasons Jamie's still behind Roger and Larissa on the list of money won in his original run. In his second appearance Jamie had $34,000 at the end of Double Jeopardy and his nearest opponent had only $1600. He went incredibly big and risked $30,067 in Final Jeopardy and responded incorrectly and won just $3933. He learned his lesson after that and has been far more conservative in wagering whenever he has had a runaway ever since (though as you know if you've been watching when he's runaway with a game he hasn't exactly had much room to maneuver since then.)

Jamie Ding has not officially reached super-champion status and indeed his run might very well end tomorrow. It could also end in a week or longer; no one can predict the future certainly not even someone who's been watching Jeopardy all his life. But in an earlier era –  which would be seven years ago – Jeopardy fans would be considering him one of the all-time greats by this point. He's already proven multiple times how great he is and whenever his run ends I know he's made sure that Season 42 keeps on surprising and delighting us with so many great champions already.

Author's Note: Jeopardy, you're killing me. Those of you who read my last piece on Season 42 will remember that I talked about James Hirsh, who I'm confident we will see in the 2027 Tournament of Champions and James Denison, who according to Jeopardy has officially qualified for it. Now here comes Jamie Ding.  I swear to God, if the next player to qualify is Jimmy or Jim I'm just going to throw up my hands and call the show Jim-Pardy until the end of the year.