It was a rough ending to a great Jeopardy! winning streak for Ben Chan, a philosophy professor at St. Norbert College.
He had won nine straight contests heading into Tuesday night’s episode, when this Final Jeopardy came up with the category of Shakespeare’s characters: “Both of the names of these 2 lovers in a Shakespeare play come from Latin words from ‘blessed.'”
The answer? It was: Who are Beatrice and Bendedick?
But Chan answered “Who are Beatrice and Benedict?” And the spelling mistake cost him dearly. He wagered enough that it left him second place, and Jeopardy! fans everywhere were so mad, because they thought spelling didn’t count:
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Lynn doesn’t finish spelling “Juliet” yet it’s ruled as a complete (albeit incorrect) response, and Ben misspells Benedick by one letter and is ruled incorrect. Clearly they knew what he was going for and yet ended his run on a terrible technicality. #Jeopardy pic.twitter.com/M9ZjJpfF5h
— Not Mark Wahlberg (@_MarkWithAnM) May 23, 2023
Sorry, but Ben got robbed on @Jeopardy tonight. He had Beatrice and Benedict (sic) and spelling does not affect whether or not a Final Jeopardy answer is right or wrong.
— Kait Hanson (@ByKaitHanson) May 23, 2023
Damn Ben on jeopardy got robbed. I thought spelling didn’t count.
— Rich (@FSURich) May 23, 2023
I am beyond disgusted with @Jeopardy!! They’ve never penalized anyone for wrong spelling, yet they chose to penalize 9 game winner Ben Chan in Final Jeopardy and cost him the game..He missed ONE LETTER!! This is so wrong!!! #Jeopardy #BringBackBenChan pic.twitter.com/hX6ALQTz6J
— 🇺🇸Jamie🇮🇱 #JusticeForMalkiRoth (@JaRaNo1128) May 23, 2023
In jeopardy rules, it states wrong spelling does not discredit an answer. Yet they did it tonight @Jeopardy
— Margie 🌸👩🏻⚕️ 😷🐇 (@margiegem) May 24, 2023
@Jeopardy Since spelling doesn't matter, Ben Chan just got SCREWED! He was correct in the Latin form!
— tnwiglex (@tnwiglex) May 24, 2023
The thing I hate about #Jeopardy is if Ben had said that response he would have got it correct, but writing it was wrong. The inconsistency has always bugged me.
— db (@metallidan) May 23, 2023
