What Will Matt Amodio Do Now That His Jeopardy! Winning Streak Is Over?
As the old saying goes, "what goes up, must come down." Alas, it appears "Jeopardy!" contestant Matt Amodio is all too familiar with the phrase as he has finally ended his impressive 38-game winning streak on the popular game show. When asked what took him so far in the competition, Amodio was blunt: "A lot of luck." He laughed as he told "Good Morning America" on October 4, "I feel like I've been in a fortunate position. It's just, once you get in a groove, things can just take you."
On the October 11 episode, however, it appears that Amodio's luck ran out. Still, "Jeopardy!" stans shouldn't expect Amodio to be drowning himself in a sea of tears quite yet, as People reports that Amodio walked away a whopping $1,518,601 richer. I'll take third place, for $1,000,000, Mike Ken Mayim.
Fortunately, Amodio appears to be taking it all in stride. "Everybody's so smart and so competent that this could happen any game," he declared in a statement. "And this time it did." But what's an Ohio native turned "Jeopardy!" champion to do after the curtain finally closes on his glory days and he's left with nothing but time on his hands to count his hard-earned prize winnings? Keep reading after the jump to find out!
Matt Amodio is set to compete on Jeopardy's Tournament of Champions
While contestant Matt Amodio officially ended his winning streak, it's still onward and upward for the "Jeopardy!" whiz. As reported by People, Amodio is set to compete on the game show's Tournament of Champions season wherein top winners from the prior season go head to head. Let the games begin!
As "Jeopardy!" watchers may recall, Amodio is still pursuing is his Ph.D. at Yale, studying Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence. In his LinkedIn bio, he writes that he is "interested in data-driven decision making and always looking for challenging problems to solve." We're sure the game show offered him some new experience on that front!
But what about in his downtime? Our guess is that he'll probably also be making the rounds at the Trivia nights in his hometown, with some newfound street cred to boot. "I always wanted to be a 'Jeopardy!' champion, and I accomplished that," Amodio said in a statement about his time on the show. "I know going into every bar trivia game that I play that I'm going to come in with a little intimidation factor. But also, I just like the badge that it represents." He then added, "As somebody who prioritizes knowledge and knowing things, this is really a good one to have following me everywhere." Watch out, barflies! "Jeopardy!" champ Matt Amodio coming to a trivia night near you!