Did you see this coming? “Jeopardy” ultra-champ Ken Jennings, who became a household fixture in 2004 during his 74-game winning streak is making headlines again. But, this time it’s in contrast to his squeaky clean image. Two years after hauling in more than $2.5 million in winnings from the game show, Jennings’ is blasting “Jeopardy” and its host Alex Trebek.
One of the unkind comments recently posted on Jennings’ website reads:
“I know, I know, the old folks love him, but nobody knows he died in that fiery truck crash a few years back and was immediately replaced with the Trebektron 4000 (I see your engineers still can’t get the mustache right, by the way).”
But Jennings’ doesn’t stop there; instead the software engineer from Salt Lake City also took aim at the show’s “effete, left-coast” categories and “same-old” format. The show’s set designers were not spared from Jennings’ caustic comments either.
“You seem to think ‘change’ means replacing a blue polyethylene backdrop with a slightly different shade of blue polyethylene backdrop every presidential election or so,” wrote Jennings.
When I first read Jennings’ posting I initially figured that the ex-“Jepopardy” champ was merely desperate for attention. He’s been out of the spotlight for two years and he probably figures he can generate buzz for his website if he throws cheap shots in the direction of the show that thrust him into the national spotlight. Talk about biting the hand that feeds (fed) you. I am unimpressed with Jennings’ comments and others seem to agree.
A backlash from readers forced Jennings’ to post a “correction” on his website two days ago. Here is a portion of Jennings half-hearted apology to “Jeopardy” host Alex Trebek:
“We regret the insinuation that Mr. Alex Trebek is a robot, and has been since 2004. Mr. Trebek’s robotic frame does still contain some organic parts, many harvested from patriotic Canadian schoolchildren, so this technically makes him a ‘cyborg,’ not a ‘robot.'”
So what do you think? Desperate cry for attention… or Jennings’ true character finally revealed?