The 10 Most Hilariously Wrong Answers On “Jeopardy!”

Warning: you will facepalm at least five times during this article.

Danny Gallagher

Sep 17, 2012

Competing in a meeting of the minds like Jeopardy! can be a soul-wrenching experience, so it’s understandable if a wrong answer, even one that seems like it came from the most disturbed and damaged part of the brain, flies out of someone’s mouth. However, that doesn’t make them any less hilarious.

“Tool Time” for $200

Jeopardy! warrior Ken Jennings didn’t have many slip-ups in his looong 72-episode run, but this one was so shocking that it’s almost as famous as his impressive achievement. Sure, practically everyone who watched it probably thought it was the answer before it flew out of Jennings’ mouth, but hearing it come from the bookish Mormon is like hearing Richard Simmons ask for the stripper with the biggest “badonkadonk”.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What is a belt stripper?” / “What is a tool box?”

“I Went to UCLA” for $400

Celebrity Jeopardy! tournaments are usually dumbed down, since the winnings are for charity and depriving the “Make a Wish” foundation of a hefty donation because you didn’t know who played the lead in “Hello, Dolly!” is a PR nightmare. This query for Lakers legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, however, takes dumbing down to a whole new level when he’s asked a question that includes a direct quote attributed to him from his “Airplane!” performance.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “Who is me?” / “Who is Roger Murdoch?”

“Group Countdown” for $600

Jeopardy! questions aren’t always about some obscure Jamaican monarch that you couldn’t remember if you completely gave up smoking pot in college – it’s also a game of wordplay and etymology. This player fails to figure out this word puzzle in record time and utters an answer that made women laugh, and men zone out for a second as they become lost in their own imagination.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What is a prom night I’ve always regretted?” / “What is a one-time anniversary gift?”

“Starts with a Body Part” for $1,600

One of the scariest sounds you can hear as a “Jeopardy!” contestant, other than the screaming of the phrase “I have no son!” from a parent in the studio audience, is the chime of the “Daily Double”. One question can literally catapult you to the top of the leaderboard or send you home in shame. So we can understand why this guy choked from the pressure and blurted out the first thing he could think of, which just happens to be the one thing men think of every eight seconds.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What is a cockatoo?” / “What is a peckerwood?”

“Punch” for $800

This hilarious answer didn’t elicit a single laugh from anyone in the studio audience, but anyone watching at home who was mildly vulgarity-literate had to reach for oxygen during all the uncontrollable laughter. Alex, however, sounds as though he’s among the oxygen deprived as he tries to suppress a laugh that sounds so strong, it could blow his sinuses clean out of his head.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What is a sperm whale?” / “What is a titmouse?”

“16th Century Names” for Final Jeopardy!

The trick to answering a “Final Jeopardy!” answer that doesn’t immediately leap to your mind, according to “Jeopardy!” champion and “Prisoner of Trebekistan” author Bob Harris, is to search the clues for hints that might accidentally lead you to the best possible answer. This guy clearly had something else running through his mind.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “Who is Heidi Fleiss?” / “Who is Ringo IV?”

“Roman Empire” for $300

The Roman Empire is another one of the “Jeopardy!” categories that would make us quake in our contestant booths. Either it got to this contestant from one of the game show’s older episodes, or he couldn’t pass up the opportunity to make the smartest poop joke in television history.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What are marijuana dispensaries?” / “What are poopatoriums?”

“‘R’2 ‘D’2” for $2,000

The audience doesn’t get a big kick out of this silly answer, but Alex can’t help but laugh right in this poor woman’s face like she’s one of the many “9-rated” lady fans who offered him a night with them: Sure, any mere mortal male would be thrilled to have them, but Alex Trebek’s greatness only deserves 10’s.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What is circley?” / “What is, and if you laugh at this Alex I’ll gut you like a Canadian sturgeon, rotunderer?”

“TV Celebrities” for Final Jeopardy!

The two wrong answers in this “Final Jeopardy!” actually are educated guesses. In fact, given the fact that the correct answer requires watching one of the least intelligent shows in broadcasting history, they should have awarded the wrong answers a couple of bonus bucks for trying to save humanity.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “Who is ALF?” / “Who is me after I totally nailed this ‘Final Jeopardy!’ by betting everything and am hauling ass to Tijuana right after the show, motherf#*$&s?!?”

“U.S. Cities” for Final Jeopardy!

The famous showdown between two of “Jeopardy’s!” biggest champions, Kennings and Brad Rutter, and IBM’s super smart Watson computer left a lot of tin-foil hat wearing conspiracy nuts wondering if the robots were one step closer to achieving total human domination. This clearly didn’t shut them up, because Glenn Beck still has a job.

Wrong Answers That Would Have Been More Humiliating/Hilarious: “What is Normandyville?” / “What is…answer does not computer…EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!”