To have a morsel in your hand but unable to taste it is the perfect example of Raquel Matta Jeopardy contestant’s situation.
Raquel Matta is a copy editor from San Pablo, California, United States.
Matta was perfectly set to dethrone the current champion Hannah Wilson, a data scientist from Chicago, Illinois. Still, a minor miscalculation on her part took that opportunity far away from her.
On the final day of Jeopardy, Raquel and Hannah were joined by project manager Joe Forti from Windham, New Hampshire, as the three played quite the competitive game.
At the beginning of the final round, Hannah led with $26K, while Raquel was at $14,000 and Joe was in third place with $5,800.
All three players made their secret bets under the category ‘Actresses and Their Roles.’
Then, the show’s host, 47-year-old Mayim Bialik, asked the much-anticipated question: “She made her big screen debut as a teen named Laurie in a movie in 1978, and she played that role for the seventh and last time in 2022.”
This is where things took a drastic turn. Joe first answered correctly with the response: Jamie Lee Curtis, wagering $5,798 to leave him at $11,598 for the rest of the game.
Meanwhile Raquel, in second place at the time, also answered correctly but only wagered $8,000 – leaving herself at $22,400.
Surprisingly, champ Hannah, answered incorrectly and wagered just $3,000, as she ended up with a grand total of $23,000 to beat out Raquel by only $600.
Raquel Matta Jeopardy player’s final wager left fans scratching their heads. The people were quick enough to jump on a thread discussing the show and were trying to make sense of Raquel’s decision.
“Why did Raquel leave $6,000 on the table?” asked one person. She put up a beautiful fight and was easily set up for success, as a correct Final Jeopardy is a correct Final Jeopardy no matter the wager.”
While some people were courteous enough to appreciate Raquel’s efforts before pointing out her mistake, some outright called her decision stupid and dumb.
It appears the fans were more upset than Raquel herself and couldn’t wrap their heads around her final wager.
Raquel’s loss not only deprived her of a win, but it also gave Hannah Wilson a winning streak of five straight.
Also, Monday night’s episode of Jeopardy made fans angry for a different reason.
Data scientist Hannah Wilson and her fellow competitors all lost out on earning more money because of a mere mispronunciation.
Hannah and players Juveria Zaheer and Sami Casanova were all left dumbstruck thanks to this question: “The author and former prisoner that said ‘socialism of any type and shade leads to a total destruction of the human spirit.’”
The three players were unable to pronounce the right answer correctly: Solzhenitsyn and all were labelled as incorrect without any regard.
How devastating it must have felt to know the right answer but still not get a reward for it.
Multiple viewers jumped in and defended the three contestants’ pronunciation. One person wrote, “Give me a break. They all had the right name! ”
Raquel Matta Jeopardy contestant’s bad decision and then this blatant disregard from the host’s side disheartened the fans.
Now that we know all about Raquel Matta’s bad final wager let’s get to know her more and take a closer look at her biography and age.
Raquel Matta Jeopardy player was born in the year 1967 but her exact date of birth is not known to the public. She is probably 55 or 56.
She was born and brought up in San Pablo, California. Although not much is known about her family background, her surname suggests that she has an Italian descent.
Raquel has lived in the same city all her life.
Her appearance on the May 9th Jeopardy episode was not her first time on the show. She was a contestant in the third season of Sports Jeopardy! in 2016.
Talking about her educational background, Raquel earned a Bachelor of Arts in History at the University of California, Berkeley.
Moreover, she holds a Master’s in Library & Information Science from San Jose State University.
This much education should have helped Raquel in making better decisions on the show, but unfortunately, it didn’t.
Matta is a professional copy editor. According to her Linkedin, she holds over 13 years of combined experience in the sports, financial, and educational fields.
As of now, she works as a copy editor at The Motley Fool, a private financial and investing advice company. She has been working at this position since 2017.
From 2011 to 2017, Raquel worked as a copy editor for the famous online sports website Bleacher Report.
Furthermore, for a brief time period, she was a proofreader at a financial services company named Wells Fargo.
It appears Raquel has worked all her life. She has extensive experience and is more skilled than most of the people that appear on Jeopardy.
From 2008 to 2009, Raquel Matta Jeopardy contestant, worked as a proofreader at WestEd, a research service in San Francisco, California.
She worked in the same position at Merrill Corporation for 10 years, from 1999 to 2009.
Raquel Matta doesn’t have a public account on Twitter or Instagram. She appears to live a private life and her appearances on Jeopardy are the only times she came into the limelight.
Since Raquel doesn’t have a public social media account, it’s difficult to figure out her marital status.
Even though Raquel couldn’t win Jeopardy due to a miscalculation on her part, her appearance on the show still got her sufficient attention.