‘Jeopardy!’ Bosses Detail Why James Holzhauer Is Absent From ‘Masters’
Jeopardy! fans were shocked when James Holzhauer wasn’t a part of the lineup for the 2025 Jeopardy! Masters. The champion came in third during the last Masters, so he was an automatic invite.
The executive producers of the game show — Sarah Whitcomb-Foss and Michael Davies — went over the new Masters season during the latest episode of the Inside Jeopardy! Podcast, which was filmed in Washington D.C. on the live tour. During that update, they explained why Holzhauer is not a part of Season 3.
Masters Season 3 begins on Wednesday, April 30, at 9/8c on ABC. Regular Jeopardy! still airs before the tournament, with Celebrity Wheel of Fortune airing in the middle of them. Even with nine players this time, instead of six, Holzhauer still wasn’t in the lineup.
“As always, our top three Masters are guaranteed an invitation to the next Masters,” Whitcomb-Foss said. Victoria Groce and Yogesh Raut, the 2024 Masters winner and runner-up, are returning for Masters 2025. However, James Holzhauer was the next runner-up, but Brad Rutter, the biggest money winner of all time, is taking his place instead.
“But, that might leave you wondering, there is another Master — our third-place finisher James Holzhauer,” Whitcomb-Foss said. “As we mentioned, it is an invitational tournament. We absolutely did extend the invitation to James, and he decided for this year, he was not going to compete.”
“Absolutely his right,” Davies said. “It’s an invitational. We invite the people we want to invite. We extended it to nine people this year to build more equity. We completely respect James’ decision.”
Holzhauer is best known for his 32-game winning streak from April to June 2019. He set multiple single-game records for winning during that time. Holzhauer also won the Tournament of Champions that November. He won $2,464,216 in his 33 appearances, making him the second-highest winner in Jeopardy! regular play, behind Ken Jennings, according to the game show’s website.
The Masters episodes will be one hour long and consist of two games per episode, with nine episodes in total. Alongside Groce, Raut, and Rutter, 2025 Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions winner Neilesh Vinjamuri, TOC finalists Adriana Harmeyer and Isaac Hirsch, 2025 Jeopardy! Invitational Tournament champion Matt Amodio, and JIT finalists Roger Craig and Juveria Zaheer, are all competing.
Jeopardy! Masters, Wednesday, starting April 30, ABC, next day on Hulu
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Conversation9 Comments
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I enjoyed watching James . He will be missed this year. Maybe he will be back next year .
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I'll miss James. Along with his tremendous skill as a player, his easy, laid-back style and big laugh that made him watchable. Won't be the same tournament without him.
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Indeed, fans would appreciate additional clarification. I can tell that this new season of Masters aims for fairer opportunity, but I also have mixed opinions about the overall arrangement. This year's appears to be the laziest ever since the 2nd-chance tournament started. What I notice is that this year's Masters will include at least one rematch among this year's TOC finalists & JIT finalists, which is inconsistent with last year's arrangement.
This new season will extend into the summer anyway, so why not increase the contestant pool to at least 12 instead of 9. Besides, they're plenty of top non-winning contestants, too (Luigi de Guzman, Troy Meyer, Shane Whitlock, Matt Jackson, Ben Chan, Dave Madden, Raymond Goslow, Jaskaran Singh,..., etc.). Also, this year's arrangement lacks diversity: 6/9 whites are in, increasing the odds of at least 2 whites entering the finals; and the remaining 3 are all South Asians.
If Jeopardy plans for a Season 4 of Masters, maybe have Ken Jennings compete again, and have a special host to take over his current role.
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Seriously, a Masters competition -- where contestants have to EARN their invitation -- and you still are crying for diversity by race???
Please remember that this is a TV game show and not a forum on political correctness.
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No mention of Amy Schneider?? Regardless Victoria Groce is a juggernaut and is by far the number one choice to win in my opinion...BUT one note...finding the Double Jeopardies (luck) seems to have become the key to winning these tournaments....but this takes away from the real skill of the game which is being a master of general knowledge...everyone goes for doubling down when they find one...its getting tedious...is there not another format that can use for these events!!
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I have seen Amy on there enough.
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Holzhauer's decision perhaps hinged on the idea that he hasn't been doing his homework lately & has become rusty.
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I don't know about that. Most of the champions knowledge seems to be ingrained. I suspect James knows Victoria Groce is unbeatable.
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I think there are several in that group who could give Holzhauer a run for his money: Raut, Harmeyer, Zaheer, just to name a few.
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