With 26 wins in his column, Jeopardy! champion and professional sports bettor James Holzhauer has started donating his winnings to charity.
Holzhauer notched his 26th consecutive win on Thursday and has amassed more than $1,900,000 in total winnings. But he has also begun donating tens of thousands to several charities.
According to the New York Post, Holzhauer is funneling much of his winnings to groups including the Las Vegas-Clark County Library, the Las Vegas Natural History Museum, and the Ronald McDonald House in Las Vegas.
Holzhauer has broken a series of records on the long-running game show. On April 17, for instance, he earned the biggest payday of any single game, winning $131,127, smashing his own previous record of $110,914. The next closest high single-game winning was the $77,000 earned in 2010 by contestant Roger Craig.
Indeed, James Holzhauer has done so well that he not only beat Craig’s $77,000 record; Holzhauer is averaging $77,000 per game.
The biggest record Holzhauer has yet to beat is the 74-game winning streak realized by Jeopardy! champion, Ken Jennings.
But Jennings recently said he is rooting for Holzhauer.
“I’m the only person alive who knows firsthand how difficult it is to do what Holzhauer is doing, and that’s why I’m rooting him on,” Jennings wrote. “I may hold a bunch of Jeopardy! records, but at heart, I’m just a fan of the show. And for any real Jeopardy! fan, this streak is something special.”
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.