Brian Cappelletto

Last updated
Brian Cappelletto in 2008 Brian Cappelletto.jpg
Brian Cappelletto in 2008

Brian Cappelletto (born 1969) is a Scrabble player who represents the United States in international competition. He was the runner-up at the inaugural World Scrabble Championship in 1991 and won the event in 2001. [1] He also won the American National Scrabble Championship in 1998, [2] and was the runner-up in 2008 [3] and 2010. [4]

Cappelletto appeared in Stefan Fatsis's book Word Freak , which follows the stories of several of Scrabble's top players in North America. Fatsis calls him "Scrabble's first child prodigy". The documentary Scrabylon , about the 2001 World Championship, also features Cappelletto as a central character. [5]

Cappelletto first appeared as a Division 1 player at the 1987 National Scrabble Championship, winning 16 of his 21 games and finishing with a winning spread of 1300. He has since appeared at the Championship ten more times, finishing in the top 5 on seven occasions in addition to his 1998 victory. He has not appeared at the World Championship since winning it in 2001. As of June 2010, his NASPA Games rating was 2047, making him the top-rated player in Illinois and the second-highest rated player in the United States. [6] Since beginning his career in 1985, he has played at least 2,700 tournament games, winning about 69%, and earning over $164,000 in prize money.

Cappelletto lives in Chicago, Illinois. Outside Scrabble, he works as an options trader and lists his interests as golf, impersonations and fantasy baseball.

Related Research Articles

<i>Scrabble</i> Board game with words

Scrabble is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left to right in rows or downward in columns and are included in a standard dictionary or lexicon.

Mark Nyman is an English professional Scrabble player originally from London, England and now a resident in Cheshire. At the end of 2002, he was rated 205 and was top-rated in the ABSP ratings. As at 7 September 2015 he is rated 200. His 27 consecutive tournament game wins is an ABSP record. He is most widely known as the first British player to win the World Scrabble Championship, which he accomplished in 1993. He married in 2004 and has two children, Max and Kizzy.

The World Scrabble Championship (WSC) is the most-prestigious title in competitive English-language Scrabble. It was held in every odd year from 1991 to 2013. From the 2013 edition, it became an annual event. It has been an open event since 2014. Although the official brand name and organizations of the event have changed over the years, many Scrabble enthusiasts from more than 30 countries compete to become World Scrabble Champion.

The World Scrabble Championship 2001 was the sixth World Scrabble Championship. The winner was Brian Cappelletto of the United States.

Joel Wapnick is a Scrabble player from Montreal, Quebec, Canada, best known for winning the 1999 World Scrabble Championship (WSC).

The Scrabble Players Championship is the largest Scrabble competition in North America. The event is currently held every year, and from 2004 through 2006 the finals were aired on ESPN and ESPN2. The 2019 event was held in Reno from July 20–24, 2019, with Alec Sjöholm emerging as champion.

Adam Logan Canadian mathematician

Adam Logan is a research mathematician and a top Canadian Scrabble player. He won the World Scrabble Championship in 2005, beating Pakorn Nemitrmansuk of Thailand 3–0 in the final. He is the only player to have won the Canadian Scrabble Championship five times. He was also the winner of the 1996 National Scrabble Championship, North America's top rated player in 1997, and the winner of the Collins division of the 2014 North American Scrabble Championship.

<i>Official Scrabble Players Dictionary</i> Word authority for American tournaments

The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary or OSPD is a dictionary developed for use in the game Scrabble, by speakers of American and Canadian English.

Joel Sherman American Scrabble player

Joel Sherman, nicknamed "GI Joel", is a top American Scrabble expert and former world champion. He is chronicled in Stefan Fatsis's book Word Freak, in Eric Chaikin's film Word Wars, and in Scott Petersen's film Scrabylon. He is also mentioned in Collins Gem's reference book. He was born in The Bronx, New York, and is an alumnus of the Bronx High School of Science.

Jim Kramer

Jim Kramer won the 2006 United States Scrabble Open in Phoenix, Arizona. Kramer has competed in 15 U.S. championship Scrabble tournaments and has represented the U.S. at the World Scrabble Championships six times. Before winning the 2006 USSO, he had top-ten finishes in the national championships three times, in 1998, 2000, and 2005. His fifth-place finish at the 2003 World Championship (WSC) was the highest by any North American player that year. He finished third in 2001.

Dave Wiegand American Scrabble player (born 1974)

Dave Wiegand is an American Scrabble player who won the National Scrabble Championship in 2005 and 2009.

Clive Spate is a British game show contestant. He was the winner of the eighth series of Countdown and has won many other TV quizzes, including the 2003 series Grand Slam, a contest between previous quiz show champions which also featured Olav Bjortomt, Mark Labbett, Graham Nash and David Edwards, among others.

Stefan Fatsis American author and journalist

Stefan Fatsis is an author and journalist. He regularly appears as a guest on National Public Radio's All Things Considered daily radio news program and as a panelist on Slate's sports podcast Hang Up and Listen. He is a former staff reporter for The Wall Street Journal.

Nigel Richards (Scrabble player) International Scrabble champion

Nigel Richards is a New Zealand–Malaysian Scrabble player who is widely regarded as the greatest tournament-Scrabble player of all time. Born and raised in New Zealand, Richards became World Champion in 2007, and repeated the feat in 2011, 2013, 2018, and 2019, and remains the only person to have won the title more than once. He also won the third World English-Language Scrabble Players’ Association Championship (WESPAC) in 2019.

The North American School Scrabble Championship, formerly the National School Scrabble Championship, is a Scrabble tournament for 3rd grade to 8th grade students, held annually in North America since 2003.

The French World Scrabble Championships is an annual Scrabble tournament that takes place in a different French-speaking country every year. Created in 1972 by Hippolyte Wouters, it was the first of the three World Scrabble Championships to be created, with the English version being created in 1991 and the Spanish version being created in 1997.

NASPA Games, formerly known as North American Scrabble Players Association (NASPA), is a nonprofit organization founded in 2009 to administer competitive Scrabble tournaments and clubs in North America. It officially took over these activities from the National Scrabble Association (NSA) on July 1, 2009. As of July 31, 2021, the organization is no longer associated with the North American owner of the SCRABBLE® trademarks, Hasbro, Inc.

The UK National Scrabble Championship (NSC) is a British national Scrabble tournament that has been held annually since its inception in 1971. It was formerly organised by Mattel, the copyright owners of Scrabble in the UK, and has been organised by the Association of British Scrabble Players (ABSP) since 2014. It is one of five major tournaments in the UK, the other four being the UK Open, the British Isles Elimination Scrabble Tournament (BEST), the British Matchplay Scrabble Championship (BMSC) and the UK Masters. The current UK champion is Brett Smitheram.

Will Anderson is a Scrabble player who won the North American Scrabble Championship in 2017, winning 25 out of 31 games, finishing ahead of runner-up Mack Meller. Anderson is currently rated 2128 as of June 2020, ranking him first in North America in the OWL word source.

The Mattel World Scrabble Championship 2019 was a Scrabble tournament organised by Mattel and Mindsports Academy (MSA) to determine the world champion in English Scrabble held from 19 to 24 November 2019.

References

  1. Cappelletto's WSC history.
  2. Cappelletto's Scrabble Association profile Archived January 3, 2007, at the Wayback Machine ,
  3. "2008 NSC Division I Final Standings". Archived from the original on 2011-05-18. Retrieved 2008-07-30.
  4. "2010 NSC Division I Final Standings". Archived from the original on 2010-11-05. Retrieved 2010-09-01.
  5. Cappelletto's along with his friend and Broker of the year Kevin Kennedy. IMDB entry.
  6. "Search NSA Ratings List by Name". Archived from the original on 2006-09-11. Retrieved 2006-09-07. NSA ratings searcher.