Joel Sherman

Last updated
Joel Sherman
Joel Sherman.jpg
Born1962 (age 61 or 62)
Other namesGI Joel
Alma mater Bronx High School of Science
OccupationProfessional English-language Scrabble player
Years active1988–present

Joel Sherman (born 1962), nicknamed GI Joel, is an American professional English-language Scrabble player and former world champion. He is featured in Stefan Fatsis's book Word Freak , [1] in Eric Chaikin's film Word Wars , [2] and in Scott Petersen's film Scrabylon. [3] [4] He is also mentioned in Collins Gem's reference book.

He was born in The Bronx, New York in 1962, and is an alumnus of the Bronx High School of Science.[ citation needed ]

Sherman's major Scrabble tournament victories include:

Since beginning his career in 1988, he has played at least 4,750 tournament games, winning about 64%, and earning at least $135,000 in prize money. [5] He is director of NASPA Games Club #56, which meets on Thursday evenings in New York City.[ citation needed ]

Sherman holds the record for the highest score recorded in a tournament game played with the North American lexicon, having defeated Bradley Robbins 803-285 at a tournament in Stamford, Connecticut on December 9, 2011. [6]

His nickname is derived from a health problem, gastrointestinal reflux syndrome, and a pun on the G.I. Joe action figure.[ citation needed ]

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.

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 2023 event was held in Las Vegas from July 15–19, 2023, with Joshua Sokol emerging as champion.

<i>Word Freak</i> 2001 book by Stefan Fatsis

Word Freak is a non-fiction narrative by Stefan Fatsis published in 2001 (ISBN 0-618-01584-1).

Lexiko was a word game invented by Alfred Mosher Butts. It was a precursor of Scrabble. The name comes from the Greek lexicos, meaning "of or for words".

<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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jim Kramer</span>

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brian Cappelletto</span>

Brian Cappelletto 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. He also won the American National Scrabble Championship in 1998, and was the runner-up in 2008 and 2010.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stefan Fatsis</span> American journalist (born 1963)

Stefan Fatsis is an American 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.

<i>Word Wars</i> 2004 film

Word Wars is a 2004 documentary film directed by Eric Chaikin and Julian Petrillo about competitive Scrabble playing. Its full title is: Word Wars - Tiles and Tribulations on the Scrabble Circuit. The film was an official selection at the 2004 Sundance film festival, had a 25-city theatrical run, was included as part of the Discovery Times Channel's "Screening Room" series, and was nominated for numerous awards including a 2004 Documentary Emmy for "Best Artistic or Cultural Programming" and an International Documentary Association (IDA) Award. The film is distributed by 7th Art Releasing.

English-language Scrabble is the original version of the popular word-based board game invented in 1938 by US architect Alfred Mosher Butts, who based the game on English letter distribution in The New York Times. The Scrabble variant most popular in English is standard match play, where two players compete over a series of games. Duplicate Scrabble is not popular in English, and High score Scrabble is no longer practised.

David Eldar is an Australian Scrabble player and pro-amateur poker player who specializes in Omaha hold 'em. He is the World Scrabble Champion of 2017, sweeping Harshan Lamabadusuriya 3–0 in the final, and 2023, again beating Lamabadusuriya by a score of 4–3.

Nigel Richards (<i>Scrabble</i> 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. He also won the third World English-Language Scrabble Players’ Association Championship (WESPAC) in 2019.

The World English-Language Scrabble Players' Association (WESPA) is the overarching global body for English-language national Scrabble associations and similar entities.

Peter Morris is an American baseball researcher and author. A lifelong love of baseball led him to membership in the Society for American Baseball Research, where he became an active member of the Biographical Committee, researching the lives of early major league baseball players.

Will Anderson is known as a tournament Scrabble player and Scrabble content creator on YouTube. He is the North American national champion in 2017, winning 25 out of 31 games, finishing ahead of runner-up Mack Meller.

Harriet T. Righter was an American businesswoman, the president of Selchow and Righter, a game company, which was co-founded by her father. Her best-known addition to the company's properties was Scrabble, which she thought was "a nice little game".

Joshua Sokol-Rubenstein is a Canadian competitive Scrabble player and influencer. He won the 2023 Scrabble Players Championship.

The 2023 WESPA Championship (WESPAC) was a Scrabble tournament organized by NASPA Games as part of the NASPA Double Down in Las Vegas - at the Westgate Las Vegas Resorts & Casino in Las Vegas, NV.

References

  1. Fatsis, Stefan, Word Freak, September 2002, ISBN   978-0-224-06061-5
  2. Word Wars Internet Movie Database
  3. Scrabylon scrabylon.com
  4. Scrabylon Internet Movie Database
  5. "cross-tables.com". www.cross-tables.com. Retrieved 2019-10-28.
  6. game-by-game results for Joel Sherman in Stamford, CT 2011 at cross-tables.com