Idiotic Jeopardy wagers (no spoilers before 6 EST)

If anyone else watched Jeopardy tonight then maybe they feel my pain on this one. The worst part is that if either of the 2 trailing players had bet the "right" amount they would have won, including the guy who went into Final Jeopardy with only about 1/3 as many chips as the other players.

Dollar amounts of players from right to left entering Final Jeopardy from left to right (I don't remember their names):

P1: $4800 P2: $13,800 P3: $12,000

Category/question is irrelevant but for the curious it was "Acting Families" and they were looking for the last name of a father and son who played 2 different real US Presidents, one on film and one on TV.

Now obviously neither P1 nor P3 can possibly win if P2 gets the answer right. He is forced to bet at least $10,201 to give him a total of $24,001 which is $1 more than double 2nd places $12K total.

With that in mind, the only way either of the other 2 have any shot whatsoever is if P2 gets it wrong, and since he has to bet at least $10,201 then he will have, at most, $3599 when that happens.

This means that P1 actually has a chance here provided P3 is stupid enough to be an amount that allows him to win. He's totally in it, he should bet $0 and his answer is irrelevant. Basically if P3 is not smart enough to make his victory impossible then she's probably dumb enough to make a huge bet and he'll win if they both miss it (which actually happens quite a lot in Final Jeopardy).

P3 however shouldn't bet any more than $2399 since that would allow P1 to pass her if he bet it all and got it right, which she can't allow to happen if she's thinking about it at all. So she can bet whatever she want's between $0-$2399 and if the leader (P2) misses the question she is GUARANTEED to win as he MUST bet $10,201 minimum.

Well, here's how it actually went down:

They all got it WRONG. Here is what they bet and what they wound up.

P1: $4,799 >>> $1
P2: $13,000 >>> $800
P3: $11,900 >>> $100

They totally handed it to P2 by making horrible wagers. Had either of them made rational bets they would have won easily. Notice how P3 sort of understands that leaving herself with something if she gets it wrong is good but ultimately decides on $100 for some reason that I'm sure made sense to her at the time. I expect this kind of **** on The Price is Right, but Jeopardy contestants should really know better.