Top-Ranked Scrabble Player Plays Dirty Word on Way to Major Tournament Win

By Christian Hoffer

A top-ranked Scrabble player used some colorful language on his way to victory in this year's Scrabble Word Cup. Ben Schoenbrun was one of 52 players who participated in this year's Scrabble Word Cup, an annual tournament with $60,000 in prizes held in Albany, NY. During a match against Lukeman Owolabi, Schoenbrun played the word "Fuckwit" for a 26 point play. As noted on the live stream, the word is not only a legal word for use in Scrabble, it also got rid of several tricky letters, including an F, U, and W all at once. The clip can be seen at the 1:27:53 mark in the video below.

Interestingly, Scrabble's use of vulgar words is why official Scrabble tournaments can't be streamed on Twitch, as the commentators noted that Twitch asked tournament organizers not to have vulgar words on display for 30 minutes or more on screen. 

We'll note that the Scrabble Word Cup featured two separate tournaments governed by separate Scrabble Word Dictionaries. However, "Fuckwit" is a legal word in both major dictionaries, so the play would have worked in either format.  

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Schoenbrun's play helped him secure the victory over his opponent on the way to a Word Cup victory. Schoenbrun placed first with a record of 23-8 and a score differential of +2242. His victory earned him $10,000 in prize money. This was Schoenbrun's Word Cup win. 

The largest North American Scrabble tournament, the Scrabble Player's Championship, will take place later this month in Las Vegas. The prize pool for the tournament has not been announced yet, although the tournament is being held back to back with the WESPA Championships, which is the largest tournament for international players, likely making the event the biggest organized Scrabble event of all time. 

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