Last year, Travel and Leisure listed their Top 20 smartest cities in America. DC was #1. Austin was #5. Denver was #8. Nashville was #15. Dallas was #25. Philadelphia was #31. Well, the next time you run into someone who writes for Travel and Leisure magazine, do me a favor and invite them to take said mag and shove it directly up their ass. Because last night, instead of just taking  random polls as to which cities are smartest, we took it to the test. And for the 3rd consecutive time, Philly came out on top. And while the first two quizzes were played using Philly rules, this time we did everything the way they do it in those other 6 cities. We gave them home field advantage, we asked their questions and played by their rules. And we still came out on top. So next time someone tells you about some meaningless poll where they rank us below all of these other cities, ask them what criteria they use. Because when it is determined objectively, Philly is smarter than any other city in America. Time and time again.

But yeah, Travel and Leisure, good job with those “polls’. They’re also a great way to determine intelligence, I’m sure. Maybe this year you can throw darts at city names to determine rankings! But while you’re drawing names out of a hat, we’ll be kicking ass.

The real beauty of winning this event? Denver now has to present us with the Cup, which we get to name. So start thinking about what we should name this Cup, as it will retain this name in perpetuity.

And if any other nerds in any other city are reading this and want a piece, give us a time and date. We’ll be there. With bells on our feet and shanks in our pockets.

Here’s the final scores. (And yes, Dallas is just as dumb as we thought they were. To be fair, though, judging by their scores I assume that half of the teams in Dallas didn’t get to play because they couldn’t figure out how the front door to the bar worked.)

Scores determined by averaging scores of the Top 5 finishers in each city. The same quiz was asked last night in 7 different cities, including Philadelphia.

1. PHILADELPHIA. AVG. 78; High Score 82
2. DENVER. AVG 76; High Score 82
3. AUSTIN. AVG. 71; High Score 82
4. ALBUQUERQUE. AVG. 69; High Score 77
5. ALEXANDRIA (Aka DC). AVG. 60; High Score 69
6. NASHVILLE. AVG. 51; High Score 66
7. DALLAS. AVG. 45; High Score 58

As my old hometown paper used to say, “A fine time was had by all.” Well, except perhaps for Steak Em up, who, after beating the Specific Jawns by 34 points on Thursday night, lost to them by 2 on Sunday night at the JGTSI. The quiz, which was also played in 6 other cities in across the US, and had Philly taking on those cities, was done in Denver style. That way, if Philly won, there could be no excuses from those Mile High morons who have quickly become our fiercest nerd rivals in the US. Final scores from other cities are coming soon. The Denver style quiz (which is a little heavier on pop culture and a little lighter on sports than mine) seemed to work out just fine for the Jawns, who played almost every week of the JGTSI without  getting a single win. But they brought their A-game on Sunday night, and when the dust settled, had a shocking 82-80 shutout of Steak Em Up. In addition to the questions, there was also a terrific performance from the Terrence Brown trio, and National Mechanics was a terrific venue for the event. I definitely want to do another event there soon. All of the scores are after the jump.

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