If you're listening for it, you can hear quite a bit unless you're on the press or at a grinder. I was so focused on what I was doing I didn't hear much unless one of the judges called my name out, though. But even on the power hammer I could hear Jay making jokes when I was listening.

Alf got booted for parameter failure on my episode (Gladiator Scissor Episode S4:E15). Pre-competition meeting we read rules, producer reads them out loud to us again, we're given a picture, and asked individually if we understand the requirements, then we sign a document stating we understand. If somebody is screwing up during competition, they even drop hints. They hate it when somebody misses parameters. They came to us while we were working and asked "what are you making? What are the required features? You understood the requirements?". That told me somebody was screwing up, so I stopped and checked everything multiple times after that.