10 Most Devastating Losses In Game Show History

Since the dawn of television, Americans have tuned in to watch their fellow American solve puzzles, answer trivia, jump through hoops, and pick the right briefcase all for a shot at becoming an instant millionaire, or thousand-aire, depending on the game show.

There have been some iconic moments in game show history, like Ken Jenning’s seventy-four day Jeopardy streak or John Carpenter being the first person to win the top prize on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. But what about the other guys? What about all the losers? Well, here are some of them.

10 Julian, Wheel of Fortune

Julian did not have a good night on this game show. The wheel played in his favor, even giving him a chance at a million dollars, but Julian couldn’t seem to get out of his own way. The first mistake of the evening came when Julian got all the letters in a puzzle. The puzzle read “Mythological Hero Achilles.” All Julian had to do was solve the puzzle, aka, say those words out loud. When he got to the final word he pronounced the “ch” in “Achilles”, not as a k-sound, which phonetically speaking, is how the word is pronounced, but he said it with a ch- sound, like “cheese” or “checkers.” You can’t mispronounce words on the Wheel of Fortune, so Julian lost his turn and the next player solved the puzzle.

9 Jason, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire

The first question or two on this show are always pretty easy. In fact, they’re so easy that if you don’t come up with the correct answer for the first question, you’ll go down in game show history as being, well, not the brightest bulb.

This was the unfortunate reality for Jason, whose first question on the popular game show was, “Homeowners buy surge protectors to protect their possessions from unexpected surges of what?” A, Electric current, B, Water flow, C, Air pressure, or D, Buyer’s remorse. Jason’s final answer was B, Water flow and he was genuinely shocked when he got it wrong.

8 Anna, Family Feud

Having to be the person who goes second during the final round of Family Feud can’t be fun. That’s a lot of pressure! Not only is your team’s entire win resting on your shoulders, but more times than not, all the good answers are already taken by your teammate who went before you. That was Anna’s problem during her turn at Fast Money. She only needed eighteen points to bring home the win and she ended up getting zero points. She didn’t get a single answer on the board and her team walked away empty handed.

7 Breton, Price Is Right

This guy made one of the craziest mistakes in game show history and is surprisingly, the only loser on this list who didn’t lose. Breton is playing Flip or Flop for a piano on the Price is Right. Using the show’s board, he has to choose to either flip the numbers or keep them as is to guess the correct price of the piano.

Breton does neither of those things, instead, he just hits the button on the board to reveal the correct answer, causing Bob Barker to walk off stage, where he takes a few deep breaths, then comes back to let Breton know that he’s going to give him the piano anyways.

6 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Jeopardy

During a game of Celebrity Jeopardy, Kareem gave an incorrect answer to a question, which on this show, usually isn’t too big of a deal. However, when you guess yourself and you get it wrong, that will definitely go on a list of devastating losses. The answer was, “Tell your old man to drag this 70’s UCLA and Trail Blazer Center (and Lanier) up and down the court for 48 minutes,” to which Kareem responded, “Who is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar?” And it wasn’t, the correct answer was Bill Walton.

5 Nikki, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire

Nerves definitely play a factor in a game show contestant’s success or failure. In Nikki’s case, nerves were her downfall. From the moment she walks on stage, Nikki is visibly nervous and she can’t get a word out without giggling, so the audience brace themselves when the questioning begins.

Her first question just requires some basic math. “What is the minimum number of six-packs one would need to buy in order to put ‘99 bottles of beer on the wall’?” After two minutes of giggling and talking it out, Nikki guesses 19. And that’s wrong.

4 Deal Or No Deal

This loss is hard to watch. The contestant has five suitcases left. Four are low numbers, two are high numbers. With those odds, the banker offers him $120,000 to walk away, which, after consulting with his family on the sidelines, he doesn’t take. He goes for it and opens up the 1,000,000 suitcase, ruining his chances at walking out with a six figure win. This contestant continues to press his luck until he’s out of options and takes the banker’s $40 deal to walk away.

3 All Three Contestants, Jeopardy

Not only was it a devastating loss for all three contestants, but it was also one of the strangest, most serendipitous occurrences to ever happen on a game show. It was Final Jeopardy, and the answer was, “A 1957 even led to the creation of a national historic site in this city, signed into law by a President whose library is now there too.” The first contestant guessed “Springfield,” the second contestant guessed “Austin,” and the third contestant guessed “Atlanta.” All three were wrong and all three wagered their full earnings, so they were all left with a balance of zero and a whole new batch of contestants were brought in the next day. And in case you wondering, the right answer was “Little Rock.”

2 Michael, The Price Is Right

All Michael had to do was guess the correct price for a box of dishwashing detergent. The brand was Bon Ami, and Michael had to guess the correct price while playing the popular Price Is Right game, Grocery Games. Michael guessed that the well-known French cleaning product was $1.08 and the actual retail price was $1.09.

But, as Bob Barker points out shortly after Michael’s devastating loss, there is a bright side. Because Michael lost by only a dollar, he will now go down in history as one of the saddest losers that game show has ever seen and he winds up on a list like this one!

1 Casey, Wheel Of Fortune

Casey played with fire during one round of Wheel of Fortune. The puzzle had three letters left to solve, but it clearly spelled out “Exclusive Nightclub”, only the “x”, the “v” and the “g” were missing. Instead of solving the puzzle Casey decides to spin and barely clears the Bankruptcy space on the wheel, and if that weren’t enough, she decides to spin again, and when it’s time for her to guess another letter, she guesses “k,” leaving us all to wonder how Casey thinks the word “exclusive” is spelled.

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