Jason Miner was the big winner when he played Wheel of Fortune – but he had to keep it a secret until last week.
Family and friends of the former teacher filed into the WNIN public theater for the experience of a lifetime – watching Miner compete on Wheel of Fortune – and win.
An avid watcher of the game show, he said actually doesn’t always win while "playing" at home, but he won big when he flew out with some family to Los Angeles for the taping.
He said he's not sure why they picked him for the show.
“I'd like to think maybe it's a bit of personality,” he said. “Maybe I did get a few of the puzzles correct when I was doing the Zoom interview, but I think they could probably see how excited I was and how much I really wanted to be a part of the show.”
Miner had forgotten he had applied to the show fall of 2023. Producers eventually contacted him for a series of zoom interviews, which led to being on the show.
He said they filmed six other shows that day, and his was the last. He said the first time he saw stars Vanna White and Ryan Seacrest he was a little starstruck.
“But they were so down to earth, so kind, so friendly – it was just like having your neighbor in the room with you. So they didn't put themselves on a pedestal by any means.”
He said there wasn’t much of a strategy to winning. He did a lot of studying of words and word prefixes and suffixes before he went. “That might have helped a little, but I think luck plays a lot into it as well,” he said. “It's just kind of knowing what letters are missing, what letters go together.”
Solving puzzles before a studio audience was more difficult than solving at home from his couch, but after watching five show tapings, he was pretty relaxed.
He had the most cash at the end of the game, and solved the most puzzles. A cheer erupted from the crowd as he called out the winning puzzle: “So Much In Common.”
He won almost $78,000 in cash and prizes – $18,000 in cash, a trip to Las Vegas, and a Mercedes Benz he gets to pick out off the lot in LA.
He said he gets the cash and prizes on a delayed schedule. He’ll get the cash 120 days after the airing, and the car 150 days. The trip needs to be booked in the next 12 months.
“It was one of the most awesome experiences I have ever had. I went with the idea of, ‘let's just go and have fun and don't make fool of yourself.’ And I don't think I did. I had fun,” Miner said.
“Winning was the furthest thing from my mind. So when that happened, it was a big surprise. It was an awesome experience. And and I'm glad I don't have to keep the secret anymore.”
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