Evaluation: Jackpot

Well, let's go:

The Spanish version makes their very last maingame round the Jackpot Round (instead of a Speed-Up). Good idea for the American version, or not?
Well, it hasn't been in this way always. In the very first days, the Panel con Bote was played in Round 3, and the last round was a normal round, but without Speed-Up. Even there were some shows that had two Paneles con Bote, Round 3 and the last one! Later the last round was a Panel con Premio (an sponsored Prize Puzzle worth between €1,000 and €2,000), and at some point of 2007 the Panel con Bote was moved to the last round if there wasn't any sponsored puzzles. Apart from this Panel con Premio, they have made more kinds of sponsored puzzles that I can explain you if you want, in this topic or in the one made for La Ruleta.

What I mean: since they award more cash in the last round they have made the show more exciting, because usually until the last round you don't know who will go to the BR, except in some cases that a player lands on the €1,000 space in previous rounds and wins €5,000 or more (just like yesterday, when a player won €9,000 in a round): they retire this wedge in the last round.

In "Wheel", it doesn't happen: the big cash round is Round 3 with Express and, specially, the Prize Puzzle. After that, yes, there are more rounds, but puzzles are shorter and, usually, they don't play more than two rounds, the latter being in part a Speed-Up round in which players often can't win enough to become winners if Pat doesn't hit the $5,000 space. What I would do is retire the Speed-Up and playing in last place an special round, maybe in this order: TU1/TU2/R1/R2 (Mystery)/R3 (Express)/TU3/R4 (PP). Now the Jackpot is retired, so they wouldn't play a Jackpot Round anymore.

Why do you think the Jackpot was retired?
I think that the Jackpot was simply retired because it was "old", as they did with the Free Spin replacing it with the Free Play wedge. Probably in some years they will do the same with the Mystery Wedges, which have now... 13 years?

However, I think that its current counterpart, the Express, is more exciting than the Jackpot. In Spain, the show lets players explicitly to control their strength to hit the Bote, so the final spins of the Wheel are more exciting: and as many of you have told, in "Wheel" you can't do it, or at least they can't notice that you are doing so.

Let's say you sat in that meeting where they decided to retire the Jackpot. Make the argument for keeping it around.
My argument would be that the Jackpot has been one of the signature wedges of "Wheel", such as the prize of the vowels or the retired Oreo $10,000 wedge. Probably they have talked about increasing the prize of the vowels when they increased the minimum to $500, but they haven't done it because of that.

PS: I've just noticed that I didn't evaluate the Mystery Wedges... Tomorrow I'll give my opinion, if you don't care about bumping up that thread 

I miss Jackpot. There were so many great things about it:
1. It favored good puzzle solvers.
2. It required luck to hit it at an opportune time (enough of puzzle revealed, large enough bank).
3. It was exciting to watch the bank grow with each successive spin.
4. Pat's joke to introduce the round. It almost always cracked me up.

Yeah, I can concede that Express is better overall, but why not rotate Jackpot in for variety's sake? As for replacing the SU with it, I just can't see that happening. The SU, while rarely giving trailing players a chance to come back from behind, has blessed us and the show with too many viral moments over the years for us to even count. It is here to stay.

I conclude my random musings on this subject with my own experience with the Jackpot round:
youtu.be/8U_O6KjzgQE
Thanks to this discussion, I have come to realize something: if only I had hit Jackpot instead of LAT on that fateful spin, things would've been SO different. Interestingly, after I had lost my turn, the next player DID hit it after revealing more of the board. The audience went WILD, and then gasped when she admitted she couldn't solve it and had to spin again. I heard the gasp (and subsequent murmuring from the audience), but it wasn't audible in what aired.

The biggest known Jackpot win was $16,000, back in October 2006. As for the latter, the highest one I know about was $23,250 on September 1997.


I think the thing is that over the Jackpot's last two seasons, it was won a total of 25 times (13 in S29, 12 in S30) for quite a bit of money. Below are all the wins of those two seasons, going numerically from lowest to highest winnings:
* S29: $6,000-$6,450-$7,000-$7,100-$7,300-$7,500-$7,750-$7,850-$9,100-$10,800-$11,050-$11,700-$13,150.
* S30: $7,300-$7,350-$7,550-$7,600-$7,750-$8,650-$9,000-$9,550-$9,950-$10,200-$10,350-$11,450.

As for why Jackpot was retired...I'm not sure, but it could well be budget since they were doing some money cutbacks in Season 31. If I were at the meeting where they discussed the Jackpot, I'd probably support it by arguing against the top prize being as high as it is.

I love the Jackpot. It was one of my favorite elements. Wheel Of Fortune never said why they retired it. Someone on the Wheeloffortune history wikia said that the Express could have been introduced in Season 31, but without retiring the Jackpot. I want the Jackpot back for Season 34.

Actually, there was at least one week (December 9-13, 1996) where it was won four times, including the Friday Finals, although that was several months before the Jackpot got sponsored.

The only 3+-win week I can find after sponsors were added was the week of March 17, 2003, which had three wins.


Maybe Eggland's Best was raising a gripe? I think they were the only Jackpot sponsor during its last two seasons, if not longer.

This is probably my 2nd most missed gameplay element (1st being the Free Spin). Horrible idea getting rid of it.