We have “so much in common” but it’s what separates us that brought Jason Miner back home Thursday afternoon. That phrase was the winning puzzle Miner solved during his recent feature on Wheel of Fortune. It won him a new Mercedes Benz which he drove from his home in Evansville to Carmi Thursday for the Kiwanis Club’s regular weekly gathering. In total, the Omaha native won cash and prizes totaling more than $77,000; something no one else in attendance could relate to. Miner did his best to pull back the curtain while affably divulging and entertaining with behind the scenes, on set, and trip details from his cross-country trek to appear on the classic game show. The Miner family is well known in the area.
I graduated from NCOE in 1997, but Carmi’s always felt like home. My parents owned a furniture store here in Carmi for all of my life growing up. And when people ask where I’m from, I generally say Carmi because there’s a better chance they’ve heard of Carmi than Omaha.
He’s always been a fan of game shows and his success on Wheel wasn’t his first foray into the bright lights.
I’ve always loved game shows. When I was young, I was a huge fan of The Price is Right. That was my show. Several years ago, I was probably 19 or 20, some of my family and I went to the show and just to sit in the audience and we had a blast, but I left thinking ‘man if I was a contestant ever that would be so much fun’. So, back in 2017 I think it was, a friend and I went to California, got tickets to The Price is Right and I was the second name they called to ‘Come on down!’ and play so I was in contestant’s row. On the show, you have to guess [the price of] whatever prize is on the stage to get a chance to go on stage and play the game. What I learned about myself is I don’t know the price of anything.
Unfortunately, that was as close as Miner got as he spent the entire show on contestant’s row.
It was September of 2023 when Miner would receive an email that Wheel of Fortune had received his application…an application he admits he has no memory of filling out. Due to his affinity with talk shows, sitcoms, and seeing behind the scenes how shows are produced, he admits it’s definitely “something I’d do”.
After a series of Zoom meetings that ranged from simple introductions to competitive and some cooperative puzzle solving, Miner says he did not do well and assumed he wouldn’t be moving forward.
It was a year later in September of 2024 I received an email that said ‘Congratulations, you’ve been chosen for Season 42. Can you be in LA at Sony Pictures on November 6th?’ Before I even thought about it, I was like I’ll be there.
At that point, Wheel staff had him filling out information, answering questionnaires, even sending in pictures of himself wearing five different outfits in preparation. After arriving in LA and doing some sight-seeing, the day arrived. Miner says he had to report at 6:30am for what would become a very long day and his spot on TV still wasn’t guaranteed.
They filmed six episodes that day. Ryan [Seacrest] and Vanna [White] don’t work many days out of the year on that show. In one day, they film a whole week’s worth of shows. They had brought in twenty-one contestants; only eighteen of them were going to make the show because there are three people on each show, they filmed six shows, three would be alternates. And nobody knew who that was going to be. They told us they’d tell us later on in the day. So all morning your nerves are churning because you’re hoping you didn’t fly all the way to California just to be an alternate.
Hair and makeup…studying the rules…watching videos where former contestants made mistakes…learning strategies and the categories, signing more legal documents, the clock struck noon and it was time to find out if he made it.
I was the last name they called for the very last show of the day to be filmed.
Other insights Miner was able to share include determining contestant spots around the wheel on set which he says is a random marble drawing. He described the wheel as very heavy, says they shoot each episode’s opening scene three times and splice the pieces together, and said everything is meticulously cleaned during commercial breaks from the wheel itself to the carpets and floors, even the car Miner would eventually win.
Among Miner’s family that got to enjoy the day with him included his sister Julie, niece Sydney, and his mother though a nasty case of food poisoning spoiled her chance to see what happened.
Miner started slow, failing to solve the first puzzle or get any money on the board. He caught his stride after spinning and landing on the Express Wedge.
If I chose to play it, I could call out letters without spinning the wheel and get $1,000 for every letter I got or I would go bankrupt if I called a letter that wasn’t in the puzzle. Well, I had no money so I said let’s play it. I called out two letters and immediately I knew what the puzzle was so I continued to call out every letter in the puzzle racking up my score. The answer to the puzzle was ‘The hottest show in town’. It also happened to be a prize puzzle and I won a trip to Las Vegas.
All told, Miner won a nice chunk of cash, that all expenses paid trip to Las Vegas, and a new car valued at more than $51,000; not bad for a guy who went in asking for very little.
I had prayed before I went. Lord, let me have fun and don’t let me look like an idiot. That was all I wanted. I didn’t want to become a meme or go viral for saying something stupid.
You can watch Miner’s Bonus Round below. If you want to try to find the show streaming on demand, it’s Season 42, Episode 85.
