Ask the Slot Expert: Strange video poker story on Jeopardy

Did you hear the following story about hitting a royal flush told by a Jeopardy contestant in her interview segment on May 14, 2025?

Contestant: I was really lucky. I was in Vegas with my husband and we were playing video poker at three in the afternoon, empty casino. And I got dealt a royal flush and I almost passed out. And then I held every card as carefully as possible. And won. And then-- What they don’t tell you is that then you have to, like, verify it. It’s not like they just spit out $1000.

Ken Jennings: Oh, it’s not like in the movies?

C: No, you just go, “Here, come help me.” [Waving hand in air.] My husband’s running around. “Please, come, find my wife. Give her money.” And I was kind of hoarding off all the old ladies who wanted to take my machine.

KJ: That’s very disappointing because you think it’s gonna spit quarters at you, and instead you’re like somebody at the CVS who wants the Immodium unlocked.

C: Basically. Yeah, he had a key. He didn’t look really happy as I was.

KJ: You did get the money in the end.

C: Yes, I did.

KJ: I’m glad to hear it.

A number of things in this story struck me as unusual. First, she was dealt a royal flush. Then she said that she "held every card as carefully as possible."

Every video poker machine I have played has automatically held every card when it dealt me a royal flush. I couldn't have made a mistake because the machine automatically held the cards for me. Maybe that's because my dealt royals have been on relatively new IGT machines.

Second, the dealt royal I had on a quarter machine did not require verification. I hit the Draw button. The royal appeared. The machine started adding credits to my meter. The machine was not a progressive, so the payout was $1000 and I didn't need a tax form.

I hit this royal recently, so the machine used tickets and not coins. About 25 years ago, Frank Scoblete and I were at Sunset Station. I played quarter video poker while he played a table game.

He found me when he was finished playing. "Ready to go?" he asked.

"In a minute," I said. "As soon as they pay me for the royal I just hit."

Because I played a quarter machine, the royal paid $1000 and I didn't get a tax form. Because the machine was a coin-dropper -- tickets may not even have been a dream way back then -- royals were paid by hand to avoid emptying the hopper and forcing guests to deal with 4000 quarters.

In any case, a $1000 royal flush doesn't require verification the way much larger jackpots do.

The contestant did not say where she played. I suspect she played at a casino that has one of the few coin-dropping video poker machines still in Las Vegas and she played one of those machines. The machine must have been very old. Maybe that's why the dealt royal wasn't automatically held.

Now her story makes sense. The machine locked up after she held her royal. The attendant didn't verify the jackpot for legitimacy. The attendant just verified the amount.

The husband probably didn't have to go flag down an attendant. Maybe they're new to handpays and didn't know that an attendant would come.

The story struck me as something that would have happened 30 years ago. It's like the couple stepped through the casino entrance and went from 2025 to the 1990s. Cue Twilight Zone theme.

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