Fans cry foul after ‘Wheel of Fortune’ player ‘robbed’ of $40,000

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Wheel of Fortune fans flew into a rage after a contestant was “robbed” of $40,000 on the game show this week.

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Megan, a married California high school choir director, needed to guess the two-word answer to solve a bonus round puzzle in the “Living Thing” category.

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With the board revealing the letters “P_N_ _RC__D,” Melissa could clearly be heard giving the correct answer: “Pink Orchid.” But then she doesn’t stop there blurting out several incorrect guesses, including “Pony Orchid.”

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But the judges didn’t award her for her first guess, with host Pat Sajak saying, “You might have been overthinking a type of orchid. I’m sorry that didn’t work out for you.”

As he displayed Melissa’s missed chance at $40,000, Sajak continued, “That would’ve been awfully nice, but you had a good night — $14,007.”

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But Wheel fans flooded social media with many viewers at home convinced that Melissa was right all along.

“I am FUMING!! She got it she said pink orchid! Wtf?!” one X user wrote.

“Hey @WheelofFortune, I definitely heard the contestant say ‘pink orchid’ at the beginning of the final puzzle and I rewound it to make sure,” another fan added. “You owe her some $$$.”

“Okay @WheelofFortune if you play tonight’s episode again for the final puzzle, the one that just aired, you will hear clearly that she said ‘pink orchid.’ You did not properly credit the winner. Go and play it back. Seriously she said exactly that! Pink Orchid!” a third person piled on.

“Please give this girl her winnings,” a fourth watcher pleaded.

“She 100% said ‘pink orchid.’ She got robbed,” a fifth viewer declared.

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But after a closer listen, others said that Megan actually might have said “Something Orchid.”

“For those wondering she said, ‘something orchid,’ great try Megan,” one person commented on YouTube.

“I thought she said ‘pink orchid,’ but she said ‘something orchid,’” a second person wrote on X. “Literally 14 rewinds.”

Several more fans pointed to Megan’s own reaction when Sajak read the correct answer as evidence that she didn’t guess “Pink Orchid.”

“Don’t ya all think that if she HAD said ‘pink orchid’ she would have spoken up to Pat and said Hey that’s the first thing I said,” one couch potato wrote, with another adding, “She definitely said ‘something orchid.’ She would have reacted differently if she knew she said ‘pink.’”

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The latest Wheel controversy follows other recent mishaps on the show.

Last week, people at home fumed after a contestant correctly guessed “Absolutely Positively” as the two-word answer in the “Rhyme Time” category.

“Pardon my French, but how the f*** does that rhyme? This country is going to hell,” one person wrote on X.

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“‘Absolutely Positively’ doesn’t belong in the Rhyme Time category a**holes,” a second blasted.

Earlier this month, a contestant named Tina drew the ire of fans when she gave “Minor Blizzard” as her answer in the event category with the puzzle almost solved.

Another contestant was ruthlessly mocked after she lost her chance at winning a BMW when she couldn’t guess “doughnuts” in the “Food and Drink” category with most of the puzzle — “BAGELS & D_ _G _ N_TS” — already solved.

“She missed Bagels & Doughnuts. Where do they find these people?” one person asked, with another exclaiming in all caps, “IT WAS BAGELS AND DOUGHNUTS YOU MORON HOW DID YOU GET IT WRONG OMG.”

The series of fails this month follows Gishma Tabari’s viral fail in the “Show Biz” category in December.

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When she was presented with an almost-solved puzzle “TH_ _RITI_S _GR_E” Tabari blurted out, “The British Ogre” as her answer (the correct response was “The Critics Agree”).

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The amusing moment was exactly what Tabari had hoped wouldn’t happen to her as she fulfilled a lifelong dream to appear on the show.

“The funny part was, right before I went on, I went to my husband, Saman, and I was like … ‘My fear is that I’m gonna go on the show and I’m gonna say or do something stupid that everyone’s gonna laugh,’” she told Fox News Digital, reflecting on her experience.

“That’s exactly what happened.”

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X: @markhdaniell

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