Worst ever Wheel of Fortune contestant finds viral fame again — 11 years after epic flop
'I shouldn't laugh at this. But I did. Twice'
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No matter how hard you might try to escape your past, Julian Batts, who some Wheel of Fortune fans declared was the “worst” player in the history of the show 11 years ago, is learning one thing: the internet never forgets.
Appearing during the game show’s College Week episodes, Batts was trying to solve a clue in the character category back in April 2014 when he had successfully completed the answer, “Mythological Hero Achilles.”
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Despite having every letter on the board revealed, the Indiana University student lost out on his chance to win $1 million and a trip to London, England when he botched the pronunciation of “Achilles.”
“A-chill-us,” Batts said, with his answer being rejected by then-host Pat Sajak.
“One of the rules of Wheel of Fortune is when a contestant tries to solve a puzzle, they must pronounce it using the generally accepted pronunciation,” a spokesperson for the game show told the Today show at the time.
Batts’ mispronunciation led viewers to declare him the “worst Wheel of Fortune player in history.”
But with his infamous moment approaching its 11th anniversary on April 11, Batts’ flub found renewed life on X where clips of his stupendous fail racked up over a million views this week.
“I can’t stop laughing,” podcaster Sarah Gonzales wrote sharing a video of Batts’ infamous moment.
“I shouldn’t laugh at this. But I did. Twice,” another account shared.
Later on in the game, when Batts had the opportunity to win a car, the Daily Mail recounted how he was missing two letters in the phrase ‘The World’s Fastest Man’ and failed again.
He fumbled another correct answer, which was ‘On The Spot Decision,’ when he guessed, ‘On The Spot Dicespin.’
Despite his screwups, Batts told Good Morning America back in 2014 that his appearance on Wheel of Fortune was one of his “greatest experiences.”
As for his mistake, he told the program that he “didn’t feel like I made a mistake.”
“It just kind of hit me like a train and I really didn’t know how to react to it – the game continued on and (another student from) Texas A&M, she solved it and it hit me right then and there that it was Achilles,” he said. “I feel like I solved the puzzle entirely and all I had to do was read it and I just went for it and I did my best.”
Batts also maintained in an interview with the Indiana Star that he wasn’t “the worst player ever.”
“Social media and the media, they’re going to say what they’re going to say,” Batts said. “They have their opinions. But at the end of the day, look at the end result. I won the show. I was the champion of the episode. Despite what happened in between, if you look at what happened, I still won.”
Reflecting on the moment back in 2021, Batts told Drew Barrymore that he went back to his hotel and asked himself, “What just happened?”
“You know when you need a moment to just breathe? … I needed like 10 of those that day,” he laughed.
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