So you didn't hit the jackpot on Fantasy 5 or Lotto 47?
A new option being offered by the Michigan Lottery is giving players a second chance to win big and doubles non-jackpot prizes.
The lottery's new Double Play option, which costs $1 more per panel per draw, begins Sunday at Michigan lottery retailers.
Here's how the add-on game works:
Double Play drawings will take place after each Lotto 47 and Fantasy 5 drawing. Another set of winning numbers will be drawn from the pool for each game, so players could match the same number in both the regular drawing and the Double Play drawing.
Double Play non-jackpot prizes are doubled. The top prizes are $110,000 for Fantasy 5 and $1.5 million for Lotto 47. Players may win prizes in the regularly nightly drawing, the Double Play drawing, or both.
Both lottery games cost $1 per draw.
The lottery will continue to offer the EZmatch option on Fantasy 5 and Lotto 47 games, which gives a chance for players to win up to $500 instantly. EZMatch also costs an additional $1 per panel per draw.
One thing to note: New bet slips will be required starting Sunday at lottery retailers. The new slips include the Double Play option.
Lotto 47 drawings are held on Wednesdays and Saturdays with progressive jackpots that start at $1 million. Fantasy 5 drawings are held daily.
Finding ways to add another dollar to a ticket......
Before you know it, they'll raise the price to $2 a ticket plus the $1 Double Play add-on.
Well, it sounds better than EZ Match. I am waiting for an option for a bigger Jackpot where the extra dollar only applies to the Jackpot prize.
I suppose, though, that they will offer a double play double down for yet another dollar before they offer any jackpot option.
I 'd kick in the extra dollar for a higher jackpot because it takes forever for the current jackpots to roll to a decent level.
Michigan needs to pull out of the Multi State Games because they are downright awful. I don't know of any websites that show the total loss per state but I know Michigan has exported a lot of Prize money on the Mega Millions for the last 5 going on 6 years and ditto for PowerBall for 3 going on 4 years. That is Money that could be kept for in state games with decent and better prizes. Six years is a long time to wait while all the prize money just keeps getting exported!
You probably don't remember the Zinger option from long ago. It added an extra dollar and printed a random six digit number on the ticket eg 355297 and if you got all six you won $100,000 all the way down to getting something for matching two or three numbers...I don't remember exactly how it worked.
Point being this type of thing has been offered from the way early days.
What hasn't been offered, as the games have been slowly destroyed and ruined, is an option to increase the jackpot prize for players who don't want to play the other games and who wont play this game until the Jackpot gets to a decent level.
Actually back in the 80's they did jack the price of the ticket up to $2 but it was too early and didn't last too long. For a short while they had two different games with one drawn on Wednesday and the Other on Saturday. One was 6/44 and the other was 6/47. That was even back when the games had great rolls and decent Jackpots.
Zinger worked like this:
A random 6-digit number was printed on each and every Super Lotto/Lotto47 ticket, whether you wanted it or not. It was exactly like the Kicker on Ohio's Super Lotto (which they still have). You had to say "YES" to the Zinger to be eligible to win. Otherwise, the ticket would show "ZINGER-NO" at the bottom.
To win, you had to match the numbers in exact order from left to right.
2 was $10
3 was $100
4 was $1,000
5 was $10,000
6 was $100,000
It was drawn using the wheels that the MI lottery used for the Daily 3 & 4 games from 89-96 (the smaller ones, not the huge wheels). I don't remember how long it lasted, but I know there's a couple YouTube videos posted (from the Fame & Fortune & Megabucks Giveaway shows) that have a clip of the Zinger Drawing included. I loved that specific drawing because the music was catchy and upbeat (I still miss the Super Lotto "Popcorn" track).