This is the type of thing that only happens in the movies. Actually, it’s the type of thing that happens in real life and then gets turned into a movie, a movie with Nicholas Cage and Bridget Fonda for example. Imagine the opening scene, you see a down and out janitor who is about to lose his job in Brookesville, Florida. You get to see his solitary life. He's a simple man who has a quiet wife and not many friends. He spends a lot of time online surfing the net. As you watch the movie you wonder when anything interesting will happen to this poor man's wretched life. He just lost his job, a job as a janitor at that, and he hasn't any family. He just sits there in his apartment, watching the day go by.
As usual the man is playing on his computer. He's down to his last $100 and instead of spending it on necessities he decided to just take a chance and play a progressive slots game instead in his favorite internet gaming casino. He gets his bonus at the Playtech-powered Carnival Casino and goes to the progressive slots game of his choice. Life isn't on his side at the moment, but for some reason he looks up and has a smile on his face. Music comes on in the background setting the tone for anxiety and wonder. He deposits $16 into the progressive game, thinking (in the background of the scene) that if he's going to do this, he might as well do it in a big way. He waits to see what the reels will bring. The audience draws closer to the screen rooting for this unlikely hero to have something good happen to his life. Silence. Then the results of the game come and he has won.
Well, I don't actually know anything about Marty Ogden of Brookesville, Florida except that he's 45, lost his job as a janitor before winning, and won over one million dollars in the Gold Rally progressive slot from Playtech. Everything I wrote about him above came straight from my imagination (and a love of bad movies). Of course, he's a US citizen, so if he wants to keep his winnings and stay out of jail he better not spend it all on playing and paying his taxes. That could be the sequel to the first movie, Marty in jail for not paying the IRS.
I want to say I'm happy for Marty. I really do, but I'm hesitant to be too happy for Marty. People who win large amounts tend to spend it all on really silly things and end up in even worse shape than they were before they won. It's actually quite a common phenomenon and is known to have happened to numerous lottery winners in the US. That doesn't mean that he will definitely blow all of his money in one go, but the fact that he was spending $100 when he was already out of work and probably should have been saving that money for when he was really going to need it, such as for food and rent, which one needs to pay whether they are working or not. This leads me to believe that he doesn't necessarily make the most conservative of choices when it comes to his money, and as such will be more likely to blow it quickly. Furthermore, he won another $12,000 later that same week, so obviously he didn't just cash out and enjoy his winnings. He kept playing. Granted, he won again, but we have no way of knowing how much he lost before he won again.
Now winning $1,966,000 is always a nice thing. It's something I would wish for any of my friends and I would love it to happen to me. However, I just can't stop thinking about his second win. This guy kept playing, which makes sense as if he won big once he's going to assume that he could win that big again. The thing is, statistically the chances are so slim, and he is so more likely to become addicted to gambling instead of walking away that I just end up feeling bad. What he should have done is say "Thank you" for his winnings, cashed them out, paid the IRS, and put them in some sort of stable investment where he will reap about 10% a year from the proceeds and live off of that. He was a janitor before his win, I'm sure $200,000 a year should be enough for him to survive.
Again, though, I'm speculating. I don't actually know anything about this man. Perhaps he is an eccentric financial scholar who decided to become a janitor instead of living life on wall street (plot taken from Fast Food Fast Women where the waitress used to be a high level executive and gave it up to be a waitress.) Perhaps he's just a janitor, who got lucky and will spend the rest of his life trying to relive that moment and the rush of the win. Perhaps he'll just get sick of gaming and will walk away to a quiet life. As I said, I don't know the guy. I just know what I would do with the money if it was me (which is smile and walk away with cash in hand). The thing is that I would have never spent $100 on a progressive slots game if I was unemployed, so this could never be me. I follow sound money management, which is to never spend what you can't afford to lose. I'm of course assuming that a 45 year old out of work janitor couldn't afford to lose $100, but perhaps he has something on the side which wasn't published and he could. As I doubt I'll ever meet Marty I'll never know.
I do know that if he does end up blowing it all we might be seeing him on the day time talk show circuit talking about his tragedy. Of course, at the time I'm writing this his win hasn't actually been confirmed by Playtech, but it has been advertised on the casino. What will become of Marty if it turns out his win was just a software glitch? Another movie scenario enfolds…

Posted on: November 18, 2005

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