Lottery player thought he won $100 but zeroes ‘kept going and going’ in Maryland
While buying some ice, a Maryland man decided to take a chance with the extra cash in his pocket.
The man asked the Sparrows Point store clerk for a $20 scratch-off lottery ticket, Maryland Lottery officials said in an Aug. 25 news release.
“I jokingly told her to pick me a winner,” he told lottery officials.
Turns out, she really did.
Once he got home, the man scratched the numbers on his All About Cash ticket using his lucky pocket knife, which he used to reveal a $10,000 winning lottery ticket a few years earlier, according to lottery officials.
After seeing he had a match on the number 27, the man scratched the rest of his ticket, lottery officials said.
“At first, I thought I won $100. Then I thought it was for $1,000,” the man told lottery officials. “It kept going and going.”
The zeroes added up, totaling a $1 million prize.
“I called my wife and said, ‘I just hit this sucker for one million bucks,’” the winner said.
The man also texted a photo of the ticket to a family member without saying he had won.
“Is that a winner?” the shocked family member responded, the man said.
The winner told lottery officials he plans to put his prize toward retirement.
Sparrows Point is about a 15-mile drive southeast from Baltimore.
This story was originally published August 25, 2025 at 2:43 PM with the headline "Lottery player thought he won $100 but zeroes ‘kept going and going’ in Maryland."
