Man guesses cryptic 'Wheel of Fortune' puzzle instantly to win huge prize

For some of us, word puzzles are difficult. When we fill out crossword puzzles, we put multiple letters in each box. (It's so weird how they never give you enough boxes). When we play Scrabble, the biggest words we can spell are "cat" and "zpg." (It's a word, I promise. Don't look it up.) And when we watch Wheel Of Fortune, our friends shout the answer at the television, then we say, "Yeah! I...also was going to say that!"

But for Emil De Leon, solving word puzzles comes naturally. During an appearance on Wheel Of Fortune, he faced a difficult board: A three word phrase for a thing, comprised of twelve letters, and all that he knew were that the first two letters were a cryptic 'n' and 'e'. Take a look at the puzzle yourself, if you'd like to give it a shot, but if you can't solve it in three seconds, Emil beat you.

Credit: YouTube

The answer (drumroll, please) is 'new baby buggy," a phrase that I don't think anyone has said out loud since the late 1920's. Emil didn't just guess the right phrase based on two letters; he guessed it correctly on his first attempt, within mere seconds. Host Pat Sajak jokingly patted the contestant down, to make sure he wasn't cheating. But it was clear he wasn't cheating, based on his genuine, jubilant reaction - Emil literally jumps for joy! And so would you, if you played Wheel Of Fortune and won a cool $53,000. Sajak was so impressed by Emil's quick-thinking he declared this "the most amazing solve in my 30-plus years on the show."

Still, the world wondered how Emil could solve word puzzles so quickly, and make the rest of us look like big fat dummies. In an appearance on Ellen Degeneres' talk show, the Wheel of Fortune-teller explained that he grew up watching the popular game show. "The first letters I learned how to say were R, S, T, L, N, E - the prominent letters in Wheel of Fortune," explains Emil. As a result, he developed an incredible talent for puzzle-solving, cracking most puzzles in Emil in under five seconds, and has a 99% success rate. (And yes, he is the worst person to watch Wheel Of Fortune with, because he's always shouting the answers!)

When asked how he guessed the esoteric phrase 'new baby buggy,' Emil broke down his thought process. "It was pretty obvious that the first word was 'new'," explained Mr. Smartypants, "then I worked on 'baby' - 'new baby', it just sounds right - and for then the hard part I worked with that B again." Well, when explained like that, the guess makes a lot sense. But it's still impressive to arrive at that answer so fast. I mean, I definitely knew it was 'new baby buggy,' too, and I was totally going to say that, but still, kudos, Emil.