Normally when someone deals, I don't have a problem with it. There's often a lot of money on the line, and the risk of losing it all, even if it is small, can be overbearing. But some deals have left me scratching my head and thinking, 'What?!' Off the top of my head:

1k Michael - Fair enough, maybe £1,000 meant a lot of money to him and his wife. But the previous offer of £9,191 was more generous statistically AND in monetary terms. And his wife seemed very shocked when he dealt. I can't help but think that most people would regret selling 1k for 100k more than losing the 1k and winning a blue.

Terri - Way back in early 2006. She turned down two fairly decent offers of 20k and 10k, and then took 3.8k on £750 vs £15k, which IMO was derisory. It seems strange that anyone would turn down large amounts of money, and then take a much lower offer which is much less generous.

Tink - Same reasoning as Terri.


There are probably loads more, but those are the main ones that stick out in my mind. What about you?

It's the standard final offer bail-out, you've lost a lot already and aren't prepared to go home with a blue after all that. The most common OPL scenario, when the higher amount turns out to be in their box after all.

I think a red-blue final pair is the toughest gamble of all to take (well, maybe not £750/£1,000 but you get the idea!) The reason being that there's no more rounds to recover it, it's basically all or nothing on a coin-flip. Not surprising the Banker can get away with some very low offers that people are prepared to accept.

You say that, but if they don't want to leave with a blue, then they should have taken one of the earlier, more generous offers. If it's a good offer for the final two, then that's more understandable, but take Terri's situation. She was given an offer of £3,800 on a £750/£15,000 final two. A final two like that warrants an offer of at least 5k. £750 isn't even that bad a sum of money, and considering that she already turned down 20k, she had a decent chance of getting back most of what she turned down.

There have been a lot (and I do mean a lot!) of Deals that have been either very confusing or shocking

Although, Mike's 1k Deal was probably the start of it all where the Banker began to believe that he can get away with offering low amounts to contestants

Since then, we've had a lot of them, even ones that ignited a lot of criticism, *Cough*Richard*Cough*

There have been some excessively cautious 11 box deals, although I don't have a problem with anyone dealing early if the offer/board merits it.

Actually, ones like Richard's are more understandable. IIRC, he was a cleaner, or something along those lines, so 22k would be life-changing for him, even though it was a fantastic board. What I find strange is when people make decisions completely contradictory to ones they made just one or two rounds ago. But with something like 1k, sure it's a nice sum of money, but hardly what you'd call 'life-changing'. His wife was egging him on as well, and considering the higher, more generous offer he already turned down, it just seemed nonsensical. A couple of the blues weren't that much less than the £1,000 he took (he had £100, £250 and £500 at the time). Deep down inside, a small part of me was kinda disappointed that he didn't have the £100,000 after all, which I realise is kinda harsh.

I think there are quite a few deals in the history of the show which could be seen as 'nonsensical' by viewers. However the important thing is that it makes sense to the player when they deal!

I think players like Terri who took a low offer after turning down a higher one are just doing it to ensure they didn't crash to a blue win after no dealing a significant sum. There is of course the other way of thinking and that is to 'chase the money', whereby a player (whose game has gone badly after no dealing a significant sum) would play far into the game to try and get back what they'd previously declined.

When players (such as Richard, Ronnie (May 08) and Ronnie (Nov 09) - aka The Two Cautiously Dealing Ronnies ) deal at 11-box for a significant sum which is a relatively poor offer, it is understandable, as the money obviously means a lot to them. But deals like £1k Michael's are quite bizarre; I don't think anyone could call £1,000 'life-changing', especially when there was £100k still on the board!!!

One that perplexed me but many forget about was Mark the Peter Kay lookalike in Banker's Birthday week '08 - he had one to open and dealt £1,100 on £3k/£750/£500. I always think once your'e left with only an orange and two high blues you may as well just take the box unless you're offered the mean, and that offer was a few hundred off!