The Ultimate Price is Right Strategy Guide: 3 Strikes

3 Strikes

Rules

A car is shown. A bag is shown; three balls painted red (the "strikes") are put into the bag and five balls, each of which has a number in the price of the car, are also put in the bag. The contestant draws numbers one at a time from the bag. If they draw a number, they must tell Drew which position in the price of the car the number is. If they are correct, the digit is lit up; if not, the ball is put back in the bag for the contestant to draw later. The contestant wins if they light up the entire price of the car before they draw the three strikes in the bag.

Random fact

This game was given a serious overhaul in season 47 to look like something you would see at a baseball stadium. As someone who lived in Boston for 14 years, went to many games at Fenway Park, and even once announced an inning of baseball on the radio, I love the look. You can see it here:

Win-loss record

• Actual (seasons 38*-47): 9-33 (21.43%)
• What it would be by random chance:
• If you know the price: Exactly 3/8 (37.5%)
• If you don't know the price at all**: Approx. 14.24%
• If you know only the first digit of the price**: Approx. 20.79% 

* Starting at season 38 as that's when the current rules of the game stabilized.

** Based on simulating the game 10 million times. The simulation chose things randomly but played perfect strategy; for example, it didn't try the same digit in the same place twice and if you tried four digits in one spot and they were all wrong, it would know to place the fifth digit there.

What was the last digit of the car's price? (seasons 40-47)

• 0: 0 playings (0%)
• 1: 5 playings (14.71%)
• 2: 8 playings (23.53%)
• 3: 6 playings (17.65%)
• 4: 2 playings (5.88%)
• 5: 2 playings (5.88%)
• 6: 7 playings (20.59%)
• 7: 3 playings (8.82%)
• 8: 0 playings (0%)
• 9: 1 playing (2.94%)

Strategy

Ask for a different game. After Drew is done laughing, pray you get really, really, really lucky. I don't have much here except that you should keep very close track of the picks you've made throughout the game so you don't repeat picks. Also, you should assume the last number is NOT 0, 5, or 9.