Christmas came early for one Louisiana gambler who decided to spend their holiday at the Fontainebleau on the Strip.

While the rest of us were wrapping presents and pretending to enjoy time with extended family, this degen was doing what degenerates do: feeding slot machines. The difference? This one paid back. Big time.

The Quick Hit

• The prize: $186,468
• The bet: $8.50
• The machine: Double Firestorm Bison
• The location: Fontainebleau Las Vegas
• The date: Christmas Eve 2025

The Hit

An $8.50 bet. That's it. Less than the cost of a cocktail at most Strip bars. And it returned nearly two hundred grand.

The guest was playing Double Firestorm Bison, one of those high-volatility machines that can sit cold for hours before suddenly erupting. On Christmas Eve, it erupted.

The Fontainebleau just opened last year, so hitting a jackpot this size at the Strip's newest mega-resort adds an extra layer of significance. This visitor will remember their first Fontainebleau trip for the rest of their life.

Holiday Jackpot Season

This wasn't the only big hit during the holidays. Across Vegas and beyond, the slot machines were treating degenerates well:

• A Resorts World guest playing Double Super Times Pay Poker hit three royal flushes on a $105 bet for $1.2 million
• Thunder Valley in California paid out $118,428 on Christmas night on Samurai Secrets
• Thunder Valley also hit someone for $105,390 on Christmas Eve on Dollar Storm Emperor's Treasure
• Prairie Band Casino in Kansas produced a $537,000 jackpot on Gold Standard Jackpots
• Horseshoe Hammond paid a Dragon Cash player $130,666.79 on the grand jackpot

The holiday spirit was flowing through slot machines across the country.

The Math (For Those Who Care)

An $8.50 bet returning $186,468 represents a multiplier of roughly 21,937x your stake. Those are the kind of odds that keep people coming back — the dream that any spin, any bet, any random Tuesday afternoon could change everything.

Of course, for every jackpot winner, there are thousands of players who walked away with nothing. That's how the math works. The house always wins over time.

But on Christmas Eve, at the Fontainebleau, one Louisiana gambler beat the house in spectacular fashion.

Fontainebleau's Big Year

The resort has been trying to establish itself as a legitimate Strip destination since opening in late 2024. Having a $186k jackpot story circulate during the holiday season is exactly the kind of organic marketing money can't buy.

When gamblers see that jackpots are actually hitting, they're more likely to walk through the doors. One Christmas Eve miracle creates a thousand future visitors.

The Bottom Line

$8.50 to $186,468. That's the kind of hit you frame and hang on your wall. That's the kind of hit you tell your grandchildren about.

Somewhere in Louisiana, there's a degen who had the best Christmas of their life. For the rest of us, we're still chasing that feeling — one spin at a time.

Happy holidays indeed.