Number 2

In Megabucks Plus under the 5/41 + 1/0 · Apr 2022 – Apr 2023 rules — 104 draws, 5 from 1–41 (an earlier era).

14times drawn · chance expected 13 +0.39σ

4draws waiting · a wait this long: 68% for any number

7.5average wait between appearances · chance says 8.2

25longest completed wait · 44% chance of one at least that long

2 is drawn as often as chance explains

Drawn 14 times in 104 draws against 12.7 expected, +0.39σ. Each draw is independent: after 4 draws away it is exactly as likely tonight as a number drawn yesterday.

Number 2, draw by draw

Drawn 14 times in 104 draws · average wait 7.5 draws · longest completed wait 25 · waiting 4 draws now

a completed wait — darker is longer the wait still running — a lower bound, not a finished gap

Where it lands in a sorted draw

Sort a draw and 2 has a favourite seat — chance gives a small number the low positions more often. That is the shape of sorting, not of the machine.

1st smallest13 · chance 12.6
2nd smallest1 · chance 1.4
3rd smallest0 · chance 0.0
4th smallest0 · chance 0.0
5th smallest0 · chance 0.0

Every position’s lane →

The company it keeps

Seen most often with these — chance gives every partner about 1.4 shared draws, and the leaders are simply the ones that came out ahead this time.

31 6 11 22 23 26

Never drawn alongside 9 of the other 40 numbers; chance expects about 10 such strangers by now. Every pair →

How many people play it

Under the crowd model, 2 is picked about 1.34× as often as an indifferent choice — 6th most popular of 41. That changes nothing about whether it comes up, and everything about how many ways a jackpot on it would be shared.

Numbers 1–31 — the birthday zone ×1.22
Numbers 1–12 — day and month overlap ×1.10

The model and its sources → · What people believe about 2 →

Every draw it appeared in

Date	Wait	Position	The draw
2023-04-08	6	1st	2 12 18 19 30
2023-03-18	6	1st	2 14 21 24 32
2023-02-25	1	1st	2 6 11 23 26
2023-02-22	4	1st	2

What this cannot tell you

Nothing here predicts the next draw. A number’s history is a record of a fair machine’s past, and the machine keeps none of it: 2 is drawn with probability 5/41 tonight whatever it did last week.