Number 28

In New York Lotto under the 6/59 + 1/55 · Jan 2010 – Oct 2010 rules — 83 draws, 6 from 1–59 (an earlier era).

11times drawn · chance expected 8 +0.93σ

3draws waiting · a wait this long: 81% for any number

7.9average wait between appearances · chance says 9.8

23longest completed wait · 63% chance of one at least that long

28 is drawn as often as chance explains

Drawn 11 times in 83 draws against 8.4 expected, +0.93σ. Each draw is independent: after 3 draws away it is exactly as likely tonight as a number drawn yesterday.

Number 28, draw by draw

Drawn 11 times in 83 draws · average wait 7.9 draws · longest completed wait 23 · waiting 3 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 28 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 smallest2 · chance 0.4
2nd smallest3 · chance 2.0
3rd smallest3 · chance 3.8
4th smallest2 · chance 3.3
5th smallest1 · chance 1.3
6th smallest0 · chance 0.2

Every position’s lane →

The company it keeps

Seen most often with these — chance gives every partner about 0.9 shared draws, and the leaders are simply the ones that came out ahead this time.

35 4 52 8 9 13

Never drawn alongside 22 of the other 58 numbers; chance expects about 22 such strangers by now. Every pair →

How many people play it

Under the crowd model, 28 is picked about 1.22× as often as an indifferent choice — 15th most popular of 59. 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

The model and its sources → · What people believe about 28 →

Every draw it appeared in

Date	Wait	Position	The draw
2010-10-06	15	2nd	12 28 34 45 46 56
2010-08-14	1	3rd	8 13 28 30 33 36
2010-08-11	6	3rd	9 21 28 30 35 51

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: 28 is drawn with probability 6/59 tonight whatever it did last week.