The category is: Don’t mess with Pat Sajak.
An irate Sajak reportedly confronted contestant Michael Colen earlier this month during the show’s commercial break — after the “Wheel of Fortune” host began to feel upstaged.
“He came up to me and just told me, ‘Hey, Michael, you know, this is my show, right?'” Colen, 48, recently recalled to Fox News. “And I politely said, ‘Yes, sir, it is your show for 41 years.'”
“But it was stern,” Colen added. “There was a stern drop of sternness to it.”
“It was two alphas going at it,” Colen added. “I’m an acquired taste. And … I’ve been putting out music for 30 years, so I have to say I’m an acquired taste.”
Colen noted that it took Sajak “a quick minute to get used to” him during the episode.
“I had to find out where the line was. This is like a lifetime dream. I was screaming, ‘Get me on this show, man,’ for like 30 years,” the rapper, who goes by the name of First Degree The D.E., added. “So, I had to find out where the line was compared, and Pat just drew it for me.”
Colen later told The Post that he believed Sajak wanted him to “tone it down a bit” but ultimately “ended up enjoying himself.”
“I believe he wanted me to succeed and have a good show, so he was giving me a little direction,” he told The Post. “The interaction was not ill-toned.”
The Post reached out to Sajak for comment.
Colen appeared to delight the studio audience from the start — especially when he began dabbing after solving a puzzle.
“You would do a backflip,” Sajak, 77, commented, with Colen responding that he would “if I wasn’t so old.”
The contestant continued to hype up the crowd when he spun the wheel and exclaimed: “All right wheel, let’s have a relationship!”
The contestant later met his downfall, however, during the show’s bonus round when he failed to solve the puzzle in time.
“I’ll give you a hint. It’s something you didn’t do,” Sajak sneered.
After witnessing Colen groan at the answer “Pick Wisely,” Sajak commented that he was “sorry” but he “had to go for it.”
Despite provoking the game show host, Colen said he wouldn’t change a thing.
“It was funny, he recognized me, and it was helpful,” he laughed. “It also ended up having America talking.”
“In addition, it allowed me to revert to my wheelhouse comedy, facial slapstick,” Colen continued. “My purpose for being on the show was to make America laugh.”
This is not the first time Sajak got seemingly peeved with a contestant.
In May, the outgoing host asked a contestant “why are you bothering” after they failed to guess the right answer three times.
Sajak also bluntly told a 22-year-old fan favorite to “don’t ever do that again” after the contestant handed him the bonus round clue.
This season marks the end of Sajak’s tenure on “Wheel” as the host announced in June that he will be retiring. He was subsequently replaced by Ryan Seacrest.