I think you illustrated where I was going with this. Nowadays, the main game offers so much loot to where you could win an equal or lesser value in the bonus round. And I think that's where my idea of it being anticlimactic comes from. "Oh I've already won $42,000...what's another 40K?*" If she pulls the 25K envelope, it's still a little more on the check, but I'm sure the reaction is a little more muted.
15-20 years ago, $42,000 was a really nice one-day total (main game + bonus). Or the 80s, where some winners didn't even crack five figures in the main game, but would play for a car worth thousands more.
*Not how I'd treat it necessarily, but just an observation