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Advantage Players Fighting Back

Discussion in 'Table Games' started by pphold, Feb 27, 2016.

  1. Malibugolfer

    Malibugolfer
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    "What doesn't kill you makes you strong."
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    I really don't see how anyone could hope to make a living as a blackjack counter. It's just way too hard to ride out negative variability, move house to house continuously, and spread enough in positive counts to make real money without getting banned. Even good teams will have to spend lots of time and effort for low 7 figures at best.
    It takes people who really look at the casino as a malevolent enemy that needs to be conquered and who are willing to dedicate their total lives to beating the house. Like Ken Uston did. And barely lived to 50 if memory serves.
     
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  2. VEGASBJ

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    The "problem" with counting is that the count is good for the dealer as well........................Can't tell you how many times the count was good, and I get the dreaded 17/18/19, and the dealer has the pat 20
     
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  3. Malibugolfer

    Malibugolfer
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    Actually almost uncanny.
     
  4. thefish2010

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    Most of the pro AP's these days are hole-carding. This gives a much higher advantage than card counting - up to 14% on blackjack, and even higher on some of the carnie games. Hole-carding is not illegal, but this is what Grosjean was doing when he was arrested. Because it is such a threat to the casinos, they simply make up reasons to arrest these guys.

    In the Grosjean case, even though he explained what he was doing to the gaming agents when they showed up, they said he was card bending. He spent 4 days in jail before he could be bailed out because he didn't have ID on him when he was arrested and they wouldn't let him out until the FBI had analyzed his fingerprints against their database of previously arrested people. When he finally made bail, he found that one of the cops in the evidence room had stolen $2500 worth of chips from him.

    He eventually sued Caesars Palace and was awarded $100k for his troubles, but this is my point about questioning the logic of being an AP for a living. Why go through all of this hassle for something that at most will make you six figures per year even if you are at the very top of the profession, is not scalable, that you will only be allowed to do for a limited period of time, and exposes you to arrest and harassment? This makes little sense, especially given that in order to be successful at most of these AP plays you have to be relatively intelligent, which means you have other options in life.

    If I were to pursue an AP career, I would follow in the steps of Bill Benter et al. Those guys realized that the key was to beat the parimutuel pools, and not repeatedly take any specific entity's money - which would make them an enemy. Instead, the tracks pursue their action aggressively, and the cornerstone of their strategy is to negotiate large rebates that other players don't get - they get a percentage of their total bets returned to them, regardless of whether they win or lose. These rebates can make certain offsetting bets profitable for them regardless of the outcome of the race, with no net risk. What they do is also extremely scalable and doesn't require them to be anywhere near the track. That is how they became billionaires.
     
    #14 Mar 1, 2016
    Last edited: Mar 2, 2016
  5. VEGASBJ

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    the other problem with the above AP scenario is the amount of hours you have to put in at every casino, every shift, every table to find the one dealer that you can hole-card exploit. Then, they may be at a $5 table with a $200 table limit. Too many hours without enough return
     
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  6. bayoubengal

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    The latest episode of Gambling With An Edge is an interview with Nersesian. Plan on giving it a listen today, his interviews are usually pretty good m
     
  7. Malibugolfer

    Malibugolfer
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    And the demise of pitch games leaving only one's with mass scrutiny.
    I agree with thefish also. Be a sharp in another gambling option or venue.
     

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