Back to the Scene of the Crime

By Carl Van Eton

Courtesy of  Public Domain Pictires

Having played blackjack for a living for more than 20 years, it never ceases to amaze me when I meet a player who upon learning that I both use and teach card counting asks me, "Isn't card counting illegal?"  My response is usually one of, "I have yet to see a casino post a sign that reads, "Please Check Your Brain at the Door."

Since when is learning how to master a game a crime?  While professional poker players are treated like rock stars nowadays, card counters are given all the respect of cockroaches.  Granted, the casinos don't like it when the public tries to do to them what they do to everyone else, which is exploit a mathematical advantage.  But to treat any player like dirt just because they exhibit skill...in my opinion, that should be considered a criminal act.

Indeed, even the courts agree that letting the casinos exclude players on the merit of their playing skill is capricious at best and litigable at worst.  In 1979, after being barred by Resorts International Casino in Atlantic City, professional player Ken Uston filed and won a lawsuit that clained casinos had no legal right to bar players simply because of their skill level.  Due to Kenny's courageous stand, the Atlantic City casinos do not have the authority to bar card counters from any Atlantic City casino. However, this lawsuit began and ended with Atlantic City.  Casinos in the rest of the country still have the right to bar knowledgeable players from their facilities. (Also, suspected card counters in Atlantic City routinely get harassed by casino management who the shuffle point, change the table limits and refuse to deal to skilled players.)

Image courtesy of Max Pixel

Having spent tens of thousands of hours in the casinos, I have witnessed blackjack players being harassed and barred.  I have also seen pit personnel kick players out who weren't counting but were winning.  Being a card counter myself, it 's child's play to spot another counter.  If a player bets the table minimum when the count is minus and jumps their bet from red action to green or even black action when the count is plus,  they are counting cards.  

So how is it that I have managed to stay under the radar and never get barred for more than 20 years?  That’s because I know several factors that can be used to keep the pit boss at bay.

1.      Most pit bosses don’t count cards.  Every casino hires several former card counters, one of which is on duty during any given shift.  Any time a player at 21 is seen to wildly alter their bet spread, or display other suspicious behaviour, the pit boss will pick up the pit phone and ask their card counter to watch the suspect player.

2.      Many card counters inadvertently telegraph their ability to casino management.  They either act suspiciously by staring fixedly at the cards as they are dealt, or they enter a casino sporting a full beard or wearing a hat that makes it difficult for anyone to see their eyes.  In short, they send up a red flag just by sitting down.

3.      If you are a card counter who wants to keep the pit boss off your back, you need to stop acting like a card counter.  More than once I have scared a card counter off by accident as I back counted a table.  When the counter noticed I was looking his way, he grabbed his chips and ran for the door.  If you act like a fleeing felon, you might as well buy a t-shirt in the gift shop that reads, Card Counter at Work.  You aren’t fooling anyone.

4.      If on the other hand, you act like a happy go lucky player who wants to play cards, have a few free cocktails and ask to get comped when you finish playing, then you will not set a pit boss’ nerves to jangling.

5.      In my Blackjack Express course, I teach players not only how to play the cards, I teach them how to wheel and deal for comps.  I mean, if your average bet is $50 or more and you don’t ask for a comp, you are acting suspiciously.  I also teach students a number of other ways to camouflage their ability at the game.  It just takes a little ingenuity to turn a profit at 21 without turning the casino into a battlefield.
6.   Don't get greedy.  If you walk into a casino with the intention of owning the place, you won't last long as a card counter.  Play short sessions where you are happy to walk away with a few hundred to a thousand dollars for playing a few shoes.  Don't engage in marathon play for the table max unless you want to get shown the door.

What really irks me is the way that casinos treat blackjack players in general.  Unlike other games

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offered in the casino, blackjack is the most vulnerable to casino chicanery.  The problem is, all too many players are willing to play any game offered to them.  I have seen more players smilingly sit down at games where the rules were skewed massively in the house’s favor.  I have also seen shoe games where the cut card placement exceeded 50%.   I have seen casinos using two complete shoes at the same table.  I have seen piss poor shuffles that were guaranteed to clump the cards together, which favors the house.  Yet players continue to walk into the propeller blades with a smile on their faces.

Even worse, when I point these factors out to the public, many times I am met with skepticism or even hostility.  Instead of banding together to boycott casinos that offer piss poor playing conditions, many players defend the problem, or even believe that the casinos should be allowed to offer any game they see fit.  When I point out the fact that it is the players and not casino management who has ultimate control over playing conditions, most people simply choose to either stick their head in the sand, or deny that players can have a say in the games.

To this I point out that right after Ed Thorpe wrote Beat the Dealer, which was the world’s first card counting book, the casinos in Nevada reacted by radically altering the rules on their blackjack games.  It wasn’t long before the players started boycotting the games in droves.  As a result, the casinos changed the rules back.  Not only weren’t the casinos taken to the cleaners by card counters, it was because of card counters that the game became so popular and profitable for the casino industry.

Image courtesy of commons.wikimedia.org

Getting back to Resorts International, the first casino to open its doors in Atlantic City, their blackjack games offered some of the best conditions and rules possible.  Not only did Resorts 8-deck games have excellent shuffles and cuts, the game included early surrender, which enabled players to cede half their bets upon receiving their first two cards regardless of whether the dealer had blackjack.  For any basic strategy player who knew how to take advantage of this rule, the house edge was cut down to practically zero.  For card counters, their advantage went through the roof.

Did the legions of card counters who marched on Resorts cut into the casino’s bottom line?  Hardly.  In fact, for the first few years of operation, Resorts International was one of the world’s most profitable casinos.  Not only weren’t card counters taking them to the cleaners, Resorts was making money so fast that they were taking cash out of the soft count room in Rubbermaid trash cans to lines of waiting armored cars.  In short, they weren’t taking out the trash, they were taking out the cash.

The ironic thing is that the casinos don’t understand that by offering liberal rules to players, they will make more money, since players will opt to play longer if there is the allure of occasionally winning.  By short sheeting players with regards wo rules and conditions, both the popularity and profitability of blackjack has taken a hit in recent years.  Face it, if you lose nine times out of ten when you sit down at a casino game, it won’t be long before you find another game or stop going to the casinos altogether. 

In other table games like poker, skilled players would never allow the house to offer conditions that skewed the results.  Try to short sheet a shuffle in the cardroom and you are asking for a riot.  That’s because poker players as a rule are highly educated not only in how to play, but in what constitutes cheating.  The majority of blackjack players on the other hand, are not. 

Being a professional player, I not only understand what is in the player’s interest and what favors the house, I simply won’t play any game that is tipped so far in the houses favor that skill doesn’t matter.  The problem is, unless the playing public wises up, it won’t be long before the casinos turn a game of skill like blackjack into a slot machine with cards.  That would be a crime.

Want to learn more?  Carl Van Eton has more than 20 years of professional playing experience.  If you want to stop visiting your money every time you go to the casinos, check out his website at http://biggameblackjack.com