Can You Beat the Casinos at Their Own Game?

by Carl Van Eton

Image courtesy of commons.wilimedia.org

The title of the world's first card counting book was called "Beat the Dealer."  It was written by Edward O.Thorpe who wasn't a professional player by trade.  What he was when he wrote the book in 1962, was a mathematician.  That means he was smart enough to realize that the only way anyone could overcome the house edge at 21 was by using math.  He realized that unlike nearly every other game in the house (the exception being poker), every time a card was drawn from the deck, the odds changed.  But what really made blackjack a worthy research project was the fact that sometimes, whether players realized it or not, the edge was not with the house.  Sometimes the odds in blackjack favored the player.