martin butter eggs joining us he was a professional gambler for ten years the
also ran a professional gambling t martin i get tons of emails about
casinos about gambling about the ethics of both running a casino and of being
eight ambler uh... i don't even know where to start but i think a good good
good places uh... off are there certain casino games where the advantage for the
casino is is minimized or is it is it basically the same across the board
'em with craps uh...
if you bet on the correct
uh... combination tibet's there you can get the the houses advantage down almost
to zero
so when you were a professional gambler what were you what were your games
we would primarily play blackjack
um... that is the one game where
the player can get an advantage over the house
uh...
and so that was the game that we focused on
okay so explain that because i think black jack in the emails i get is the
one people most seem to think
that by using a system where using a method error that there is a way to get
an advantage over the house and i don't understand it because my my
understanding is if you type
the house you actually lose your bet so how did how can you take that back
mathematically and get the edge back
okay well there's a lot there's a lot of information to to answer that question
there
in a nutshell the reason the blackjack is different than all the other games is
back
the outcome of the next hand
is partially determined by the outcome of the last chance
and the reason for that is because the cards that we have
there were dealt out during the last count
are no longer available
soaker plan from a sixty x u
you play a few hands some cards are gone
now there's
kind of a different
that you're playing with uh... as opposed to the one that would be hella
six-fold accent
and there are certain situations then where
uh... the advantage goes over to the player because of the the composition of
the deck remaining
okay so is this are we getting basically into the idea of card counting keeping
track of the cards that have been dealt
and kind of keeping a mental tally of of what's what's still left there or not is
that where you getting up with this
yeah that's the most common way
to use that that information uh... is through car coming
uh... it's kind of the easiest way it's the more reliable way
but nowadays it's the one that the casinos are also the most familiar with
so
it's kind of a double-edged sword there
okay so how does that work uh... in other words number one
what do you really counting when you are a card counting accounting face cards
and also uh... why why is that not allowed and how is it in forcible
especial
sewing card-carrying basically what you're doing is your
counting the ratio of high cards
too low cards
and
so as low cards come out of the debt
and the deck becomes more you know kind of more weighted towards those tenzin
aces
uh... the advantage
shifts over to the player
and the other way around if
if the kisses start coming out in greater proportion and there's more to
little cards left
then the houses advantage tends to go up
um...
no reason i guess the reason the car coming is not allowed
because these casinos are
private businesses and they have the right dislike any private business to
refuse service
for a customer
uh...
thirty forty years ago they might have
for a new in jail upper kar counting now it is that's not going to happen but
but they will ask you just not to play blackjack and and
applied to play together games in the casino
so as casino security has gotten more sophisticated over time
powell what what's the easiest way to spot someone who is card counting i mean
is that someone who looks pensive there has to be more to it than that right
oh absolutely got really there are way more sophisticated now than they used to
be
uh... they've gotten down to the thing that matters the most
this when a player is raising his best
that's how hard counter is going to get his advantage because
uh... me you're not going to have the advantage
in the majority of hands it's going to be a minority of times when you have
that opportunity and so
to make up for all of the hands where you're playing in a disadvantage
you need to be able to bat
a lot more
when that opportunity arises
so with that you know with uh...
admin of computers in and automated software
casinos are now able to just wrap a person's betting and see what the
advantages that they have on each hand and kind of evaluate them that way
okay and has this done so in order to do that does that mean everything and that
is being dealt every players activities being
tracked by some kind of software or is it more the dealers sense of what's
going on in may be getting their supervisor involved it's a kind of over
see what's happening
i would say that
it's more the latter it's more likely that
the floor supervisor is going to select the individuals that he wants security
to kind of focus on
but usually it's going to be the highest betters
but it could be somebody that if if the form and notices some
uh... some behavior that looks like a car counter
yet bearing bats when when
slow cards are gone
and stuff like that
then they could focus on that person because just too much going on for it
because he has to pay attention to everyone
so let's get to the the the next question which is our their so-called
systems that are straightforward that do work for someone who says
this is my sister for example oftentimes people say well here's my system
uh... with blackjack it's close to fifty fifty so this is this is what i'm told i
mean so what i do is i'd make one bad
and then if i lose i doubled the bat
for the next ten and then if i were
lose our double the bat
and then eventually i'm going to win i'm going to win big are now i tried the
math on that anything really seem to work out to me i mean how does that
sound to you and are there the so-called systems that the kind of amateur gambler
can utilize
in the long run none of those types of systems will work
so this type of system what it does is it allows you supposed to win
uh... a lot of the time usually it's a small when
uh... but then upon
occasion
you'll lose nine bets in a row
and if you're in a few went from ten to twenty two forty eight to eighty to one
sixty and up from there and pretty soon you're at
two thousand three thousand hand
or the table limit and you just can't you can recover from it
that-that's exactly be the uh... the numbers that i came up with so in in the
last thing in your experience it hard casinos and let the best left to
just for fun that is it really just a place to stay away from a few real goals
is to make money
you know i mean if you're real if you will go lawyers said try and make money
gambling you need to either you'll learn how to count cards
at what work you know one of the other
methods that are better
would generally
will legitimately give you an advantage other games like poker for where you're
playing against other opponents are definitely beatable
uh... sports betting
if you're
really good
and you can make some money there as well it's difficult because the houses
edge is pretty big bear
but other than that
i think it's just best saying okay if i'm gonna go
to vegas and
i've got this much money in a file is it
that's fine and if i win that's great i had a good weekend
yeah i think uh... i'm glad my producer took that line of thought a couple years
ago he just uh... said you know what i'm his losing every single time um... i
think i'm done with it
of martin butterick out for a former professional gambler rank and wing team
of really great to speak with you today