I was hanging out with a guy recently that goes by the name Yoshi and he's
been a very successful card counter and we're talking a little bit about how we
got into card counting and it just got my mind going on some of the unexpected
things that really led to me having success and I want to share those with you
right now.
So, the first thing that really helped me out when I started as a card counter is
I had very low overhead, very few expenses, honestly I was just really
cheap. But because I didn't have a lot of money they need to make to get by every
month, I was free to really continue to grow a bankroll. So, for those that don't
know I started with $2,000 and within a year I had over $50,000. If I would have
needed a couple thousand dollars a month to live off of there's no way I could
have grown to a fifty thousand dollar bankroll in the first year. Well, year two
I made a couple hundred thousand dollars. Year three I made another couple
hundred thousand dollars. If I would have had high overhead it would have been
really hard for me to leverage my investment in that way. And as I was
talking with Yoshi, he said pretty much the same thing. I was amazed by how
little he's spent of the seven figures he's made as a card counter. So, if you're
wanting to make as a card counter keep your expenses low. It's going to be the
easiest way to leverage your investment and grow it so you can make more money.
So, a second thing that I was thinking about that really helped me make it as a
card counter is that I started with low expectations I started with Stanford
Wong's professional blackjack and in that book he has what he calls benchmark
win rates. So with a ten thousand dollar bankroll if you find certain
rules you can expect to make like sixteen dollars an hour. Then if you
find better rules you might be able to make twenty dollars an hour. I
started with $2,000. So, I was thinking well I'll never make $20.00 an hour as a card
counter. But, because I had low expectations I was really happy
initially to be grinding it out making five and seven dollars an hour. Well, fast
forward six months and I'm making over $200 an hour as a card counter and the
sky was the limit. But if I would have started out at the beginning thinking
I'm gonna make a million dollars in the first year I would have been horribly
disappointed to be making hundreds of dollars at the beginning. Because I had
low expectations I was really content
to put in the hard work to grow a bankroll and then be able to make good
money. So if you want to make it as a card counter my advice is to keep your
expectations in check. Don't expect to get rich overnight but you can make
serious money as a card counter if you put in the hard work put in the time and
like any investment it grows over time. The third thing that really helped me
out when I started out as a card counter is I didn't have any gambling baggage. I
hadn't even been into a casino until I had practiced card counting for who
knows how many hours. Now, I know people like Joe who has made upwards of seven
figures and he actually was a blackjack player before. He enjoyed playing
blackjack and then he turned that into being a successful card counter. But for me
it was helpful that I didn't have a lot of you know gamblers fallacy or weird
logic or bad habits or bad superstition. Or honestly, people that have a serious
gambling problem the wiring in their brain
changes and it's gonna be hard to override that. So, my advice to you is do
not form bad habits by gambling if you want to make it as a card counter. Step
away from casinos. Practice your skills. Walk into the casino again when you know
you can walk in as an investor and not a gambler. A fourth thing that was critical
to me making as a card counter is access to games. So, I was really lucky to be in
Seattle at the time I was because there are so many little casinos here and then
there are tribal casinos sprinkled around the area too.
But all these little mom-and-pop casinos I was able to play lots of hours and
really get my skills honed. So, what does this mean for you? Well, if there's only
one casino within a five-hour drive of you, card counting might not really be worth
it. The juice might not be worth the squeeze if you're gonna have to drive
that far have all the gas costs and all that stuff.
And if you get backed off from the only place in five hours if you have nowhere
else to play. Now, I do know professional card counters that all of their trips
are traveling and flying. So it can be done, but for me I don't think I would
have made it if I had to fly to Vegas to count cards
So the fifth thing that
helped me make as a card counter is that I had nothing to lose. So what do I mean
by that? Well, when I got into card counting, you know, I was not making
much money in another job and I also didn't hang out in casinos at all. I
never went to casinos. so card counting for me was an opportunity to see if I could
make some money outside of my job and if it didn't work out I would have been
okay. But also I wasn't afraid of back offs. I wasn't afraid of failing I
really had nothing to fear. If you're afraid of the back offs, if you're afraid
of losing the money, if you're just afraid of being a failure at something
it's gonna be a lot harder to make it as a card counter then if you have nothing
to lose and I've found that a lot of the most successful card counter I know they're
in a similar situation with me. Where they've got some money, they're willing
to give it a try, if it doesn't work out it's okay. And because of that they're
fearless in their approach to card counting.
The final thing that I had that
really helped me make it as a card counter and this is actually a really
big one is the right mentors. So, I read books and I read the right books. I read
professional blackjack by Stanford Wong. I read burning the tables in Las Vegas
by Ian Anderson. And I knew a couple other card counters that were much more
seasoned than me. I knew Ben who had been trained by we'll call it "the big team"
but one of the largest national teams and without that connection I
wouldn't have received the training I needed. There's another guy I played with,
I call him Sammy because I don't wanna use his real name because he still plays,
but Sammy had been a card counter for about a decade by the time I met him. He
was much more seasoned and he really saved us from some huge mistakes we were
making on our earlier team. If I hadn't had those mentors I know I wouldn't have
had the success I had. So for you my encouragement is find the right mentors
Whether it's through blackjack apprenticeship. Whether it's through
another network. Whatever it is, don't try to, you know, reinvent the wheel. Learn
from people who have had success with it. Go out there crush the casinos.