As early as page 11 of The 21st-Century Card Counter, Colin Jones mentions the monolithic truth of the universe: “the team’s performance was consistently lower than the math predicted.” Such has been the experience of every team in the history of AP, and every solo card counter, too. When teams look at their spreadsheets and […]
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What is “Blackjack”?
Episode 5 of Colin Jones will air on its regular schedule next time, but this recent comment on the GWAE Facebook page deserves (maybe) an immediate reply: Marketing the 6:5 variant as just straight blackjack is as preposterous as a casino marketing the house table game “Casino poker” “3card Poker” with a house edge dealt […]
Colin Jones (S1 E4): In the Beginning …
In The 21st-Century Card Counter, Colin Jones describes how he started out: [p. 6] “I convinced Grace to let me take a third of everything we had in the bank—$2000—to the casino. If I lost it, I’d be done.” Those two sentences sum up two of the biggest challenges facing a new counter or AP. […]
Colin Jones (S1 E3): What is “Real”?
When I read gambling books, I usually dog-ear pages of interest. With Colin Jones’s book, The 21st-Century Card Counter, I had to change my approach. It made no sense to dog-ear every page, so I just started circling passages and writing notes in the margins. In lieu of a traditional book review evaluating the book, […]
Colin Jones (S1 E2): The Devil is Mr. Jones
For the amount of vitriol directed at Colin Jones online, you’d think the man eats babies. In reality, he’s guilty of a far greater sin—he wrote a card-counting book, The 21st-Century Card Counter. That book is one pillar of a viral card-counting enterprise also supported by the documentary movie Holy Rollers, the website blackjackapprenticeship.com (BJA), […]
Colin Jones (S1 E1): You Had Me at “Zippered Po...
People online think that I have great disdain for card counters. That isn’t true, per se. I have disdain for posers, and it just so happens that almost everyone who brags on YouTube about counting cards, or who claims online to be a “blackjack expert,” is a poser. My respect for the late “MathProf” (Dr. […]
Coronavirus V: The Blackjack Call
The Blackjack Ball, an annual get-together of professional gamblers, was historically hosted by Max Rubin over New Year’s, when the big card-counting teams would create their own fireworks all over Vegas. It was great fun while it lasted. But New Year’s became a victim of its own success. Vegas is so crowded on holiday weekends […]
2020: Rise of the Machines
by James Grosjean Count me among the Netflix drones who loved The Queen’s Gambit (2020), but I’ve always been a chess enthusiast. During my college years, I probably ate a thousand chocolate croissants while watching the quirky, magnificent Murray Turnbull (aka “The Chess Master”) take on all comers in the town square—“$2, refund if you […]
In the Wild
In this ongoing series I’m going to share anecdotes and observations from the casinos, usually for entertainment purposes only. I’m limited in what I can share in real time, so I might expand the column to guest contributors or non-casino material in the future. If you leave a comment, please reference the post number. #2. […]
Coronavirus IV: Rats!
I am Charlie Brown to The Rat’s Lucy van Pelt. When The Rat guest-blogged that the re-opening of casinos could bring a uniquely juicy opportunity for APs, I was skeptical. I told Anthony Curtis, “So surveillance has a little more work, but that doesn’t turn a sweatshop into a candy store.” I made a verbose […]
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