Blackjack Hall of Fame

In 2002, Max Rubin, casino executive, long-time advantage player, and author of the wildly successful and hilarious book Comp City, came up with the idea of a Blackjack Hall of Fame—no doubt inspired, at least in part, by Binion’s Wall of Fame, which honors the world’s greatest poker players. At the time, Rubin was a marketing consultant for Barona Casino in San Diego and he had a four- or five-pronged vision for the Hall, all of which came to pass.

Barona, near San Diego

First and foremost, the Hall recognizes the players, theorists, and authors who have had the greatest impact on the game, particularly in gaining an advantage over the casino; it also reveals to the public the manifold abilities of the players “whose achievements at the tables have largely been hidden from view.”

Second, since it was sponsored and housed by Barona, it garnered a lot of publicity for the casino. And since a casino was sponsoring a celebration of the greatest blackjack players, “its creation was in some way an admission by the gaming companies that card counting does exist and that ultimately little can be done to stop it,” as expressed nicely by countingedge.com. Plus, as a fine example of Rubin’s originality and ingenuity, Barona issues a “lifetime comp” to all inductees — full room, food, and beverage, for free, for life! — as long as they agree never to play blackjack at Barona for as long as they shall live.

Third, voting for the original members was open to the public and took place online, which again attracted a lot of publicity and votes. The obvious number of 21 nominees were put on the ballot, of whom seven were inducted.

And fourth, the whole thing was tied in to the Blackjack Ball (subject of the next and last page in this section), which Max hosted every January in Las Vegas. The original seven inductees were announced at the 2003 Ball and all subsequent members have been nominated and voted in, one at a time (except for 2004 and 2008), by the current Fame members and announced at the Ball. Barona exhibits the photos and bios of all inductees on the Hall.