#2 The one-handed deal. In pitch games (single- or double-deck blackjack, THB at the Taj Mahal, UTH at Thunder Valley), a right-handed dealer will hold the deck in the left hand, and use the right thumb and index finger to peel off the needed cards one at a time. Most dealers, even BAD under most circumstances, will deal using that standard method. On occasion, though, you’ll see BAD deliver a hit card, or the turn card in THB, using just the left-hand only, either by pushing the card off with the left thumb, or by inverting the deck and dropping the top card. Either way, it’s a tell of a bad attitude. If that method is easier for BAD, then it shows how lazy BAD is to violate standard dealing technique just to save the effort of using the right hand. Most often, though, BAD is trying to show off. The one-handed deal is a slickster move, and frankly, it’s not that impressive. I can deal a hit card one-handed, too, and I’m not a professional dealer.<\/p>\n
#3 Walking the game. You used to see more dealers “walk their games,” meaning that they would angle their shoulders, or even take a step or two to each side and angle the shoulders, in order to follow the action, but still maintain a view of the dormant side of the table. It is true that many dealers were trained to do this. It is also true that most dealers do not do this, regardless of their training. The dealers who do it will always say, “This is how you’re supposed<\/strong><\/em> to do it,” with the clear implication that every one of their colleagues doesn’t deal properly. But that’s why it’s a tell. Yeah, the dealers were all trained to do that, but none of them care to bother with it, so the one who does is basically the little hall monitor who’s trying to make everyone else look bad. It’s more about showing off than game protection.<\/p>\n As a game protection measure, it’s inconsistent with my philosophy, which is that good game protection is seamless. Good game protection is invisible to the civilian gambler, and not accusatory. The walking-the-game thing is insulting. It’s a very blatant angling of the shoulders to say, “I’m handling first base’s action on the hand, but I’m watching YOU<\/strong><\/em> at third base to make sure you don’t cap your bet, or mark the cards, or steal chips out of the rack.”<\/p>\n Winning money off that type of game is more difficult, not because of the game protection, which largely would not affect legal AP moves anyway, but because those tells indicate an attitude that the dealer does not want you to win. She’ll find ways to cost you.<\/p>\n Have you seen these tells before? Do you agree? Please share your comments.<\/p>\n Obviously you can see when a dealer is grumpy, argumentative, cocky, or lazy, but of course dealers may make a modicum of effort (the key word there: modicum) to suppress such a bad appearance. That’s where we employ tells, subtle clues, some based on dealing procedure, that give away that the dealer has a bad […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[601,240,39,590,586,54,592,62,516,596,574,466,593,600,281,245,549,589,584,599,598,594,597,585,587,595,591,588],"yoast_head":"\n![\"Facebook\"](\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/gambling-with-an-edge\/wp-content\/plugins\/social-media-feather\/synved-social\/image\/social\/regular\/96x96\/facebook.png\" "\\"Follow")
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