In your answer to the question about the history of the Blackjack Hall of Fame, you mentioned the Blackjack Ball and said it was another QoD. Well, just in case no one else asks about it, what is the BJ Ball?
Thanks for following up on our hint. Being the 21st of the month, we thought it a "natural" to answer it today.
The Blackjack Ball was launched by Max Rubin, as part of his grand vision to celebrate the greatest 21 players, experts, and authors. The first event was held in January 1997 and it’s been held in January every year since.
The Ball is open, by invitation only, to a highly select group of advantage players and the like, but has grown to well more than 100 people. Besides full-time blackjack pros, the list includes hedge-fund managers, software developers, Fortune 500 executives, the lawyer for the players (also a member of the Hall of Fame), and others who’ve used advantage blackjack as stepping stones in their evolution in business and high finance.
Security, as you might imagine, is extremely tight; attendees are notified of the location shortly before the Ball, have to pass through several screenings to gain admittance, and are required to bring a chilled bottle of premium champagne. At first glance, all the precautions might seem excessive, but look again; considering the lengths to which the casinos go to portray advantage players as cheaters and thieves, the fact is that the players are much more in danger from the casinos than the casinos are from the APs.
A contest of skills is held every year and the winner is presented with the Grosjean Cup. The Cup is named after James Grosjean, considered by most players in the know the greatest AP of all time — the professional-gambler equivalent of Michael Jordon or Tom Brady. He’s proved it too: Grosjean won the Blackjack Ball’s skills contest three times before he was banned from playing and had the trophy named after him. He graduated from Harvard University, then got his Masters from the University of Chicago’s prestigious School of Economics. He’s also the author of Beyond Counting, the most comprehensive book on advantage play in existence.
After several final-table appearances and multiple runner-up finishes in prior years, our own Anthony Curtis finally closed the deal and won the coveted trophy — an engraved Nebuchadnezzar of Luc Belaire Champagne. The equivalent of 20 regular bottles of champagne, this monster sits in the conference room at Huntington Press and is so heavy, you can barely pick it up, let alone pour it into a champagne flute. We predict it’ll remain sealed for a long time to come.
The 2017 Ball was also the 21st year of its existence. The significance of the number, coupled with the release of Edward O. Thorp’s new book, A Man for All Markets, made the Ball one of the social events of the year for the game’s elite. Thorp was in attendance and addressed the 130 or so attendees.
The 2017 Blackjack Hall of Fame inductee was Don Johnson, who made headlines a few years back when he beat the Atlantic City casinos for upwards of $5 million and has since been the subject of numerous print and TV stories detailing his methods and high-rolling lifestyle.
The 2018 inductee will be announced at this year's Ball, which takes place, in fact, tonight in Vegas. Ball attendees vote in one new Hall of Famer from a list of seven nominees; check Today's News on the home page of this website tomorrow for this year's inductee.
And here's Anthony Curtis, holding the prize for his 2017 win.
