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“True M” versus Harrington’s M and Why Tournament Structure Matters

by Arnold Snyder
(From Blackjack Forum Vol. XXVI #1, Spring 2007)
© Blackjack Forum Online 2007

Critical Flaws in the Theory and Use of “M” in Poker Tournaments

In this article, I will address critical flaws in the concept of “M” as a measure of player viability in poker tournaments. I will specifically be addressing the concept of M as put forth by Dan Harrington in Harrington on Hold’em II (HOH II). My book, The Poker Tournament Formula (PTF), has been criticized by some poker writers who contend that my strategies for fast tournaments must be wrong, since they violate strategies based on Harrington’s M.

I will show that it is instead Harrington’s theory and advice that are wrong. I will explain in this article exactly where Harrington made his errors, why Harrington’s strategies are incorrect not only for fast tournaments, but for slow blind structures as well, and why poker tournament structure, which Harrington ignores, is the key factor in devising optimal tournament strategies.

This article will also address a common error in the thinking of players who are using a combination of PTF and HOH strategies in tournaments. Specifically, some of the players who are using the strategies from my book, and acknowledge that structure is a crucial factor in any poker tournament, tell me they still calculate M at the tables because they believe it provides a “more accurate” assessment of a player’s current chip stack status than the simpler way I propose—gauging your current stack as a multiple of the big blind. But M, in fact, is a less accurate number, and this article will explain why.

There is a way to calculate what I call “True M,” that would provide the information that Harrington’s false M is purported to provide, but I do not believe there is any real strategic value in calculating this number, and I will explain the reason for that too.

The Basics of Harrington’s M Strategy

Harrington uses a zone system to categorize a player’s current chip position. In the “green zone,” a player’s chip stack is very healthy and the player can use a full range of poker skills. As a player’s chip stack diminishes, the player goes through the yellow zone, the orange zone, the red zone, and finally the dead zone. The zones are identified by a simple rating number Harrington calls “M.”

What Is “M”?

In HOH II, on page 125, Dan Harrington defines M as: “…the ratio of your stack to the current total of blinds and antes.” For example, if your chip stack totals 3000, and the blinds are 100-200 (with no ante), then you find your M by dividing 3000 / 300 = 10.

On page 126, Harrington expounds on the meaning of M to a tournament player: “What M tells you is the number of rounds of the table that you can survive before being blinded off, assuming you play no pots in the meantime.” In other words, Harrington describes M as a player’s survival indicator.

If your M = 5, then Harrington is saying you will survive for five more rounds of the table (five circuits of the blinds) if you do not play a hand. At a 10-handed table, this would mean you have about 50 hands until you would be blinded off. All of Harrington’s zone strategies are based on this understanding of how to calculate M, and what M means to your current chances of tournament survival.

Amateur tournament players tend to tighten up their play as their chip stacks diminish. They tend to become overly protective of their remaining chips. This is due to the natural survival instinct of players. They know that they cannot purchase more chips if they lose their whole stack, so they try to hold on to the precious few chips that are keeping them alive.

If they have read a few books on the subject of tournament play, they may also have been influenced by the unfortunate writings of Mason Malmuth and David Sklansky, who for many years have promulgated the misguided theory that the fewer chips you have in a tournament, the more each chip is worth. (This fallacious notion has been addressed in other articles in our online Library, including: Chip Value in Poker Tournaments.)

But in HOH II, Harrington explains that as your M diminishes, which is to say as your stack size becomes smaller in relation to the cost of the blinds and antes, “…the blinds are starting to catch you, so you have to loosen your play… you have to start making moves with hands weaker than those a conservative player would elect to play.” I agree with Harrington on this point, and I also concur with his explanation of why looser play is correct as a player’s chip stack gets shorter: “Another way of looking at M is to see it as a measure of just how likely you are to get a better hand in a better situation, with a reasonable amount of money left.” (Italics his.)

In other words, Harrington devised his looser pot-entering strategy, which begins when your M falls below 20, and goes through four zones as it continues to shrink, based on the likelihood of your being dealt better cards to make chips with than your present starting hand. For example, with an M of 15 (yellow zone according to Harrington), if a player is dealt an 8-3 offsuit in early position (a pretty awful starting hand by anyone’s definition), Harrington’s yellow zone strategy would have the player fold this hand preflop because of the likelihood that he will be dealt a better hand to play while he still has a reasonable amount of money left.

By contrast, if the player is dealt an ace-ten offsuit in early position, Harrington’s yellow zone strategy would advise the player to enter the pot with a raise. This play is not advised in Harrington’s green zone strategy (with an M > 20) because he considers ace-ten offsuit to be too weak of a hand to play from early position, since your bigger chip stack means you will be likely to catch a better pot-entering opportunity if you wait. The desperation of your reduced chip stack in the yellow zone, however, has made it necessary for you to take a risk with this hand because with the number of hands remaining before you will be blinded off, you are unlikely “…to get a better hand in a better situation, with a reasonable amount of money left.”

Again, I fully agree with the logic of loosening starting hand requirements as a player’s chip stack gets short. In fact, the strategies in The Poker Tournament Formula are based in part (but not in whole) on the same logic.

But despite the similarity of some of the logic behind our strategies, there are big differences between our specific strategies for any specific size of chip stack. For starters, my strategy for entering a pot with what I categorize as a “competitive stack” (a stack size more or less comparable to Harrington’s “green zone”) is far looser and more aggressive than his. And my short-stack strategies are downright maniacal compared to Harrington’s strategies for his yellow, orange, and red zones.

There are two major reasons why our strategies are so different, even though we agree on the logic that looser play is required as stacks get shorter. Again, the first is a fundamental difference in our overriding tournament theory, which I will deal with later in this article. The second reason, which I will deal with now, is a serious flaw in Harrington’s method of calculating and interpreting M. Again, what Harrington specifically assumes, as per HOH II, is that: “What M tells you is the number of rounds of the table that you can survive before being blinded off, assuming you play no pots in the meantime.”

But that’s simply not correct. The only way M, as defined by Harrington, could indicate the number of rounds a player could survive is by ignoring the tournament structure.

Why Tournament Structure Matters in Devising Optimal Strategy

Let’s look at some sample poker tournaments to show how structure matters, and how it affects the underlying meaning of M, or “the number of rounds of the table that you can survive before being blinded off, assuming you play no pots in the meantime.” Let’s say the blinds are 50-100, and you have 3000 in chips. What is your M, according to Harrington?

M = 3000 / 150 = 20

So, according to the explanation of M provided in HOH II, you could survive 20 more rounds of the table before being blinded off, assuming you play no pots in the meantime. This is not correct, however, because the actual number of rounds you can survive before being blinded off is entirely dependent on the tournament’s blind structure.

For example, what if this tournament has 60-minute blind levels? Would you survive 20 rounds with the blinds at 50-100 if you entered no pots? No way. Assuming this is a ten-handed table, you would go through the blinds about once every twenty minutes, which is to say, you would only play three rounds at this 50-100 level. Then the blinds would go up.

If we use the blind structure from the WSOP Circuit events recently played at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, after 60 minutes the blinds would go from 50-100 to 100-200, then to 100-200 with a 25 ante 60 minutes after that. What is the actual number of rounds you would survive without entering a pot in this tournament from this point? Assuming you go through the blinds at each level three times,

3 x 150 = 450

3 x 300 = 900

3 x 550 = 1650

Add up the blind costs: 450 + 900 + 1650 = 3000.

That’s a total of only 9 rounds.

This measure of the true “…number of rounds of the table that you can survive before being blinded off, assuming you play no pots in the meantime,” is crucial in evaluating your likelihood of getting “…a better hand in a better situation, with a reasonable amount of money left,” and it is entirely dependent on this tournament’s blind structure. For the rest of this article, I will refer to this more accurate structure-based measure as “True M.” True M for this real-world tournament would indicate to the player that his survival time was less than half that predicted by Harrington’s miscalculation of M.

True M in Fast Poker Tournaments

To really drill home the flaw in M—as Harrington defines it—let’s look at a fast tournament structure. Let’s assume the exact same 3000 in chips, and the exact same 50-100 blind level, but with the 20-minute blind levels we find in many small buy-in tourneys. With this blind structure, the blinds will be one level higher each time we go through them. How many rounds of play will our 3000 in chips survive, assuming we play no pots? (Again, I’ll use the Caesars WSOP levels, as above, changing only the blind length.)

150 + 300 + 550 + 1100 (4 rounds) = 1950

The next round the blinds are 300-600 with a 75 ante, so the cost of a ten-handed round is 1650, and we only have 1050 remaining. That means that with this faster tournament structure, our True M at the start of that 50-100 blind level is actually about 4.6, a very far cry from the 20 that Harrington would estimate, and quite far from the 9 rounds we would survive in the 60-minute structure described above.

And, in a small buy-in tournament with 15-minute blind levels—and these fast tournaments are very common in poker rooms today—this same 3000 chip position starting at this same blind level would indicate a True M of only 3.9.

True M in Slow Poker Tournaments

But what if you were playing in the $10K main event of the WSOP, where the blind levels last 100 minutes? In this tournament, if you were at the 50-100 blind level with 3000 in chips, your True M would be 11.4. (As a matter of fact, it has only been in recent years that the blind levels of the main event of the WSOP have been reduced from their traditional 2-hour length. With 2-hour blind levels, as Harrington would have played throughout most of the years he has played the main event, his True M starting with this chip position would be 12.6.)

Unfortunately, that’s still nowhere near the 20 rounds Harrington’s M gives you.

True M Adjusts for Tournament Structure

Note that in each of these tournaments, 20 M means something very different as a survival indicator. True M shows that the survival equivalent of 3000 in chips at the same blind level can range from 3.9 rounds (39 hands) to 12.6 (126 hands), depending solely on the length of the blinds.

Furthermore, even within the same blind level of the same tournament, True M can have different values, depending on how deep you are into that blind level. For example, what if you have 3000 in chips but instead of being at the very start of that 50-100 blind level (assuming 60-minute levels), you are somewhere in the middle of it, so that although the blinds are currently 50-100, the blinds will go up to the 100-200 level before you go through them three more times? Does this change your True M?

It most certainly does. That True M of 9 in this tournament, as demonstrated above, only pertains to your chip position at the 50-100 blind level if you will be going through those 50-100 blinds three times before the next level. If you’ve already gone through those blinds at that level one or more times, then your True M will not be 9, but will range from 6.4 to 8.1, depending on how deep into the 50-100 blind level you are.

Most important, if you are under the mistaken impression that at any point in the 50-100 blind level in any of the tournaments described above, 3000 in chips is sufficient to go through 20 rounds of play (200 hands), you are way off the mark. What Harrington says “M tells you,” is not at all what M tells you. If you actually stopped and calculated True M, as defined above, then True M would tell you what Harrington’s M purports to tell you.

And if it really is important for you to know how many times you can go through the blinds before you are blinded off, then why not at least figure out the number accurately? M, as described in Harrington’s book, is simply woefully inadequate at performing this function.

If Harrington had actually realized that his M was not an accurate survival indicator, and he had stopped and calculated True M for a variety of tournaments, would he still be advising you to employ the same starting hand standards and playing strategies at a True M of 3.9 (with 39 hands before blind-off) that you would be employing at a True M of 12.6 (with 126 hands before blind-off)?

If he believes that a player with 20 M has 20 rounds of play to wait for a good hand before he is blinded off (and again, 20 rounds at a ten-player table would be 200 hands), then his assessment of your likelihood of getting “…a better hand in a better situation, with a reasonable amount of money left,” would be quite different than if he realized that his True M was 9 (90 hands remaining till blind-off), or in a faster blind structure, as low as 3.9 (only 39 hands remaining until blind-off).

Those radically different blind-off times would drastically alter the frequencies of occurrence of the premium starting hands, and aren’t the likelihood of getting those hands what his M theory and strategy are based on?

A Blackjack Analogy

For blackjack players—and I know a lot of my readers come from the world of blackjack card counting—Harrington’s M might best be compared to the “running count.” If I am using a traditional balanced card counting system at a casino blackjack table, and I make my playing and betting decisions according to my running count, I will often be playing incorrectly, because the structure of the game—the number of decks in play and the number of cards that have already been dealt since the last shuffle—must be taken into account in order for me to adjust my running count to a “true” count.

A +6 running count in a single-deck game means something entirely different from a +6 running count in a six-deck shoe game. And even within the same game, a +6 running count at the beginning of the deck or shoe means something different from a +6 running count toward the end of the deck or shoe.

Professional blackjack players adjust their running count to the true count to estimate their advantage accurately and make their strategy decisions accordingly. The unadjusted running count cannot do this with any accuracy. Harrington’s M could be considered a kind of Running M, which must be adjusted to a True M in order for it to have any validity as a survival gauge.

When Harrington’s Running M Is Occasionally Correct

Harrington’s Running M can “accidentally” become correct without a True M adjustment when a player is very short-stacked in a tournament with lengthy blind levels. For example, if a player has an M of 4 or 5 in a tournament with 2-hour blind levels, then in the early rounds of that blind level, since he could expect to go through the same blind costs 4 or 5 times, Harrington’s unadjusted M would be the same as True M.

This might also occur when the game is short-handed, since players will be going through the blinds more frequently. (This same thing happens in blackjack games where the running count equals the true count at specific points in the deal. For example, if a blackjack player is using a count-per-deck adjustment in a six-deck game, then when the dealer is down to the last deck in play, the running count will equal the true count.)

In rare situations like these, where Running M equals True M, Harrington’s “red zone” strategies may be correct—not because Harrington was correct in his application of M, but because of the tournament structure and the player’s poor chip position at that point.

In tournaments with 60-minute blind levels, this type of “Running M = True M” situation could only occur at a full table when a player’s M is 3 or less. And in fast tournaments with 15 or 20-minute blind levels, Harrington’s M could only equal True M when a player’s M = 1 or less.

Harrington’s yellow and orange zone strategies, however, will always be pretty worthless, even in the slowest tournaments, because there are no tournaments with blind levels that last long enough to require no True M adjustments.

Why Harrington’s Strategies Can’t Be Said to Adjust Automatically for True M

Some Harrington supporters may wish to make a case that Dan Harrington made some kind of automatic adjustment for approximate True M in devising his yellow and orange zone strategies. But in HOH II, he clearly states that M tells you how many rounds of the table you will survive—period.

In order to select which hands a player should play in these zones, based on the likelihood of better hands occurring while the player still has a reasonable chip stack, it was necessary for Harrington to specify some number of rounds in order to develop a table of the frequencies of occurrence of the starting hands. His book tells us that he assumes an M of 20 simply means 20 rounds remaining—which we know is wrong for all real-world tournaments.

But for those who wish to make a case that Harrington made some kind of a True M adjustment that he elected not to inform us about, my answer is that it’s impossible that whatever adjustment he used would be even close to accurate for all tournaments and blind structures. If, for example, he assumed 20 M meant a True M of 12, and he developed his starting-hand frequency charts with this assumption, then his strategies would be fairly accurate for the slowest blind structures we find in major events. But they would still be very wrong for the faster blind structures we find in events with smaller buy-ins and in most online tournaments.

In HOH II, he does provide quite a few sample hands from online tournaments, with no mention whatsoever of the blind structures of these events, but 15-minute blind levels are less common online than 5-, 8-, and 12-minute blind levels. Thus, we are forced to believe that what Mason Malmuth claims is true: that Harrington considers his strategies correct for tournaments of all speeds. So it is doubtful that he made any True M adjustments, even for slower tournament structures. Simply put, Harrington is oblivious to the true mathematics of M.

Simplifying True M for Real-Life Tournament Strategy

If all poker tournaments had the same blind structure, then we could just memorize chart data that would indicate True M with any chip stack at any point in any blind level. Unfortunately, there are almost as many blind structures as there are tournaments.

There are ways, however, that Harrington’s Running M could be adjusted to an approximate True M without literally figuring out the exact cost of each blind level at every point in the tournament. With 90-minute blind levels, after dividing your chip stack by the cost of a round, simply divide your Running M by two, and you’ll have a reasonable approximation of your True M.

With 60-minute blind levels, take about 40% of the Running M. With 30-minute blind levels, divide the Running M by three. And with 15- or 20-minute blind levels, divide the Running M by five. These will be far from perfect adjustments, but they will be much closer to reality than Harrington’s unadjusted Running M numbers.

Do Tournament Players Need to Know Their “True M”?

Am I suggesting that poker tournament players should start estimating their True M, instead of the Running M that Harrington proposes? No, because I disagree with Harrington’s emphasis on survival and basing so much of your play on your cards. I just want to make it clear that M, as defined and described by Harrington in HOH II, is wrong, a bad measure of what it purports and aims to measure. It is based on an error in logic, in which a crucial factor in the formula—tournament structure—is ignored (the same error that David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth have made continually in their writings and analyses of tournaments.)

Although it would be possible for a player to correct Harrington’s mistake by estimating his True M at any point in a tournament, I don’t advise it. Admittedly, it’s a pain in the ass trying to calculate True M exactly, not something most players could do quickly and easily at the tables. But that’s not the reason I think True M should be ignored.

The reason is related to the overarching difference between Harrington’s strategies and mine, which I mentioned at the beginning of this article. That is: It’s a grave error for tournament players to focus on how long they can survive if they just sit and wait for premium cards. That’s not what tournaments are about. It’s a matter of perspective. When you look at your stack size, you shouldn’t be thinking, “How long can I survive?” but, “How much of a threat do I pose to my opponents?”

The whole concept of M is geared to the player who is tight and conservative, waiting for premium hands (or premium enough at that point). Harrington’s strategy is overly focused on cards as the primary pot entering factor, as opposed to entering pots based predominately (or purely) on position, chip stack, and opponent(s).

In The Poker Tournament Formula, I suggest that players assess their chip position by considering their chip stacks as a simple multiple of the current big blind. If you have 3000 in chips, and the big blind is 100, then you have 30 big blinds. This number, 30, tells you nothing about how many rounds you can survive if you don’t enter any pots. But frankly, that doesn’t matter. What matters in a tournament is that you have sufficient chips to employ your full range of skills, and—just as important—that you have sufficient chips to threaten your opponents with a raise, and an all-in raise if that is what you need for the threat to be successful to win you the pot.

Your ability to to be a threat is directly related to the health of your chip stack in relation to the current betting level, which is most strongly influenced by the size of the blinds. In my PTF strategy, tournaments are not so much about survival as they are about stealing pots. If you’re going to depend on surviving until you get premium cards to get you to the final table, you’re going to see very few final tables. You must outplay your opponents with the cards you are dealt, not wait and hope for cards that are superior to theirs.

I’m not suggesting that you ignore the size of the preflop pot and focus all of your attention on the size of the big blind. You should always total the chips in the pot preflop, but not because you want to know how long you can survive if you sit there waiting for your miracle cards. You simply need to know the size of the preflop pot so you can make your betting and playing decisions, both pre- and post-flop, based on all of the factors in the current hand.

What other players, if any have entered the pot? Is this a pot you can steal if you don’t have a viable hand? Is this pot worth the risk of an attempted steal? If you have a drawing hand, do you have the odds to call, or are you giving an opponent the odds to call? Are any of your opponent(s) pot-committed? Do you have sufficient chips to play a speculative hand for this pot? There are dozens of reasons why you need to know the size of a pot you are considering getting involved in, but M is not a factor in any of these decisions.

So, again, although you will always be totaling the chips in the pot in order to make betting and playing decisions, sitting there and estimating your blind-off time by dividing your chip stack by the total chips in the preflop pot is an exercise in futility. It has absolutely nothing to do with your actual chances of survival. You shouldn’t even be thinking in terms of survival, but of domination.

Harrington on Hold’em II versus The Poker Tournament Formula: A Sample Situation

Let’s say the blinds are 100-200, and you have 4000 in chips. Harrington would have you thinking that your M is 13 (yellow zone), and he advises: “…you have to switch to smallball moves: get in, win the pot, but get out when you encounter resistance.” (HOH II, p. 136)

In The Poker Tournament Formula basic strategy for fast tournaments (PTF p. 158), I categorize this chip stack equal to 20 big blinds as “very short,” and my advice is: “…you must face the fact that you are not all that far from the exit door. But you still have enough chips to scare any player who does not have a really big chip stack and/or a really strong hand. Two things are important when you are this short on chips. One is that unless you have an all-in raising hand as defined below, do not enter any pot unless you are the first in. And second, any bet when you are this short will always be all-in.”

The fact is, you don’t have enough chips for “smallball” when you’re this short on chips in a fast tournament, and one of the most profitable moves you can make is picking on Harrington-type players who think it’s time for smallball.

Harrington sees this yellow zone player as still having 13 rounds of play (130 hands, which is a big overestimation resulting from his failure to adjust to True M) to look for a pretty decent hand to get involved with. My thinking in a fast tournament, by contrast, would be: “The blinds are now 100-200. By the time they get around to me fifteen minutes from now, they will be 200-400. If I don’t make a move before the blinds get around to me, and I have to go through those blinds, my 4000 will become 3400, and the chip position I’m in right now, which is having a stack equal to 20 times the big blind, will be reduced to a stack of only 8.5 times the big blind. Right now, my chip stack is scary. Ten to fifteen minutes from now (in 7-8 hands), any legitimate hand will call me down.”

So, my advice to players this short on chips in a fast tournament is to raise all-in with any two cards from any late position seat in an unopened pot. My raising hands from earlier positions include all pairs higher than 66, and pretty much any two high cards. And my advice with these hands is to raise or reraise all-in, including calling any all-ins. You need a double-up so badly here that you simply must take big risks. As per The Poker Tournament Formula (p. 159): “When you’re this short on chips you must take risks, because the risk of tournament death is greater if you don’t play than if you do.”

There is also a side effect of using a loose aggressive strategy when you have enough chips to hurt your opponents, and that is that you build an image of a player who is not to be messed with, and that is always the preferred image to have in any no-limit hold’em tournament. But while Harrington sees this player surviving for another 13 rounds of play, the reality is that he will survive fewer than 4 more rounds in a fast tournament, and within two rounds he will be so short-stacked that he will be unable to scare anybody out of a pot, and even a double-up will not get him anywhere near a competitive chip stack.

The Good News for Poker Tournament Players

The good news for poker tournament players is that Harrington’s books have become so popular, and his M theory so widely accepted as valid by many players and “experts” alike, that today’s NLH tournaments are overrun with his disciples playing the same tight, conservative style through the early green zone blind levels, then predictably entering pots with more marginal hands as their M diminishes—which their early tight play almost always guarantees. And, though many of the top players know that looser, more aggressive play is what’s getting them to the final tables, I doubt that Harrington’s misguided advice will be abandoned by the masses any time soon.

In a recent issue of Card Player magazine (March 28, 2007), columnist Steve Zolotow reviewed The Poker Tournament Formula, stating: “Snyder originates a complicated formula for determining the speed of a tournament, which he calls the patience factor. Dan Harrington’s discussion of M and my columns on CPR cover this same material, but much more accurately. Your strategy should be based not upon the speed of the tournament as a whole, but on your current chip position in relation to current blinds. If your M (the number of rounds you can survive without playing a hand) is 20, you should base your strategy primarily on that fact. Whether the blinds will double and reduce your M to 10 in 15 minutes or four hours should not have much influence on your strategic decisions.”

Zolotow’s “CPR” articles were simply a couple of columns he wrote last year in which he did nothing but explain Harrington’s M theory, as if it were 100% correct. He added nothing to the theory of M, and is clearly as ignorant of the math as Harrington is.

So money-making opportunities in poker tournaments continue to abound.

In any case, I want to thank SlackerInc for posting a question on our poker discussion forum, in which he pointed out many of the key differences between Harrington’s short-stack strategies and those in The Poker Tournament Formula. He wanted to know why our pot-entering strategies were so far apart.

The answer is that the strategies in my book are specifically identified as strategies for fast tournaments of a specific speed, so my assumptions, based on a player’s current chip stack, would usually be that the player is about five times more desperate than Harrington would see him (his Running M of 20 being roughly equivalent to my True M of about 4). ♠

The Ball Cap Kids Meet the Oaf from Hell

by Math Boy
(From Blackjack Forum , Summer 2006)
© Blackjack Forum 2006

[Editor’s Note: Math Boy has been a professional gambler for as long as I have known him. Don’t get the idea that anyone can start making money in poker tournaments this easily right from the start, just by reading The Poker Tournament Formula (or half of it). Math Boy’s got a lot more game in him than any average newbie who starts out in tournaments. He has a long history of involvement in high-risk gambling plays where aggression is not only the optimum strategy, but a necessary component of profitable play. He plays casino games at the highest levels, and the poker tournaments he played were small stakes events in terms of his gambling bankroll. But I really like this article. He sent us this story unsolicited, and I am publishing it because it really does address the fearless attitude you must take into a tournament, and, let’s face it, it’s amusing as hell. —A.S.]

“Since, as a beginner, you can’t be good, at least opt for being dangerous.” —The Poker Tournament Formula

I liked the sound of Arnold’s new book, The Poker Tournament Formula. I’d heard from people that players are worse in no limit games than limit, and it seemed to me that players would have even less of an idea of how to play no limit tournaments. Plus, no limit tournaments sounded like something fun to do for grins. In 2000 I had read the Lee Jones book on low limit hold’em (Winning Low Limit Hold’Em, Conjelco, 2000), and I had played about a dozen hours of low limit poker in the years since then. So I got Arnold’s book and started reading it. I read the first few chapters at home, and got up to the position strategy. On the flight to Vegas I read about card strategy, and flipped ahead to a few chapters that seemed like lighter topics. I got to the point where I had read the position strategy, card strategy, and how to keep track of how much was in the pot. Three new things were enough to keep track of for my first tournament.

So I got to Vegas and the first tournament I entered was a small stakes event rated Skill Level 1. I figured I would not want a higher skill level tournament because I had no skills. In this first tournament, I screwed up the position strategies. The book advises that from the button you should raise if first in, call any number of limpers, and call up to one raiser. But from the button and the two seats next to it I was raising any number of limpers. I lasted 25 minutes.

That night I went to a higher class of casino to play in a higher skill level tournament. I had read the rest of the card strategy section, and knew much of what I had done wrong in my first tournament. Unfortunately, I immediately became the table oaf when the third guy got to the table, because I had sat in his seat, 6, when my card said 4 and I didn’t know the difference. I lasted 35 minutes this time, but learned more. I watched a wraparound shades pro push people around from position. I went out when I had pocket kings and got beaten by A-Q, but overall I played the strategy much better. I was able to stereotype players. I had talked to Arnold about learning the position strategy, and he had advised me to stop looking at my cards, so I went ahead and raised with whatever crap hands I had, but looked at my cards anyway to try and remember card strategy as well. As I made the position strategy raises, I was always amazed how often everyone would fold just because I bet with position. Someone would check, I would bet with junk, and they would fold time and time again.

The next day I went to the same higher class casino for another try. At my table, there was a boat person, two ace masters, and two tight players. One guy tried to steal every other blind and rarely got shown down. I just played the strategy in The Poker Tournament Formula. I stole blinds, and won a hand or two. The table broke up and I got sent to another table. My first hand at this table, I went all in with a great hand and busted out another player. The next hand I was on the button and the bet was $100 with blinds of $25-$50. I wanted to bet, so I threw out $200. The dealer said “call”, because you can’t raise with one chip. A few minutes later I made the exact same mistake, thus becoming the table oaf once more.

The blinds were $100-$200. A cagey codger next to me was wearing a Binions shirt and an Orleans hat. He threw out $600. I wanted to bet $1000 as I had A-K on the button, so I threw out two purples. The dealer said that was a call, because you can’t raise with one chip. I protested because that didn’t seem right. The flop came with a king and two other cards. Apparently, the cagey codger could not feel threatened by anyone who could be that much of an oaf, because he pushed all in. I called and beat his K-J. Later on at that table, I lost back half my chips to a worse hand that outdrew me.

I got taken to another table. I have a Rolex, and three other guys at this table had Rolexes. One was a Brit with a two-tone submariner, and the others were two ball cap kids with no caps but plenty of chip shuffling tricks. The ball cap kids had crappy datejust Rolexes. For people who don’t know anything about Rolexes, Rolex gives each store a certain number of each model. The popular models (submariners, daytonas) sell out quickly. The unpopular models (day-dates, datejusts) sit on the shelf for a long time and at some point probably get smuggled to ebay to get sold off. (OK, call me a watch snob. But it’s true. And it’s also a tell.) At one point the two ball cap kids are in a pot. There is a bet before the flop, and the other guy calls. The flop comes down K-K-5, and one bets. (Which I would have done no matter what.) The second ball cap kid takes about two minutes, then folds and flashes the table his pocket aces to show how brilliant he is in his laydown. I think to myself there is no way in hell I would have just folded like that. Later I get into an all-in showdown with Mr. Pocket Aces and I have to show my K-5 (I was on the button). I had drawn out on him, and Ball Cap Kid #1 tells me sarcastically, “I think you had the better hand.” I tell him I had the better hand after the river came down, and that is all I care about. He spends the next few minutes making sarcastic remarks at my expense, and then I was sent to another table. I had one other lucky draw-out in the entire tournament. Those were the only two times I had to show a junk hand. But by that time I had more than double the chips of anyone at the new table.

Two more tables later a player I liked went out and was replaced by a cagey codger with an Orleans hat. No one liked this guy. He thought very highly of his witty repartee. He was telling the dealer how to deal. He was telling the table oaf to not show his cards to everyone. (By that time I had too many chips to be the table oaf.) About ten minutes later I was the small blind and in the pot with Orleans Hat. The flop came, and I knew I wanted to bet, but forgot that I had to go first. I waited a long time, expecting him to bet. Then he made some comment, and I bet $1200 as the blinds were $200-$400. He made a snide comment that he had intended to bet the same amount, and I replied, “That’s great.” At that time we started paying antes and I started having a problem. I was stealing the blinds like clockwork, and it took too long to scoop and stack all the greens and blacks as well as keep track of who was betting what.

After that table broke up, I had made it into the final 30. I went to my penultimate table and had the biggest chip stack. Yet, by Arnold’s definition, I was slightly desperate because I had about 25 big blinds! So I played a little looser even though I had more chips. At this point, I had been at the table with a few people who were experienced players, and who stole the blinds. They all had mediocre chip stacks. By Arnold’s standards, they should have been all in every time they made a bet. Yet, a Dutch player was the only one who did that. When we got down to about 20 players, the dealer counted out over a dozen hands where no one saw the flop. It was just ante-blinds, then one guy would bet, then the table would fold. Once in awhile one of the short stacks would go all in against the bettor, and the guy who bet would just fold. I took about one out of every five blinds at this point, and my chip stack kept on creeping up while better players’ stacks kept on creeping down. Everything was happening just like Arnold said it would in the book. There was a tight player to my left who made the final table and had about half my chips. He also was a great source of chips, because I stole the antes and blinds from him several times in a row without a call.

At one point I had a mediocre hand and made a position play. A smallish stack went all in over the top of me. But the amount to me was only about $800 more than I had in the pot, and I figured I was being given something like 5:1 odds. So I called with my 6-4s. I pulled out the straight to win, and that was the second of two times I got shown down with a junk hand. While I know how to calculate pot odds, that is the only time I had to do it. I don’t think I had a flush draw the entire tournament.

I actually made money from a cagey codger. He had shown down three times. Every showdown he had a pair, and one pair was as low as 5’s. So I had him down as a pair master. When I had pocket 10’s, he made a smaller bet than usual. He had a smallish stack at this point, and I figured that he could not have a pair, but must have two high cards and was taking a half-hearted shot at the blinds. I bet my usual bet to make him call. Then after the flop he checked. I bet, and before he folded he showed me his A-K that the flop had missed. I had made money from stereotyping him.

The closer we got to the final nine players who would make up the final table, the tighter everyone got. When there were 10 players left, Ball Cap Kid #1, who had been ragging on me, went all in as the first one to bet. Pair Master Cagey Codger went all in to call him. Then I pushed all in with pocket queens, and Ball Cap Kid #1 goes “Oh shiatsu” (real swear word edited out). My hand busts out both guys. Even better, Ball Cap Kid #1 only got half the 9th place prize because he busted out at the same time as the cagey codger. We moved over to the final table, where the Submariner Brit from the last table was the short stack. He thanked me for busting out two guys so he would get higher in the prize pool.

At that point there was one stack bigger than mine. I just followed the strategy in The Poker Tournament Formula and stole blinds and antes. At that point the blinds were $500-$1,000 and the antes were $200. Those steals add up! My standard bet was $5,000 at this point, and people would just lay down for me when I made my position plays. I would push people around with total crap because I was in position, and would steal blinds when in position. At one point we had a break and there were six people left. A tattooed British guy came up to me when I was going into the bathroom and said, “You are a great poker player. You are a dangerous man when you have chips.” That made my day, because I knew I had no skills except for being able to follow Arnold’s book. Later, the British guy busted out at #5, and I whispered in his ear that I had never played a tournament previous to the day before. He looked like his eyes were going to pop out of his head.

Shortly after that the chip leader suggested a chop. With a very slight adjustment, we agreed to a chop weighted by chips. I had the second most chips on the table at that point, even though I had lost a showdown to the fourth place player, Submariner Brit. So I had made better than 2nd place money in my third tournament. Better than 88 other players, even though I have always considered myself a horrible poker player. I was horrible in high school and college before I knew how to gamble. Other pros can testify to my bad low limit play. But I read half a book and won money. I told the other three guys at that point that I had never played in a poker tournament or no-limit cash game before the previous day. All I had done was read half a book. The chip leader told me he hoped I wouldn’t read the second half of the book.  ♠

Plan Your Play, Play Your Plan

by S. Yama
© 2003 S. Yama

The $1 Million Blackjack Tournament at the Las Vegas Hilton Casino has breathed fresh interest into tournament blackjack.

Thanks to Blackjack Confidential Magazine’s detailed descriptions, bet-by-bet and hand-by-hand, each month we can relive experiences of the contestants. For the last few months, perhaps starting with K. Smith’s article, BCM has included wonderfully telling tales of major tournaments.

Being able to view all cards in the order they were dealt, knowing the players’ bankrolls, bets and decisions, creates pictures of high fidelity and makes an analysis of each player’s strategy easy and revealing.

Looking at these play-by-play reports I’ve tried to imagine what could have motivated a player to bet or play the way he or she did. But then, it dawned on me: The majority of players are betting randomly and haphazardly, perhaps playing hunches. There was no planned strategy to their play.

I understand that blackjack tournaments are social events. Tournament players enjoy seeing one another during these tournament rendezvous. We meet, talk, joke around and gossip. We are genuinely happy for those blessed with success and share the sorrows of those not-so-blessed. Often, we complain about our lack of luck or somebody’s extraordinary luck.

Well, my advice here is to give luck a chance.

How? By having a plan on how to bet and play even before you enter a blackjack tournament.

Oh, I realize there is a small group of players who analyze tournament plays to death. But these same players achieve better results then most, too. The average player doesn’t need to worry about trying to pull a fanciful play that bring an additional percentage point or two to their game. Especially if, in doing so, they lose concentration or the effort obstructs the “bigger picture.”

Such fine points aren’t necessary. But, a basic tournament plan is absolutely necessary. It doesn’t have to be an ultimate plan.

After playing a round you should always ask yourself, “What could I have done better?” If you do this, chances are you will play better in your next round.

Here are some simplified strategies or ideas for playing at Las Vegas Hilton with an eye toward reaching the finals:

Casino Tournament Tips for Beginners

1. The less tournament experience you have, the more aggressively you should bet.
2. In the first half of a round you shouldn’t try to correlate to other players.
3. In the first half of a round, betting slightly more or less will have no strategic importance.
4. When trying to catch up with your opponent:

1. Use a betting progression starting with (pick one) 1/15^th, 1/7^th or 1/3^rd of your bankroll. Contrary to some opinions, my advice is to double down or split if Basic Strategy calls for it.
2. Bet big when your opponents bet small. It is twice as easy to win a maximum bet two times in a row than it is to wait until the last hand and get a swing (you win and your opponent lose) versus just one player.

5. The last few hands are most important.
6. Try to position yourself going into the last hand of a round. To get there you have to plan and succeed in the hand leading up to it.
7. Try to be in the lead (or in the top two places in a qualifying round) going into the last hand of a round with a lead within the following ranges:

1. Have any lead. Having any lead is often as good as having a big lead.
2. Have a lead of more than half of the maximum bet.
3. Have a lead of more than the maximum bet.

8. If you aren’t in the lead, try to stay within the following ranges:

1. Trailing by less than ½ of maximum bet (or half of leader’s bankroll).
2. Trailing by less than maximum bet.

9. Most of the time it will not matter by how much exactly you are leading or trailing as long as it is within the striking range.
10. The “double down” is one of the most powerful techniques you can use. When you double down regardless of what cards you have, or if you split a pair and play optimally, you will win one-third of your hands!
11. If losing your bet takes you out of contention, then bet the maximum.
12. If losing your bet would take you out of contention and you plan on drawing only one card, then double down.
13. When trailing, try to intersect ranges to determine your bet:

1. The smallest winning bet that gets you ahead of your main opponent if your opponent also wins. If you are betting before your opponent, try to guess what she or he might be betting when it is their turn.
2. The smallest bet, which when doubled, gets you ahead of your main opponent if your opponent also wins.
3. The biggest bet, which when lost, leaves you with more than half of your main opponent’s bankroll if your opponent also loses. If you’re betting before your opponent, assume that she or he will push.

14. Generally, when leading and there are two or fewer opponents and you bet first, bet less then your lead.
15. When leading and there are more than two opponents, bet slightly more then the bigger bet of the two:

1. The maximum bet minus half your lead over the next player.
2. If your opponent bets in front of you, risk the opponent’s bet times two, minus your lead, all divided by two.

16. When you need to swing your opponent, then draw to at least 18 and two points more then your opponent has.
17. When you need to gain on your opponent (you win, while she or he pushes, or you push while she or he loses), draw to at least 17 and one point more then your opponent has.
18. Don’t surrender small bets when Basic Strategy doesn’t call for it.
19. Proper use of surrender may be profitable but it is also complicated. Don’t use surrender if you haven’t mastered it.
20. Deal with one issue at a time.

To Win Casino Tournaments Keep It Simple

Perhaps the last point requires some additional comments. Analyzing tournament strategies can get so complicated that even the best players can get confused. Don’t panic. Stay focused by trying to answer prioritized questions:

Who is your main target (whom to “whack”)?

What is the difference between your bankrolls?

Is the difference bigger or smaller than half of the maximum bet?

Is it more than the maximum bet?

Do I have a lock?

Can I catch up with this player? Should I focus on another player?

How much will he or she lose or gain on this hand?

How much do I need to bet if we both win?

How much do I need to bet to succeed if we both win doubled bets?

What is the downside if we both lose? And so on.

Analyze one player at a time with questions and answers. This is a method of small steps. Don’t move to the next question until you have a clear answer to the previous one.

Don’t worry about mistakes. You will make mistakes in casino tournaments. I rarely play a round without finding a better play I could have made—twenty minutes after the game. Don’t insist that your way of playing is best. See if there was a better way. After awhile you may find that “coulda-shoulda-woulda” is more fun than what really happened at the table.

Have a plan for your next casino blackjack tournament. Good results will follow.

I promise,

S. Yama ♠

[Ed. Note: S. Yama is a professional casino tournament player who is widely regarded by tournament pros as one of the handful of top tournament players in the world.]

For more information on winning tournament strategy, see Casino Tournament Strategy by Stanford Wong and Play to Win: A World Champions Guide to Winning Blackjack Tournaments by Ken Einiger.

Legal Implications of Various Types of Fake ID for Professional Gamblers

by Andrew S. Blumen, Attorney at Law
(From Blackjack Forum IX #1, March 1989)
© Blackjack Forum 1989

One of the recurring problems for the professional blackjack player is being able to play in a casino that is dealing a good game without being recognized as a card counter by the casino employees. When that occurs, the player is usually barred.

So players go to great lengths to be able to play undetected. Among the props used by the player are false beards and mustaches, wigs, dressing and playing the role of the “hick from the sticks” and many other similar ruses.

In conjunction with the above props, many players obtain false identification documents (I.D.) so that when asked who they are by casino personnel, they can produce proof of a name not known by the Griffin Agency or the casino security. Players using certain types of false identification (I.D.) run the risk of federal and state prosecution. The following actually happened to a very successful “21” player.

Jim had been playing blackjack for many years all over the world. Because he was extremely successful, the number of casinos where he could play was dwindling to the point where he had to do something to fool the casinos or look for a new profession. Jim decided that the only chance he had of continuing his career as a professional “21” player was to convince the casinos he was someone other than himself.

Jim set about this endeavor the same way he did when learning to play blackjack. He visited various bookstores and searched through several mail order catalogues seeking literature which would tell him how to obtain identification documents (I.D.) in a name other than his own. He was amazed at the vast number of books and pamphlets published dealing with this subject matter. These publications included subjects on how to obtain birth certificates and death certificates, how to obtain drivers’ licenses while not physicalIy appearing at the motor vehicle office of that particular state, how to obtain social security cards and credit cards.

Armed with this information, Jim sent away to various states and received lists of people who had died at a very young age. He then requested the birth certificates of these dead people. Once he had these documents in his possession, he obtained a social security card in the false name and a driver’s license or l.D. card from the appropriate state. He also obtained a Notary Public stamp in a false name. Armed with these documents, Jim was ready to play in casinos within the United States under an assumed name.

However, Jim still had a problem. Since he travelled to foreign casinos on a regular basis, and since they request a passport as proof of identification, Jim went to New York and applied for a passport in the name of one of his fictitious identities. Jim intended to use this passport only when a casino requested it as proof of I.D. and would use his own passport for entering and exiting the country. By only using the false passport for casino purposes, Jim assumed he could not get in trouble.

Several weeks after applying for the passport, several FBI agents arrived at Jim’s residence in Nevada armed with an arrest warrant for Jim and a search warrant for his residence. Jim was arrested for “making a false statement in the application for a passport.” Jim was taken by the FBI to the Federal Building where he was initially held without bail pending his extradition to New York to face this charge.

During the search of his house, the FBI confiscated lists of births and deaths, several birth and death certificates, social security cards, drivers’ licenses, a notary public stamp, and numerous books on assuming a false identity. These items were turned over to the United States District Attorney’s office in Nevada. The U.S. Attorney presented these items to a Grand Jury which returned a multiple count indictment against Jim. Jim was charged with several counts of production of a false identification document, a federal crime.

Because there were two separate cases against Jim in the two different states, he had to hire two attorneys to argue his bail motions and to defend him at trial. His attorneys’ fees were sizeable. As a result of the criminal charges, Jim faced up to five years in prison and a fine not to exceed $250,000.00 on each individual charge.

In addition, the federal government had enacted “Sentencing Guidelines” which, if applied to Jim’s case, could have resulted in mandatory jail time. Due to some fortuitous circumstances, Jim’s cases were consolidated and negotiated to his benefit. The terms of the negotiations were that he pled guilty to making a false statement in the application for a passport and to two counts of production of false identification documents. All remaining charges were dismissed. Pursuant to negotiations, Jim received probation. He also was required to do 160 hours of community service and pay a modest fine.

Since the time this case was completed, the Uniform Federal Sentencing Guidelines have been upheld as constitutional by the United States Supreme Court. Had they been applied in Jim’s case, Jim would have faced a minimum of six months and a maximum of twelve months in prison. Depending on certain mitigating factors which would determine Jim’s offense level, he would most likely not have been eligible for probation. This result would occur although Jim had never been arrested or convicted of any criminal offense before. As a result, Jim would have had to spend time in jail for these offenses.

It is important to note that to be charged with the crime of “production of a false identification document,” a person need only have such a document in his possession. It is not necessary to represent this document identifies you to a government official. Among the false documents which can result in criminal charges are drivers’ licenses, social security cards, passports and a notary public stamp in a false name.

Had Jim not applied for a passport in a false name, it is unlikely that he would have gotten the attention of the Feds. Therefore, without this attention, Jim would not have been indicted on the additional charges of production of false identification documents. It is for each individual to decide whether the risk of a felony conviction is worth the acquisition of false I.D.

Even without the Feds’ initial involvement, the player runs the risk of the casino notifying the Feds if you use false I.D. in their casino, should they discover this. Further complications could also result after arrest, including an Internal Revenue Service review of your financial affairs.

It is up to each individual to determine whether the risks are worth the potential rewards. Should a player decide to take the risk, it is important to remember never to use the false I.D. or give a false name when dealing with a government official. Confine your use to casino personnel only, and never attempt to obtain a passport in a false name. If you do, you very well could end up in jail. ♠

A Card Cheats’ and Crossroaders’ Paradise

by Arnold Snyder
(From Blackjack Forum Vol. II #3, December 1988)
© 1988 Blackjack Forum

[Before Arizona passed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, the state legalized “socail Gambling” in bars and nightclubs – completely unregulated. This article is about that “social gambling” experiment. I’m posting it in both the Cheating section and the Blackjack History section because this has nothing to do with the legal blackjack scene in Arizona today. – A.S.]

The way I hear it, the cheating was all a big mistake. Except for the squeaky-clean state lottery and your occasional church bingo night, there wasn’t much gambling in Arizona.

But what the hay, this is the Wild West, and cowboys will be cowboys. There were always a few bars and strip joints running backroom poker and blackjack games, your occasional crap table off in the corner. There were never any laws in the state prohibiting social gambling. Casinos were illegal, but Friday night poker games were just considered good clean fun.

The problem, as perceived by the lawmakers, was that some of these two-bit bars with backroom gambling were making decent money in the back room, and, naturally, paying no taxes on these ill-got gains.

It didn’t seem necessary, or even possible, to get rid of these friendly games. Social gambling had been going on as long as anyone could remember. No one was getting hurt. Organized crime wasn’t involved. There weren’t even any crossroaders or cheating (that anyone knew of). It was small potatoes.

You couldn’t expect the police to start busting the bar owners or patrons of these games. These weren’t criminals. They were fine upstanding citizens having a little innocent fun on payday. Everyone played a little blackjack some time. And what with the booming casino industry of Laughlin, Nevada, plastering their billboards all over the state of Arizona — just a few hours’ drive from Phoenix, well it just didn’t make sense to make an issue of it if Arizonans wanted to keep their entertainment dollars right in their own hometown.

But it was the principle of the thing. Bar owners were just not paying their fare share of the taxes. Not that there was any great tax potential from these nickel and dime games. Just the principle.

The last thing the legislators wanted to do was make it legal for the bars to run these gambling games. They didn’t want casinos in Arizona. They just wanted to clarify the law. If people wanted a little friendly social gambling, fine. But no casinos. Bars shouldn’t be banking these games, raking the pot in poker, dealing the blackjack and taking the house edge. It just wasn’t fair. And if there’s one thing that Arizona’s lawmakers pride themselves on, it’s their sense of fair play.

The solution seemed so simple. There wasn’t much argument in the legislature. They’d simply define “social gambling.” You want to play a little poker, a little blackjack, shoot some craps, fine. Any adult establishment could allow games like these right out in the open.

But the bars couldn’t bank the games. No one could bank the games. These would be friendly games between the players, and only between the players. Who deals? The players. Who sets the rules and the stakes? The players. Who rakes the pot? No one. In fact, it would be against the law for any establishment offering such games to charge their customers any cover charge to play, or to benefit in any way from these games.

If the players wanted to drink while they played, they could order drinks. But no bar was going to hustle drinks or pressure players to spend money. These were friendly games, played by mutual agreement of the players. Fair games. No house edge. No problems.

A Law Designed for Card Cheats

On August 18, 1987, Arizona Revised Statute 13-3301 was signed into law. “Social Gambling” was defined as “gambling which is not conducted as a business and involves players who compete on equal terms with each other in a gamble if all of the following apply:

• “a) No player receives, or becomes entitled to receive, any benefit, directly or indirectly, other than his winnings from the gamble.
• “b) No other person receives, or becomes entitled to receive, any benefit, directly or indirectly, from the gamble.
• “c) None of the players are below the age of majority (21 years).”

That seemed pretty clear. No casinos. No house edge. No banking the games. The law was straightforward. Friendly. Fair.

Jolee’s Lounge in Glendale, a suburb on the west side of Phoenix, was one of the first establishments to take advantage of the new law. Jolee’s owner, Joann Ashley, heard about the new law and figured the novelty of a couple poker tables might pump up her business. She thought her regular customers might enjoy playing poker and the tables would probably draw in some new customers as well.

She was right about the latter. Within several weeks it was hard to get in the door. There were crowds around her two tables waiting to jump at an open seat. Her regular customers weren’t so regular anymore. It just wasn’t the same atmosphere.

Heavy gamblers were controlling the tables, but there wasn’t much Joann could do about it. The law prohibited her from having much say about the games, lest she be accused of acting as “the house” for her own benefit. More disturbing to her were offers she was getting from professional card sharks. They wanted to give her a cut of their action in exchange for the use of her tables with their own dealers.

Worst of all, the big crowds did not spell financial success. Ms. Ashley learned, to her dismay, that gamblers drink a lot of coffee and not much else. She had always provided coffee to her customers for free. Within a couple months, her Friday night business had dropped from $1200 to $300.

By December of 1987, four months after Arizona’s “social gambling” law was defined, Jolee’s Lounge became its first casualty. Joann had taken out the poker tables. She didn’t have gambling anymore. But she’d lost her regular customers as well. She was forced to sell what was left of the business.

No one knows how many bars and night clubs in Arizona tried “social gambling” within the first year of the new law. But the Phoenix police department had a list of 22 full-time gambling establishments just in their county. The police didn’t know quite what to make of this new phenomenon. Unlike Nevada or New Jersey, Arizona law didn’t specify any game rules or regulations. There were no cheating statutes. No training or licensing of dealers or pit personnel. No pit bosses. No agency existed to oversee the games or to enforce laws designed to protect the public. There just wasn’t much of a law to enforce.

The new law had been in effect more than a year, in fact, before anyone had been indicted for a gambling violation. On September 15, 1988, Tommy Caselli, owner of Tommy’s Full House Casino on Camelback Road in Phoenix, was charged with a misdemeanor violation of the law. Tommy’s mistake, according to the assistant D.A. who was prosecuting the case, was that Tommy had advertised the gambling in his establishment. To the D.A., this indicated that Tommy would be “benefiting” from the games. Tommy stopped running his newspaper ads, and within a month, these charges were dropped.

Since then, other bars have been busted for running the games in their establishments with house dealers. Whether or not these charges will stick has yet to be seen. How long this wide open gambling will exist in Arizona is anybody’s guess. Most informed sources feel the state lawmakers will either outlaw social gambling, or more strictly define this recreation in order to rid the state of the current problems as soon as possible.

I spent three days in Phoenix in September with Blackjack Forum’s esteemed correspondent and Laughlin reporter, Pigbait, as my guide. Here are some of the technical data I collected on Tommy’s Full House Casino.

A Report from the Arizona Card Cheat Scene

On Thursday night, there were 11 blackjack tables in operation, as well as 5 poker tables and a crap table. On Friday night, there were 13 blackjack tables, and on Saturday, these increased to 15. Most of the tables were regulation 7 spotters with a “Harvey’s” logo on the felt. Some were card tables with a felt layout thrown over it. A few were card tables with no layout at all.

The game rules varied according to the dealer’s choice. I saw one 4-deck shoe game on two of the nights. All of the other games were 1- and 2-deck handheld. Players bring their own cards. Any player who is dealt a blackjack may take the deal. If you don’t have your own cards you can only exercise this option if some other player at the table will lend you his deck. Most players do not want the deal because of the risk.

The dealer sets the betting limits. I saw games with limits of $2 to $5, $2 to $10, $2 to $20, $5 to $20, $5 to $50, and $5 to $100. Most games have a $20 upper limit. The problem with taking the deal in such a game is that if you lower the limit (which is the dealer’s option), many players will leave the table. A few consecutive dealer busts at a full table with a $20 limit could wipe out a moderate bankroll.

Rules and procedures also vary widely. Many games are dealt to the bottom card, with all but the bottom and burn cards being played.

Many dealers show the burn card, and some won’t burn an ace. Most games are dealt face-up to the players so that players never touch the cards.

Sound like a card counter’s dream? One deck dealt to the bottom, all players’ cards face up? Someone pinch me.

Both soft 17 rules are used, and both Vegas and Reno doubling rules are also employed. Dealer’s choice. Most dealers do not offer insurance. Some do. Blackjacks pay 3 to 2, but most dealers do not use 50¢ pieces. If you get a blackjack with a $5 bet, you will be paid either $7 or $8. Again, dealer’s choice, but most dealers will alternate the underpay and overpay if you remind them.

Common oddities: No chips are used. All bets are cash on the table. A bill folded in half means “bet half” (i.e, a $20 bill folded in half in your betting circle means you are betting $10). Most dealers do not make change until after the hands are completed. A bill placed between two betting spots means you are playing two hands, betting half the bill’s value on each (i.e, a $20 bill placed between two spots means you are playing two hands, betting $10 on each). A $20 bill folded in half between two spots means you are betting a total of $10, or $5 on each of two hands.

Seconds Dealing, Marked Cards, Stacked Decks and More

Most dealers peek under tens and aces to see if they have a blackjack prior to completing the players’ hands. Some dealers peek under all of their upcards before completing the players’ hands. This may strike you as stupid — or it may strike you as a potential cheating move. Since there is no legitimate reason for the dealer to know his hole card in advance unless he has a ten or ace up, he could be seeking this information for any of a variety of scams.

This, of course, is the biggest problem you face if you gamble in Arizona. Avoiding the scam artists. One reliable source informs me that every card mucker and crossroader in Nevada has relocated to Phoenix in the past year, and that a large proportion of the games being dealt are crooked.

Marked cards are common, what with dealers supplying their own decks. You will not be able to detect the markings, which may often be nothing more than lightly sanded edges that allow the dealer to identify tens and aces. Be especially wary of any dealer who varies his upcard and hole card. The trick is for the dealer to always show a ten or an ace up, so that the players will always be hitting their stiffs and rarely doubling down or splitting. A move like this requires no other legerdemain, and is very strong.

Also, watch out for dealers who deal face down games, then don’t turn up alI of the players’ cards after a player busts. This is a classic move for a dealer working with a third base confederate when he wants the confederate to draw off a card or cards that he doesn’t want to deal to himself. Such a dealer may be using a marked deck, waiting for the top card to be the one he needs to make his hand. (Most games — even 1- and 2-deck — are dealt face up.)

Dealers who peek under all up cards — not just tens and aces — may be signaling their hands to confederates, or may want to know their hands in advance for many other possible cheating moves. Dealing styles are so amateur that it is not uncommon at all for dealers to peek under non-tens/aces. Most of these dealers probably do it because they’ve seen others do it, or it was always how they played in home games and they just want to know their hands.

Many cheats have been run out of games by players or bar owners who have caught them. This is a fairly regular occurrence in Phoenix games — especially dealers getting caught with “short” decks or marked cards. Sometimes, guns are drawn, though no instances of actual shootings have occurred yet to my knowledge. It is legal to pack a pistol on your hip in Arizona, and it is not uncommon to see gun-toting citizens. Remember, this is the Wild West.

Unlike Nevada or New Jersey, Arizona law does not spell out what constitutes cheating, therefore, no arrests have been made in these cheating incidents. Although these games are legal, don’t forget that these are back-alley games, with back-alley rules. If you’re accused or even suspected of cheating, you may have to deal with back-alley justice.

For this reason, I would strongly advise against “spooking” as a strategy — that is, positioning yourself behind a dealer so that you can signal a confederate at the table as to the dealer’s hole card. This is so easy to do in Tommy’s Full House Casino that you may be tempted to try and pull it off. There are no pit bosses. Just a few “security” employees of the bar whose main job seems to be asking customers to remove their hats because of the “dress code.” (No t-shirts! Stricter than Caesars Palace!)

You can stand directly behind most of the dealers and look over their shoulders. Nobody will stop you. But if somebody suspects you’re passing signals to your buddy at the table, your arguments that the “law” doesn’t cover this, or even that it’s an untested legal area in Nevada, may not wash very well with the bikers escorting you out the back door.

Also, watch out for inaccurate payments on winning hands. With all of the folded bills and bills between spots, etc., “errors” — which may or may not be intentional — are not uncommon. Some errors will work to the players’ advantage. The worst mistake I saw was a dealer who, after busting, did not collect the bets from the players who had also busted, but considered these hands pushes!

If it appeals to you to take advantage of amateurs and drunks, you’ll love Arizona.

Personally, I would not play in any game in Arizona that I was not dealing. I just don’t trust dealers who bring their own cards. I would also not deal a game unless I had arrived with friends who would be accompanying me out at night’s end. Dealers carry a lot of cash. I would also deal a face-up game so that players did not touch their cards. And I would be hyper-aware of spooking and front-loading possibilities as I dealt. I would also make change for folded bills and bills between spots prior to dealing the hands.

If you like craps, you’ll find an interesting back-alley style game at Tommy’s. Again, it’s players vs. players. No house. They’ve got a regulation size casino crap table with no layout on the felt. Players make up their own proposition bets by mutual agreement, set their own odds, etc. The don’t pass bet is popular since no numbers are barred; don’t bettors have a 1.4% advantage.

The poker games look very loose — lots of cash on the tables. Big pots. High-low split games were popular when I was there.

Personally, I wouldn’t go near the poker or crap games with my money. These games offer far more cheating possibilities than blackjack (assuming you’re dealing).

In any case, there’s a good chance the Phoenix lawmakers will do away with the whole gambling scene soon. I’ll keep you posted in these pages on developments as they occur. If you’re real sharp, and you’ve got a good sized bankroll, and a few big friends to escort you around town, you might want to check out Phoenix. It’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen in Nevada or New Jersey.

If you’re a casual player, stay home. This is no place for amateurs. If you’ve just got to see it to believe it, then check it out, but keep your wallet in your pocket. You’ll see some of the sharpest hustlers in the country cleaning the clocks of Phoenix locals night after night.

If you insist on playing, spend a few hours watching Steve Forte’s Gambling Protection Series (DVD 3 Set) on how to detect cheating moves before you hit the tables. You may not be able to see the moves, but it should add to your enjoyment of the games to know why you’re losing so consistently.

In the last week of October, Pigbait did a mini-survey of the action available in the Phoenix area. There are dozens of bars with one or two tables that he did not survey. Note that although there are no house rules, the smaller bars tend to develop an unwritten set of rules and procedures that the regular patrons agree on. If you try to deal a different game, you may have no one to deal to. ♠

• Angelo’s (E. Mesa): I table, 4-deck shoe dealt down to last 8-10 cards; double on any two cards; no insurance.
• Annie’s (Mill Ave., Tempe): 1-3 tables, 2-and 4-deck games; dealt face down: both double-down rules (dealer’s choice); dealer’s choice on insurance; limits 2-5, 2-20.
• Dancing Sunshines (32nd & McDowell, Phoenix): Open 24 hours; 2-3 tables; 2-decks; face up; no hand held deal (decks on table); no insurance; double 10-11 only; dealers almost always peek under any up card; limits 1-3, 1-5, 2-10, 2-20; any player may ask for the cards to be counted face up onto the table at any time to insure against short decks.
• J.J. McLinqus (University Ave., Tempe): 2 tables; I deck; hand held; dealer’s choice doubling; no insurance; limits 1, 1-2, 1-3, 1-5,-10.
• Lester’s (Bell Rd., Phoenix): 3-4 tables; 1- or 2-deck; hand held; face down; both doubling rules; no insurance; limits 2-5, 2-10, 5-10, 5-20.
• Pool & Brew (32nd & Thomas, Phoenix): Open 24 hours; 2-3 tables; 2-decks; face up; no hand held dealing (decks on table, dealt with one hand); double 10-11; no insurance; dealer usually peeks under every up card; limits 2-5, 2-10, 5-50.
• Tommy’s Full House (Camelback Rd., Phoenix): 12 tables; 1-, 2-, and 4-deck; dealer’s choice on doubling rules and insurance; limits 2-5, 2-10, 2-20, 5-20, 2-50, 5-100.