The 21st-Century Card Counter – Page 2

Posted on July 19, 2021 by James Grosjean — 9 Comments

Colin Jones (S1 E6): The Secret to Investing—OPM??

I walked off a game the other day, and I have Colin Jones to thank. On paper, the game could be a 20% edge or higher. In the real world? Not so much. My frustration grew. Why am I playing this 10% garbage? I’m out.

Where does Colin Jones fit into this? Something he wrote on p. 14 of The 21^st-Century Card Counter hit home, because I’ve wrestled with it my whole career, even though I’ve never seen it in print before: “Being responsible for other people’s money is a whole different animal. I never lost a night’s sleep riding out the swings with my own money, but shouldering the weight of family and friends’ money definitely came with bouts of night sweats and indigestion.”

Posted on July 14, 2021 by James Grosjean — 6 Comments

Colin Jones (S1 E5): Dark Matter

As early as page 11 of The 21^st-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 see the stark gap between AV (Actual Value) and EV (Expected Value), they have a puzzled look like this is some great mystery. The only mystery is why rookie teams ignore the answer that I’m about to explain for the nth time. [PRO TIP FTW: use “nth” the next time you play Hangman.]

Posted on July 2, 2021 by James Grosjean — 4 Comments

Colin Jones (S1 E4): In the Beginning …

In The 21^st-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. Achieving social acceptance or support from family, friends, and square work colleagues, and starting with a minuscule bankroll make success incredibly difficult. What business would you dare to start with only $2000? Would you open a yogurt shop with that? Could you set up a B2B online marketplace with that? A high-end driving/limo service?

With only $2000, what would happen if you go to Vegas to become a card counter? You’d be better off getting yourself castrated, going down to Fremont Street, and collecting $10 from every tourist who wants to kick you in the crotch. But fools rush in where angels dare to tread, so CJ took the crazy path of trying to become a card counter.

Posted on June 26, 2021 by James Grosjean — 18 Comments

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 21^st-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, I decided to treat the book like a textbook, and go through its talking points in an N-part series. Here we go!

[p. 5] “This ‘card counting’ thing haunted me. Was it real?” That’s the question I’ve faced and debated publicly for two decades. CJ’s perspective at the time was a bit different from mine. He was wondering if you could really make money, or a living, doing it. I ask the logical follow-up: Even if you could, why would you want to? By the end of the book, the hero CJ answers his own question (yes, card-counting is “real”), but evolves to answer my follow-up (answer: “I wouldn’t”).

Posted on June 21, 2021 by James Grosjean — 5 Comments

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 21^st-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), and the in-person boot camps offered from time to time. Before I continue with the multi-part book review I began in my last post, let me address the mild controversy surrounding the book’s author, Mr. Jones (“Jones”? Really?).

As a disclaimer, let me say that other than reading CJ’s book, I have no connection whatsoever to the BJA empire. I’ve never attended a boot camp, and I know CJ only from meeting him a few times at Max Rubin’s annual Blackjack Ball. I won’t bother to start with the perfunctory, empty statement, “He’s a really nice guy,” because that definition of “nice” carries no weight with me. I’ve known friendly talkers who would buy you coffee or pick you up from the airport, but still abuse you and steal six or seven figures from you, so what does “nice” really mean, anyway? But since you asked about CJ, yeah, he’s a really nice guy.

Posted on June 14, 2021 by James Grosjean — 14 Comments

Colin Jones (S1 E1): You Had Me at “Zippered Pockets”

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. Michael Canjar) went up greatly when I saw him wearing his cargo pants, anonymously blasting 2x$800 on the double-deck at the Atlantis in Reno. One of my teammates had an interesting encounter in the wild with the late Peter Griffin. When someone is out there, putting cold, hard cash on the felt, and consequently growing the chip inventory on the kitchen table, that’s instant credibility in my eyes.

As Tommy Hyland wrote in the Foreword to Colin Jones’s The 21^st-Century Card Counter, “the guy walks the walk.” I haven’t encountered Colin in the wild (yet), but I know Tommy is right on this one. It’s easy to talk the talk online, on Green Chip, or the Discord, and sound uber-smart, and knowledgeable about counting and all kinds of advanced plays, but the talk rings hollow if you try to get it past an actual practitioner. I can’t read 10 posts on any online forum without getting the urge to rant, but I resist that urge and refocus my chi.

Tag: The 21st-Century Card Counter