Blackjack Education of a young card counter

Thanks for the kind words, Mission, but I just feel like teaching isn't one of my strong suits. I have trained three people. It happens to be the three people I live with. Two of them, my partner and my brother went pretty smoothly. My brother is smart....much smarter than me and he picked things up very quickly.

The one that was a problem, was my other housemate, who I trained 3 years ago. I don't know if it was him or I, but it just did not go smoothly. I would try to explain things and he wouldn't get it. And I would try again and again and he wouldn't get it. And you just can't going over the same thing....the same way, if it isn't registering. You gotta get creative and kind of circle around to a different approach that might register better. I tried hard, but I just felt like I wasn't very good at that.

In the end, he didn't even stick with blackjack, but went back to Poker and I had my one really bad year that year, in part because I lost so much time training him that I didn't get in the playing time that I normally do, and in part that just happened to be the one year where Lady Variance didn't smile on me, but instead kicked my butt. So the whole teaching thing left a bad taste in my mouth. When my brother moved in the following spring after graduating college and wanted me to teach him, I was like Oh geez! Thank god it went much more smoothly.

 

Some people simply just can't "get it".

I was on vacation with my dad a while ago, maybe like a year or so. He wanted to go gamble (we weren't in LV) for some reason. Okay, sure, I'll go. I looked up a few in the area and one had a $100 loss rebate. Okay, cool, let's go! He knows how it works, if you lose you get half today and half tomorrow (or 2 days? Don't remember). I figured the best option, all things included, was a $1 VP machine. We were both down $100 after a little while. I told my dad something like, "Okay....you wanna leave and go back or keep playing?" He said let's keep playing....fine by me. Told him not to use his card any more because he registered the $100 loss, as did I, so now we'd get $100 in FP. Since we were planning on continuing to play, if we used our players cards while playing and we ended up winning, we wouldn't get that $100 in FP. I could not explain it to him for the life of me. He was sorta upset I wouldn't let him use the card anymore to keep earning those magical points! And I don't think he's ever figure out why NOT using our cards after losing $100 was a good idea.


A lot of AP stuff, especially when it gets to "theoretical" stuff....people just don't get it. They think if you're up $3k in a shoe then by the end of it are down $2k, you must'a done something wrong or should have "quit while ahead" and "don't get greedy".

They understand a coin flip is 50/50, but they don't understand if you win $20 when it lands on heads and lose $10 when it lands on tails, your expectation is $5 per flip and should continue playing as long as you can....even if you show them all the math and everything else, they'll just think "well either you'll win $20 or lose $10, it's 50/50!"

Sorta like how some of us can't think of 2 words that rhyme, can't draw a picture of a stupid cat, or for us white folk--can't dance (if you're black, imagine swimming or playing ice hockey....that's what dancing & rhyming words is to us!).

 

KewlJ,

Don't be sad, 'cause two out of three ain't bad. KewlJ you can teach all night, but that ain't get your roommate nowhere.

 

I had to learn the same thing on machines.

 

Blackjack in 2023 is very different from the blackjack of 1970s or 80s when a variety of card counting systems were invented. In the earlier era, single-deck or double-deck were common, and shoe games had no more than four decks. For card counters, easy money were surely there in the casinos. Unfortunately, those were only the good old days.

Many once-powerful earlier counting systems have become totally useless after casinos implemented their card-counting counter measures. Casinos' simplest counter measure: 6-deck or 8-deck shoe with huge cut off. Today's would-be card counters -- young and old -- need to be prepared for tougher job environments. New skills, not just the skills touted by old-timers, and new mental attitude are needed for all would-be card counters.

 

I haven't posted many updates on the young card counter that this thread was titled and is about, because I felt it is not my place to share his story and experiences. He doesn't seem all that interested in doing so, and that is probably a smart decision. But since it has been 8 years, I do want to give a general type update, not infringing too much on his privacy.

That young card counter, my brother, who moved to Las Vegas after college and started playing blackjack for a living in 2016 is now in his early 30's and is finishing his 8th year of making a living through card counting. He has done fantastic! He settled in playing a level green to light-mid black, just as I played for many years here in Vegas. That level of play is well tolerated as long as you play short sessions, have a good-size rotation of casinos that you play and just don't make a nuisance of yourself at any one location.

When my brother started, I wasn't sure what his future was going to be. I thought he might pursue this for a couple years, tire of it and move on to something else. But at 8 years in, he seems to be settling in for the long haul and enjoying the lifestyle and what he is doing. That is his call. Could change tomorrow.

Now one thing about my brothers 8 years is he has never had one or two of those bad years, long periods of losing or just stagnant flat results (not winning), which is a real test. Well, until this year. He has been significantly below expectation all year, currently about 1/3 of expectation for his amount of play. The year is not over of course, his results could improve significantly, or worsen significantly or stay the same way below expectation. But whatever happens he has handled this year well. No panic. Minimal frustration, and this kind of year or period can be very frustrating.

I haven't been wishing this kind of year on him, but I have been expecting it, as it comes at some point and wanted to see how he handled it. It is easy to play when you are winning and things going according to plan. Harder when you are losing for a long period or stuck in the mud spinning your wheel. He has handled it great.

So that is the update to a "young card counter", who is doing well.

 

It has been verified by numerous APs that UNKewlJ fabricated most all of his blackjack play, and is mostly just a low end video poker player.

 

Hey, dude. That's quite a cautionary tale. I haven't had a similar experience myself since I mostly play with virtual money (I'm pretty cautious and can't afford to lose real cash). However, I have a friend who can easily lose $10k in a week. He's quite wealthy, and when he bets, he doesn't really calculate his chances of winning—he just hopes for the best.