Casino Surveillance Pro

When it comes to casino table games, the thrill of the gamble is often accompanied by the glamour of the setting and the social aspect of playing against others. However, beneath the surface of this exciting environment lies a critical skill that separates the seasoned players from the novices: money management. Why is Money Management Crucial? Money management is arguably as important as knowing the rules of the game you’re playing. It’s the framework that supports your gameplay, allowing you to maximize enjoyment while minimizing financial risk1. Effective money management helps you extend your playtime, increase your chances of long-term profits, and most importantly, it prevents you from spending cash you can’t afford to lose2. Setting Limits: The First Rule of Thumb The cornerstone of money management is setting clear limits on the amount of money you’re willing to spend. This involves establishing a bankroll – the total amount of money you’ve set aside for gambling activities. Yo...

So last month I posted about some questions that I get from people when they find out what my job is. This is the follow-up to that post and it’s mostly going to be about what cheating from the inside, or cheating by the dealer, would look like if it was going on. The easiest way for a dealer to cheat, on the player’s behalf, would be simply to dump the game. Dumping the game is when you pay the player for a losing hand or overpay the player on a winning hand. If you’re in surveillance and you happen to see this happen oh, the best thing you can do is keep quiet at least for a moment or two and see if it continues. It’s possible that the dealer just made a mistake and paid a losing Hand by mistake. If you continue to watch you’ll see if he’s doing it on a regular basis and if so if he’s doing it to a specific player. This would indicate collusion, or a conspiracy between the player and one or more players to do so. It’s always best to have plenty of information and evidence before movi...

This post is sponsored by Amazon Prime .  You can get a free 30 day trial of  by clicking  here .  And don't forget about my article, called " Sports Betting: Advanced middle techniques for college and pro football wagering ." It's all about a way to bet on sports with very little risk but high potential rewards. Click  here  to go to the eBay listing. It's only $4.99 plus fifty cents shipping.  Now on to this weeks topic.  I'm sure some of you invest in the stock market. Almost every one has a 401k if their employer offers it. Some off you  might even invest in individual stocks or a mutual fund in a private brokerage account.  So let me ask you what you would do if you got a hot tip from a friend about a tech stock, a "highly volatile" tech stock, that was poised to go through the roof. Maybe they're about to release a new app, and there are rumors that Google is going to buy them out. Maybe you've squirreled away some "mad money...

I want to start out by saying that the table games management of the casino industry, including those tasked with surveillance and game protection, is made up mostly of experienced, level headed professionals who conduct themselves in a professional manner, as ladies and gentlemen. Some of them have a college education and a degree, although for most, the education has come from the "School of Hard Knocks".  No one, and I truly mean no one , comes into this industry knowing everything there is to know, so we are all recipients of on-the-job training, in one form or another. That having been said, you do not have to go very far to find persons who are overly opinionated, prejudiced and envious of others who have more talent, opportunity and/or are more successful than themselves. Still others have just been at this for too long, and have a bad case of cynicism and a poor attitude toward everyone and everything. Although this kind of thing happens in every industry, for whate...

Last week I posted a Twitter poll (@casinologger) asking readers to vote on which hand was the hardest to stick to basic strategy on. These were the four poll options, along with what percentage of votes they got: 1. Hard 12 vs dealers 2 up 34% 2. Hard 13 vs dealers 3 up 31% 3. 9,9 vs dealers 7 up  14% 4. A,6 vs dealers 6 up  21% Here is my analysis of your votes: As you can see, hands 1 and 2 together took 65% of the votes, and I'm sure I know why.  I hate when the dealer has a two or a three up and apparently you guys do too. I just know that if the dealer has a ten for a hole card, he will draw an eight. Or if he has a seven for a hole card he'll draw a 10.  I even seem to lose when I stand on a 20 in these situations. The way to play this hand is to remember that when the dealer has a two or three up you hit if you have a hard 12 and stand if you have a hard 13. Now, you can deviate from basic strategy based on the count if you want to. but if you do it to...

Last night I continued my empirical research on dice setting, with mixed results. Let me tell you about it. So I was back at the Bonanza Casino, on North Virginia Street about 3 miles north of downtown, where the craps table has either a $2 or $3 minimum until 6 pm on most weekdays. I bought in for my usual hundred, and placed $5 on the pass line. My plan was the same as it usually is when I play craps: $5 pass line with max odds, and then place the 6 and 8 for $12 each, once a point is established. I'm continuing with the same way of setting that I said I've done before, which is to have the five and one touching each other on the inside. I also noticed that the threes face me as I set the dice, in kind of a V formation. I then used my three finger/one thumb grip and through the dice to the far end of the table as before, as low and slow as I possibly can. (I've taken to calling this a "low energy" dice toss.) So what were the results? I threw a lot of sevens ...

As I begin, here is a reminder that I have a Patron page. Click here to become a Patron and support my Blogging. And  here is the link to my Amazon affiliate page and some  Good books about Casino gambling . Now on with the show. I came across this article online and wanted to pass it on to you here. Lucky Idiots' May Be Bigger Casino Threat Than Card-counters Casino bosses who agonize about blackjack card-counters might be focusing on the wrong type of advantage player, a top gambling mathematician says. Instead, they should look closer at the “lucky idiot” who repeatedly plays poorly yet amasses huge winnings, says Eliot Jacobson, owner and president of Jacobson Gaming and operator of www.apheat.net , which analyzes casino games, side bets and methods of advantage play. That “lucky idiot” might be part of a team using advantage-play techniques that are more profitable than card-counting and more difficult for casino supervisors to identify, Jacobson says. In general, adva...

I found another great craps video on YouTube, this one talks about the different pay off amounts on place bets. It's really pretty goofd. Click Here to view it.   I also came across an article in Cigar Aficionado magazine recently. It's about the leader of a group of advantage players, who have taken a large amount of money, if they are to be believed, out of a lot of different casinos. Click here to go to the article. I also want to mention some Android apps that I use on a pretty regular basis. (If you're an iPhone user, sorry you're on your own.) For craps, I use an app called Craps Trainer Pro, by E7systems.com. I use the paid version, I think it was about four or five dollars. It's a fun little Sam, that will not let you make play sore by bets or take off odds unless you bet the right amount of money. And the payoffs are accurate. I used two different apps for training on blackjack. The first is called Blackjack Strategy Trainer by Aeon Apps. it shows yo...

Hi everybody. I have been away since late last year. If you have read the older posts you will see that I was having a lot of medical problems. I think I have most of them fixed, finally, and feel like blogging for the first time in a long while. So, on to the topic of today. I have been trolling through Youtube recently, and seen a lot of videos on craps betting systems. They all say something about  "How to win at craps" or words to that effect. They are all bullshit and "Click bait", designed to get video views and subscribers (and eventually money) to the channel owners. They will all claim to have some kind of "never lose" system and then show a series of throws, bets and payoffs that some how "prove" that their system works. Don't believe it for a second. Here is one that is typical of the whole bunch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tn5z8Me_phE It's called the "Iron Cross" betting method because the bets line up in...

New Casino Confidential show podcasts are now online and available for download. Click here and look for shows posted on 10/24 & 10/31.

After watching the Astros beat up on the Yankees last night (which netted me a nice $75) I decided to play a little blackjack at my favorite low limit tables. I had an interesting thing happen that I went to tell you about. I was on spot 5, just to the right of the third base player, who appeared to be a novice player. At one point he tucked a busted hand. This is when you bust, but tuck the hand under your bet like you didn't bust. The guy was a littler tipsy, but not really drunk, and he probably just counted wrong.  He had drawn a 3+3+7 while holding a 5 + 4 for a total of 22. What I found unusual is not that he tucked the busted hand, it happens from time to time, but that the dealer did not notify the Pit Boss when it happened. She just said something to the player and then continued on with the take and pay. This is the sign of a sloppy dealer. The reason that the Pit Boss gets notified about it is in case the player does the same thing with a different dealer. Having thi...

Just did a new radio show and podcast yesterday, my first show in over a month due to illness. The podcast is available here . Since I haven't been on the air since before the tragic Las Vegas shooting, I feel like I need to comment on what role surveillance and security would have played in the response to the active shooter in addition to how they would gather information about the shooters whereabouts and movements prior to the incident. So that's what this show is about. It will have to be a two-parter, with the second part airing next week. You can listen live on the internet here or locate the podcast later from the same link as above. The show airs on 1180 AM KCKQ in Reno, live on Tuesdays at 4:30 PM PST (-8 GMT).

I got a chance to play some Blackjack on Friday night at my favorite low limit Casino. Only had $50 on me, which is what I bought him with, so it's a good thing that it was a $2 minimum table. I usually make my base bet $5 but tonight I made it just $2. Played for about half an hour, and the dealer was very hot, at least at first. She ran everyone off at the table, except for me,  after about 10 minutes. I enjoy playing one-on-one versus the dealer, but it is a real quick way to get fingered as a card counter when you are the only one at the table. Because of this, I basically just flat bet one hand at $2. The count never went very high anyway, so I didn't feel too bad.  Walked away down $10. No big deal but one thing happened that I want to talk about. Towards the end of my play, I hit a 14 vs. a ten, and busted.  When I flipped the cards over and they (accidentally) landed on top of each other, so that you could only see the face of one of the cards (a four). Now th...

I'm happy to report that we had a great show on Tuesday, yesterday, with noted gaming consultant Thomas Gallagher as our guest. The hour long show really flew by, and we didn't get to discuss as much with Mr. Gallagher as I wanted to. Here is a link to the podcast of the show. Mr. Gallagher made a special offer to anyone who emailed him saying that they heard him on the show, so listen to the podcast for his special offer then you can email him and get a special deal on his gaming manuals. Just copy and paste this link into your browser to go to the FTP page for downloads of all of the podcasts of Casino Confidential. ftp://shows.americamatters.us/Show/Casino%20Confidential/ Also, I want to remind everyone that I will be posting my NFL week 2 pic of the week on Friday. Have a great day everyone.

Had a great show today, basically  talking about what it takes to be a better blackjack player.  I will post the podcast link ASAP. I also want to tell  all my readers  about this great new discount travel card.   Register for Free for a $200 VIP Card good at selected hotels  and resorts worldwide.  Did I mention it's free ?   Go to www.gurufast.com/james

Today I had my first Casino confidential show on KCKQ 1180am in Reno Nevada. I will put a link to the FTP site where you can download it if you'd like to listen to it. Okay so maybe I'm not the most professional and Polished radio talk show host you've ever heard, but at least I'm trying. Bill Zender was an excellent first guest. He is a very professional and Polished speaker and knows more about casinos than most people have ever learned. Be sure and check out his website at www.BillZender.com to find out what he's up to, purchase some of his books, or see his YouTube videos. On a sad note, no-one called in to win our free giveaway prize. We were giving away range passes to Reno Guns and Range, located on Market Street in Reno Nevada right behind the Harley-Davidson dealership. Their phone number is 775-826-2626. We will try again next week to give away a couple of free passes. Are phone number for the giveaway is toll free 844-790 8255. Call Ian next Tuesday f...

This post is sponsored by Amazon Prime .  You can get a free 30 day trial of  by clicking  here . Speaking of Amazon, they have some great books about how to win at blackjack, craps, and other casino games. Click on this link:  Good books about Casino gambling And don't forget about my article, called " Sports Betting: Advanced middle techniques for college and pro football wagering ." It's all about a way to bet on sports with very little risk but high potential rewards. Click  here  to go to the eBay listing. It's only $4.99 plus fifty cents shipping.  Now on to this weeks topic.  This is a repost from a year or so ago, but it's still good info, if I do say so myself. Whenever I meet people and tell them what my profession has been for the last 25 years, I always come away with the feeling that they equate card counting and advantage play as cheating. It is not, of course, as most of the readers of this blog undoubtedly know. It is just...

Greetings all, I have gotten some more recent (good) feedback from a reader who brought up some excellent questions that I would like to address here. The first observation is that most of my examples concern single deck games.  To that, I plead guilty. And I will do a better job of covering the double deck and shoe game. The reader also correctly pointed out that many of the rules that casinos use make card counting at double deck and shoe games not very effective. Rules such as double down only on 9, 10 or 11, and no double after split obviously increase the house advantage more than most counters care to accept.  Also, deck penetration can discourage counters as well. The last casino I worked for had the dealers on double deck games burn 24 cards at the top of deck. This keeps most serious counters from ever even sitting down at double deck games. For these reasons, I usually use single deck games as my examples, but will endeavor to use more multi deck examples in th...

I am not going to tell you how I know this, but I am sensing some blow back from certain segments of the gaming industry about what I am doing here. SO.... I am going to open up on that segment of the industry with both barrels.  I am going to reveal the dirty little secret about tribal gaming that none of them want the public to know.  This secret is a little outside the realm of blackjack and how surveillance watches it, so you will need to indulge me. So what's the secret? The "slot machines" in tribal casinos are ripping you off. Let me explain. In most corporate gaming locations in this country, like Nevada, Atlantic City and other jurisdictions where the casino is owned by a corporation and not an Indian Tribe, the slots machines work this way: Each slot machine is basically a desktop computer. It has its own CPU, and a memory chip called an EEPROM that run the game and display the graphics that you see on the screen. Each machine has its own built in random numbe...

OK, here is how I would go about masking the fact that I am counting cards like a madman. Order a drink. At least it looks like a drink to surveillance. It can be a coke or club soda, of course, the camera cant tell the difference. It's not smell-o-vision. Engage the other people at the table. Laugh, smile, fist bump, high five and talk with the other players. Talk with the dealer. Flirt with the cocktail waitress. Be friendly, dont sit there stone faced with a 1000 yard stare watching each card as it is delivered or exposed.   Look away from the table once in a while. Especially if the cut card has come out or it is the last hand of a hand held game before the next shuffle. Try to appear relaxed and casual. By the way, you should never get caught off guard by a shuffle. Know the house rule, in this case, how deep the dealer should go in to the deck before shuffling. You dont want to put out a bet that is five or ten times your base bet, only to see the dealer start to s...