Casino Surveillance Pro

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).

Okay, I've had a lot of people ask me what is the secret to my success. I'm off to a 5 and 0 start this year in NFL free picks, and this is not the first year that I've had pretty good success against the bookmakers. And by the way, every free pic that I release is a pic that I made a play on myself. I put my money where my mouth is. I've had several people ask me if I'm using some kind of a system, in the answer to that is no. What I'm using is called common sense. Let me explain. There are certain conditions in which I feel the betting line posted by oddsmakers gets distorted because of various factors. I like to identify where those conditions exist, and how they may have affected the line. Having done that I like to make plays where I feel there is a better than usual value to the pic that you make, whether you were laying points are getting points. When I take a favorite I like to play games where the line is "cheap", or where the favorite is n...

I had a comment from a reader on Google Plus who questioned why I hadn't had a podcast in the last 3 weeks, so here's an update on my medical conditions. Some of you may know that I am going through chemotherapy for leukemia. So that has compromised my immune system. About 3 weeks ago I got bronchitis real bad and while I am feeling better it is still hanging on. Plus it makes my voice sound like crap, so I haven't been doing the radio show or the podcast. Hopefully that will change this week. Thanks, Jim

I had a question comes my way about the recent , tragic shooting at the Mandalay Bay casino in Las Vegas. This person wanted some insight as to the response of security and surveillance during and immediately after such an incident. I figured that this subject may be of interest to many of you out there, so here is my response. First of all, here are some physical facts about surveillance cameras, security operations and surveillance operations at the larger casinos, both in Las Vegas and all around the world. Most casinos have two separate surveillance rooms. One of the rooms, is manned by surveillance personnel who are experts in all types of casino gaming and cheating. These are the people who actually watch the games, the money, the cashiers and count rooms, and do all the things that you think of as the "eye in the sky" doing. These surveillance agents will have access to every single camera on property. The other surveillance room will be manned by security personnel...

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.