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“It’s all numbers, the croupier thought. Spin of the wheel, turn of the card, time of your life, date of your birth, year of your death. In the Book of Numbers the Lord said, ‘Thou shall count thy steps.’”
Jack Manfred, Croupier
Okay, this was more like it. No strangers to trust. No investors to consider. We re-booked our Vegas flights on the way down. Mike needed us to postpone the trip for one week. Now all that we had to focus on was our own system that had previously been working like a well-oiled machine. Sure, our bankroll was no longer six figures but our payout was clear and there was no question about who was responsible for what.
Of the two tables I back-counted, the one to my left went south quickly. The running count had dwindled to -8 over three decks. We never spent time waiting for shoes to recover from negative counts. The possibility of it swinging back to a significant enough true count, with a considerable number of decks remaining, was slim.
The table on my right had potential. It had boosted to a running count of 10, with 5.25 decks remaining. The good thing about Foxwoods was its proximity to Boston. The bad thing was, unless we played in the high-limit room, most of the shoes were 8-deckers instead of 6. We didn’t quite have the bankroll yet to play in the high-limit room. It didn’t matter much in terms of our strategy, though, since Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun didn’t allow mid-shoe entry at their high-limit tables. So once a shoe began, new players couldn’t jump in until it was completed. This made back-counting impossible in the high-limit rooms in Connecticut. Vegas was the place to be but for now it would have to wait.
I noticed that an adjacent table’s dealer was finishing his shuffle, so I made my way around to view the table on my left where the running count had risen to +10 and the new shoe on my right. As I circled around the back of the table to better position myself, I watched out of the corner of my eye as the running count dissipated to 7. The new table’s dealer dealt the first round of cards, +4. The pause for a blackjack payout at third base gave me enough time to reach my desired stakeout location.
Plus seven and plus four, my mind compartmentalized. I watched a series of subsequent rounds at each table. For a while, it worked out that the two tables’ dealers dealt at staggered times, which allowed me to easily keep track of both tables at once.
The first number was the left-hand table. The second number was the right-hand table.
| +6 | +4 |
| +8 | +2 |
| +5 | –2 |
| +9 | even |
| +11 | +4 |
Something was developing on table 1. It was +11 with 4.25 decks remaining. Just under a true count of 3. I’d seen D.A. across the way bouncing from table to table. A minute earlier with nothing pending, I saw him work his way out of the blackjack area, toward the Rolex store in the hallway. He knew where I was so I was certain he had his eye on me.
The table was getting warm.
I folded my arms.
For the next couple of hands the two tables started dealing at almost the exact same time, making it more difficult to maintain a count on both. After one round of cards, with my eyes shifting back and forth like a spectator’s head swiveling at a tennis match, the counts were:
| +10 | +2 |
I abandoned the table on my right, knowing that the table on my left could possibly move into 3-with-3 territory. On the next initial deal, the cards looked quite average—the count was still +10 before anyone had a chance to play. But then the low cards came spilling out of the dealer’s shoe like a magician pulling an infinitely long multi-colored silk scarf from his pocket.
Low card.
“Hit.”
Low card.
“Hit again.”
Low card.
“I’ll hit again,” one of the players said.
And it kept on going until finally the dealer pulled out a 6 on his four-card 15, for a 21 that beat every hand. The count was +21 with 3.25 decks to play.
Scratch to the head.
There was no sign of D.A. I moved into position blocking an open seat and preventing anyone else from easily sitting down there.
Another scratch to the head again.
Still no sign of D.A.
Fortunately, a few of the players were so discouraged that the dealer had just outdrawn them that they vowed the table was cursed and decided to look for action elsewhere. That was common. As the count rises, naturally many low cards are being dealt. Because low cards are coming out and low cards favor the dealer, it makes sense that the players at the table would be more susceptible to losing those hands. Of course they couldn’t be expected to know that the table was in prime position for some big bets, and not only were we the ones who would swoop in and make them, but we’d also avoided all of the terrible hands on the way to this favorable situation. If only D.A. would jump in.
Where the hell is he? I might have to sit down myself.
The count was 21 over 3.25. That’s a true of 6.3—rounded to 6.5. I’d be betting two hands of 5.5 units. Our unit was $40. To make life easier and to account for spreading to two hands, it would be about two bets of $200 each. Nice round numbers.
Thankfully, the players who felt like it was the right time to go had shoved their chips forward to the dealer in an all-in type of movement. But this wasn’t poker, and they weren’t all in. They were coloring up, exchanging the few chips they had left for fewer chips of higher denominations to take with them. That gave me some time.
One more try.
I scratched my head again.
No D.A.
I had no choice. I was going in. I reached into the inside pocket of my jacket and felt a wad of bills. It was larger than I was expecting and was held together by a rubber band that strangled around it twice—that was the backup—$10,000. Wrong pocket. I had a series of $2,500 stacks in each of my four pants pockets and the other in the inside pocket of my jacket. As I pulled out $2,500 from my right front pocket, I heard a familiar voice.
“Excuse me, are you going to sit here?”
Relieved, I replied, “Uh, I thought about it. It seems like a really fun table, but from what I hear, the dealer’s been killing it.”
“Is that right? Well, I’ll take my chances,” he said as he politely moved in front of me, pulling out the unoccupied chair I had reserved.
Really fun meant twenty-one and D.A. clearly had all the information he needed. We’d worked on fine-tuning our call-in strategy, because it looked awkward to enter a shoe with just a few decks remaining, only to leave as soon as it finished, as we both had done in the past. So we decided to implement some adjustments.
No matter what happened during the shoe, the person being called-in would participate in the start of the next one. The purpose of this was twofold. First, it reduced the chances that surveillance or pit personnel would suspect that he was jumping into only hot shoes, which would imply that he was being called-in. Second, if the next shoe got hot again, he could call the other back in as the gorilla big player.
As for me, after a back-counting call-in like the one I’d just initiated, I would find two new tables to count. Then, one of three things would happen:
I’d wong myself into a hot shoe. Or, D.A.’s next shoe would go cold and he’d return to the back-counting scene, but this time wong himself in. Or, if D.A.’s next shoe got hot, he’d call me in and signal to me as the gorilla big player.
We were starting to become extremely versatile, back-counting with call-ins, back-counting and wonging ourselves into the game, and call-ins with subsequent gorilla big player call-ins.
Sure enough, about 15 minutes later, after D.A.’s shoe had ended and the next shoe was well underway, I saw D.A. leaning his head in his hand as his elbow rested on the table railing. It was the signal that his table was getting warm again.
The tables I’d been counting all hovered between the dreaded –1 and +3 range—not bad enough to let me walk away but not nearly good enough to sit down and play.
The Friday evening Foxwoods crowd was starting to file in. A number of patrons clogged the pathways between where I stood and D.A.’s table. As courteously as I could, I pushed my way through the stampede of weekend warriors, people ready to relinquish their Friday paychecks.
By the time I got into position, D.A. immediately stood up to pretend to check his cell phone.
The table is hot—sit down!
Despite the increasing number of patrons, there were a few chairs open at the table. I took my seat across the way from D.A. and reached into my pocket for cash.
“So you decided to give it a try after all?” D.A. asked, still as if a complete stranger. It was only a little while earlier that I’d pretended to walk away from the really fun table because the dealer was supposedly killing it.
“Hell yeah. Just give me a few drinks and I’ll gamble my kids’ college education!”
Everyone seemed to laugh, including the dealer, Hamid, who did his best to remain professional but friendly.
“Is that Jocelyn over there? Jocelyn! Hey, Jocelyn, come here!” I shouted to the floorperson.
I’d glanced at her nametag just prior to calling in D.A. a few minutes earlier. I wasn’t studying it, per se, but there was something interesting about this woman. My thoughts, however, were deep in my subconscious and I hadn’t realized it until I sat down.
Jocelyn had a slightly outdated haircut and looked to be in her early 50s. It was clear that her days and nights in casino pits had taken their toll on her, but she had a warm and friendly smile.
“Jocelyn, of all the floor people here, I want you to check me in. You seem the nicest!”
“Sounds like you have a little thing for Jocelyn,” Hamid said jokingly.
“Hamid, you’re right.” I was nearly shouting right now. I had swilled a quarter of my remaining beer when I sat down. I wasn’t drinking any substantial amount. I mostly held the free drinks that the cocktail waitresses distributed until I needed them for show. We had a strict policy against any real drinking while playing—it was only for cover and I was getting into my role. D.A. was there to signal me. My job was simply to read his signals, place the correct bets, and look the part of a reckless drunken gambler.
“Hamid, I think you’re right. I love Jocelyn!”
I’d gotten the attention of players at the table, Hamid, and now Jocelyn, the floorperson. Many new counters fear the dealers, but there’s little risk with them. It’s the floor people and surveillance that are the concern. I saw Jocelyn making her way over to the table to punch in my players card. Pit personnel log in a players card, then track variables such as total hours played and average bet size. Checking in with a players card is optional. Not everyone has one, but the casinos will ask and it’s rare for a player not to have one. In theory, the process is designed to help figure out an equitable way of handing out comps. It can also help the casino figure out its theoretical win by multiplying the time played by the average bet size and each game’s house edge. A portion of a player’s expected loss is credited back in the form of comps. The other thing that it accomplishes is allowing the casino to monitor its players’ details—names, dates of birth, and mailing addresses.
And suspicious play.
For advantage players, that’s the conundrum. We need to use the cards for comps and to avoid sending up a red flag by not having one, but by doing so we’re giving the casino information, which is rarely a good thing for a card counter to do.
“Good evening, young man. Do you have your card?” Jocelyn was holding back a bit of a smile.
“For you, I have my card and my phone number, Jocelyn.” I wasn’t completely comfortable with my shtick, but it was the first one that seemed to come to me.
Meanwhile, the dealer had begun dealing the cards and in between my flirting and animated behavior, I was taking signals from D.A. To an outsider, I was just obnoxious. To Jocelyn, who stuck around to make small talk for a few minutes and subtly bask in the obvious attention, I was almost charming. D.A. and I knew that I was just playing a part in a two-man team and executing the second leg of a winning strategy.
“So do you have a long night?” I asked.
“Actually, I only have about twenty minutes left then I’m free,” she replied with a smile.
There was a good chance she was flirting back, but I suddenly realized we were on the verge of a shift change, a crucial timing point for us. D.A. had caught that, too. Leaving before a shift change and coming back shortly after was almost the same as going to an entirely new casino, but without the travel. However, playing through a shift change meant that the exiting floorperson got the arriving floorperson up to speed on the current players, including anything noteworthy, like potential card counters. By avoiding the shift change, we could grab a bite to eat and come back minutes later with virtually a clean slate. We needed to finish up this shoe and get off the floor as soon as possible.
Minutes later, the shoe ended and as we’d rehearsed many times, D.A. organized his chips, colored up, and headed for the car. At that moment a player at a table across the pit spilled a drink and Jocelyn scurried away to help mop it up. It was as good a time as any for me to take off and catch up elsewhere with D.A.
I slid my chips forward and Hamid arranged three pumpkins, each orange chip worth $1,000, in a pile next to my stack of blacks and greens, awaiting approval for the exchange. Finally, Jocelyn came back and Hamid indicated the transaction.
“Color coming in … six-thousand.”
We headed to Mohegan Sun. D.A. and I used the time in the car between Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun to recap our session.
“Where the hell were you with that twenty-one count? Did you buy a Rolex?” I asked.
“Man, I’m so sorry about that. I saw your first signal and then I ran into some guy I knew from back home and I couldn’t get rid of him. Now, that was a good shoe.”
“Yeah, that was a great session overall.”
We successfully used the trifecta of tactics at Mohegan Sun too, each earning plenty of comps for dinner. Although our tactics were keeping us free of heat, collectively we had a bit of a downswing, dropping just under a grand. Overall we were still up. We’d played for about 90 minutes through some very high and low counts. Our betting swings were varied and we both felt like it was a good time to leave. We could hit the new shift back at Foxwoods.
When we arrived, things immediately got good.
“Excuse me,” I asked, “are you sitting here?”
“No, screw this. I’m going to play keno.”
Keno. Twenty.
Decks remaining were 4.25, giving me a true count of 4.75. Rounding up to 5, subtracting 1 for the offset, the correct bet was four, or two hands of three units. Because of both our total wins and our growing feeling of invincibility, we decided at dinner to increase our unit to $75. It was only a $25 increase but it was still a little aggressive for our overall bankroll. We were willing to deal with the increase in volatility.
Two bets of $225.
“Black action,” the dealer said aloud.
“Can I swipe your card, sir?” asked the floorperson. He was tall, lanky, and had a slightly nasally voice. Although I couldn’t quite see his nametag, I took him for a Eugene. After punching a few things into the kiosk he slid my card across the table while offering the standard and often disingenuous, “Good luck, sir.” I saw his nametag. It read Gene and I chuckled to myself.
It didn’t start off well. We’d only been in Foxwoods for a brief time when the good shoe presented itself. Even though I lost my first few hands, the count continued to rise and I was forced to bet even more. I won some but lost more. In three to four minutes, I’d dropped nearly $2,000. To add insult to injury, and for the first time in my life, I paused for a second to process the sensation I felt on my left shoulder.
The tap.
It was the modern day finger-up-the-spine, as had been the more common warning back in the heyday of Vegas. A finger-up-the-spine meant “It’s time for you to go, or else we won’t be so kind in asking you to leave again.”
“Excuse me, Mr. Tilton?”
“Yes?”
“Hi, I’m Joe Kowalski, the casino shift manager.” He extended his hand.
“Nice to meet you,” I replied.
“We believe that you are too skilled a blackjack player for us, and while you’re welcome to play other games here, we ask that if you continue to play blackjack, you do so only at the table minimum and only on one hand at a time.”
“Really? But I just lost a grand in three minutes!”
“Yes sir, and only one hand at a time.”
The other players at the table were whispering to one another and even the dealer looked a little taken aback. I was pissed. Not because I’d been backed off. In actuality, a part of me was relieved to finally have my much-needed battle scar and inherent vote of confidence from a casino. Instead I was upset about walking away from a true count of +8. With a max bet capped at six units, that was two bets of $450, and I was about to make my money back. I was down two grand and could get back to even in a few hands. But I didn’t have that option.
“Okay, no problem,” I said as sincerely as my insides could muster.
D.A. had seen the situation play out from a distance. He was back-counting a couple of tables, hoping to either wong himself in or see me signal him back to my table a few minutes later. But it was time to roll with the punches and we took our separate paths to the car.
We pulled out of the parking lot a few minutes later.
“Congratulations on the back-off, man—welcome to the club. It’s about fucking time.”
“I’m just so skilled they haven’t been able to catch me.”
“Or you suck so bad that you’re not really a threat.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” I joked back. “It was probably just a mercy back-off. Ya know, to throw me a bone and keep my ego happy. Regardless, we’ve got some tweaking to do.”
“I know. I have some ideas on addressing Connecticut but we should iron out some shit for our Vegas trips soon.”
“That’s right.” I remembered, “Next weekend is Vegas, Take Two.”
“Let’s hope it happens this time, because if it falls through again, maybe we should think about going solo, without Mike’s team. What do you think?”
I thought about what he was asking. Despite a couple of back-offs that were an inevitable part of the game, we managed to win on a consistent basis and we ran our team like a successful business, complete with a mission statement, bios for each of the characters we’d developed, regulations, balance sheets, revenue projections, overhead, and payroll.
“I think Mike would be OK with it. Maybe we could let him know that we’re playing on our own and that if something comes up that’s one-hundred-percent certain and he needs us, we’ll be there,” I suggested.
Playing outside of Mike’s team wasn’t a problem, but out of respect to him we didn’t want to be playing regularly without him knowing. We owed him that. But we’d wait until the following weekend to see how it played out. If the Vegas trip didn’t come to fruition, we’d let him know we were on our own.