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Choosing the Dealer
We think of the dealer as an automaton, the casino's assem-bly line worker creating expectation from probability. But the innocuous dealer has a great deal of power over the outcome of the game. This clout can manifest as both good and evil.
For the good part, you may be sitting across from a deal-er who is sloppy, exposes cards, occasionally pays you for pushes and gives you a push when you should bust. You may be able to see under the hole-card as the dealer takes his peek, or double when you are not allowed (in a game that does not have DOA). This may be worth a little bit for a single session, and identifying a sloppy dealer can be worth a lot more over several sessions, but it is certainly nothing you can bank on in the long run.
There is some debate among players whether it is ethical to accept incorrect payouts from sloppy dealers. It is certain-ly legal. As an advantage player, I recognize these payouts are part of my long-term profit. I encourage each individual to consider this question; it deserves an individual answer.
One thing you should never do is to correct a dealer payout error to another person seated at the table. Let each person be responsible for his own ethical decisions, especially if those decisions have no direct consequence to your life.
There are many professional players who specialize in locating dealers who are prone to errors and exploiting the defects in their procedures in a wide variety of games. The names of these dealers are passed around on private web sites and in certain underground publications. Pay attention to the dealer; you might find he is nicer than you expect.
It is too bad the reverse isn't true at casinos. You have to protect yourself from dealer errors that hurt you, so pay attention and double-check the dealer on every hand. You
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also have to identify dealers who are purposely cheating you, and that's the evil part.
Let's get into the head of a cheating dealer. Suppose you are a magician specializing in card manipulation (that is, a
"mechanic"). You have been performing at kiddie birthday parties for too many years and are tired of the brats. You are looking for a sure fire way to make a lot of money with your expertise at card sleight-of-hand. So you move to Las Vegas and you train to be a blackjack dealer. Then you begin cheating.
There are dealers who steal directly from the casinos, and there are dealers who steal from players on behalf of the casinos. Either way, it is going to hurt your bottom line. In fact, dealer cheating is the single largest source of stealing, on a cash basis, that casinos battle. There are many blackjack professionals who are convinced that cheating is rampant among dealers in Las Vegas and in hand-held games every-where. A dealer named Dustin Marks wrote several books about his successes as a cheating blackjack dealer.1
I am not aware of any specific instance when I was intentionally cheated (dealer errors are common, though), but deception is part of the cheater's intention. A little knowledge about how dealers cheat can go a long way towards helping you to protect yourself.
The safest game you can play is a shoe game that uses a cut card and a mirrored device to check for blackjacks, although even this is not foolproof. If, however, you prefer a handheld game, either single deck or double deck, then you had better learn to check out each dealer as he begins dealing to you, and then watch the dealer carefully for the duration of his stay.
The first way dealers cheat is by playing with a friend or partner who is posing as an anonymous gambler at the table.
The dealer then deals seconds to the player (if necessary) to
1. Dustin Marks was a "professional" cheating blackjack dealer in the late 1980s who beat the casinos using the techniques described in his books. Marks was never caught. He has appeared on Real TV, the Discovery Channel, the History Channel, the Learning Channel, and Hard Copy discussing his exploits.
Choosing the Dealer
guarantee that he will win more than his share of hands. This arrangement would seem to not affect you, but it does. The dealer knows that if the tables he is working routinely lose money, he will come under suspicion. Therefore, he deals seconds to assure that other players lose more than their fair share of hands, so that the bottom line for the table is kept in check.
This may come as a shock, but did you know that some casinos are still controlled by the mob? If a casino is in the business of laundering money, then they may desire that a specific player win his illegitimate mob payoff. I was once at a casino and accidentally overheard a pit boss say to a dealer, a card sharp draped in gold jewelry: "You see that guy over there in the hat? Table 3, seat 2. I want you to take care of him." I left the casino immediately and did not stay around to see the payoff take place.
How do you detect cheating? A quick lesson on how to deal "seconds" is in order. To begin with, you must use the
"Mechanic's grip." The dealer holds the deck face down in his left hand. His left thumb is on top at a 45º angle, pointing towards the right front corner. This thumb is then used to press back the top card so the dealer can peek at its value before dealing it. The index finger is in front at the right front corner of the deck. The base of the thumb is in contact with the opposite left lower corner. The cards are gripped between these two corners and are held by the index finger applying pressure across the diagonal to the base of the thumb. The third, fourth, and fifth fingers help keep the deck is place on the right side. The deck is not resting, but is slightly above the dealer's palm.
If the dealer wants to deal the second card to a player, he uses his thumb to push back the top card about half an inch, then the thumb of his right hand slides across the card under-neath the top, which is now partially exposed. This pulls out the second card enough to be grabbed by the dealer's remain-ing fremain-ingers and dealt to the player. You might try dealremain-ing a
62 The Blackjack Zone
few seconds, so you can get a feeling for how it is done, but you will most likely be clumsy and several cards will fly out of the deck. These dealers, however, are professional magicians who can deal seconds so well that they can't see it themselves.
If you spot your dealer using the mechanic's grip you should immediately be on guard. The next phase, however, is the most difficult: detecting the cheating. You simply will not see it take place, so you have to rely on a different sense, your sense of hearing. When a non-cheating dealer deals a card, it is slid off the top of the deck and makes almost no sound at all. A second, however, makes a very distinct sound - if you want to hear the sound, simply place a piece of paper between two others and then remove it very quickly. You will hear the hissing of paper rubbing against paper. That's the sound you have to get to know, and that's the sound that gives away the dirty deed. If you hear this sound and spot the Mechanic's grip, thank the dealer very much for his kindness, and find another table. Better yet, find another casino.
Besides profit, there is another reason dealers cheat -simply because they can. They are bored and enjoy having the power to cheat you. Cheating can be caused by vanity as easily as greed. If you are the least bit suspicious that there is cheating going on, find another dealer or casino. It is sim-ply not worth it to take the chance.
Dealers can cheat you without using card manipulation.
There are at least two sources of this to be aware of. The first way is called preferential shuffling. Some dealers know how to count cards, so they know when the remainder of the deck is in your advantage and when it is in the casino's advantage.
In the long run, these variations in advantage will be evenly divided. But the cheating dealer, aware that the deck is in your advantage, can decide at his whim to shuffle the deck.
This leaves you with more bad decks than good, and creates a huge edge for the casino.
The only way to protect yourself against preferential shuffling in a hand-held game is to learn card counting, and
Choosing the Dealer
pay attention to the dealer's decision to shuffle. Many deal-ers use a preferential shuffle to encourage extra tips from players they believe to be card counters, dealing an extra round only if a dollar tip is given. Frequent tipping will quickly bankrupt the counter, so the experienced counter will immediately find another game. The non-counter, on the other hand, will just get hammered by bad hands.
The next way to cheat the player is to give incorrect pay-offs or to purposely miscount the values of the hands. The dealer only needs to identify a single player per shift who is not very quick about counting his own hand. Make sure you are not that player. Always double check the dealer's count-ing and payoffs, and don't hesitate to call the cards back if you think the dealer has miscounted. It is your money out there, so take the time to defend it!
At most casinos dealers do not have pockets and can't hide a chip that they might decide to palm. If you notice that the dealers at the casino have pockets, be especially careful:
the dealers may be palming chips right off the table. Is that stack of eight green chips you bet now only seven high when it is being paid off ? Amazing acts of magic can and do hap-pen, so beware!
The subject of cheating by players and dealers is vast, and its complexities are beyond the scope of this book. This introduction is meant to bring to your attention the real pos-sibility that sooner or later a cheating dealer is going to target you.
Because dealers are capable of both good and evil, I rec-ommend playing at the same casino and getting to know the dealers. Every time you sit across from a new dealer you have a big assignment, and that extra work can detract from your enjoyment of the game. The dealer is the automaton inter-facing between you and your expectation. Do your best to insure that the dealer is having no influence, good or bad, over that expectation.
64 The Blackjack Zone