Just curious...and noobish...

Rub · Jan 14, 2009

I am kinda new player and and there might be a similar top.

My question is connected with the story if the MIT BJ team.

I am using the Hi-Lo and I spread my bet when the TC is +2 or +3 I bet 2 units, when it's +4 or +5 I bet 3 units and etc.
Okay it might be profitable in the long term, but the profit is VERY small....almost none...
So I am curious how those students made ''millions'' in no time...it's not only the card counting, and it's not only the changes you make in Basic Strategy according to the count...there must be more, much more...although I don't see it anywhere...

Can someone give an aswer - how those guys actually made such a cash for no time ? It's just sounds unreal...or may be I am not familiar with the story...

Blue Efficacy · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

I am kinda new player and and there might be a similar top.

My question is connected with the story if the MIT BJ team.

I am using the Hi-Lo and I spread my bet when the TC is +2 or +3 I bet 2 units, when it's +4 or +5 I bet 3 units and etc.
Okay it might be profitable in the long term, but the profit is VERY small....almost none...
So I am curious how those students made ''millions'' in no time...it's not only the card counting, and it's not only the changes you make in Basic Strategy according to the count...there must be more, much more...although I don't see it anywhere...

Can someone give an aswer - how those guys actually made such a cash for no time ? It's just sounds unreal...or may be I am not familiar with the story...

Unless you're playing a very high quality game, you will need to spread your bets a lot more than that. And avoid playing negative counts at all if at all possible.

Sonny · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

They had great skills and a huge bankroll. A card counter will generally expect to earn 1-2 units per hour. At one point the MIT guys were using a $4,000 unit, which earns about $4,000 per hour. With 3-4 BPs playing simultaneously in different casinos the money will add up very fast.

-Sonny-

Rub · Jan 14, 2009

Sonny said:

Sounds strange....the reson is good enough for a normal person to borrow his house and make some money playing BJ (after he mastered the counting, bet spread and etc...it won't take much time....or at least is not much when you think about the money you can earn).
So why not every normal person doesn't try it ? Sounds reasonable enough.

I have one more question: Does the Martingale system works when you use it on High Counts looses ?
For example the TC is +5 and I bet 15$, but I loose, the next game I bet 30$ (The count is still high, so I still have an advantage) and so on...can it really go to hundreds $, when you have an advatage (at least in the first 2-3 hands) ?
If it works, than you will make all your high count hands, a winning hands (or something like that...you will bet twice as the last bet, till the High Count repays you...)

Brock Windsor · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

A bit misleading, try to think of it in terms of units not dollars. JC estimates they made a bit more than $10million over 20 years. That's 1000 max bets (of course their max bet wasn't always $10K) but suppose a 1 unit bet over that time span averaged $100. With a small team of counters utilizing a BP to maximize their bet spread making 5000 units a year is not at all unrealistic. Add a few addional skills for your best players such as cutting to an ace, 10 steering, or shuffle tracking and I would guess $10million was below their expectation. It was not overnight riches, the toughest part of any major team is probably the financing to play at that level.
BW

Sonny · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

Probably it wouldn’t take more than a few years of study and practice, but most people never get that far. Like any other profession, becoming a great Advantage Player takes a lot of hard work and discipline. You really have to love the game. Most people who learn card counting aren’t interested enough or dedicated enough to become great players. There is just so much to learn that most people either get bored or frustrated. Even the few that learn how to play properly will never be good enough to play professionally.

You can make great money being a physicist or engineer too, so why isn’t everybody doing that?

Rub said:

No, the Martingale will still be much worse than betting properly. Even when the count is high you are still more likely to lose your hands so any progression system is going to be a waste of time. You will win less money and the risk will be much greater. Here is a similar thread from a few days ago:

http://www.blackjackinfo.com/bb/showthread.php?t=12738

-Sonny-

rollem411 · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

There are many reasons why people choose not to play BJ as an AP. They may not enjoy the atmosphere, live close enough to a casino to yield decent results, they already have a better job, or they simply just don't feel like doing it.

In order to make the millions you will need to put that house up and much more to have a sufficient BR and not lose it all. But would most people put their house up in order to do this? I hope not.

It all sounds reasonable until you hit that losing streak. Say you put your house up and use that money as your bankroll (200,000) and you use $1,000 as your max bet. You would want a low ROR in this case because you are not on a replenishable br. You start to lose max bets and you suddenly go down about $20,000. I would say the majority of players will either quit, or sadly enough chase their losses and lose it all. IT's an emotional roller coaster and not many people can "whether the storm" and deal with losing. Your best bet would be to put a bankroll together strictly for BJ...play low stakes and see what it's all about before you start swinging for the fences.

Rub · Jan 14, 2009

Sonny said:

Years sounds too scary...for MIT didn't take years...
I mean...you can learn the Basi Strategy and Counting for 2-3 weeks...and counting accurate and speed for about a month (not 1 hour a day ofc...it will take more).
I understand you need practice....but years ?

"Even the few that learn how to play properly will never be good enough to play professionally."
Why they won't be good enough ?

And one more thing - is there a chart for high/low counts ?
I mean a chart with the differences from the Basi Strategy when the count is High (or Low).

rollem411 · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

Sorry for jumpin in on your post Sonny, but... Once you begin playing you will understand along the way that by the more live experience you have, the more you learn. There are a lot of opportunities out there once you realize what to pick up on and this takes years.

Rub · Jan 14, 2009

rollem411 said:

Yea but I think you can become a very good BJ player for not more than 6 months...REALLY good...picking up among the opportunities might take years, but I believe you can prepare yourself for the tables for not more than 6 months...

BTW Thank you all for the answers for now

Sonny · Jan 14, 2009

Rub said:

It takes more than a few years of experience to play the way the MIT guys did. They had the benefit of being trained and organized by a Uston team member (technically a Francesco team member but I'm sure Kenny wouldn't mind the credit) with an MBA from Harvard. Sure, a pro can train someone to count cards at a pro level in maybe four to six months or so (including indices, quarter-deck estimations and TC conversions), but that student will still have a long way to go before they are ready to play on their own. They’ll be good enough to be a spotter or a signaler but they won’t have the skills to actually make any money. They will need to learn everything about the game including expected values, standard deviations, risk of ruin, bankroll management, different betting styles (backcounting, Wonging, optimal bet spreads, playing multiple hands), different playing styles, different playing techniques (shuffle tracking, hole carding, steering, sequencing, comp counting, and many others), camouflage techniques (a good act(s), cover plays, manufacturing losses, avoiding heat, etc.), scouting good games, traveling cheaply, transferring money and many, many more things before they can play at a professional level on their own. That’s the stuff that takes years of practice and experience.

-Sonny-

ming · Jan 14, 2009

i always thought the MIT team made so much money because they were one of the first teams and everything was much easier back then, was it in the 80s? better rules, no heat...and that everything is so different now that it's more or less impossible to get rich doing it unless you have a HUGE bankroll, nomatter how gifted you are?

callipygian · Jan 14, 2009

Sonny said:

Also, keep in mind that there were multiple MIT teams, from the early 1980's through the early 2000's. The book "Bringing Down the House" is a collection of the embellished stories from many different teams, and the movie "21" is an embellished version of the book.

Rub, here's an example of how things were embellished:

In the book (I didn't see the movie, so perhaps this scene is also in the movie), the new card counter is taken to an underground Chinatown casino to practice. After a few hours, a bag is thrown over his head and he starts freaking out; a voice then asks him what the count is, and the whole scene is revealed to be a setup and a test of how well someone can keep the count through pressure.

In real life, a group of new counters saw a Chinatown charity blackjack game which was beatable. They then proceed to sit down and beat the snot out of the game, and are unable to cash their chips afterward (they settle for a lower amount than they had actually won).

If what you "know" about the MIT team(s) come from the movie or book, I'm pretty sure your impression of them is wrong.

Sonny · Jan 14, 2009

ming said:

I thought the book was based on the MIT team in the early 90s. That was 15-20 years after the Francesco teams, Uston teams, Hyland teams, Czech teams, Kaplan teams and who knows how many other groups. Uston published his book describing the entire strategy back in 1977 so it wasn't like the MIT guys were doing anything the casinos didn't already know about. I don't think the conditions were necessarily much better, they just kept churning people whenever they got burned out. I’m sure heat was a very big problem. I think their advantage was that they were large, well-funded and strong players.

-Sonny-

ihate17 · Jan 14, 2009

To add to this

Sonny said:

In Uston's second book, Million Dollar Blackjack, he describes an experiment in AC and though I do not believe he mentions the number of teams in action you do get the feeling that there were at least dozens and dozens of teams that showed up.
I had an uncle who played shortly for a team at least 5 years before Uston hooked up with Francisco.

ihate17

ihate17 · Jan 14, 2009

Maybe you can today but I could not 32 years ago

Rub said:

32 years ago I began my cardcounting hobby. The games I played were superior to the games offered today but the information available for training today is far superior.
I was a net loser in 3 of my first 5 years and to this day I am sure it was not the counting but emotional things like steaming and playing too long when I was down that caused the majority of this. There was probably quite a bit in the way of cheating going on also and later I learned how to recognize certain cheating methods.
Point is, one can easily learn BS, learn a counting system and learn indices in 6 months but that might not be enough to get over those human type emotional things that can easily turn an advantage into a disadvantage.

P.S. Since those initial years I have only had 3 additional losing years.

ihate17

callipygian · Jan 14, 2009

Sonny said:

The people who sourced the material for the book were from the early 90's, but they admit they borrowed liberally from other teams - the Holyfield fight was in the late 90's, but I think the heyday of outside bankrolling was in the 80's. I'm not convinced any of the teams after Strategic Investments were bankrolled from the outside.

MAZ · Jan 14, 2009

callipygian said:

No man, the BDTH book was based on embellished stories by Jeff Ma as told by that hack Mezrich. Very few of the stories in the book happened to the Kevin Lewis character, and none of the other main characters of the book were ever approached to give any corraborating information on what the real facts of the story were. Not to mention compensated for their likeness in the book or the movie. You got the Chinatown story close enough, the final take was $1400. I'm tired of all the blankheads out there spewing opinions like it was fact about what went on during those days with the MIT teams. Nobody here but me and a very small few know what the deal was. SI failed, there was no hiding money from the IRS. Zg if John told you any different and you bought it you're more gullible then your own marks. The teams of the 90's did have outside bankrolling until about 94'. The only team that mattered at the end called it quits around 2000 due to heat based on huge play and the best players getting burnt out. Not to mention that legit jobs came around for most that paid well with no headaches. I know of a few that still make their living from BJ in one form or another. As far as the other book written by the liar Mezrich about the "other" MIT team, I refuse to say the name of it, the best use for that book is for BTU's in your fireplace. Its full of lies and garbage information based on what we like to call the second string.

callipygian · Jan 14, 2009

MAZ said:

Mezrich isn't a hack, he did exactly what he was supposed to do - take otherwise mildly amusing anecdotes and turn them into an epic legend.

Rub · Jan 15, 2009

Can I find anywhere a basic strategy chart with High Count influences on it ?

Just curious...and noobish...

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