Damon Agnos at Seattle Weekly has a highly readable profile of a professional gambler called Noah, a card counter turned sports bettor who built a seven-figure bankroll from scratch. That’s a rare feat.
Noah started out as a part-time grinder, betting very small. Counting cards for low stakes like that is difficult because table minimums [...]

From stories dated Jan. 14 to Jan. 22, 2010.

An 18-year veteran of an upstate New York police department, Robert Risi, on Jan. 21 began serving a one-to-three-year sentence for stealing cash from his department’s evidence room to support his gambling addiction. Risi, the father of a six-month-old daughter, has already paid restitution of $15,800 and [...]

I discourage counting cards because the phenomenon of counting overall benefits the casinos: blackjack’s reputation for fairness – for being a fair game, a good gamble, “best wager in the house,” all of that – derives, directly, from the mythology of counting. From the stories and the books about it. Prior to the publication of [...]

Compulsive gamblers going nuts is again our theme, because they continue going nuts, and because the cumulative effect of the stories of their ongoing nuts-going may prove beneficial someday. I don’t know. But it’s worse out there than you’d think:

A defense attorney for Ausaf “Omar” Siddiqui asked a judge on Dec. 23 to dismiss [...]

Happy new year, they say. I’ll believe that when I see it. The times are as dark as we’ve known. Those of us not killing ourselves are eating the people who are. Life, in America, is not good. We’re either hoopleheads or burglars. Saints are rare. Decency is inconceivable. I get in a van this [...]

I’m giving a nominal lecture verging, maybe, on some kind of performance art next Monday, January 11, at Pete’s Candy Store in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. This is part of the Open City Dialogue series. Good fun. I’ll teach you the basics of card counting and, as is my habit, analyze the spiritual component.
It starts at [...]

‘The Hangover,’ the film, has card counting in it. Supposedly. Our heroes run into trouble and need fast money to the tune of 80 G’s. It’s a situation I’m familiar with in Vegas.
There are a lot of things you can’t do when you need 80 G’s in a hurry in town. Among them is [...]