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The canons of poker, as clearly understood and tacitly accepted by every player, allow unlimited deception to win maximum money from ownerless pots. Therefore, everyone can and should freely use unlimited deception in every poker game. But no one should use deception outside of poker. If a person "plays poker" outside of a poker game, he becomes a dishonest person. Even in poker, however, a person becomes dishonest if he violates the understood and accepted canons of poker by usurping money through cheating. (Cheating is any manipulation of cards or any collusion that gives a player or players advantages not available to other players.)
Many poker players, including most professionals, do not fully distinguish between what is honest and what is dishonest, in and out of a poker game. For example, many professional players who day after day lie and practice deceit in poker ironically do not grasp the rightness of their poker deception. To them, lying and deception in poker become little different from cheating in poker. Their ethics become hazy and ill-defined. They feel the only barrier to crossing the line from lying and deception to cheating and stealing is the threat of being caught. By removing that threat (e.g., through undetectable Neocheating techniques), they cross over the line and begin cheating.
The failure to understand the black-and-white moral differences between deception in poker and cheating in poker is one reason why many players react so strongly (often violently, sometimes murderously) against a cheater. They fear that without strong anticheating reactions, everyone would easily cross over the line from deceiving them to cheating them. Sensing their own capacity to cheat, they assume the same capacity resides in everyone. Thus, even if they never cheat others, they fear that others will cheat them. Generally those who react most violently against cheaters are those who would most readily cheat others if their fear of being caught and evoking similarly violent reactions from their opponents did not restrain them.
Most amateur poker players hold the classical but misleading views about cheating. They perceive nearly all cheating as being done either by bumbling amateurs who are easily caught or by highly dexterous and invincible cardsharps who have perfected sleight-of-hand skills through years of laborious practice and dangerous experience. In holding those misleading classical views, most amateur poker players remain unsuspecting of the casual, natural-appearing collusion cheating and Neocheating practiced among the professional establishment.
As the stakes of public games increase, the percentage of professional players increases--as does their motivation to cheat. Every player should increasingly expect and look for cheating as he progresses to higher-stake club or casino games ... right up to the highest-stake games, including the finals (down to the last three players) of the million-dollar world championship, freeze-out tournaments held in Las Vegas, Nevada. Most finalists in those tournaments are public-game professionals who have worked in the professional establishment for years. Few members of the professional cheating establishment would have qualms about making collusion arrangements in those tournaments or any high-stake game: Two of the three final players could safely and swiftly squeeze the third player out of the game with collusion betting to assure both the remaining players, for example, a several-hundred-thousand-dollar return on their original $10,000 stakes (their entry fees). By their collusion, the final two players would vastly improve their investment odds--they would eliminate any possibility of losing while guaranteeing themselves a large win.
When, how, and why does a public-game professional begin cheating? Imagine a lonely public-game player struggling against the house cut to become a full-time professional and suddenly discovering a friendly professional establishment with an ongoing cheating system readily available to him . . . an undetectable cheating system requiring no special skills and available for his immediate profit. Such a player, especially if he is a mediocre or marginal professional, will often embrace that opportunity by tacitly cooperating with the establishment professionals in perpetuating their system. He accepts their collusion cheating as a trade tool required for playing competitive, professional poker. As he blends in with those professionals and adopts their system, he becomes increasingly dependent not only on their establishment but on collusion cheating to survive. He loses his independence and becomes a stereotyped, public-game professional. With a sense of professional righteousness, he becomes a cheater.
The alert player who is familiar with the basic professional cheating techniques can detect any cheating, even the most skilled and invisible cheating, without actually seeing the cheating. An alert player usually can tell who is cheating, what technique is being used, and exactly when the cheating is occurring by detecting patterns and combinations of illogical betting, raising, pace, and playing style by his opponents.[ 37 ]
Once a player has detected and confirmed cheating in public poker, he has five options:
The good player rejects his or her first option as not only dishonest and unhealthy, but also as the least profitable option. Several of John Finn's encounters with professional cheating described next in this chapter illustrate the other four options.
Although John Finn played mainly in private poker games because of their greater profitability, he did recently spend several months playing public poker in the Gardena, California, card clubs and in the Las Vegas, Nevada, casinos. In both the clubs and casinos, he discovered professional cheaters operating in the higher-stake games. John's public-game experiences uncovered six common cheating methods used in public poker (see A-F on the following pages). He also learned how the good player can routinely beat professional cheaters in public poker. More important, he learned to identify those situations in which he could not beat professional cheating.
During his first two days in Gardena, John Finn played in each of its six poker clubs. After the second day, he became aware of a cliquish network of amateur players, professional players, floormen, and cardroom managers woven through those six clubs. The continuous circulation of poker players among the clubs allowed everyone in that network to effectively communicate (and gossip) with each other. While most of the habitual amateur players in Gardena recognized they were a part of a clique, few recognized that the professional establishment was using them as fodder.
In the lower-stake games, John Finn found mainly amateurs; the few professionals were usually shills. In those games, he detected no cheating. On the fourth day, he graduated to a $20 blind, lowball draw game. In that game, he discovered from their poker styles and conversations that players in seats 2 and 5 were professionals involved in collusion cheating. Even before identifying them as full-time professionals, he knew they were colluding. Their methods were simple, effective, and unnoticeable. Both players sat low in their seats . . . each slumping a little lower when the other dealt. On dealing draw cards with smooth quicker-than-the-eye motions, the dealer would expose key cards as fleeting blurs perceptible only to his partner. The partner would return the favor on his deal. The cheaters accomplished their card flashing with out suspicion despite the great pressure on dealers in the Gardena card clubs not to flash cards. (Only once did John observe a collusion cheater being scolded for his "careless" dealing. Ironically, John observed on numerous occasions non cheating dealers being scolded for flashing cards.)
By knowing when his own lowball draw card had been flashed, John Finn could outmaneuver the cheating partners by more accurately predicting what they would do as the result of their knowing his draw card. The cheaters, therefore, were constantly misled by John's counter actions--they repeatedly misjudged what he would do. John Finn exploited and beat both collusion partners by using the cheating counteractions described in his notes on lowball cheating:
In each of the above examples, the cheater would have either won more money or lost less money if he had concentrated on playing sound poker to gain broad information about his opponent (rather than on cheating to gain information only about his opponent's draw card).
Throughout the night, John Finn used those counteractions to exploit and beat both collusion cheaters. And on occasion, when positioned properly, John saw cards flash between the partners. He used what he saw to further improve his advantage. When the game ended at seven in the morning, the two professional players were big losers. They left the table cursing their "bad luck," never realizing that their own cheating had victimized them.
Over the next several days in Gardena, John Finn noticed five trends while moving from lower-stake to higher-stake games:
Because the best public-game professionals and cheaters concentrated on the highest-stake lowball games (in which professional cheating was most effective and profitable), John Finn found that he could often improve both his edge odds and his investment odds by dropping back a level or two from the highest-stake games. When he dropped to lower-stake games, competition lessened-- money extraction was easier and often more profitable because of the decreased ratio of tough professionals and cheaters to easy losers and amateurs.
In public poker, great pressure is on the dealer not to flash cards, especially in high-stake lowball. But these games offer professional collusion cheaters the greatest profit incentive to flash cards. Most card flashing, therefore, occurs in the high-stake lowball games. The flashing motions are usually so quick and smooth that very few outsiders ever notice or even suspect card flashing. And most professional collusion cheaters use cautious discretion and avoid flashing cards whenever they sense suspicion by others. If flashing is suspected, the colluding partners will usually switch to a less effective signaling system or move to another game.
Still, many professional cheaters in Gardena use only reciprocal signaling systems because they are not sufficiently knowledgeable about systematic card flashing. And while collusion signaling is more commonly used among cheaters, card flashing is more effective and flexible because the colluding partners need no prearrangements, no agreements, no payments, no splitting of loot, no secret signals, no collusion betting, no deck stacking, and not even card flashing on the initial deal: They need only to flash draw cards toward their fellow professionals--toward any fellow professional who will tacitly return the favor. Their flashing movements are usually so natural and guiltless that few if any opponents ever see them. And if they are suspected, neither the victims nor the poker club management can directly accuse the colluders of cheating because they have no concrete evidence. Furthermore, the cheaters can have different, unplanned collusion partners for every game so no fixed set of partners can ever be pinned down and accused of collusion cheating.
In any case, collusion cheating of all varieties among establishment professionals is becoming increasingly common as they silently extend to one another their mutual, professional "courtesies." In fact, some California card clubs have compiled lists of suspected collusion cheaters who are either barred from the club or are not permitted to play at the same table.
But whenever a poker player cheats, the quality of his play declines because his time, energy, and thought must shift from sound-poker actions to cheating actions. He usually becomes overconfident and careless about playing poker--his objectivity, concentration, and discipline diminish as his thinking efforts become diluted. His betting becomes distorted and usually overly aggressive. And most importantly, his hands become more readable and his actions become more predictable whenever he cheats.
The classical card-manipulation type of cheating is rare among the Gardena professionals. John encountered that kind of cheating only once, and he made a quick profit from the cheater by pulling an old ploy against him--the torn-corner flash:
In his final lowball game at Gardena, John sat to the left of a collusion cheater who had switched a card with his partner to win a pot. After the hand, John saw the cheater ditch a face card on the floor. No one noticed the missing card. On the next hand, the cheater summoned the floorman for new cards. The cards were exchanged, but the ditched card remained on the floor. Two hands later, when the same cheater was involved in another pot, John leaned under the table to pick up some money he had purposely dropped. While under the table, he quickly tore the corner off the ditched card and slipped the corner into his jacket pocket.
Several hands later, John had a powerful six low. The cheater on his right had a callable low hand. John reached into his pocket, withdrew the torn face-card corner, and positioned it at the top edge of his cards. Then while concealing his other cards, he accidentally-on-purpose flashed his hand to the cheater, who immediately spotted the "picture card" in John's hand. John bet the $20 maximum. Now positive that John was bluffing a busted lowball hand, the cheater raised. John inconspicuously dropped the torn corner beneath the table and reraised. Since they were the only two players remaining in the hand, the number of raises was unlimited. They reraised each other the maximum $20 bet many times. Suddenly the cheater stopped betting. He choked, pushed back his chair, and looked on the floor. Dropping his hand face down on the table, the red-faced man promptly left the game without even calling John's last $20 raise. John pulled in the $460 pot.
John Finn left Gardena knowing that he could consistently beat both the professionals and the cheaters to earn a regular income from any club game, except possibly from the highest-stake lowball games that were dominated by the best professional players and cheaters.
John Finn first encountered professional casino cheating in a large poker room of a major hotel casino in downtown Las Vegas. The cheating involved the dealer, the cardroom manager, and his friend--and was unusual because management was involved.[ 38 ]
Initially, John Finn was not suspicious of or looking for cheating patterns because (1) the game was fairly low stakes $5-$10 high stud (although that was the highest-stake game in the cardroom at the time), and (2) the cardroom manager was not only playing, but was sitting next to the dealer. The game seemed safe from cheating.
Moving clockwise from the dealer's left sat (1) the cardroom manager, (2) a professional poker player, who was also a friend of the manager, (3) a poor-playing tourist, (4) a regular player, (5) [an empty seat], (6) an ex-poker dealer, (7) John Finn, and (8) a woman who was an off-duty blackjack dealer.
Within an hour, newcomer John Finn was the biggest winner. He was playing aggressively, winning heavily, and badly beating the other players--especially the woman player in seat 8, who was playing poorly.
The manager and several other players seemed annoyed and confused over John Finn's unorthodox and unpredictable play. After a shift change of dealers, the woman player switched to empty seat 5. Two hands later, another tourist sat in empty seat 8. He found a loose card beside John's elbow. The card apparently had slid under a napkin left by the woman player, and the dealer never noticed the missing card. (Some dealers can feel when one card is missing by the bulk and weight of the deck.) Several players glanced sharply at John as if they had discovered how he was beating them. The manager left the table and returned moments later.
Before the next hand, a floorman brought two fresh decks of cards to the dealer. John Finn became puzzled on noticing the cards were in a brown box bearing an orange-shield label from the Normandie Club in Gardena, California. Two hands later, John maneuvered into a strong position and was betting heavily. The manager beat him in a series of illogical but infallible calls and bets that did not coincide with the manager's poker style or ability. Staring straight at John Finn, he pushed the large pot to the woman player--the heavily-losing, off-duty blackjack dealer in seat 5. She took the money without appearing grateful or surprised by the manager's "generous" action.
Several hands later, John Finn again maneuvered into a strong and favorable position; he bet heavily, but once more was beaten in a similar series of illogical calls and raises by the manager's friend--the professional player. John became alert and suspicious. At first he thought his hole cards were being flashed, especially since the professional player sat low in his seat. Trying to counter that possibility, John was unsuccessful as he lost two more large pots to the manager, who again won through a series of illogical but infallible moves. John then noticed a slight crimp in his cards--such as might occur if a dealer had crimped for a false cut and then failed to bend out the crimp. In addition, the dealer gripped the cards in a way to facilitate false cutting. Yet, John detected no evidence of card culling, discard sorting, or deck stacking. After certain hands, however, the dealer would periodically glance at face-down discards as he gathered cards for the next deal. Still he made no attempt to rearrange any cards.
John Finn lost another large hand to the manager's friend. While assuming that he was the victim of collusion cheating, John did not know how or when it was occurring. His counteractions not only failed, but increased his losses. He had lost his winnings and was losing over $200 before he realized how the cheating was occurring. The method was simple, essentially undetectable, yet devastatingly effective. After each hand, the dealer simply gathered the face-up stud cards in a natural way, making no attempt to cull, sort, or stack them ... he merely remembered the value and order of the exposed cards. If too few cards had been exposed, he would simply glance at some face-down cards. By remembering fourteen cards[ 39 ] and by keeping them in an unchanged order on top of the deck through blind shuffles, false riffles, and false cuts, the dealer would know everyone's hole cards--thus, he would know everyone's exact hand right up until the seventh and final card. From that omniscient position, the dealer would then make all the playing and betting decisions for his partner (or partners) by signaling when to fold, call, bet, or raise. The playing partner would never need to know anyone's hand, including his own; he would only need to follow the signals of the all-knowing dealer.
On losing his third large pot to the low-sitting professional, John Finn realized that he could not beat that kind of collusion cheating and that his only choice was to quit the game. In order to gain some benefit, in order to analyze player reactions, John decided to openly declare his suspicion of cheating without revealing how much he really knew. He wanted to leave himself in the most knowledgeable and strongest position should he decide to return to the game.
After losing the pot, John placed one of his crimped hole cards on the flat palm of his hand and lifted the card to eye level. The dealer was waiting for the card as everyone watched John Finn. "Are these cards marked?" he asked, knowing that except for the crimping they probably were not. At that moment, he yanked his hand from beneath the card. It fell in an irregular motion to the table. Everyone stared at John ... everyone except the dealer, the manager, and the professional player--they kept glancing in different directions. John Finn picked up his chips and left. He had learned something.
An all-knowing collusion dealer greatly increases the investment odds for his playing partner while leaving the playing partner immune to errors and detection as well as to having his hands and intentions read by the good player. Furthermore, the cheater's cards always appear normal and above suspicion. No dramatic or improbable set-up hands occur. The cheater may fold at any time during the hand and sometimes is beaten on the last card . . . all normal in appearance and above suspicion-- except for the cheater's illogical playing and betting patterns and his unnaturally improved investment and edge odds.
More important to the good player, such a cheating system is difficult if not impossible to beat. The good player has only the seventh and final down card with which to outmaneuver and beat the cheater. (That final card is the only unknown to the signaling collusion dealer.) But by the final bet, the good player's investment odds would be so diminished by the previous four bets controlled by an infallible pair of collusion cheaters that he probably could not beat them over the long term. If the cheating technique includes the dealer's knowing or peeking at the final down card or if the game is five-card or six-card stud with no final down card,[ 40 ] the good player then has no way to beat the dealer-player collusion cheaters, even if he could crack their signaling code.
The strength of their collusion system lies in its simplicity and natural-appearing play. By contrast, the classical cheating systems involve dramatic big-hand or certain-win setups. Such setups are not necessary or even desirable. The dealer-player collusion system quietly extracts money from its victims. Such a collusion system is ideal for casino poker because the house dealer[ 41 ] deals every hand, thus leaving the collusion partners in an ideal cheating position for every hand (unlike club or private poker in which each partner deals only once each round.) That constantly favorable cheating position allows a slower, more casual and natural method for extracting money from victims. Furthermore, no player touches or cuts the cards except the house dealer, thus greatly facilitating and simplifying the cheater's card manipulations and false cuts. But in club or private poker, a non dealing player usually cuts the cards, making card manipulations and deck stacking more difficult for the dealer.
C. Collusion Cheating with House Dealer--Culling and Stacking
On the following afternoon, John Finn entered a newly remodeled downtown casino that had introduced poker only a few weeks before. The card area was small and offered only $1-$3 stud games. Wanting to examine low-stake casino poker, John Finn sat in the open seat on the dealer's left. Again, he did not expect cheating in a low-stake game. He soon realized that the other four players were locals--they all knew one another and the dealer. But none of the players appeared to be professionals or good players. The players and the dealer chatted amicably among themselves. John Finn played the role of an inexperienced tourist by asking naive questions about the rules. The game was loose. On the third hand, all four players stayed until the final card. Sixteen face-up cards were exposed, including an exposed two pair of aces and queens. Another ace and another queen were also among the face-up cards. John Finn watched with narrowing eyes as the dealer picked up the cards--he scooped up a queen and an ace and then three other cards. His hand darted back to scoop up the second queen and ace and then three more random cards before scooping the final queen and ace. He then gathered the rest of the cards.
After carefully squaring the deck, the dealer made several false riffles and a false cut before dealing. John knew what was going to happen. He did not even look at his two hole cards. His first up card was a queen. The first up card of the player on his left was an ace. The player with the ace looked twice at his hole cards and then bet $1. Everyone folded to John. He paused and looked at each player and then at the dealer. Everyone was watching him and waiting. The dealer stopped smiling when John placed the edge of his right hand firmly over the lower half of his hole cards and tore them in half. He then turned over his two torn queens, placed them face-up alongside his third queen. John then quickly flipped over his opponent's hole cards, which were aces, and placed them face-up alongside that opponent's third ace. Everyone remained silent.
"Redeal." John ordered. The dealer glanced toward the mirrors in the ceiling over the blackjack tables and then quickly collected the cards--including the torn ones. He redealt from a new deck. Over the next dozen hands, John Finn aggressively manipulated his now tense and confused opponents. In twenty minutes, he ripped $50 from the low-stake game and left. As he walked down the aisle of blackjack tables, he glanced toward the poker area. The dealer and the players he left behind were still staring at him.
That was a mistake, John Finn thought to himself. I revealed too much about myself for only $50.
That evening, John Finn entered a major casino on the Strip. The casino had a large poker area. The action was heavy. In addition to many low-stake and intermediate-stake games, several high-stake stud games ($30-$60 games of high stud, low stud, and high-low stud) were in progress. John began in a $5-$10 game, moved up to a $10-$20 game and then graduated to a $15-$30 stud game before encountering professional cheating.
The cheating was simple collusion between two professionals who signaled the strengths of their hands to each other. The cheater with the strongest hand or position would indicate to his partner when to check, bet, or raise. Their collusion entrapped or drove out players and increased or decreased the betting pace--whatever was most advantageous to the cheaters at the moment. The collusion partners increased their investment odds by either sucking in or driving out players to improve their betting position and their odds for winning. They entrapped players and then generated bets and raises to build larger pots whenever either cheater held a strong hand. They consistently bilked the tourists and transient players . . . at least until John Finn entered their game.
He promptly detected collusion cheating by the illogical patterns of checks, bets, and raises between the partners. Since the dealer was not involved with card manipulations or flashing, John easily turned the collusion to his own advantage at the expense of the cheaters. He beat the cheaters because their collusion actions markedly improved his accuracy in reading their hands and intentions. When either partner held a strong hand, John read their strength more quickly and folded sooner--thus saving considerable money. Moreover, when the cheating partners revealed a strong hand and John held a stronger hand, he quietly let them suck him and other players into the pot. He let them build the pot for him with extra bets and raises. On the final bet, John would end his passivity with a maximum raise.
Also, the colluding partners doubled their losses to John whenever they bet as a team into pots that John won. If they had not colluded, normally only the player holding the strongest hand (rather than both players) would have been betting into John's winning hand.
To further increase his advantage, John Finn manipulated the readable hands and intentions of those cheaters against the other unsuspecting players. But John reaped his most profitable advantages from the cheaters when they bluffed. (Most collusion cheaters are overconfident and often can be lured into bluffs.) John would keep calling with a mediocre or even a poor hand as the bluffing partners kept betting aggressively to drive out players who held superior hands. John would then simply call the final bluff to win the pot. Or when necessary, he himself would bluff by stepping in with a raise after the final bet to drive out the bluffer and any remaining players to win the pot with a busted or a poor hand.
In three hours, John Finn converted the two professional cheaters from substantial winners into the biggest losers at the table and drove them from the game. With a $600 profit, he left that table to explore other games. He sat down at a table where four professional players were operating as two separate teams of colluding partners, cheating each other as well as the other three players. John assumed the role of a slightly drunk, wild-playing tourist--an ideal fish. He promptly broke the game open by playing all four cheaters against one another and against the other three players. In an hour, John ripped $900 from the game and then abruptly left the table. As he walked away, some of the players mumbled about his "unbelievable hot streak" and his "dumb luck."
John walked over to the highest-stake game in the house--a fast-paced, $30-$60 lowball, seven-stud game (razz). As he studied the action, he wondered about the unusual house rule that allowed five raises instead of the standard three. The five raises greatly increased the flexibility and advantage of collusion cheaters over their victims. John also wondered about the much higher proportion of professional players and collusion cheaters he observed in this casino. Was the management aware of their collusion cheating, he wondered. Did the management establish the five-raise rule to accommodate the cheaters? Or were the professional collusion cheaters drawn to this casino because of a five-raise rule innocently established by management to increase the betting action? . . . John assumed the latter to be true.
Standing behind the dealer, John Finn continued to watch the high-stake game. For nearly an hour, he studied the two biggest winners. From their conversation and style, he knew they were professionals, yet neither seemed to be cheating or colluding. Still he noticed that in spite of the large pots, the dealer was not being toked (tipped) when either professional won a pot. John Finn studied the dealer more closely: Gathering the face-up cards in a routine left-to-right order, the dealer made no attempt to rearrange the cards. But as players folded, the dealer would make a pile with their face-down discards and then gather their face-up cards and flip them on top of the discard pile. He would then flip the later-round face-up cards directly on top of the discard pile while slipping dead hole or face-down cards beneath the pile. If the hand ended with fewer than fourteen up cards being exposed, the dealer would casually glance at several face-down discards and toss them on top of the discard pile.
Although John could not actually see any blind shuffles, false riffles, or false cuts (or verify any illogical cheating patterns[ 42 ]), he speculated that the dealer was memorizing everyone's hole card and then signaling the best moves to one or both of the professional players ... in a way similar to that used by the dealer who was colluding with the casino manager and his friend two days earlier in the downtown casino. And, as in the downtown casino, John Finn concluded that with his current knowledge and experience, he could not beat that kind of dealer-collusion cheating. He therefore left the casino without playing in the $30-$60 game.
E. Amateurish Collusion Cheating with Sanction of House Dealer
Traveling south on the Strip, John Finn came to another major casino with a large cardroom. He observed the various poker games for thirty minutes. After considering the higher-stake games, he sat in a medium-stake ($10-$20) seven-card stud game because more of its players looked like losers. All were out-of-town gamblers and tourists, except for two women players sitting together across from John. Although their conversation revealed they were experienced local players, both women played poorly. Nevertheless, they were winning moderately because of their collusion cheating, which was crude and obvious. They blatantly showed their live hole cards to each other and then coordinated their betting to produce a collective advantage. The other players either did not notice their collusion or were too indifferent or timid to object. By quietly taking advantage of their much more readable hands, John converted the two women from winners to losers.
John then lost a fairly large pot to the women cheaters. During the hand, they had flashed their hole cards to each other. Then in a crude and visible manner, they actually swapped their final hole cards during the last round of betting, allowing one woman to win with a full house. After she turned her hole cards face-up, John Finn stuck his arm over the pot when the dealer started pushing it toward the woman. John then silently removed all the chips he had put into the pot. "Any objections?" he asked, looking at the two women and then the dealer. No one objected. John had his information. He picked up his chips and left for a higher-stake game.
F. Unbeatable Collusion Cheating through Dealer-Player Partnerships
John Finn entered the casino farther south on the Strip that normally offered the highest-stake poker games in Las Vegas. For twenty minutes, he watched six players in a $100-$200 seven-card stud game. He detected two professional players in the game and studied them (one was apparently losing slightly, the other was winning heavily). They were working over four out-of-town gamblers, all of whom were losing. While the two professionals did not seem to be in direct collusion with each other, when winning a pot neither player toked (tipped) the dealer. And while the dealer never glanced at face-down cards when gathering cards for the next deal, he did riffle and shuffle the cards several extra times whenever the previous hand produced fewer than twelve face-up cards. Without seeing anything else, John speculated that when the dealer was riffling the cards he was also memorizing the hole cards of every player. As before, John knew he could not beat collusion cheating involving a house dealer who knew everyone's hole cards. So he left without playing.
After three days in Las Vegas, John Finn realized that professional collusion cheating was well ensconced in higher-stake casino poker. He also knew that the alert good player could subvert and beat most forms of professional cheating in public poker. And most important, he identified those collusion situations that he could not beat.
In theory, even collusion cheating involving all-knowing house dealers can be beaten by the good player with superior strategy and better money management. Yet to beat such cheaters, the good player needs to know what the cheaters know ... he needs to know the concealed or hole cards of every opponent through near perfect card reading. But few if any players can achieve such perfection. Therefore, essentially all players, no matter how good, will lose money in games dominated by well-executed dealer-collusion cheating.
In any case, justice prevails in poker. The honest good player will generally win more money from poker than will the professional cheater. Furthermore, as a professional player becomes increasingly dependent on cheating for his support, he will become increasingly entrapped in an unproductive career and a limited future. The honest player, on the other hand, retains his independence and freedom to seek more creative and profitable opportunities, both inside and outside of poker.
Nevertheless, because of the cosmopolitan and dynamic nature of public poker, it is often a harbinger or indicator of what will eventually occur in private poker. Indeed, today the new and subtle, yet simple and invisible, cheating techniques (Neocheating) that are spreading throughout public poker are already infiltrating private home games.
Six commercial poker clubs in Gardena, California, are surveyed in Table 37. Those six clubs provide 210 poker and pan tables with 1680 seats. Throughout California, 400 licensed poker clubs have a potential capacity of 14,000 tables and 112,000 seats. State licensed poker parlors are also found in Montana, Oregon, Washington, and other states.
Thirty-three major casinos in Las Vegas, Nevada, are surveyed in Tables 38 and 39. The growing interest in public poker and the attractive profit margins possible from a well-run poker operation have caused sharp increases over the past few years in the number of poker tables in Nevada casinos. In addition to the more than thirty major poker rooms in Las Vegas, at least forty additional casino poker rooms exist in other cities and towns in Nevada. And major casino poker rooms are found in Reno at Cal Nev, Circus Circus, Harold's Club Harrah's, Horseshoe Club, MGM Grand, and Sahara Reno: and in Lake Tahoe at Park-Tahoe and Sahara Tahoe.
| Card Club | # of Tables | Draw Games* | Stakes, $ | Comments |
| Eldorado Club 15411 South Vermont Avenue Gardena, California (213) 323-2800 (Closed Thursdays) | 35 |
|
| More emphasis on high-stake lowball. Attracts toughest lowball professionals. Rough on beginners and amateurs. |
| Horseshoe Club 14305 South Vermont Avenue Gardena, California (213) 323-7520 (Closed Wednesdays) | 35 |
|
| Most crowded. Greatest variety of poker. More higher-stake games. Highest percentage of tough professionals. Roughest on beginners and amateurs. |
| Monterey Club 13927 South Vermont Avenue Gardena, California (213) 329-7524 (Closed Tuesdays) | 35 |
|
| Same management as next-door Rainbow Club. Some of the best professionals work these two clubs. |
| Rainbow Club 13915 South Vermont Avenue Gardena, California (213) 323-8150 (Closed Tuesdays) | 35 |
|
| Same comments as Monterey Club. More emphasis on pan. |
| Normandie Club 1045 West Rosecrans Boulevard Gardena, California (213) 323-2424 (Closed Thursdays) | 35 |
|
| Tendency toward lower stakes. Fewer professionals. Generally less crowded than other clubs. Good club to learn in. |
| Gardena Club 15446 South Western Avenue Gardena, California (213) 323-7301 (Closed Wednesdays) | 35 |
|
| Same management as Horseshoe Club. More relaxed atmosphere. More regular players, but fewer professional players. More low-stake action than other clubs. Best club to learn in. |
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[ 37 ] To detect invisible cheating, a player must be involved in at least one hand and perhaps several hands in which cheating occurs in order to observe the illogical poker patterns and variables. For that reason, every player must be cautious about high-stake or no-limit games in which he could be lured into a single cheating setup and financially wiped out before detecting any cheating. A player must never relax his vigilance against being set up for a one-shot, big-hand play designed to wipe him out. Indeed, the wise player views with suspicion and is prepared to throw away without a bet any super-powerful hand (e.g., four of a kind or a straight flush) that he receives in high-stake games with strangers.
The alert and adroit player, nevertheless, can beat the one-shot, big-hand cheating setup by scalping the bait but not swallowing the hook when the setup hand finally appears. Being aware of a cheating setup, the shrewd player can sometimes extract sizable bait (e.g., $5000) by staging an illusory huge payoff (e.g., $100,000). After plucking the bait, he must fold without a bet on the first super-powerful hand dealt to him. Or better yet, he should leave the game before the big hand is sprung--in which case, he may even be able to return for more bait.... But the good player is also smart--he never tries conning unsavory players who might rob, assault, or even kill him for his counter-intrigue.
[ 38 ] Normally even the lowest-level management in major casinos is unaware and innocent of professional cheating in their cardrooms.
[ 39 ] Rapid memorization of large groups of cards can be difficult. But, with practice, most players can learn to rapidly memorize fourteen or more cards (even the entire deck) by association, mnemonic, and grouping techniques. (Reference: Perfecting Your Card Memory by Charles Edwards, Gambler's Book Club, Las Vegas, Nevada, 1974.)
[ 40 ] Six-card stud with no final down card has nearly replaced seven-card stud in Reno and is beginning to appear in Las Vegas. Without an unknown final hole card, five-card and six-card stud give an unbeatable advantage to the dealer-player collusion cheaters.
[ 41 ] Not every house dealer cheats. In fact, most casino dealers never cheat and are probably unaware of any professional collusion cheating occurring around them. When a collusion dealer is temporarily relieved by a non cheating dealer, the collusion partner will sometimes leave, but will often continue playing while waiting for the collusion dealer to return. Agreements with and payments to collusion dealers are usually made off shift, away from the casino. Payments are by a flat rate, by a percentage of winnings, or by a combination of both.
[ 42 ] The alert player detects and verifies illogical cheating patterns by evaluating the actions of cheaters relative to his own playing and betting actions. But without actually playing in the game, an outside observer, even an alertly suspicious and knowledgeable observer, cannot easily see or verify the illogical patterns of a competent cheater . . . at least not in a short period of time. (That is one reason why casino management is seldom aware of professional cheating in poker; few people can detect competent poker cheating without actually playing against the cheaters in order to notice and evaluate illogical cheating patterns.)
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