Fun and Games in Tahoe

Thread: Gambling and Risk-Taking Conference

So, as mentioned in the first post in this thread, could we resist the lure of the blackjack tables at the Tahoe gaming conference? Well, yes and no. We didn’t play at all, but we did shadow a number of tables trying to see how in the world advantage players could possibly “hole card” the dealers (catch a glimpse of the hole card due to sloppy dealing). No luck there, either.

We did meet a couple of notables in the world of professional blackjack. We sat with Semyon Dukach, former notorious MIT Strategic Investments Blackjack Team member and the main character in Busting Vegas: the MIT Whiz Kid Who Brought the Casinos to Their Knees. Although he claimed to be retired from the world of professional gamblers who use “advantage play” or skills techniques to win big, he reportedly picked up a few hundred dollars at the blackjack tables over lunch. Just because he could, we suppose.

Semyon was on a panel with another advantage player, James Grosjean, who wore a disguise throughout the conference. Undue paranoia? Don’t forget we were at a casino. Well-known advantage players often are escorted from casinos – or treated more harshly – once they are identified by security. (The joke was that Semyon not only didn’t wear a disguise, but actually sauntered down to the tables with his nametag on. He’s retired, though, right?)

More to come on advantage play and tribal casinos.