Card counting blackjack teams are formed for a number of reasons. Initially, as the number of blackjack card counters skyrocketed in the early 1960's, Las Vegas casinos changed their blackjack rules to protect themselves from what they saw as an invading army of cheating players.
Counting cards at blackjack is not cheating, and it isn't against the law. It's just expert play. Casinos don't like expert play. They like bad players with lots of money. And, as it turns out, with most of the new players who read about card counting in Edward O. Thorp's Beat The Dealer, that's exactly what they got - players with a rudimentary understanding of the game of blackjack and plenty of cash. Most went home broke.
However, like Thorp himself, there were some who made a little money after perfecting their play. Since the number of 21 players increased tremendously but the number of players who had really learned card counting was small, the casinos made more money and they relaxed the rules again The best players tried to figure out how to increase their winnings and keep from betting barred from playing.
Getting BarredNevada casinos reserve the right to restrict the play of any player, for any reason, so excellent blackjack players can be barred from the 21 tables. Now that's a disaster if you have spent hundreds of hours learning to perfect a count system, and it's not that hard for experienced pit supervisors to spot a card counter. However, a few bright minds in the late 1960's took advantage of what they termed "team play."
Team PlayBlackjack team play has several advantages besides the training of new players. Even if the team members simply play on their own and share a bankroll.
- By combining their bankrolls, players are able to make larger average bets and increase their hourly rate of income because each player's element of ruin (the chance they will go broke) is reduced
- With more players in action, the team will reach their goal much faster
- Initial scouting of blackjack conditions at each casino is shared and more time is spent actually playing
Regardless of the many advantages of team play, the first truly successful blackjack teams used a new weapon against the casinos - the Big Player.
In this form of blackjack team play, the team forms a community bankroll and also employ's a new element of play by dispatching several counters to different blackjack tables in a single casino. These players make table-minimum bets and keep a running count of the cards in the shoe at their assigned table. Since card counting depends on betting the smallest amount when the odds are in the casino's favor and the largest amount when the count is in the player's favor, the counter waits until the count is fairly high (usually 1.5 to 2 percent in the player's favor) and then signals to the Big Player who is wandering around the gaming floor waiting to get in a game.
When the Big Player sees the signal, he joins the game, takes the signals from the counter (including the running count and the number of aces used) and begins making large bets. An average table limit might be $5 to $500 and the counter keeps playing the minimum bet, but the Big Player walks right in and bets $500. The Big Player picks up the count and keeps betting the maximum (often on two or three hands) the team bankroll allows until the count goes down or becomes unfavorable. Then they leave the game.
If all goes well, another team member will soon call them into another "favorable" shoe and the process continues. Since they continually make large bets only when the odds are well in the team's favor, the average win rate is substantial. The most successful teams have employed as many as a dozen counters and two or three Big Players in a single casino simultaneously to take full advantage of their time. These teams often win as much as $25,000 to $50,000 in just a few hours. The average win is smaller, but an occasional $100,000 win happens.
Teams are not always created equally, so winnings are shared in different ways. In most instances, a bankroll is established and play continues until that amount is doubled. When this happens, half the win goes equally to those who have invested, although a manager may take an extra share for setting up the team. The remaining half goes to the players depending on their total hours.
Because the Big Players have more risk of being noticed and barred and they are usually more experienced, they often receive two to three times the hourly rate the counters receive, but each team has its own rules and its own way of chopping up the winnings.
