A ploppy's Day! Turning $140 to $800+

[Cardcounter]

There was this crazy man who made all kinds of horrible mathimatical plays but still turned $140 into $800 plus I had never seen a player play so poorly and do so well in my life. Some of the plays he made where to double down on 5, split 4's against a 9, double down on hard 13, split 6's against a 10, stay on ace-5, and those where only some of the errors he made. He to be playing with a 10% disadvantage and he still turned $140 into over $800+ betting no more than $25 a hand.

 

[ChefJJ]

It's called gambling.

 

[iwantblackjack]

And, sometimes the worse feeling is when you are either in negative territory or just a small gain.

 

[MEDITANK]

I guess I would call that extreme positive variance of the strange kind. That guy could do no wrong.

 

[sagefr0g]

There was this crazy man who made all kinds of horrible mathimatical plays but still turned $140 into $800 plus I had never seen a player play so poorly and do so well in my life. Some of the plays he made where to double down on 5, split 4's against a 9, double down on hard 13, split 6's against a 10, stay on ace-5, and those where only some of the errors he made. He to be playing with a 10% disadvantage and he still turned $140 into over $800+ betting no more than $25 a hand.

yep this happens. i saw a guy playing like that make $10,000 at a $100 min table only to turn around and lose it all. man was he PO'd . then he takes about $15 to a $5 min table and turns it into about $300 playing as you described above. but he was still really PO'd .

 

[rogue1]

the bum

The guy walked into the TI back in 1995 I guess it was. Cashed a $400.00 social security check and turned it into about 1.5 million,playing horribly all the while. His bad play finally caught up with him and his fortune dropped to $50,000. Steve Wynn then personally ordered him off the property because the bum was extremely rude to the dealers,waitresses,etc. One waitress described him as vile.

 

[ihate17]

Over and over again and do not know if myth or not

The guy walked into the TI back in 1995 I guess it was. Cashed a $400.00 social security check and turned it into about 1.5 million,playing horribly all the while. His bad play finally caught up with him and his fortune dropped to $50,000. Steve Wynn then personally ordered him off the property because the bum was extremely rude to the dealers,waitresses,etc. One waitress described him as vile.

Certainly possible, but I have heard that same story I think well before 1995 and so far it has happened according to the one telling the story, at several different casinos.

The thing is anyone with any style of play can get lucky (good old positive variance) for a period of time. What drives players who might be members of a board like this crazy is when that guy is killing the casino and the casino is killing you. Throw a max bet out, you get 15, the clueless wonder gets blackjack and the dealer is showing a 10, over and over again. Variance and justice just do not run together many times.

ihate17

 

[Mimosine]

What drives players who might be members of a board like this crazy is when that guy is killing the casino and the casino is killing you. Throw a max bet out, you get 15, the clueless wonder gets blackjack and the dealer is showing a 10, over and over again. Variance and justice just do not run together many times.

ihate17

it only kills you if you let it. right?

i've seen one guy at a table i was playing, playing two spots and he would ramp bets up thoughout the shoe from 2 X $10 to 2 X $50ish with no correlation to the count, just ramp as the shoe got deeper. after playing with him for about an hour or two he amassed a huge pile of greens and blacks (~$1000). having assessed that he wasn't counting or using AP i chalked it up to luck and ignored it. saw the same guy a few weeks later with piles of green and black (~$1500), playing the same strategy. after an hour of play this latter night he was down under $300. Unless he was ratholing Rhino-style. [/sarcasm]

long story short, there are a lot of things one could get emotional about while playing, and i have been plauged by the standard ones too (e.g. losing in high counts while everyone else wins). but as soon as i see someone who isn't an AP winning tons, i ignore it, it's irrelevant to my game and if i can't learn anything from watching them play (since they aren't an AP) then its time to get back to playing, get back to focusing, and get back to winning albeit at a slow but steady pace.

 

[21forme]

Variance and justice just do not run together many times.

A variation of the Apple slogan : Think Long-term.

 

[EasyRhino]

Unless he was ratholing Rhino-style.[/sarcasm]

Hey, gotta use my puffy jacket for something!

... you know, I think I need to start observing lucky ploppies more often, so I can learn how to be like them. I'm worried I don't look happy enough. I mean, I get excited when I win individual hands, but if I go on a streak, I start fighting myself and downplaying it.

 

[Cardcounter]

I wonder what the odds where!

I wonder what the odds of this player turning $140 into $800 where? A 100 to one or maybe even 1000 to 1. His odds to lose his whole $140 in one hour had to be at least 90%. With 5% going to losing a little bit, 3% with breaking even after an hour, 2% to be ahead after an hours play by a little bit. I would say the odds had to be more than a 10,000 to 1 that he could do that well.

 

[EasyRhino]

I forget, do you work at a Mindplay shop?

If so, did the computer melt down when it tried to evaluate his play?

 

[halcyon1234]

I wonder what the odds of this player turning $140 into $800 where? A 100 to one or maybe even 1000 to 1. His odds to lose his whole $140 in one hour had to be at least 90%. With 5% going to losing a little bit, 3% with breaking even after an hour, 2% to be ahead after an hours play by a little bit. I would say the odds had to be more than a 10,000 to 1 that he could do that well.

Depends. Even if you take BJ and a 50/50 game, it seems likely enough:

140 (win) .5 = 280
280 (win) .25 = 560
240 (win) .125 = 800

Three wins in a row is not unheard of.

Now, if he had $140 and was playing $5 a hand-- then I'd put it at nigh impossible. =)