The player next to me—as is often the case—was tipping the dealer tonight. I—as is always the case—was not. The dealer thanked Mr. Tips more noticeably each time for the table scraps coming his way, and Mr. Tips responded by ever more loudly espousing the eternal virtues of tipping. They were addressing each other, but they were talking at me.
This happens on a regular basis. I have become accustomed to being the lone big bettor at a table, raking it in hand over fist, and nevertheless wearing the label Ungrateful McCheapy-Pants for not tipping a dime.
Finally Mr. Tips got up the nerve and asked me to my face why I don’t tip. I remembered that this player had been talking earlier about signing up for a blackjack tournament.
“Do you ever tip the dealer in a blackjack tournament?”
“NO WAY!” He chortled. “Why would I do that?”
“You tip the dealer here, why not in a tournament?”
“Every dollar counts in a tournament. It might make the difference between winning and losing.”
“That’s why I don’t tip,” I said. A long silence followed.
“Well,” the player finally said, “What goes around, comes around, you know? It’s about Karma.”
“The same Karma that is suspended for blackjack tournaments everywhere?”
Over the long haul, the casino takes a few cents every round from the average player. The advantaged player turns that on its head to take a few cents every round from the casino. Don’t let your moments of high positive variance fool you. Your margins are a lot smaller than your chip stack. In the long run, he who gives away his cents makes neither cents nor sense. –Loudon Ofton
This is fantastic! Ya gotta love the brilliant people who sit at the blackjack tables. Gamblers suck!
Loudon – as always, a great story. There have been plenty of times I want to tell both the dealer and Mr. Tips to Suck IT!
And you guys wonder why you are told to leave and not come back? The dealer is the 1st line of defense and is questioned many times in the shift bosses office about how someone is playing if the table is dumping and can make the difference on weather or not your booted b/c if your throwing some red & green tokes to the dealer, you can bet your ass he’s not going to call you out. Now if you feel like being a dick and not giving a $ for hitting a 15 hand run at the end of the shoe that may of doubled your stack, and having you blow smoke in our face all night…well thats the kind of thing that makes me want to kick your teeth in.
Oh, and yes, I am a dealer. Have been for 4 yrs and i love watching people come in who think they can count a proper deck (usually who just watched “21″ the day before) and loose their roll in 30 min.
So go ahead and worry about being ” fired” each time you come play b/c hey, having the dealer on your side just makes no sense at all when you sit down at a table and everyone there and the game it’s self is there to separate you from your cash in the least amount of time as possible.
We will get booted regardless of who does it or who calls the flag on us. We play boldly and maximize our EV. Tipping dealers just cuts into the small 1.5-2% advantage I’m working with. If someone told you that you could make $40/hour playing blackjack, but you have to tip out $15 an hour to dealers in the hopes that it buys you some longevity, would you? Just because we are playing with green and black chips doesn’t mean the hourly rate that we are hoping to maintain will be significant. Just because I just won $1000 doesn’t mean I’m up that much. You don’t know what my bankroll is, you don’t know how much I’m down or up for the month. Why should I give you a cut of the very small advantage I’m striving for just to flip over some cards.
Man, I hate some of the people that sit at the tables. One time I hit a 12 against I think it was either a 2 or 3, can’t remember which, and this guy next to me says “I can tell you’re from Wisconsin, cause that was a stupid hit.” In which case I replied, “You must be from Minnesota, cause you have no idea what you’re talking about.”
The casino was right on the edge of the two states, but either way, guy was an idiot.