Posted on 05/13/2013 11:59:09 AM PDT by grundle
What's the best way to win a game of chance? Turn it into a game of certainty.
That, a British casino is charging, is exactly what world-renowned poker player Phil Ivey did in winning £7.6 million — about $11.9 million — in one spectacular run of punto banco, a baccarat game. Crockfords is charging that Ivey observed tiny flaws in the game's cards, and used that knowledge to give the house a severe thrashing. As a result, the casino is refusing to pay, and Ivey has filed suit to receive his withheld winnings.
(Excerpt) Read more at sports.yahoo.com ...
Casinos live by cheating people, so they really hate to have someone turn the tables on them. If you count points and use probability to improve your chances, and even win, they will bodily throw you out as if you were — what shall we say? — “playing their game.”
Correct. It is the casino’s responsibility to provide high-quality cards. If they were negligent, they deserve the loss.
The cards had a tell -— LOL.
Case will be settled out of court for an "undisclosed amount"
Everybody wins this way: The casino does not pay the full $12,000,000.
And Ivey gets to keep his thumbs.
How could they possibly prove that Ivy “noticed a small imperfection in the cards”???
Does that “imperfection” exist?
Is it sufficient to develop a determinitive pattern?
Just a theory, eh? No proof of anything except the casino's own bad faith.
Let’s see... Casino found no problems when Ivey was 500k in the red, but finds problems when he’s $12 million ahead. Shocking that.
Surely the dealer would never use slight imperfections in the cards.
I saw this just now on Yahoo.
I follow the WPT and know Ivey’s reputation.
Rare, I think for a topflight Hold ‘Em poker champ
to get involved in a baccarat type tournament card game.
Having said that, I hope the casino KEPT THE EXACT CARDS that were used in the disputed games, because otherwise they are just talking about hypothetical situations where he “could have” noticed imperfections in cards that “could have” come his way during the game.Much of their case seems to be based on the contention that Ivey requested of the dealer that he keep the same decks in play, that would otherwise have been discarded, game by game, at regular intervals. Their case “could” be good if they proved that, because it’s the only thing that supports any questionable
behavior by Ivey.I don’t see how much of Ivey’s case could hinge on the casino’s not provided perfectly uniform cards—that would almost be like an admission he took advantage of the non-uniform cards. (And for him to take advantage of that he would have to note WHICH of these cards were numbers he needed to go all in and bet big when it was to his advantage. ONLY THE CARDS USED have any relevance to this charge that he “cheated”. Card sharps have always used their OWN marked cards, or cards they themselves have surreptitiously marked in small ways during play, to give themselves an advantage. This time the casino may have done it FOR the players, by accident.
I agree with the comments that, even if all this is true, Ivey did nothing wrong. In addition, though, there’s an extremely simple solution the casino could have employed.
At the beginning of a normal shuffle, the stack of cards is broken into two equal parts. At that point, it’s a common practice in the U.S. for the dealer to rotate one of the halves by 180 degrees. Then, after the shuffle, there’s no way for a player to know if a particular observed card is a high card from the right-hand stack or a low card from the left-hand stack; they look the same.
I could have told them this, and my consulting fee would have been a lot less than they’ll end up shelling out to Phil Ivey.
Apparently, after he was $800k down, he and his female companion requested that they get a thorough viewing of the cards being used, he then started winning every hand and somehow convinced the casino to use the same deck on the second nite. They then went from making $50k bets/hand to $150k bets. They casino only deposited $1.6M into his account.
Crockfords sounds like their taking their cue from Indian casinos.
So, I’m curious: do casinos have some sort of ‘user agreement’ that everyone must sign? Something like “I promise to lose money when playing your games?”
Prediction:
The casino will sue the maker of the cards blaming them for the imperfections
” Let’s see... Casino found no problems when Ivey was 500k in the red, but finds problems when he’s $12 million ahead. Shocking that.”
LOL!
There was a great ‘caper’ movie in the mid-60s called Kaleidoscope, where a guy snuck into the playing card printing plant and altered the printing plates to ‘mark the deck’ of the cards used by all the European casinos.
Maybe someone remembered that movie.
Or maybe the Casino is just a corrupt, sore loser.
Things like this are a good example why no one should ever expect to win anything from a casino game.
Good for Phil and I hope he can make them pay up.
If this ever goes before a jury (even in Britain) They won’t be siding with the casino. Everyone knows the odds are stacked in favor of the house.
What's next, a carnival suing that a ring tosser noticed that the game wasn't totally rigged?
Even if Ivey requested the same deck, its only a request. The casino makes and orchestrates play at their discretion.
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