Casino Player July 2022

PLAYING THE TABLES

TABLE TALK

Winning Streaks Readers share memorable gaming sessions, for better or for worse

➤ by John Grochowski

W ithout streaks,casino games wouldn’t be much fun at all. If the house collected its 1.41 percent on the craps pass line roll after roll or its 5.26 percent on double-zero roulette spin after spin, there would be little reason to play. But winning streaks give us hope and sometimes pad our bankrolls.They grow out of normal probability, as do losing streaks. Over thousands of plays,casinos will collect something close to the expected percentage, but we all win some and lose some. Streaks give us our most memorable sessions, for better or for worse.Several readers have decided to share their experiences when streaks seemed to defy the norms. ARTIE I was playing craps with my normal method.I make a pass bet and fol low with a couple of come bets. I like to have three numbers in ac tion, all backed with odds. The casino was moderately busy and there were five other play ers at my table. I’d just finished a good roll. I made five passes,made some nice money and was feeling pretty good about the world. The next five shooters all went point-7.No one made any money. There wasn’t even a 7 or 11 on the comeout. Just losers. A little extreme, right? The first shooter rolled a 6. Everybody was rooting him on, but no luck.Next roll was 7. On down the line, another 6 and another 7.Then a 9 and 7, and a 4 and 7. Barely five minutes after my roll, there was only one shooter left before it came back around to me. The fifth shooter was a big burly guy they were calling Jimmy.He had a really nice touch, a big slow arc that would hit the wall and come to a dead stop on the first bounce.Nobody had left the table yet, but everybody was talking about a break. Jimmy’s first roll was an 8, just like you’d hope.Next roll looked good out of his hand, but the dice stopped on 4-3.ANOTHER point 7. I was betting $10 on pass,then $10 on come.I lost all the passes, but won the comes on the 7s. But I lost my odds. It was a 3x, 4x, 5x table, so I lost $30 in odds on the 4, $40 on the 9 and $50 each on the two 6s and the 8s. In all,

I lost $220 in that stretch without a single pass.Awful. I stuck around to see if I could repeat my good roll. I did make a point to break the streak, but sevened-out right after.Time to leave. ROSA I don’t usually bet single numbers. I’m a red or black, odd or even kind of girl. But the board at the roulette wheel showed the number was 6 the last two times and three of the last eight.Also, twice in the last 10 the number was 18. My birthday is 6/18, so I said to myself,“Self, if you’re ever going to risk single numbers, this is the time.” Instead of $10 on red and $10 on odd, I bet $10 on 6 and $10 on 18. Six came up right away, so I had a 35-1 payoff. Next was an 18, so I won 35-1 again. I’d never won more than $200 in a session, and here I was with $700. I thought I would faint.

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