Grady said:Here are my general guidelines for beating craps:
1. You must play at a place where somebody wins once in a while, not a bust-out joint like the Sands Regency in Reno.
2. Play only at night. There are rarely big wins in the daytime.
3. Use my "pocket system" with your cash. Assuming that you're into the ebb and flow of a good game, meaning you're winning and losing bets, go to your pocket occasionally with chips, not enough to destroy the integrity of the bankroll but enough so that you don't go broke if you lose what you're playing with on the table. The house doesn't like players to do this but it's your money. Examples from my past: In Atlantic City, when I once won $60,000 in 20 minutes, when I cashed in I had $17,000 in chips in my pockets. Another time in Reno, I cashed out $48,000 and had $13,000 in my pockets.
4. Try to begin play at a table where people are hollering, having a good time and have chips in front of them.
5. If you're playing where the odds aren't more than the 3, 4 and 5 times odds on the points always take the full odds. For newish players this means you can take 3 times odds on the 4 and 10, 4 times odds on the 5 and 9 and 5 times odds on the 6 and 8.
6. You MUST believe that the dice will pass.
7. Press intelligently, with courage but don't be crazy in this department.Just now, in Vegas I had a nice "hump roll", meaning if I got past this I am gonna win upwards of $15,000. The shooter had just made a five, where I had had a $250 flat bet and taked $1,000 odds. Now I wager $400 on the pass line and he gets an 8 for a point. I take two dimes ($2,000) odds and make three come bets for only $100 but with full odds. Now, if he makes the 8 , I get $2,400 to $2,000 for my five times odds I've taken and they have to pay off the $400 flat bet, a total of $5,200. If he had made the point, I would've scaled back to a $250 flat bet and played smart and carefully from there.
He didn't make the point and just in case I made a mistake of some kind, I had $4,400 in my pockets.
8. You have to understand that today everything is different at craps. In the old days, we pool players had many high up in the 5 figure wins when it was $500 limit and single odds. Today that would be utterly impossible. You have to win your money in short bursts, say from 10 minutes to 30 minutes.
9. Don't make bets based on hunches, don't make "sucker bets", like the field or the hard ways and perhaps most importantly, be patient. If the dice aren't passing a little, nothing will make you a winner. One of my greatest strengths is holding down my losses. However, I don't put any kind of "unit" restriction on my wins. For one example, I wandered into the Trop one Thur.,where I discovered that they had a five times odds special on Thursdays. I was on my way home from Reno to South Carolina, driving and I stopped in Vegas to visit a lady I liked. Anyway, I only bought $800 in chips and I won $65,000 in a couple of hours.
I hope these may help you with your dice game.
Hey Grady. Do you remember the one time we bombed the Sands Regency Crap table with the $200 limit. Maybe you weren't there that year. It was around 1990 or 91. I know Mataya and Nickie were in the game. Frisco Dave, me and a few other pool players. I think Danny was in too.
The dice got hot for everyone who rolled. The first player threw like 15 passes, plus many numbers. About a twenty minute roll. Most of us had started out betting like $5 or $10 and taking double odds. By the end of this roll, we were all betting like $50 or a $100 on a number and taking double odds. Next player, another good roll. And so on for about three or four more players. We had all started with peanuts (it was the last day of the tournament and everyone was near broke). But now everyone had thousands in front of them and they had to reload the table with about 50K more.
It was Mataya's turn. It had been over an hour and the dice hadn't gotten around the table. We were all screaming and hollering like crazy. We loaded up and Jimmy throws a come out 7. Bam, we win another grand or so. Everyone whoops. Jimmy throws an 11. Another nice lick, followed by a roar and no one is winning more or yelling louder than Jimmy. They seem reluctant to give him the dice. He growls at them and he takes the dice and throws another 7. The table erupts and Jimmy is spewing profanities of joy. He has them stuck over 10K, from a meager bankroll.
Now they won't give the dice back to Jimmy. They mix them in and the stick man holds them. He says Jimmy is too loud and he can't throw. There is a stalemate. Jimmy is screaming for the dice, and the stickman passes them to the next player. This guy refuses to take the dice. My turn, I pass too. He passes the dice all the way around the table and no one will take them. It's back to Jimmy, but the man will not give in. This lasts for about 5 minutes and finally I break the stalemate.
I gather all my chips (several thousand) and say to all, I'm heading for the cage. The game breaks and everyone follows along. We cash out thirty or forty to the good at the little bust out Sands. I'm pissed, because I think they did something illegal to stop the game. But later over coffee Jimmy explains something to me. He says we got the Sands in a bad spot. They can't win. If the dice cool off, we will all quit anyway. And if they stay hot, we can really hurt them now. A run of numbers can easily cost them tens of thousands more.
They wanted to close the table, and they did.
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