Phil's Gambling Debts

[Soloman1]

Yep, there's always the vig...

 

And they're nothing more pathetic than a gambler/investor trying to get back to even.

[wobgon]

Yea, except,most folks i know who play the stock market end up making money.....Most folks I know who gamble, unless heads up against one another, are losing money.

[KillerPenguin]

Yea, except,most folks i know who play the stock market end up making money.....Most folks I know who gamble, unless heads up against one another, are losing money.

Love that your avatar pic is of Val Kilmer playing one of the most famous gamblers (/dentists/gunfighters) of all time.

[Awsi Dooger]

Gambling against Billy Walters is like chasing fool's gold. Now there is someone to nominate for "most interesting man in the world."

 

Sure, if your idea of the most interesting man in the world is a dishonest cheat who doesn't risk anything unless the odds are slanted in his favor.

 

I've detailed those Walters stories before, ones I witnessed first hand. Billy Walters is bad news. That is well known internally in Las Vegas even if somehow the aura remains and even 60 Minutes was suckered into a mostly flattering account.

 

The best move Mickelson has made in decades is to (apparently) separate from Billy Walters.

 

I have no idea why the assumption is that Mickelson lost money gambling against Billy Walters. Billy Walters moves money. He used to have a runner in every major sportsbook. I knew most of his guys since I was a runner/minor partner with a much smaller group. Those Walters runners would often tip me off on who he was about to play, so I could jump in for a nickel or dime of my own money before the odds changed. That went on with other groups also.

 

Much more likely, Mickelson placed sports wagers through Walters and eventually lost, gradually building up a negative balance. Once it reached a certain level Mickelson had an agreement to pay. That's where the $2 million quote comes in. I've had the same arrangement countless times with many guys. Obviously our digits were a fraction of this. We'd settle when it reached maybe $2000 either way. Some guys with bigger pockets/more trust would set the number at 5 dimes or 10 dimes.

 

Anyway, sports/horse gambling is a tough racket if you do it the standard way. A flawed process is passed down to the next generation of flawed processors. You invest hours handicapping a set of games or races. Let's say you subjectively like the Jets. You take the Jets +3.5 points. Then you sit back and see what happens. Rinse and repeat.

 

The guy who takes that route has very little chance in the long run. When I arrived in Las Vegas in 1984 I was shocked that virtually everyone was using that method. I saw daily second guessing and rationalization and stress. More than anything, there was zero carryover benefit. Handicapping that Jets game provided absolutely nothing beneficial toward the next day or next month or next year. Those guys start from scratch every day. Now, some guys believe that's the joy of the matter, the fascination. A local sports analyst/handicapper named Arne Lang argued that the process keeps you young mentally.

 

I quickly identified that I needed crutches. Dozens if not hundreds of them. So I got all the sports record books I could find from the dusty Gamblers Book Club and logically bunched games together into categories. I found countless systems. For example, NFL road teams coming off a loss cover the spread roughly 9% more dependably than road teams coming off a victory. It's basically 54% for the prior game losers and 45% for the prior game winners. Obviously that's not going to make you rich but it's a terrific grind method to shift the odds that critical few percent in your favor. I started looking for other angles, ones that focused on betting on road teams coming off a loss, and against road teams coming off a victory. I'm not going to give away those angles but they boost the percentages. Not to the ridiculous 70 or 80 percent claimed by touts but into the high 50s and sometimes low 60s. To this day the mainstream sports media is wonderfully ignorant that you get a more inspired effort from NFL road teams coming off a loss. I've known about it for more than 30 years. Yes, there is some smug satisfaction from that, and it sources from gambling. With home teams it really doesn't matter if you won or loss the week before. Nothing changes appreciably. Obviously this can stagger from season to season. I'm referring to long term.

 

I take some heat on this site for fixating on LPGA golfers and their height. But that was another method to steal a few percent and not rely on subjectivity. After doing great on golf matchup wagering for almost 15 years, including being banned from golf betting at Harrah's for a full decade, I had a disastrous golf wagering year in 1999. I needed angles. For the LPGA the stats weren't available but after compiling bios on all the prominent LPGA players I was shocked that the players in the 5 foot 6 range were dominating the matchups and also the wins. You didn't have to know much of anything. Just bet on 5 foot 6. It made sense to me, since that height combines enough wiry power but also not too far from your work. Too many things go wrong at 6 feet or nearby for a female golfer. Not enough consistency. I attended LPGA events in Las Vegas with a golf betting buddy. It was at the Desert Inn. We'd desperately try to figure out the heights for new players who did not have online bio information. He'd take a list of players and follow them long enough to make an estimate on their height, and I'd take a second list. Then the next day we'd switch. Finally we'd compare notes. Now that was enjoyable and memorable. Rarely did we differ by more than an inch or inch and a half.

 

For the PGA I threw everything in an Excel program. It spit out driving distance and putting as the key combo. Guys who owned both of those stat categories over their matchup opponent had a phenomenal percentage. It was 68% when I first hit that calculate button on my Power Mac 7500. I'll never forget my astonishment when I saw that figure. And it held up for a couple of years until the sportsbooks found sharper golf oddsmakers. I still don't know if someone tipped them. The matchups shifted dramatically almost overnight. Suddenly the players with similar distance/putting numbers were matched against each other. Only a few of us knew about the system. One guy paid for a condo in full. Others were making more money with my research than I was. That's my admitted flaw. When I have an edge I am overly conservative. Billy Walters probably could have bought the moon if he knew what I knew about golf matchup realities circa 2000-2002.

 

The work needs to be done ahead of time and then robotically applied day to day. That's my belief. I knew damn well I didn't want to be wasting 6-8 hours a day handicapping games once I reached my 50s and beyond. I'm still using angles I found in 1984. For example, any football or basketball team that wins outright as home underdog has a miserable history if their next role is also as home underdog. I love that system. Not too many plays but awesome percentage. Again, the sports media is unaware. They'll actually tout that team as on an upward spike, and likely to spring another upset. Whoops.

 

Also, when you are in Las Vegas know enough sharp guys, word spreads on how to make money. For maybe 6-8 years beginning in 1996 there were slot machines called the Vision Series that were a goldmine. You couldn't lose. At peak it was the equivalent of a $25 per hour cash job, not to mention the occasional jackpot. I know guys who completely changed their lives based on those machines. I'm still kicking myself for not abandoning sports to devote full time to the machines. Even tap out guys had money in their pocket all the time. Plus the machines were fun to play. I've probably mentioned those machines previously on this site. They started to decline once a guy wrote a book about them, called "Robbing the One Armed Bandits." That put heat on the machines. Chinese found out about them. Suddenly hundreds of Chinese stormed Las Vegas solely to play those Vision machines. I also saw the Chinese slot playing gangs when I vacationed in the New England area and visited Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun. There are still a handful of those machines around, and some occasional lesser versions. But the fun is basically lone gone.

 

As a sports bettor I've also played tons of middles and scalps (arbitrages). It's all about the math. When every casino had its own independent sportsbook they all had their own personality. Some would move quickly, others slowly. Some were high on favorites, others low on favorites. You learned the tendencies and knew where to race to grab the best number, and then play it in combination with another favorable number from a different joint. That's what anti-gambling types don't understand. Sure, the odds are slanted against you but in sports you only have to hit slightly above 52% to break even and there are numerous ways to creatively overcome that house edge.

 

Sportsbooks make mistakes. They are not nearly as sophisticated as conventional wisdom allows. I've bet into bad numbers more times than I'm willing to admit. I guess there's some Billy Walters in all of us. And some friends of mine took considerably greater advantage. I'll give one example: When college basketball over/unders were starting to become prominent but not every game was used, the Imperial Palace put up 169 on an obscure Mid American conference game. The number looked ridiculous. I handicapped quickly and made it something like 132. Then I realized what happened. The adjacent game on the schedule was Duke vs. Maryland. Everybody was using that total and it was in the 168 range. The Imperial Palace had nothing on that total. They put it in the wrong place. So my friends and I slowly hammered the under, in straight bets and parlays and round robins and everything. The supervisor slowly moved the total down but didn't realize it was on the wrong game until a supervisor from another sportsbook walked in and pointed it out to him. We cashed big. And that's hardly an isolated example. I'm not going to provide the best ones. Unfortunately, once corporate mergers dramatically sliced the number of independent sportsbooks, the number of mistakes plummeted also. I feel sorry for the young guys who venture into the Las Vegas sports betting world these days. They have to do it on the square.

 

Also, did I mention comps galore? That's a variable that can't be ignored. When I was full time in town and had connections behind almost every sportsbook counter I never had to pay for a meal. Often I was offered a comp after just eating via comp at an adjacent joint. Now that I'm in Miami mostly fulltime and I have taken my sports winnings and transferred them into novice stock market investing, it still is a difficult transition actually paying for meals. Somehow I can't convince Golden Corral or Pizza Hut that the buffet is supposed to be comped for me. But I'm working on it. I still love buffets.

[KYMAR]

The triumphant return of AWSI Dooger!

 

As always, fascinating read sir!

[CasualLie]

Awesome post AWSI...

 

Now that you are into stocks. Use your gambling experience to study up on options. Very similar to handicapping as in you can grind out a nice living by doing two things that most investors never understand - know the math and be disciplined.

[mukster]

AWSI, I just ran an anagram solver to see if I could get behind your name. I get "I do wagers" and "raw goodies" (???)

 

Any clues? :)

[hogans71]

Thanks awsi- always fantastic insight...

[lowheel]

This thread title is hilarious. Debts!!! this guy is banking 45 million + this year. He loves the juice he doesnt play for fun.. ever

In 2004 i was working the canadian skins game up here. It was him John Daly Hank Kuehne and Vijay Singh. The pro am the day before the event they were betting every hole, longest drive in play closest to hole pushing and pressing every hole. Kuehne backed off because he wasnt really making those guys level money but on the back 9 i think JD and Phil were doing 2k a hole like it was nothing. Thats probably why hes so sharp this late in his career every shot matters. Hell, even DJ wont play money games with him any more, tells you something right there

[Vindog]

I love to throw dice. I like the thril and the excitement and running my systems. I love people crapping on me (pun intended) when I bet the don't side.

 

That said, I got kids and a job and if I take more than 300 to the casino I get nervous.

 

I can easily get the blood moving in that bankroll. Casinos are weird places man.

[braincramp52]

I'm 64 and lost $20 in a Casino in the Bahama's one time. I was pi$$ed off the rest of the night. I like my money too much to gamble. Well, maybe a little on the course. :)

[bullie76]

It's his money and he can do what he wants. But just think of the good he could do with that money with charities. I know......he already does a lot and that's fine. But to throw it away is senseless. Most all of us have a $1 bet or so with our buddies for bragging rights. I simply don't understand why it takes thousands in bets to do the same for multi-millionaires.

[lowheel]

It's his money and he can do what he wants. But just think of the good he could do with that money with charities. I know......he already does a lot and that's fine. But to throw it away is senseless. Most all of us have a $1 bet or so with our buddies for bragging rights. I simply don't understand why it takes thousands in bets to do the same for multi-millionaires.

 

Pretty simple really it has to be enough so that it matters. A guy making 40k a year gets nervous on a 200$ bet a guy who makes 20 million a year needs to have a couple hundred k on th line to feel the same. Its just prorated

[Twitch12]

These guys are gambling on a different scale than most of us, although there's a lot of truth in the earlier comment that 2% of $50m affects you less than 2% of $40k!

 

I was in a casino in Tunica, MS several years back and a buddy was sitting at a poker table when John Daly sat down. He was playing pretty high stakes (as far as I'm concerned anyway) and wound up winning just over $260k in a quick few hours. My buddy asked him casually about the amount he was wagering and Daly said it wasn't worth him to play if the win didn't excite him or he the loss piss him off. We talked to the pit boss later and were told that Daly came that night to our casino from another where he'd just lost $245k. Overall not a bad night to net $15k for him, although my buddy didn't fare nearly as well!

 

I used to be in the casino industry and can attest to Daly's losses. The only inaccuracy in your story is that it wasn't at a poker table, it was at a blackjack table. While Daly has played his fair share of Blackjack, a majority of his loses are at the slot machines. His biggest loss is detailed in his biography and occurred at the Wynn. He was playing a $5,000 per spin slot... As for the original thread, I don't think there is a percentage of income to answer your question. It is all a matter of risk sensitivity.

[Tcann32]

It's totally different than just the percentages too. It's a lot of money, but 5% isn't a ton, and on top of that, he still had $40M+ left over.. Even if he lost half of all of that, he'd still be more than ok. It's amazing to imagine having so much money that you can lose $2M and it doesn't affect your lifestyle or financial stability in any way.

 

Rory put it in perspective last year when asked about the large purse of a tournament: "I just want to win the trophy. There becomes a point when you have enough money and having a little more or less of it wouldn't make any difference." When a little is over a million, that's just insane to me.

[socccer4life3]

its all relative and risk tolerance. Furthermore when you get "used" to the amounts your betting you dont' even realize it anymore. I play poker recreationaly but for profit (haven't had a losing year in 4 years) and i can lose 800-1000 in a night and not think twice about it. 5 years ago if i lost $100 i would be crapping my pants but you get used to things and become numb to them. I'm not some millionaire but when you distance yourself from the money is when you become really dangerous. If the money means more to the guy your betting than to you that puts you at an advantage. Let the guy have some fun and enjoy the gamble like the rest of us do or do not do.

[Pleasedwith3putts]

Last week Charles Barkley reported that Michael Jordan routinely has hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line in a round of golf.

 

Those guys play in a different financial universe than you and I.

 

I was down in West Palm Beach a few months back and told by a local pro that Jordan has a big game every week in which they play for $100k per hole. Apparently the guys put their stake into a bag and a security guard goes round with them (he thought they played anything up to a six ball!) in a buggy and hands out the cash when someone wins a hole. I didn't get to see his home but it's apparently enormous. Also gather DJ practices out of the same club and they've had to build a new tee the other side of the putting green for when he wants to practice hitting driver as he's so long. At that time they take the putting green out of use.

[williamsnrb]

I used to play for a lot of money when I was younger because a) I was good then and 2) I had nothing to lose. I was trying to make a go at professional golf and if I went broke, that was just part of the chase.

 

However, about 5 years ago, I got into a $2 wolf game with some big local names (guys that some people on wrx might know). One guy got behind and started pushing by going lone wolf, but lost like 6 holes in a row. By the time we got to #18, the hole was worth $1,600 per man. I was legitimately nervous because now I have a mortgage and a family. That was a crazy day and the last time I've gotten into anything like that. Lol

[playa]

It's his money and he can do what he wants. But just think of the good he could do with that money with charities. I know......he already does a lot and that's fine. But to throw it away is senseless. Most all of us have a $1 bet or so with our buddies for bragging rights. I simply don't understand why it takes thousands in bets to do the same for multi-millionaires.

Call me cynical but I think there are a lot more good things you can do with money than just give it to not for profit charitable organisations, no questions asked. Many not for profit organisations are thinly veiled corporate charletans who are mlre interested in making money themselves than giving to charity. In Australia it runs as low as about 15 cents in the dollar or less actually making it to the actual recipients after the CEOs and staff have taken their cut. Much better to start your own foundation if you are a Phil so you can make sure the money goes to intended recipients.

[miket_81]

However, about 5 years ago, I got into a $2 wolf game with some big local names (guys that some people on wrx might know). One guy got behind and started pushing by going lone wolf, but lost like 6 holes in a row. By the time we got to #18, the hole was worth $1,600 per man. I was legitimately nervous because now I have a mortgage and a family. That was a crazy day and the last time I've gotten into anything like that. Lol

 

Sorry but I have to know how that turned out....

[williamsnrb]

However, about 5 years ago, I got into a $2 wolf game with some big local names (guys that some people on wrx might know). One guy got behind and started pushing by going lone wolf, but lost like 6 holes in a row. By the time we got to #18, the hole was worth $1,600 per man. I was legitimately nervous because now I have a mortgage and a family. That was a crazy day and the last time I've gotten into anything like that. Lol

 

Sorry but I have to know how that turned out....

 

Ha...well, the guy was not hurting for money, so he was not worried about losing at least $4,800 (which is what he would have paid out to three players if he would have tied the last hole. It would have been more if he had lost). The problem was, he was so mad by this point that he was threatening to "take someone down with him" (meaning he was going to pick a partner and then that partner would be on the hook with him.) We tried to talk with him about staying true to the spirit of the competition, but by this point, he was out for blood. So on the 18th tee, we renegotiated the terms to half of what he owed and the player who he chose as a partner for the hole would not be on the hook for his debts. In the end. it worked out well for everyone but him. :) However, that was a situation that got out of control really fast. I only had like $20 in my pocket because it was supposed to be a $2 game!

[micscottj]

I say God bless him. Its his money and his business. I am jealous that it isn't me.

[Awsi Dooger]

IMO, this was one of the great weeks in golf history, as a class act in Sergio Garcia finally won a major just days after a lifelong lowlife cheat like Billy Walters finally got convicted.

 

After Walters was convicted, so many aspects from the articles were familiar. He used code words for Dean Foods just like his Las Vegas runners were (are) forced to use code words. The runners all had illegal radios around their waist and ear pieces so they could communicate with Billy and others in their office. Two way communication in sportsbooks is illegal. A runner nicknamed Hog from Philadelphia used to tell me about the silly code words and how mad Billy would get if someone slipped up and forgot to use the code.

 

His prior acquittals had nothing to do with the truth of the matter. The authorities have no idea where to look. They think they do. They have no clue. One friend of mine who followed those cases told me that Billy's biggest problem was probably not to laugh at the questions that were asked, and the ones that were not asked. Similarly when I experienced Gaming Commission personnel trying to evaluate sportsbook procedure it was shocking at how unprepared and ignorant they were, as if they had been plucked off the street with no background or training or interest level.

 

This time Billy encountered some investigators who knew what they were doing. Whoops. I'm sure it was a shock to him. If it had been sports related I'm sure he could have wiggled around it. They wouldn't know where to look, or how to decipher. The stock market is more mainstream than sports wagering, and no doubt that attaches to higher caliber of investigators. Lousy handicapping on Billy's part. Older coaches tend to get lazy and same with older bettors. Besides, the people who had the goods on Billy were not going to talk, for fear and for payoff once everything emerged calmly on the other end.

 

Billy Walters had an undeniable edge and sophistication when he entered the realm and forged his legend. Those Computer Boys picks were very sharp. But there's one ongoing annoyance: Sports betting is a grind. No matter how good you are the advantages are slight. Contrary to conventional wisdom, sports odds are based solely on power ratings. Blended stolen power ratings. I'll provide a link to the process in a minute. Somehow fans want to believe that all kinds of amazing subjective decisions are involved in those pointspreads. Mystery process. Nope. It's power rating consensus with a home field value applied. That's it. Nothing complicated and that's why it takes maybe 30 seconds to 1 minute per game to set the odds, during those oddsmaker sessions. Everybody is looking at the same power ratings so everyone is on the same page. Nobody cares about series history or other garbage. There is brief discussion if something unusual popped up, like a key injury. Otherwise the chief oddsmaker opens the debate, it goes very quickly and then he announces his final call of what the opening line will be.

 

Here is that link: http://vegasseven.com/2013/03/20/making-line/

 

That's exactly what it looks like, other than these guys dressed up for the photo since they knew the cameras would be there. Normally it's casual attire. In the old days there were notebooks with the power ratings. Now it's computerized.

 

When I arrived in town the power ratings were more scarce and primitive. They didn't have power ratings at all on sports like tennis or golf or women's basketball, etc. They literally made the odds up off the top of their head. I had a field day. Then the internet soared and power ratings of all type were available to be stolen and blended into a reliable consensus. Over the course of a year those power ratings are plenty sufficient for the sportsbooks to manage a profit with little work and no second guessing. When everyone is amazed that a result fell close to the pointspread, that was the power ratings at work, not some incredible decision making from behind the counter.

 

Billy Walters had that Computer Boys edge in the early years. By the time I encountered him in the late '80s he was already a desperate cheat. I've provided those specific previously. I can rattle them off the top of my head because they are the blatant truth: Billy's friend Jack Binion opened a sportsbook for the first time. Billy Walters wanted a free half point on every wager, the first crack at every halftime line, no halftime line could be pick-em, he could go back and bet into the original halftime line even if it changed significantly, and he dictated that the parlay card odds be set on Monday night and sent to the printer and not Tuesday night like standard practice from every joint in town. Billy Walters wanted those soft Monday numbers on those fixed parlay cards, so he could feast when on the handful of games that had moved sharply on his favor later in the week.

 

The first sportsbook manager, a good friend of mine and very astute guy, barked at those concessions. He told Binion, "You're giving away the store." Billy had that manager fired within weeks. The second guy was named Tommy and considerably older. It was a prized late career advancement for him. Billy realized this was a significantly tougher nut to crack, that Jack Binion wouldn't cave as easily. So when Tommy also balked at the concessions and had the audacity to set a halftime line at pick-em, Billy threw a tantrum and started to scheme. He invented a story about hockey totals, that Tommy and the sportsbook manager of the Riviera, Jack Lysight, were colluding to profit on hockey totals, of all things. Actually the only thing that was going on was that the two books used separate hockey oddsmakers. The one Binion's joint was using, a guy named Eugene, favored the over so he would use let's say 7.5 with juice on the under while everyone else used 7 with juice on the over. It could not have been more tame or meaningless but Billy Walters realized that Jack Binion was gullible enough to believe he was being scammed. Therefore Billy presented the bogus hockey total angle to Binion, who fired Tommy.

 

For years Tommy and I joked about that. He would say, "Hockey totals? Can you believe it?"

 

Tommy developed cancer and died during the mid '90s.

 

Once Tommy was ousted Billy Walters took over the oddsmaking himself for Binion's property. I wish I were kidding. Billy put up intentionally bad odds and had his henchmen first in line to bet into them. I've mentioned that perfectly good Masters matchups were on the board, drawing two-way action. Billy ordered them to be removed, saying he would provide "proper" matchups. We all knew what that meant. They would be slanted and he would pound them himself. Sure enough, he had joke matchups like Faldo in his prime at -120 against a faltering Tom Watson, and then Billy's henchman would be standing there fidgeting around waiting for the matchups to go up so he could hit them multiple times for the limit.

 

Naturally I couldn't help wondering about the obvious: If Billy Walters is such a megasharp gambler then why does he throw tantrums and why does he need crutches like free half points or manipulated odds? I asked his runner Gary about it several times, in subtle fashion. Gary finally conceded that Billy wasn't hitting nearly the percentage that he did years earlier, and had become increasingly frustrated about that.

 

Billy was about to get a major break. In the '90s many new huge casinos popped up and devoted tons of floor space to high profile race and sportsbooks. They hired old time bookmakers to run those race and sportsbooks. I think I've described it here as the Good Ole Boys Network. Those sportsbook managers didn't think their salaries were in line with what they were worth or how much their area of the casino was contributing to its popularity. Consequently they were more than willing to have their hands greased in a major way. Billy Walters and several others were more than willing to do it. The most blatant example was at the Mirage. That went on for years and years. It was also prominent for a shorter period at MGM Grand. Incredibly favorable odds were put up, but designated for specific bettors only. Those bettors would win and then funnel a chunk of the profit back to the sportsbook manager. If this sounds like cynicism or theory, it's not. Smack in front of us. I could give dozens of specifics. I had a friend who would hang out at the Mirage betting counter on Saturdays, knowing he could pick up a sloppy piece of the leftovers and be allowed to keep it. For example, a college basketball game without a total would have a halftime score of maybe 48 points. That is abnormally low. Then the sportsbook manager would take advantage of that situation and put up a second half total of let's say 55. His designated bettors would pounce, taking the over. My friend would jump in and get maybe 2 dimes at over 59, the adjusted number. That was still way too low and everybody knew that. The 55 only looked normal and could pass the smell test in relation to the first half 48. But it really should have been 74, or something like that. Second halves in college basketball are considerably higher scoring than the first half, due to late fouling etc.

 

Anyway, that's the type of thing that went on for years. Cheaters on both sides of the counter. Billy would also pay his way into first in line at all the major lotteries, like the Super Bowl prop lotteries. You could sit there all day but those numbers weren't going up until Billy's runners walked into the room. And they were going first, not you. Some guys barked at it but nobody behind the counter cared. Sometimes they would literally laugh. Again, you learned to wait for the sloppy seconds or thirds or fourths.

 

Once the Good Ole Boy Network was dissolved based on new ownership, age realities, and simply getting caught in the act (MGM and Mirage), then Billy suddenly has a problem. Once you've had a feel for the cheat it's difficult to return to the daily grind of maybe a few percentage advantage here and there. Billy is not the only example of this. I had others who had feasted at Mirage concede to me that they suddenly didn't know how to handle it. But those guys didn't have the resources or influence of Billy Walters. He turned to the golf property ownership. I have heard stories of what happened there, and I believe them since they fit with his reality of not doing anything without a severe manipulated advantage, but since I didn't witness firsthand I'm not going to specify. There have been examples of Las Vegas open hands like the Dario Herrera situation. Billy no doubt is also skilled at simply suckering people, without need to cheat. He couldn't sucker wise guy sports types as dependably as commission types.

 

Posters on various sites seem to like my Las Vegas stories. Here's another one. We called Harrah's, "The Gift Shop," because of all the mistakes they made. For example, they would leave the playoff series price still on the board and bettable even after the subsequent game was played. Let's say San Antonio is playing Houston and the series is -220 favoritism to San Antonio. But Houston goes on the road and steals game one as underdog. Obviously that's going to radically shift the adjusted series price. Nope, not at Harrah's, at least not the same night. They would still be open and still have that initial price on the board. This went on for years in the '90s. The nighttime ticket writer named Phil was very sharp. He would shake his head and punch the tickets for us, saying if management was stupid enough to allow this to happen then the tickets were rightfully written.

 

Somebody in this thread said gamblers don't have IQs higher than their shoe size. Well, I'm now 13.5 on the latter category but I didn't feel particularly stupid while making those wagers at Harrah's. That money is now at work in the stock market, primarily in boring index funds.

 

Billy Walters wasn't patient enough for the grind so now he faces a sentencing date. I'm sure he's a good friend and family man. But I don't appreciate a reputation that detours severely from reality.