Professional gamblers are a real miracle. Most gamblers regularly lose money, while experts in very many cases take a big jackpot home. There is nothing more enjoyable and interesting than the ability to achieve your own goals in spite of the opposition of some forces, for example, the casino administration.
However, gambling establishments are also on the alert, and gamblers who clearly apply strategies or win too often and consistently are simply asked to leave the premises. In a virtual casino, no one can withdraw a gambler from the game. However, the casino can counteract it in a different way – by countering the withdrawal of won funds. There are many other ways to push a successful gambler out of the casino. The administration can always make its existence unbearable if it sets itself such a task. But, in spite of everything, the professionals continue to win and withdraw their winnings.
Who can be called a professional gambler? This is a person who knows the world of gambling brilliantly, understands the theory of probability and mathematical statistics (not professionally, but within the limits sufficient to understand the processes in gambling), as well as a disciplined and sober gambler. In his profession, as in any other, there are advantages and disadvantages.
Pros and cons of a professional gaming life
Let’s take a closer look at the advantages and disadvantages of a pro player’s career.
Advantages:
- if you are interested in sports and professional gambling, this profession can turn into a hobby that makes money;
- you will be pleased to beat the casino;
- successful professional players become owners of amounts that raise them several steps up the social ladder;
- your profits are much more difficult to tax than many other professions.
Disadvantages:
- the possibility of countermeasures by the administration of a gambling establishment in relation to a successful gambler;
- lack of stability and guarantees, high probability of a major loss;
- this job, like any other, can be boring.
6 types of professional gamblers
How to become a professional gambler? There are no educational institutions that can teach this profession. However, you can rely on reliable information sources, including books, as well as advice from experts and your own experience. It is also important to know what kind of gambler you want to become. After all, there are as many as 6 professional gambler tips, and each has its own specifics.
6. Bet on arbitration
Surebets are mathematically calculated bets on 2 opposite outcomes of the match. Naturally, bets are placed in different bookmakers. Then why is there a surebet situation? It’s simple. Bookmaking is a lucrative business that has spawned competition. To attract new players, the offices use different moves: they arrange promotions, give free bets, and set high odds. The last point is used by arbers. There are more vital reasons.
In the modern sports world, bookmakers are pulling the line for a huge number of events. Physically, there is not enough time to monitor the market, comparing your coefficients with competitors. Nobody canceled the human factor either. Bookmaker analysts are certainly professional gamblers, but they are still prone to make mistakes, overestimating or underestimating the odds on events. An error in one bookmaker will certainly lead to a surebet on the other. In arbing, it is important to carefully consider all bets. In addition, such a “double” gambling should be conducted in secret from the bookmakers.
5. Bet on a horse
Horse racing has perhaps the longest history. Among the bookmaker’s offerings, online betting on horse racing takes precedence over a significant number of sporting events. By themselves, horse races are an extremely beautiful sight, and for those who make the correct forecast, it is also a way to somewhat improve their own financial situation.
At the moment, there is a lot of information in the public domain, based on which the client of the bookmaker’s office can successfully place bets on horse races. There are several main types of bets, offers, which are used by most professional gamblers. The essence of the bet to win is as follows – if the horse you bet on comes first in the race, then your bet is won. The odds are formed even before the race, during the race these odds may change. There are also bets that involve division into two parts.
One part of the bet is made on the victory, the second part is assigned to the place that a particular horse will take in the race. The forecast provides an opportunity to guess the sequence in which the horses participating in the race arrive at the finish line. That is, you need to guess which of the horses will come to the finish line first, and which will come second.
There are several variations of this rate – forward forecast, reverse forecast and combined forecast. When preparing to place a bet on the races, players collect all available information about the upcoming race. First of all, this concerns the condition of the horses that will take part. The presence of injuries and other factors that can worsen the health of the horse are the first things that attract the attention of the professional gambler.
Equally important is the number of recent races a horse has participated in, as frequent races can drain the animal. Experienced players recommend that beginners study the change in odds. It is known that the principles of fair play are not always observed at the racetracks where the races take place. Some tricks are used by the participants, and these tricks are immediately reflected in the coefficients.
The bookmakers themselves are making attempts to track matches that may turn out to be negotiable and react accordingly – to lower the odds, or even exclude the race from the table altogether.
So, if a few days before the race the bets were accepted at the odds of 30/1, and on the day of the race the odds fell sharply to the level of 7/1, then, most likely, the bookmaker received information that this particular horse “should” come first. So it is very possible that this will happen. The main task of the bookmaker’s clients is to keep track of changes, constantly keeping an eye on the pulse. Sophisticated bettors are more likely to win than lose when betting on the races.
4. Sports trader
The main things you need to know about sports betting are choosing the right bookmaker, analyzing matches, attitudes towards gambling, principles of running a bank and betting strategies. For those who want to start betting on sports, you need to decide on a bookmaker. There are bookmakers offering various bonuses only for registration or for depositing an account.
But if you plan to play long distance, consider promotions last. First, pay attention to the reliability and legality of the bookmaker. It is important for a professional gambler to decide on the type of sport and the championship on which he will place bets. There can be several such tournaments. But the more competitions you try to cover, the less time you will have to analyze. This reduces the likelihood of accurate predictions in sports betting.
When placing bets at bookmakers, you must understand your purpose and risks. If you treat bets as a way to make money, be ready to work full-fledged with the study of statistics, watching matches, tracking news, and so on. It is also important for the sports trader to aim for the difference between back and lay bets.
3. Matching player
The current professional gamblers have received an endless list of online casinos, which has created an impressive competition. In the struggle for visitors, casino owners are adopting various tools.
The bonuses are the best. Thanks to incentives, users feel like dear guests and stay on the game portal for a longer period of time. Therefore, the clubs are steadily increasing the bonus program. This can be used to gamble without risking money. However, this possibility may not be permanent.
2. Professional casino player
Professional gambling clubs offer customers not only numerous slot machines, but also other types of gambling entertainment. Of course, modern realities make their own adjustments. Pro players can now also play online and stream it. The aristocrat slots are very popular. But most professionals still prefer traditional games. Poker, baccarat, as well as blackjack delight fans of table and card games for several centuries. Clients are allowed to place bets for real money.
To play professionally, regardless of random luck and bad luck, you need to master the skills of tracking and counting cards. You also need to learn how to hide these skills from casino owners, as they try to restrict or prohibit the game of card-counting gamblers.
1. Poker player
High level poker players do not win huge amounts of money because they are always lucky. They treat poker like a job and devote all their time to training and games. Professionals never stop learning, they constantly improve their skills. That is why such players can reach incredible heights in poker.
The professional gambler devotes all his time to the game of poker. He can play 5-6 hours a day and read poker books for another 3-4 hours, analyze mistakes, study strategies. There is no weekend away from poker for the pros, while regular players may play irregularly and neglect training. Experts know the mathematics of poker perfectly, calculate the odds instantly and play only by strategy. Ordinary players often hope for luck and do not pay due attention to calculations.
Top 5 famous professional players
Below are the top of the most famous professional gamblers. Their biographies make it possible to understand what qualities are needed in order to become the best of the best in the world of gambling.
Archie Karas
Archie Karas was born in 1950 into a poor family and from childhood he became interested in gambling. At the age of 15, the young man left his father’s house, began working as a waiter on a ship and visited many countries. At the age of 19, he stayed to live in Los Angeles, where he constantly played poker in a gambling club.
Archie gradually grew rich, he was no longer interested in the club, so the young man began to visit the casino. In 1990, Archie owned $ 2,000,000 but lost all the money in a few years. He only has $ 50 left. But Archie did not despair and in 1992 borrowed $ 10,000.
With this money, he went to the Horseshoe Casino located in Las Vegas. The events that took place here have gone down in the history of the casino. For several hours of the game, the young man’s capital amounted to $ 30,000. After that, Archie went to the pool table, where he arranged a game marathon with a famous businessman.
The game lasted 2.5 months with short breaks. As a result, Archie won $ 1,100,000. After that, he won $ 6,000,000 in poker from the same businessman in 3 weeks. Later, Karas won $ 1,200,000 from the legendary player Stu Ungar and $ 2,000,000 from the equally famous Chip Reese. Within 6 months of playing with the most famous players at the time, Archie had a fortune of $ 17,000,000 and became an icon for professional gamblers.
After that, interest in poker faded, and Karas went to the Horseshoe casino. Here he played dice and won over $ 1,000,000 in one evening. Once the moment came when Archie became the owner of all the most expensive casino chips and could no longer carry that much money. But then the guy in his life began a “black streak”. First he lost $ 11 million, and then $ 17 million. In 1995 he became poor again, losing about $ 40 million. Karas currently resides in Vegas and claims to have no regrets. But now he doesn’t play for high stakes, but is only fond of poker.
Bill Benter
Bill Benter is one of the most successful professional gamblers in the world. His Hong Kong-based syndicate has raised millions of dollars in horse racing. But racing was not Benter’s main success. As a student, Benter once saw an ad in an Atlantic City casino: “Professional card counters are not allowed to play at our tables.” It cannot be said that this warning had any effect on him. Rather, it led him to believe that card counting works.
Casinos have always fought tricks that they thought were scams. But this did not stop Benter from making a huge amount of gambling money. His cumulative income throughout his career as a pro player has exceeded a billion dollars.
Edward Thorpe
The blame for the losses incurred by the gambling houses (or thanks for them, depends on the point of view), should be Edward Thorpe. In 1962, professional gambler, published Beat the Dealer, describing a successful blackjack strategy. As professors of mathematics, Thorpe developed winning strategies for several types of gambling. Starting with $ 10,000, he successfully applied his methods of play until he got rich. Thorpe was inundated with letters and offers of financial support to try out the casino strategy. Offers reached $ 100 thousand. Thorp selected two New York City multimillionaire candidates.
The first, Emmanuel “Manny” Kimmel, owned the Kinney Parking network and was previously involved in alcohol smuggling, illegal lotteries and was associated with criminal gangs. The second, Eddie Hand, was Kimmel’s business partner in trucking. In response to the skepticism of the press in his direction, Thorpe decided to prove that his theory works, Eventually, the casino owners limited Thorpe’s options, but by then he had amassed a significant fortune.
Chris Moneymaker
Prior to joining professional poker, Chris Moneymaker was an accountant. He was born in Atlanta, where he graduated from university with a degree in accounting. In his free time, he liked to play poker. At first, he didn’t even dream of becoming a professional gambler. Chris was quite happy with the role of an ordinary worker with a wife and a child.
But the salary was so modest that Moneymaker began to think about additional sources of income. Unbeknownst to himself, Moneymaker began to devote almost all his free time to the game. Of all types of tournament events, he preferred satellites. The calculation turned out to be correct – one of the qualifying games gave Moneymaker a ticket to the WSOP. In the first round of the $ 39 satellite, Chris beat 18 opponents.
Chris’s main victory was yet to come. In May, he took a leave of absence from work to travel to Vegas. The WSOP kicked off on May 19th at Binion’s Horseshoe Casino, where Moneymaker saw world-famous professional gamblers live. On the third day of the competition, Chris beat Johnny Chen, on the fourth – Phil Ivey, and in the final he managed to snatch the victory from Sammy Farh. Chris himself did not understand how he became the proud owner of $ 2,500,000 and the main WSOP trophy – the Gold Bracelet.
A series of successful performances led to the fact that dozens of well-known poker sites and companies wanted to cooperate with Chris. Out of all the variety of options, he decided to stop at PokerStars. And in 2005 he became a full-fledged member of the poker room team. For many years, Moneymaker remained loyal to PokerStars.
Under its banner, he won competitions many times. In 2008, his total winnings reached $ 2,800,000. The American continues to play at PokerStars now, using his lucky nickname – Money800.
Billy Walters
Billy Walters is known worldwide as a professional gambler of America, the most successful gambler in Las Vegas, with a streak of roulette victories and successful sports betting for 30 years. Due to a series of first failures in his career as a pro player, he divorced two wives.
His parents tried to convince him to get a permanent job, but Walters believed in victory and did not stop. In 1983, Billy left for the capital of the machines, Las Vegas. This decision changed his life forever. After a series of victories in local establishments, he met with one of the members of the Computer Group and began to use winning algorithms in the game with them, looking for weak points in bookmaker organizations.
A couple of years later, Walters became a member of the Las Vegas elite class. He became involved in entrepreneurship, investing winning money in parks with golf clubs. Despite the fact that his fortune was estimated at a decent amount of money, he could not say goodbye to professional gambling. In almost 40 years of a successful player career, Billy has lost only once.
According to various sources, he received more than $ 15 million every year. Billy’s failures began after he began to play not only in casinos, but also on stock exchanges. In 2015, he was sentenced to 5 years in prison for insider stock trading.
9 tips from a true professional player for all rookies
Maria Konnikova, a well-known Russian-American poker player and author of several books on game theory, gives some useful advice to aspiring professional gamblers.
- Don’t be afraid to ask experienced professionals.
- Find good mentors, because learning from them is often even free;
- Gain experience. independently playing not only “live” but also online.
- Record for further study and analysis interesting moments of the game that may be important to you.
- Find like-minded people, discuss the intricacies of the game with them.
- Remember to supervise experienced players for training purposes.
- Don’t be overconfident.
- Do not think about bad beats, the game itself and its prospects are important, not momentary results.
- Treat gambling as a non-professional duty, but as a hobby. It is important to enjoy gambling, not just win.
Conclusion
It can be concluded that the gambler’s profession, like any other profession, is not suitable for everyone. Based on the above information, you can objectively assess your abilities and decide whether gambling will become your life’s work.
Author
Vitaly Coleman is a gambling specialist. Several years ago, Vitaly joined the Slotsspot web portal team. Working on these projects allowed him to attend many gambling events and conferences. Mr. Coleman regularly writes articles for many specialized media and also appears as a gambling expert in several podcasts.