Jimmy, the King of Singaporean Gamblers

I read this real gambler's story & like to pass it onto here for you guys to enjoy.

"Jimmy, the King of Singaporean Gamblers, loved money from a young
age.

At 18, he was sent to UK to study economics.
He discovered that you could make
fast money through gambling if you win.
Gambling became his sole consuming
passion until he became a professional
gambler.

[Like theTraveller,]
Jimmy travelled around the globe in order to
gamble and made a lot of money.

While he experienced supernatural power to
win, the devil was setting traps for him.
[As if he were in "twilight zone",
Jimmy testisfied that a 10 was turned into a 9 as he wished.]

He was very proud and arrogant. He
hated his own family and even his
children avoided him. At the young age
of 29, he became the Asian Baccarat
Champion. During the height of his
career, he made over 20 million
Singapore Dollars [ US$12,712,941] However, deep
inside, he was constantly living in fear�
fear of losing and fear of assassins.
The devil is the father of lies. Very
soon Jimmy was left with nothing. What
he made in six years with the
supernatural power of Satan was lost in
six months.
[Jimmy could no longer be able to turn a 10 into a 9 as he wished]
Jimmy was proud and could
not face defeat. His bitterness drove
him to attempt suicide.
He knew for fure that he jumped from the 15th floor,
but he did not know why
he was not pencaked on the ground.
He believed he was saved by the Almighty.
So he gave up being a professional gambler
& got a "real job" as a evangelist"."

Click this link to see Jimmy in action during his "real job":

http://macautimes.net/times/60/JimmyTang1.jpg

In the above pic, the ex-gambler Jimmy prayed & asked ppl to stay away from casinos. He got burnt from casinos & wished ppl learned from his mistakes.

Note to APs, I like the above story; anything is possible!
Also, it's only fair to read Jimmy's sad story in addition to theTraveller's happy stories.

I think there was nothing we can learn from a non-AP like Jimmy... My stories weren't all happy. The most recent sad stories were I won only $5K while a distinguished AP won $80K in the same battle ground in a week...: (

I agree with not learning from a non-AP like Jimmy, but how is you story sad? Sure, you didn't win as much as another AP. What a pity - BUT YOU WON. I wouldn't say that $5K for a week is bad either.

theTraveller, I disagree with you in 2 counts.

A) Come on! making $5g is NOT a sad story; it's a happy one!
So I and double4more are against you, 2 to 1, lol.

B) As to NOT learning anything from Jimmy's story, I disagree with you and Mr. double4more. I think at least 2 things can be picked up from it:

1) It's very important to stick with Kelly.
The story reemphasizes it.
Jimmy failed the Kelly Rule.
He won over $12mil in 6 years & lost them all in 6 months!
BTW, if he won mega-bucks 6 years in the roll, he's some kind of AP.
So Kelly, Kelly, & more Kelly!

2) It's very important to read lots of good gambling books.
As you mentioned, you've read over 400.
Now what if Jim had read the books of Wong, Snyder, theTraveller, and became a very good AP?
If Jim did, he might not get bankrupted.
So Read, Read, & more Read!
By the way, hey there's a free gambling library with over 1,000 good stuff right here:

https://www.blackjackforumonline.com/content/TOClibrary.html

Hopefully there is NO more Jimmy's sad story for a while. I think Jimmy's story serves as a warning as in : "Killing the chicken to warn the undisciplined monkey!"

jimmy's story was made into a movie a few years ago.
whether he actually had supernatural power or he was very lucky for a few years then finally pobability set in and he lost all his money ++
it seems to me (being more scientific and mathematic) that he was one of those very few who as very very lucky for a long time..
however as we APs all know.. for normal players, probability will eventually set in and he lost all his money.
for a long time winner.. i can imagine its almost impossible to cope with defeat. so probably IMO psychologically he tried to find an excuse for losing. and in his case... his head told him that he was once psyhic but after 6 years of good run he lost that supernatural power. i'm not saying that he is lying becos he probably believed that's wat happend...

Jimmy was not an AP at all so Kelly or not made no difference for him. He should read more books indeed but with his early lucky run he wouldn't read books serioudsly.

As JimmyB once said: "Sometimes.... the truth is more bizarre than fiction" Jimmy Tang's story truly seems unbelievable.

It seems a few respondents implied that Jimmy Tang failed because he's not an AP, and that the casinos' edges caught up with him after 6 years.

Perhaps the respondents are right. However, what about our own AP guy (BT3100) with 15 year-experience? He failed too & got himself "self-barred" from all local casinos before he became the next Jimmy Tang. I think there are more sad stories like JT & BT's which are not posted here to warn us & keep us on our toes. We mostly read the happy stories from theTraveller's, Johnny C's, Mr. Bigplayer's, DD' etc. because they are still here to tell the stories.

However most defeated APs seem to disappear from here without a trace; it's like the lotto winner is publicized & made known, but the millions of lotto-losers are kept quiet & unpublicized. Hence we don't read about losers' sad stories except this one:

BT3100 wrtoe:
"I am telling my story as a way to say goodbye and maybe help someone who may be in the same situation. I have been "working" BJ for 15 years. I have read just about every book, studied many counting, money management and tracking strategies. I have had good years, bad years and a great deal of enjoyment with this challenging, exciting and sometimes crazy game. However over the past 2-3 years I began to get caught up in the game too much. It stopped being fun and became an obsession. I have not posted much on this board but I have been here since the early days.
I know that the lack of control I have is my own fault and I do not wish to judge anyone or their ability to control their own actions.
What I want to tell everyone is that it all came to an end on Thursday.
I was in AC, had been there three times this week instead of working, anyway I had a moment where I realized that my life can no longer go on in this direction. I had been down 4-5K on the day but also up 7K at one time. Money was not the motivation for what I did next.
I walked into the security office of the casino that I was at and asked to be placed on the excluded players list.
The guard almost shit, he called the head of the dept who immediately came to the floor to meet me. He and another guy escorted me up to their office where they treated me very well. I could not believe how professional they were. They explained all of the options including a total life long exclusion from all of their properties or if I went to casino control I could be excluded from all A/C casinos.
This is the option I opted for. They even took the time to call my wife, they asked me to sit in the next room over. I was able to hear them talking to my wife. They were even nice to her.
It was very different than I though it would be.
The most ironic part of the whole story is that for the past 10 years I have worked my ass off to stay off this list only to place my self on it. I choose to quit this way because I could not do it through GA or self control. I want to wish each of the best in your future. I envy you for your ability to control your actions and play with your head.
You passion for this game is what keeps you grinding and enjoying the ride.
Good Luck and remember no 6/5
BT"

So, hey APs, are you guys going to stick to your wishful thinking: "It will not happen to us (the APS), it only happens to the next guys (BT3100) who don't know what they are doing!" ?

Hey I don't know the real answer neither until I'm or we are down on JT or BT's hellish roads. God forbid!

well here is a really sad story.
it was back at the beginning years of playing
i had a 125 max bet BR which took me a couple of years to build up (playing from $5 table slowly moving up to $10 then $25 then $50 then finally $100 with a 1-15 spread)
i played about 6-8 hours a day usually playing heads up
and the really sad ending to this was losing 100max bet in 3days.
i was practically losing every big bet with alot of double downs and splits which got annihilated.
basically alot of the bets were bet with rising counts and every time when the bigs came out the dealer had pat 20 or BJ.
with crazy shoes where the TC rose to TC+4 with 3 decks out then rising to TC+5 with 4d out then TC+6 with 5d out and then remains at TC+6 till the last 1.5D left then drops down to TC+3 when the cut card comes out with dealer pat 20 or BJ almost every hand with a dropping count.
playing heads up, that is alot of losing hands.
i'm pretty sure alot of APs out there had shoes like that before where they lose a shzt load.
well i had those like 3days in a row... i dont know how many SD to the left i was at .. but it hurts.. both financially and mentally.
well if i had followed completely with kelly i would cut down my bet to 70% after losing 30+max bets and then further reduce another 30% after losing another 30+max bets then yet another 30% reduction, but even that would've taken me right back down to the $10 table where the table conditions would deteriorate (no more head up, slow game and etc) and making it take forever to get back to the $100 table.
alot of APs i know didnt think things like would ever happen at all, but i can tell u that even the chance is slim, but it is still possible.
back then i was always using that 5% ROR rule of thumb, but the thing was i used that consistently everytime my BR increased and not reducing after large losses, so eventually i hit that 1/20chance ROR.
just as AP007 has pointed out alot of the big time APs didnt think things like these would happen. which i also agree with. is that they probably were more on the lucky side to start off with to have made alot of money to become big time APs so it would only seem natural to them that its not possible to lose like crazy even with an edge.
however most international APs use alot more than just basic card counting, so their edge is alot higher, and hence their ROR would reduce greatly.

Thanks for sharing with us your interesting story. I enjoy reading it.

I hope there are more educational stories posted here like yours, JT's, BT's, & perhaps from the famous international AP named OctopusKen (OK). BTW, what did happen to O K? Did he get whacked in Bahamas among the 50+ unidentified victims? God forbid! Sometimes I'm afraid that the ultimate terminator of APs may not be financially (like JT or BT), but physically & bodily (like KenU. found dead in Paris, or perhaps O K???).

From your story about the loss of 100 max in 3 days, I can relate to your story with my 700,000 hands of simulations circa 1988 (man, PC was really slow in those days). I set my own program to test how many BIGGIES I could lose with 700,000 hands played when the counts were >=+3. The result showed that at least 80 hands could be lost before climbing back up to win 90+ hands. That simmed-result has made me really HUMBLE because I dare not overbet my BR since that crazy losing streak (-80units) can strike anytime without warning.

You also mentioned about the counter's death trap in which most paints were accidentally kept behind the cut card. The counts went up & up, NOT much of paints came out EVEN down near the cut card. By the time that cut card came out, an AP dumped a bundle of blackchips. So don't feel back, you get lots of APs as companies who return their hard-earned winnings in those death-trap situations.

I'm curious. How did you recover from those killer-losses? How long did you take to rebuild your pr? It must hurts real bad when your hard-earned money almost got wiped out in 3 days. Hmmm, I hope you will share with us your come-back story...just like the Maxman215's.

You implied that the international APs (iAPs) could get more edges over regular APs (rAPs). Hence the iAPs assumed the less risk of ruin financially than the rAPs. I agree because iAPs seem to find good rules such as these:

Resplitting aces or any cards forever
Doubling down after resplitting aces
Doubling down after resplitting non-aces forever until busting
Doubling down for whatever reasons forever until busting
Surrendering bad cards after doubling
ES,
LS,
Joker-automatic-win
5-cards-automatic-win
6-cards-automatic-win
same-suit bj pays double, etc...
(Source: from books that I've read)

However, it's only fair to point out that the iAPs seem to assume much higher risk of ruin physically & bodily. A couple of examples follow: An iAP was asked at gun point by a casino owner: "give me my money back or give me your life!"; another iAP was attempted at his life by an assassin ordered by his competitor, but luckily he was saved by his bodyguard; & finally there was an iAP got whacked by a mafia ordered by casinos. I hope that iAPs get life-insurance-policies for the benefits of their parents, wives, sons & daughters when they're gone MIA. God forbid.

... the famous international AP named OctopusKen (OK). BTW, what did happen to O K?

Octopus Ken posts on Green Chip.