Triangle Blackjack

What happened to Triangle Blackjack? I read some about it. Now I find The Pro saying that Harrahs bought all the rights to his book. What's going on with this and why is there no discussion of Blackjack material so powerful that Casinos rush to buy the rights.

He says on his site:

"Note: All rights to the Triangle Blackjack method have been sold to Harrah's Entertainment, Inc.; Boyd Gaming Corporation and as per the sales agreement the completed final version of the Triangle Blackjack method will not be made available to the public."

Anyone hear from this Pro?

Read what he says about the promised book at this link:

http://triangleblackjack.com/

JCL

First Exxon/Texaco buys the rights to the 200 miles to the gallon carburetor, and pulls it from the market!

Then BT/Amoco buys the rights to the little tablet that turns a gallon of plain H₂O into a gallon of motor fuel, and pulls it from the market!

Now this!! What am I gonna do? Get a job?

I think you don't believe The Pro. Why is that?

JCL

Depending on what day it is, you can never be sure if the Pro is claiming to be alive or dead.

> Triangle Blackjack is different because it doesn't hard count small
> and large cards to gain an advantage. Triangle Blackjack also
> doesn't rely on a running count of small vs. large cards to gain an
> advantage. Instead, Triangle Blackjack relies on a combination of
> events in the current round or combination of two consecutive
> rounds virtually ignoring what occurred previously.

That sounds great! I'll ignore all the information I know about the shoe and just focus on the current hand. Maybe I'll start doing that with my bank accounts as well. I'll ignore all the checks I previously wrote and only deduct the check I am writing now. I'll be making money in no time!

> First, it almost completely eliminates raising your bet when the
> running count and/or true count is high but the remaining cards
> are non-random.

That is absurd. You are ignoring all the cards that you have already seen so you really don't have any idea what the rest of the cards are going to be. If I have seen 200 cards come out of a 312 card shoe then I have a very good idea of what the remaining cards are. The results will therefore be less random. If I ignore 190 of those cards and only look at the 10 cards currently on the table then the results are going to be MUCH more random than if I had complete knowledge of the remaining cards. The more information you have the less random the results will be. This system makes every hand you play seem like the first hand of the shoe and therefore more random than any legitimate system.

> Importantly, the required events still accomplish the fact that
> the next round should favor the players.

I'm afraid not. The events from one hand will very rarely overcome the multiple events that occurred in the previous hands, especially after one deck has been dealt out. By ignoring all the cards you have already seen you will be raising your bet after only one good hand. If the results of the previous hands were very negative, which is usually the case, you will be raising your bets when you are still at a disadvantage. Here's how the formula looks:

Bigger Bets x House Edge = Bigger Loss

Pretty intuitive, right?

> Secondly, and most importantly, the required events that must occur
> before ramping your bet almost always indicate the strong
> possibility of natural 3-2 blackjacks or double down opportunities
> occurring.

I don't even know where to start with this one!

First of all, this system does not "almost always" indicate a strong advantage. As I have explained, it actually interprets several unprofitable situations as being profitable.

Secondly, how can it indicate a strong possibility of blackjacks AND double downs? If it indicates a rich section of tens and aces then you will not be doubling down as often. Would you double down on a hard 20 or 21? What about a pair of aces? Hopefully not. You would only double down with two small cards such as 6,5 or A,6 (Remember, aces are considered high cards for betting but small cards for playing). You will actually have fewer opportunities for double downs in this circumstance.

> Considering all players at the table, the expectation is better
> than 50% that at least one player will be dealt a natural
> blackjack.

That is simply not true. Besides, I don't care about the other players, I want MY blackjack! This guy keeps using misleading statistics and vague terms like "almost always" when describing how his system performs. That is a sure sign that he doesn't know what he's talking about.

This is just another one of those Leon Dubey style "situational" betting strategies that have been proven to be worthless time and time again. This system is "almost always" a waste of time.

-Sonny-

They could've used you as a one of the jurors for the O.J. Simpson trial.

Brilliant! Create a system so catchy for the players and so good for the casinos that they'll buy all the rights and give it away to their players! Sounds like a winning system to me.

Let me give it a try...

Have you heard of the T-21 system? It's not a progression, and it doesn't use unreliable scams such as counting cards. With T-21, you are guaranteed to win or tie 80% of all hands. And to top it off, this system is so valuable that you can resell it for even more than you paid for it!

Early adopter packages start at $1,000. Any takers?

Imagine this:

The T-21 system is actually developed by Harrah's and given to you free as soon as you reach some exalted status like Diamond. Or even better given to you as soon as you join their club because it will help you make get to some dumb status quicker.

The internet is a wonderful source of information, good, bad and horrible but there is plenty of it.

The same guy who posts on the sport-betting site?

His picks had been remarkable the last time I looked. These kinds of selections are terrifically hard to do to get past break even for at least three reasons:

1. Because they are done a day before post time, he has no way of knowing the condition of the mount. The horse may be sweating white foam, shivering from fever and have runaway diarrhea, but he is in there anyway because the Racing Secretary needs to complete a field. At the track you can see this and throw him out, although only a minority of patrons actually go to the walking ring look at their selections.

2. Because they are done a day before post time, he has no way of knowing if pace match-ups will change because of scratches or additions from the also-eligible list. Horse bettors who discount pace cannot win.

3. Because they are done a day before post time, he has no way of knowing what tote action will tell. The majority of bettors are mistaken on the implications of tote price. Books written by names you would recognize blatantly state that horses going off at longer prices than expected make excellent bets. This is false. It has been statistically demonstrated that bet down horses win a disproportionate share of races. Being bet down, in isolation, does not a wise selection make. But by restricting wagers to well bet entrants, a careful win bettor can raise his p (p = propensity to win, q = propensity to lose, r = propensity to tie [ in racing a dead heat ]; p + q + r = 1) to over .5. The implications of a high win percentage more than justify taking the shorter odds. The decision between bet downs and hopeless long shots isn't even close, and I refer anyone interested to the writings of the late Huey Mahl. Until my own writings are published, which may never happen (I'm old and have serious vision problems), Mahl has written the best work I've seen on betting sizing and expectation where payoff odds fluctuate.

The Pro (if indeed this is the same guy) has made a remarkable record at spot plays. Many, including me, have observed that all thoroughbred selections qualify as spot plays. But applying situational selection criteria to a twenty-one game is not something I would automatically accept. I respect Gary the Pro's work, and I apologize to him if I have impugned it and him, but I would have to devote a lot of time, which I don't right now have, to examination and analysis before I gave my personal endorsement of whatever this Triangle methodology is. (Not that my opinion matters much to anyone but me.)

I'm not a horse bettor, but I think I would like it if I had the time.

I did notice a few years ago that, despite his eccentricies, he publicly made some predictions well in advance on some races, and he was completely accurate.

And the change has been simulcasting. I've never attended meets at Delaware Park or Hawthorne, for example, but both tracks have shown me terrific wagering opportunities. Watching three tracks at once is a stretch, but following two at a time at one of the many palatial books found, for example, on the strip is a snap. Truth is, it compares favorably with professional blackjack. Three to six win bets every day (I almost completely avoid the exotics) offering substantial advantage is far from rare. And there just isn't the insane fluctuation and tiny theoretical edge and the heat and suspicion offered in the casinos.

Of course, you can't smell the horse manure either, but you can't expect to have everything.

Of course, you can't smell the horse manure either, but you can't expect to have everything.

But, I do remember you had a flavor for life.
:-)

Gary has deleted losing records at SSB. I'm talking dozens of picks, dozens of posts. I'm not convinced the picks he now posts are his own, either.

What he leaves on the boards is bound to smell like a rose.

I do not attest to the veracity of their posted content, nor do I "omit...important factor[s]". I did read a post by Gary stating that his posted picks showed a high win percentage. If you dispute this, please take it up with him.

chatted with him here in the past. Yes, he has a non-counting "system" that I personally believe ... well you know what I believe about such. But he is at least a pretty congenial person, even when "taken to task about a non-counting system" (even by yours-truly on occasion). He has earned my respect for the way he conducts himself.

But his system still sucks as far as BJ goes. :) And I hope that one day he discovers that. :)

If you look at his company web site, http://www.prompco.com/, it's pretty clear that Gary is a "Pro" of marketing first and foremost. You may want to consider that when evaluating his gambling strategy claims.

"His picks had been remarkable the last time I looked."

That statement may be true. My point was that if anyone (Gary or anyone else) deleted losing picks, then what remains would most likely look "remarkable".

You didn't mention that Gary had deleted previous losing picks. It's certainly possible you weren't aware of it. Regardless, his repeated deleton of losing picks has been discussed ad nauseum (both with and without Gary's active participation in the discussions) at SSB in the same fora where you found his horse picks. To post that he has a "remarkable" record without mentioning the gigantic asterisk next to his record borders on the naive, the irresponsible, and the half-researched.

If you disagree, please take it up with Gary.

To post that he has a "remarkable" record without mentioning the gigantic asterisk next to his record borders on the naive, the irresponsible, and the half-researched.

You're right. I should have said that was his claim. I was not aware of any lying and historical revision. I did no research. I just remembered what he'd written and accepted it.

Claiming such a win rate did not seem unthinkable. Davidowitz wrote that he had achieved a 50% win rate on picks he broadcast over the radio in the �60s. I was not aware I was being naive and I apologize.

It's the curse of the internet, really. Very few people are willing to go back through hundreds of posts to get an idea of a forum's "history". I'd include myself in that group. In this particular case, I just happened to be around to witness his repeated deceptions and his lame excuses when he was challenged about them, so I didn't really have to do any research.

And I suspect you know far more about betting on the horses than Gary does.