Heat

As I reminded you earlier, if you are winning despite all the un-favorable conditions and casino countermeasures, keep playing. If you follow that advice, then you are likely to feel a little heat. Heat refers to psychological pressure put on a winning player by the pit bosses. This can be very uncomfortable for you.

I received one kind of heat in 1975 when playing at a down-town Las Vegas casino where they are not used to twenty-five-dollar-chip bettors. I was betting twenty-five-dollar chips and was ahead over four hundred dollars when the pit bosses started to buzz around the table like hornets. Finally, they surrounded my table. Two of them stood on each side of the dealer and two more of them stood behind me, one on either side. That was heat! All they were trying to do was to pressure me into quitting.

If this should happen to you, my advice is that you keep play-ing as long as you are winning in spite of the pressure, if you can stand it. I decided to leave with my winnings when I lost three hands in a row. I played another ten minutes. When I got up, the pit bosses trotted off to wherever pit bosses go to wait for the next problem. I had my money and they had my absence so we were both happy.

Barring Players

If you are winning in too threatening a manner, the pit bosses may skip the soft stuff and get to the ultimate countermeasure: barring. I have been officially barred in only one casino, and that not because of my play, but because they made a connection be-tween my appearance on their island and the subsequent appear-ance of my first Blackjack website on their island's websiteshelves. I have been asked to leave casinos several times.

If you are asked to leave a casino, do so. But take down all the details of the en-counter. Get the date, time, and casino. Record the dealer's name, the pit boss's name, and any conditions of play, such as your betting pattern and winnings. You may want this informa-tion at some later date for legal action (for more on the legal status of barring certain players, see Chapter Twelve).

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