There have been many times when the entire population of a table followed me to another casino.  Twice it happened when I went from the Golden Nugget to Binion’s Horseshoe, and then proceeded on to Four Queens.  It’s quite an event when a crowded table suddenly vanishes right before the Pit Bosses eyes.  All these people were previous strangers to me.

It happened again when I had a couple of great hands at O’Shea’s (a Flamingo Hilton off-shoot), and went to Harrah’s, and then across to Treasure Island, and subsequently, The Mirage.  I felt like the leader of a kindergarten field trip.  “Okay, everybody hold onto the skipping rope, we’re going to Caesars now!”   When I show up with eight or ten other players in tow, THAT GETS NOTICED!

At New York New York, I had the rare occasion where the dealers, who were making HUGE tokes, organized it so that everyone passed on shooting, thereby the dice would immediately come back to me following my 7-Out.  After doing that for six more decent-length hands in a row, the Pit Boss came over and said, “That’s enough, everyone else take a turn or I’ll shut the table down.   You can’t trade on his luck all day long!”  I beat a hasty retreat to the Monte Carlo Hotel, but eight of those previously-unknown players followed me there too.

Many times, four or five people who are vacationing together as a group will ask if they can buy my girlfriend and I dinner in hopes that they’ll get in on another hot hand later in the evening.  Occasionally I will oblige, but most times I just sincerely thank them for their flattering and generous offer.

I was playing at the Freemont Hotel in downtown Vegas.  The only other player at the table starts a conversation after we each have a couple of decent hands.  He attributed his “luck” to being with someone else who was “luckier” than he was.  He felt that my excess of luck was being absorbed into him by way of cosmic osmosis or something like that. It was one of those times when I felt like saying, “Hey, your village just called, they are missing their IDIOT!”

Anyway, he begged to let him follow me around for just a couple of hours.  He offered food, drink and a share of his profits.  I haven’t been courted like that since my girlfriend got an $845 speeding ticket in her super-charged Jaguar XKR. I told him to meet me over at Fitzgerald’s Casino in thirty minutes. 

Like clockwork, he was there upon my arrival.  He looked so much like an anxious puppy that I thought I should spread some newspapers on the floor in case he pissed himself with excitement.  He had brought a couple of friends who he said also needed the benefit of my shooting to re-inflate their wallets. 

We went on to become good friends, and to this day, when I go to Vegas, we get occasionally together for a couple of lengthy and profitable sessions.  His eagerness has never waned, and he sometimes brings his wife along if we are going to combine it into a dinner and show social-happening, otherwise he is content with the camaraderie and profit that this joint-venture brings. 

“Basketball Don” introduced himself to me one night while playing at San Remo, which is located beside the Tropicana.  We had seen each other at a couple of other casinos before, so it was natural that we struck up a conversation during a chip-fill lull in the action.  We had a decent session, and as I was coloring-out, he asked where I would be playing later, and could he join up.  He didn’t seem like he was out on a weekend pass from the Clarke County Detention Center, so I agreed. Don was actually a highly-touted college-player who had played on a full-scholarship at Gonzaga in Washington State.  Despite his phenomenal showings in the NCAA March Madness for two years in a row, he had injured himself in an off-season accident, thereby ruining his pro-NBA prospects.

Later at the Flamingo, there he stood.  Some of Don’s friends had tagged along.  I don’t know where he found them.  Maybe the line-up at the cash-for blood-donations clinic was closed that day.  They weren’t the kind of street urchins that I usually encounter at the Western or the El Cortez.  Rather they looked like refuges from a 1950’s bowling tournament.  Pompadour hair, pointed-toe eel-skin boots, and pastel-colored bowling shirts is how a robbery-victim would have described them. 

Anyway, we had a great time, as they bet up a storm for the dealers and themselves.  Two of the dealers knew me, and quietly thanked me for bringing such generous tippers to the table.  They also heavily tipped the cocktail waitress to bring them “special” drinks from Dr. Wu’s bar that used to be just outside of the Peking Market restaurant.

Don and his friends turned out to be totally harmless, and well connected in the local dance-club circuit.  We still get together with about five other couples, and really enjoy ourselves.  He currently manages THE hip place to be seen, located at the south-end of the Strip, at the casino-hotel where you will find ALL the well-manicured yuppies.

“Cincinnati Carmen” is one of the most talented Precision-Shooters that doesn’t believe in Precision-Shooting!  I’m not a heretic for saying that.  He truly believes that his good, clean, honest, no-vices-lifestyle, combined with incredible good fortune and God’s will, is the reason he is into his fifth year of making lifestyle-changing profit from craps. 

Still, he likes to know where I’m playing so that he’s got an alternative income-stream in case his planets, moons and stars aren’t properly aligned.   Carmen is one of the few professionals that is constantly traveling around the world in pursuit of the game. 

I hear from him when he is in places like Oregon, Indiana or Missouri.  I fill him in on my travel plans and we sometimes meet up.   I last saw him at Casino Niagara in Niagara Falls, Ontario a short time ago.  His throwing accuracy is truly awesome, but the man still doesn’t believe that it’s skill at all; he still says it’s based on faith, love and good karma.  Far Out, Man!!!

Three “inner-city”-type rappers from L.A. decided that “Mr. Mayo-on-White-Bread” Mad Professor was just the ticket they needed to make legit money away from the crack-infested corners of their ‘hood.  One of the trio had seen me during an earlier session at the Trop, and he told his posse to get in on a good thing.

We started off at, of all places, Excalibur, late one night.  As their collective profit increased, their betting took on proportions that exceeded the Excal’s table limits.  They wanted to continue playing, and asked if we could find a place with higher limits. 

I was staying at the Mirage, but suggested that Caesars would handle their action, and they’d easily raise the limits if I asked them to.  They dutifully met me there, and dutifully Caesars raised the “head room” to accommodate their play. 

I’ll admit that I was really enjoying myself, as they were making extremely large bets for both the dealers and the shooter (ME!!!).  The payoffs were HUGE, and the tips coming my way were outstripping my own winnings by a margin of at least 5-to-1.  We played a total of eight hours between the two casinos.  With their winnings, they started up a fledgling record label, which I understand has become a force in the rap-dance-club music scene.

Hawaii Pete is not a typical undisciplined gambling tourist.  He is a seasoned gambler who specifically looks for Precision-Shooters, and then bets heavily on them.  I first met him at Bally’s back in ’93.  He studied shooters, just like a technician would “clock” a roulette wheel.   When he determines an advantage, he jumps in cautiously at first, and then more aggressively. 

He said that he had tried to learn how to shoot properly, but arthritis hampered his ability, so he “shopped for shooters” instead.  He admitted that sometimes he’d have to survey hundreds upon hundreds of shooters until he saw someone whom exhibited ability, but he said the wait was almost always worth it. 

He came over to Vegas from his home on Maui for three weeks every two months.   He said that every trip was profitable, and was becoming more so as he met more “qualified” shooters, and followed them around on their sessions.  He said that he had never met anyone who was so consistent with the dice as I was.  I thanked him for his compliment, but I figured that he said that to anyone who he figured he could make a buck off of. 

A day later, I met Pete’s wife.  She was effusive in her excitement over her husband talking about me non-stop.   She said that he couldn’t stop talking about what I was doing with the dice, that she had to meet me herself.  They turned out to be a really decent retired couple, who my girlfriend and I even visited the last time we were in Hawaii.  They now schedule their trips to the “mainland” to coincide with my visits to Vegas, Reno, Laughlin, Louisiana and Mississippi.