The MIT Blackjack Team was a group of students and ex-students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, and other leading colleges who used card counting techniques and more sophisticated strategies to beat casinos at blackjack worldwide. The team and its successors operated successfully from 1979 through the beginning of the 21st century. Many other blackjack teams have been formed around the world with the goal of beating the casinos.

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• The Real Mit Blackjack Team

Blackjack and card counting[edit]

Blackjack can be legally beaten by a skilled player. Beyond the basic strategy of when to hit and when to stand, individual players can use card counting, shuffle tracking, or hole carding to improve their odds. Since the early 1960s, a large number of card counting schemes have been published, and casinos have adjusted the rules of play in an attempt to counter the most popular methods. The idea behind all card counting is that, because a low card is usually bad and a high card usually good, and as cards already seen since the last shuffle cannot be at the top of the deck and thus drawn, the counter can determine the high and low cards that have already been played. They thus know the probability of getting a high card (10,J,Q,K,A) as compared to a low card (2,3,4,5,6).

• The MIT student asked him to train and be in charge of what would later become known as the infamous Blackjack Team. By the year 1992, Kaplan and his squad were ready to beat the house and become millionaires overnight by exploiting the card counting strategy in the new mega-casinos that were booming at that moment.
• Inside the MIT Blackjack Team: The Real Secret to Success Exploits of card counting team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that ripped off casinos for millions of dollars at the blackjack tables are legendary.

John Grochowski: Nothing fires up a gambler's imagination like the possibility of beating the house at its own game.

In 1979, six MIT students and residents of the Burton-Conner House at MIT taught themselves card-counting. They traveled to Atlantic City during the spring break to win their fortune. The group went their separate ways when most of them graduated in May of that year. Most never gambled again, but some of them maintained an avid interest in card counting and remained in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Two of them, J.P. Massar and Jonathan, offered a course on blackjack for MIT's January, 1980 Independent Activities Period (IAP), during which classes may be offered on almost any subject.

First MIT blackjack 'bank'[edit]

In late November 1979, Dave, a professional blackjack player contacted one of the card-counting students, J.P. Massar, after seeing a notice for the blackjack course. He proposed forming a new group to go to Atlantic City to take advantage of the New Jersey Casino Control Commission's recent ruling that made it illegal for the Atlantic City casinos to ban card counters. Casinos instead have to take other countermeasures like shuffling the cards earlier than normal, using more decks of cards, or offering games with worse rules to destroy the advantage gained by counting—even though these all negatively impact the non-counter as well.^[1]

The group of four players, a professional gambler, and an investor who put up most of their capital ($5,000), went to Atlantic City in late December. They recruited more MIT students as players at the January blackjack class. They played intermittently through May 1980 and increased their capital four-fold, but were nonetheless more like a loose group sharing capital than a team with consistent strategies and quality control.

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'Mr. M' meets Bill Kaplan[edit]

In May 1980, J. P. Massar, known as 'Mr. M' in the History Channel documentary, overheard a conversation about professional blackjack at a Chinese restaurant in Cambridge. He introduced himself to the speaker, Bill Kaplan, a 1980 Harvard MBA graduate who had run a successful blackjack team in Las Vegas three years earlier. Kaplan had earned his BA at Harvard in 1977 and delayed his admission to Harvard Business School for a year, when he moved to Las Vegas and formed a team of blackjack players using his own research and statistical analysis of the game. Using funds he received on graduation as Harvard's outstanding scholar-athlete, Kaplan generated more than a 35 fold rate of return in fewer than nine months of play.^[2]

Kaplan continued to run his Las Vegas blackjack team as a sideline while attending Harvard Business School but, by the time of his graduation in May 1980, the players were so 'burnt out' in Nevada they were forced to hit the international circuit. Not feeling he could continue to manage the team successfully while they traveled throughout Europe and elsewhere, encountering different rules, playing conditions, and casino practices, Kaplan parted ways with his teammates, who then splintered into multiple small playing teams in pursuit of more favorable conditions throughout the world.

Kaplan observes Massar and friends in action[edit]

After meeting Kaplan and hearing about his blackjack successes, Massar asked Kaplan if he was interested in going with a few of Massar's blackjack-playing friends to Atlantic City to observe their play. Given the fortuitous timing (Kaplan's parting with his Las Vegas team), he agreed to go in the hopes of putting together a new local team that he could train and manage.

Kaplan observed Massar and his teammates playing for a weekend in Atlantic City. He noted that each of the players used a different, and overcomplicated, card counting strategy. This resulted in error rates that undermined the benefits of the more complicated strategies. Upon returning to Cambridge, Kaplan detailed the problems he observed to Massar.

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Kaplan capitalizes a new team[edit]

Kaplan said he would back a team but it had to be run as a business with formal management procedures, a required counting and betting system, strict training and player approval processes, and careful tracking of all casino play. A couple of the players were initially averse to the idea. They had no interest in having to learn a new playing system, being put through 'trial by fire' checkout procedures before being approved to play, being supervised in the casinos, or having to fill out detailed player sheets (such as casino, cash in and cash out totals, time period, betting strategy and limits, and the rest) for every playing session. However, their keen interest in the game coupled with Kaplan's successful track record won out.

The newly capitalised 'bank' of the MIT Blackjack Team started on 1 August 1980. The investment stake was $89,000, with both outside investors and players putting up the capital. Ten players, including Kaplan, Massar, Jonathan, Goose, and 'Big Dave' (aka 'coach', to distinguish from the Dave in the first round) played on this bank. Ten weeks later they more than doubled the original stake. Profits per hour played at the tables were $162.50, statistically equivalent to the projected rate of $170/hour detailed in the investor offering prospectus. Per the terms of the investment offering, players and investors split the profits with players paid in proportion to their playing hours and computer simulated win rates. Over the ten-week period of this first bank, players, mostly undergraduates, earned an average of over $80/hour while investors achieved an annualized return in excess of 250%.

Strategy and techniques[edit]

The team often recruited students through flyers and the players' friends from college campuses across the country. The team tested potential members to find out if they were suitable candidates and, if they were, the team thoroughly trained the new members for free. Fully trained players had to pass an intense 'trial by fire,' consisting of playing through 8 six-deck shoes with almost perfect play, and then undergo further training, supervision, and similar check-outs in actual casino play until they could become full stakes players.

The group combined individual play with a team approach of counters and big players to maximize opportunities and disguise the betting patterns that card counting produces. In a 2002 interview in Blackjack Forum magazine,^[3] John Chang, an MIT undergrad who joined the team in late 1980 (and became MIT team co-manager in the mid-1980s and 1990s), reported that, in addition to classic card counting and blackjack team techniques, at various times the group used advanced shuffle and ace tracking techniques. While the MIT team's card counting techniques can give players an overall edge of about 2 percent, some of the MIT team's methods have been established as gaining players an overall edge of about 4 percent.^{[citation needed]} In his interview, Chang reported that the MIT team had difficulty attaining such edges in actual play, and their overall results had been best with straight card counting.

The MIT Team's approach was originally developed by Al Francesco, elected by professional gamblers as one of the original seven inductees into the Blackjack Hall of Fame. Blackjack team play was first written about by Ken Uston, an early member of Al Francesco's teams. Uston's book on blackjack team play, Million Dollar Blackjack, was published shortly before the founding of the first MIT team. Kaplan enhanced Francesco's team methods and used them for the MIT team. The team concept enabled players and investors to leverage both their time and money, reducing their 'risk of ruin' while also making it more difficult for casinos to detect card counting at their tables.

Team history 1980–1990[edit]

The MIT Blackjack Team continued to play throughout the 1980s, growing to as many as 35 players in 1984 with a capitalization of as much as $350,000. Having played and run successful teams since 1977, Kaplan reached a point in late 1984 where he could not show his face in any casino without being followed by the casino personnel in search of his team members. As a consequence he decided to fall back on his growing real estate investment and development company, his 'day job' since 1980, and stopped managing the team. He continued for another year or so as an occasional player and investor in the team, now being run by Massar, Chang and Bill Rubin, a player who joined the team in 1984.

The MIT Blackjack Team ran at least 22 partnerships in the time period from late 1979 through 1989. At least 70 people played on the team in some capacity (either as counters, Big Players, or in various supporting roles) over that time span. Every partnership was profitable during this time period, after paying all expenses as well as the players' and managers' share of the winnings, with returns to investors ranging from 4%/year to over 300%/year.

Strategic Investments 1992–1993[edit]

In 1992, Bill Kaplan, J.P. Massar, and John Chang decided to capitalize on the opening of Foxwoods Casino in nearby Connecticut, where they planned to train new players. Acting as the General Partner, they formed a Massachusetts Limited Partnership in June 1992 called Strategic Investments to bankroll the new team. Structured similar to the numerous real estate development limited partnerships that Kaplan had formed, the limited partnership raised a million dollars, significantly more money than any of their previous teams, with a method based on Edward Thorp's high low system. It involved three players: a big player, a controller, and a spotter. The spotter checked when the deck went positive with card counting, the controller would bet small constantly, wasting money, and verifying the spotter's count. Once the controller found a positive, he would signal to the big player. He would make a massive bet, and win big. Confident with this new funding, the three general partners ramped up their recruitment and training efforts to capitalize on the opportunity.

Over the next two years, the MIT Team grew to nearly 80 players, including groups and players in Cambridge, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, California, Illinois, and Washington. Sarah McCord, who joined the team in 1983 as an MIT student and later moved to California, was added as a partner soon after SI was formed and became responsible for training and recruitment of West Coast players.

At various times, there were nearly 30 players playing simultaneously at different casinos around the world, including Native American casinos throughout the country, Las Vegas, Atlantic City, Canada, and island locations. Never before had casinos throughout the world seen such an organized and scientific onslaught directed at the game. While the profits rolled in, so did the 'heat' from the casinos, and many MIT Team members were identified and barred. These members were replaced by fresh players from MIT, Harvard, and other colleges and companies, and play continued. Eventually, investigators hired by casinos realized that many of those they had banned had addresses in or near Cambridge, and the connection to MIT and a formalized team became clear. The detectives obtained copies of recent MIT yearbooks and added photographs from it to their image database.

With its leading players banned from most casinos and other more lucrative investment opportunities opening up at the end of the recession, Strategic Investments paid out its substantial earnings to players and investors and dissolved its partnership on December 31, 1993.

1994 and forward[edit]

After the dissolution of Strategic Investments, a few of the players took their winnings and split off into two independent groups. The Amphibians were primarily led by Semyon Dukach, with Dukach as the big player, Katie Lilienkamp (a controller), and Andy Bloch (a spotter). The other team was the Reptiles, led by Mike Aponte, Manlio Lopez and Wes Atamian. These teams had various legal structures, and at times million dollar banks and 50+ players. By 2000 the 15+ year reign of the MIT Blackjack Teams came to an end as players drifted into other pursuits.

In 1999, a member of the Amphibians won at Max Rubin's 3rd Annual Blackjack Ball competition. The event was featured in an October 1999 Cigar Aficionado article, which said the winner earned the unofficial title 'Most Feared Man in the Casino Business'.^[4]

In the media[edit]

Books[edit]

• A variety of stories about a few of the players from the MIT Blackjack Team formed the basis of The New York Times best-sellingBringing Down the House, written by Ben Mezrich. While originally marketed as nonfiction, Mezrich later admitted characters and stories in the book were mostly fictive and composites of players and stories he had heard about through hearsay. The private investigation firm referred to as Plymouth in Bringing Down the House was Griffin Investigations.^[5]
• Mezrich wrote a follow-up book, Busting Vegas, which took even greater liberty with the actual happenings of the team. Many events in this book were at least partly based on incidents that occurred during the team's Strategic Investments era.^[6]
• Jeffrey Ma wrote a book titled The House Advantage: Playing the Odds to Win Big in Business about his time on the 1994 MIT blackjack team.
• Nathaniel Tilton, a student of former MIT team captains Mike Aponte and Semyon Dukach, authored The Blackjack Life detailing his experiences playing and being trained by the MIT Blackjack Team players.^[7]

Films[edit]

• The 2004 film The Last Casino is loosely based on this premise and features three students and a professor counting cards in Ontario and Quebec.^[8]
• The 2008 film 21, inspired by Bringing Down the House and produced by and starring Kevin Spacey and Jim Sturgess, was released on March 28, 2008 by Columbia Pictures. Jeff Ma and Henry Houh, former players on the team, appear in the movie as casino dealers, and Bill Kaplan appears in a cameo in the background of the underground Chinese gambling parlor scene. The script took significant artistic license with events, with most of its plot being invented for the movie, hence it refers to being 'inspired by true events' rather than 'based on true events.' One of the most significant departures from reality was the portrayal of the team being run by a professor (the Kevin Spacey character), when in reality the team was always run by students and alumni. The characters in the movie were also fictionalized amalgams of various players throughout the years of the team's existence - for example, the character Choi is very loosely (and inaccurately) based on Johnny Chang, and the character Ben Campbell, is an amalgam of numerous players, with the opening scene based on Big Dave's interview, and subsequent admission to Harvard Medical School, where much of the interview revolved around his participation on the team.
• The 2010 film Teen Patti is an uncredited remake of 21.

Television[edit]

• The Mysteries at the Museum series on the Travel Channel featured the story of the MIT Blackjack Team in the episode titled 'Siamese Twins, Assassin Umbrella, Capone's Cell'.
• The story of the MIT Blackjack Team, in its incarnation as Strategic Investments, was told in The History Channel documentary, Breaking Vegas, directed by Bruce David Klein.
• The Bringing Down The House period was featured on episodes of the Game Show Network documentary series, Anything to Win, and HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel (episode 116).
• The BBC documentary, Making Millions the Easy Way, addressed the Bringing Down the House period as part of the renowned 'Horizon' strand (directed by Johanna Gibbon), told the story of a Strategic Investments breakaway group, and revealed the science behind the winning formula.
• 'Double Down', an episode of Numb3rs concerned a counting group, led by a High School teacher, which launders money through casino winnings.

Other[edit]

Several members of the two teams have used their expertise to start public speaking careers as well as businesses teaching others how to count cards. For example:

• Mike Aponte of the Reptiles co-founded a company with former MIT Blackjack Team member David Irvine called the Blackjack Institute.
• Semyon Dukach of the Amphibians founded Blackjack Science.

References[edit]

1. ^Griffin, Peter A. (1979). The Theory of Blackjack. Huntington Press. ISBN0-915141-02-7.
2. ^'How a team of students beat the casinos'. BBC.com. Retrieved 26 May 2014.
3. ^Blackjack Forum interview with Johnny Chang
4. ^The Twenty One Club: The annual blackjack ball hosts Gambling's Most Furtive (and Quirky) FraternityArchived 2009-04-20 at the Wayback Machine cigaraficionado.com, Sept/Oct 1999
5. ^Ian Kaplan (March 2004). 'review of Bringing Down the House'.
6. ^ThePOGG (10 November 2012). 'ThePOGG Interviews – Semyon Dukach – MIT Card Counting team captain'.
7. ^'ThePOGG Interviews – Nathaniel Tilton author of 'The Blackjack Life''. Retrieved 6 March 2013.
8. ^The Last Casino at IMDb.Retrieved 2009-11-03.

External links[edit]

The MIT blackjack team is probably the most famous group of professional players in the game of blackjack and the sport of card counting. This site would not be complete if we didn't write a little bit about them and what the true story was behind the famous blockbuster '21' movie. The idea behind the team would originate from Al Francesco, one of the original members of the Blackjack Hall of Fame inducted in 2002. Ken Uston is another huge name in the concept of blackjack teams like MIT. Most notably is his book 'Million Dollar Blackjack' which was released not too long before the blackjack team was created. Two other famous books about the team are 'Bringing Down the House' (which the movie '21' is based off of) and 'Busting Vegas' by Ben Mezrich. If you enjoy learning about card counting and blackjack, there is an excellent TV show called 'Breaking Vegas' on the History Channel as well.

How MIT Started the Blackjack Team - Early History

The team started in 1979 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and consisted of students and ex-students from this school along with some from Harvard University and their business school as well. It started off as a mini-course named 'How to Gamble if You Must', which was a type of independent extracurricular 'club' when class was not in session. Some students from the Burton-Conner Dorm decided to sign up and try it out. At first, they learned about poker and play micro-stakes poker games. Later on they began to learn how to play blackjack and how to count cards.

They trained and improved their skills at the campus itself and inside the classrooms, much the same way it was described in the movie in fact. The people who signed on were skilled in mathematics and statistics and usually students in these fields. As you may know, card counting and learning basic strategy is all about numbers and probabilities. Those who are good at math and statistics would have a much better chance of doing it right and actually enjoying the math in the game.

Atlantic City, which has many large casinos like Las Vegas, was the first stop for this group. They wanted to test out their new skills here. Unfortunately, they failed quite badly and the original group broke up. Later on, a gambler who goes by the name 'Dave' proposed to form another team with J.P Massar, who was a graduate and also one of the people who organized the first trip out to Atlantic City. They wanted to take a great advantage of a special law in Atlantic City that allows card counters to play. Believe it or not, it is illegal to bar any card counters from playing at casinos in this city!

This new team consisted of 4 players with Dave. They also started off with a $5000 investment and this time they decided to go back to test their skills and were successful. Later on, new members started to join and they continued practicing the game during their own training sessions. They actually started getting on a roll and were winning on many weekends at the beginning but then that started to change. The students started to lose and lost some confidence in their abilities to beat the house. It was a mystery why they were doing so badly until they met up with Bill Kaplan.

Bill Kaplan, J.P. Massar and the new MIT blackjack team

The history of Kaplan is quite interesting. This is the man that actor Kevin Spacey, the professor, plays in the movie '21'. He received his Bachelors Degree from Harvard in 1977 and was going to attend Harvard Business School for a Masters Degree. He had done a lot of research on card counting and blackjack before he graduated. Bill decided to delay entry into Harvard Business for one year in order to move to Las Vegas and start up his own team. The money he used was from funding he received from Harvard after his graduation but the rewards were staggering. He made a 35 fold return on his investment or won 35 times what he brought with him, in only 9 months!

Later on in 1978, he had to go to Harvard Business School while his team continued to play in Las Vegas for the next 2 years. In 1980, Kaplan graduated and the team was tired out from playing in Vegas so they decided to go international. The team broke up since Kaplan could no longer manage his team over such long distances. At around this time, J.P. Massar from the MIT team met Bill Kaplan at a Chinese Restaurant. Massar overheard Kaplan and his conversation about how successful he was. Massar then invited Kaplan to come with him to Atlantic City and to watch his team and figure out what the students were doing wrong and why.

It turns out that Massar's team was doing many things wrong. Each student was using a different card counting system, so they were essentially on the wrong page. Those systems were complicated, they were making errors, losing the count or even each student having inconsistent counts. It turns out that the students spent most of the time arguing about mathematical methods and equations rather than actually playing the game in the casino. Later on, Kaplan gave Massar his recommendations and report on the students.

The advantage that these players got on the blackjack table was stunning. Due to playing perfect basic strategy and coupling it with card counting, they could get a 2% edge over the casino. Normally the casinos have between 2% and 10% edge over the player, which ensures that the player will eventually lose in the long term. The card counters now have ensured that the casino loses in the long run and basically turns the casino into a personal ATM, literally. It has been known that the players would use other strategies such as tracking aces and advanced shuffle techniques and could even get an edge as high as 4% over the casino. This larger edge means they would win more money more often. It has been reported that even 5% to 10% edges against the casino were possible but it was extremely rare and required a perfect game with an awesome count. Basically it's the card counting aspect that turns your negative chance into positive chance winnings.

This new team was a boon for Kaplan. He could now train a new team of the students locally. This time Kaplan used a systematic and much more organized process for the students. Now everyone followed strict rules to use a single card counting system, a similar betting system and strict training. Players had to report information such as what systems they were using, what casino they were playing at and what times they played. They had to pass some requirements before even being able to play at the tables. It turns out that Kaplan's formal management strategies and business organization skills paid off and they became wildly successful.

After about one ummer season since Kaplan met Massar, the first MIT blackjack bank was started. It was built up through investments by outside investors and the students themselves. There was about $89,000 initially and the MIT team consisted of 10 players along with Massar and Kaplan. They doubled the size of the bank in only 10 weeks and were highly successful. They theoretical figure for earnings was to make $170 per hour and the actual result ended up being about $163 per hour, which was very close to the ideal statistics. The winnings were split among the players and the investors in proportion to what they put into the bank and the investors were making a 250% return on investment! This was astronomical compared to 15% annually in the stock market, which in itself would be amazing.

MIT team history in the 1980s

1980 was the year when the MIT blackjack team really took off. By the time 1984 came around, there was about 30 players and had about $350,000 in money to play with. At about this time, Bill Kaplan had become notorious at casinos around the country. Casinos had people following him around and were looking out for the guy because of how much money he was taking from them. This made it impossible for him to be effective on the team and he decided to quit for awhile and go full time in the real estate business.

Occasionally he would play once in awhile and invest some money into the team but he was not active. The team after 1984 was generally run by Massar and a few of the newer members: John Change and Bill Rubin. Again, as time went on between 1985 and 1988, the team was struck with fatigue and 'burn out' and eventually lost interest. By the end of the decade, the MIT teams played through 22 banks and 70 people were involved as team players.

Strategy and systems used in the 1990s

The team recruited players at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology by posters and flyers that were hung up around the campus. It was hard to get in and it took a lot of work, practice and skill. The training itself did not cost anything and it was almost like a hobby for many students. When they got good enough, they had somewhat of a final exam called the 'trial by fire', which was an extremely difficult test of their skills before they would become full members. A player would have to play through 8 to 10 standard decks of cards (a large shoe) and play a perfect game as well as keeping the correct count. Even after this, they still had more training and played in real casinos with small money before finally being able to handle the big high-stakes blackjack.

One notable student was John Chang, an undergraduate at the school who joined in 1982. Chang would eventually help run the team later on in the decade and into the 90's. In 1992, Kaplan, Massar and Chang made a huge move. They decided to take advantage of a new casino that was opening up nearby called Foxwoods Casino,located in Connecticut. Kaplan was able to raise a million dollars by forming a new team around 'Strategic Investments', a Massachusetts Limited Partnership. Ironically, this was done through his knowledge of real estate investing. This marked the revival of the MIT blackjack team, addition of new members and training.

The team then spread across the country with members in many states along the East Coast, Midwest and the West Coast. Another notable player in the MIT team history was Sarah McCord a student who joined in 1983. In this new team, she was responsible for the all the recruiting and training that happened in the West Coast as she lived locally in California.

They started gambling all over the world at the same time and the casinos were taking some serious hits. They have never seen such a coordinated assault against the game of blackjack in so many areas at the same time. Some would say that this would be the golden age of the MIT blackjack team. Eventually the casino started fighting back by figuring out who the card counters were and banning them from playing there again but MIT kept hitting them even harder by sending new players with new faces to the casinos so when one player got banned, another 'stranger' could come in and take their place. At one time, the team won nearly $500,000 during a single weekend in Las Vegas

Eventually the casinos caught on and had investigators find out that a large concentration of the caught players were from Cambridge. Then that tied in with MIT and they figured out where they were all coming from. As another tool to fight back, they took the yearbook and stored the pictures in a database at the casino to keep an eye on anyone who could be from MIT and make identification much easier.

This seemed to be the end of the team. Most of the best players on the team were not allowed into the casinos anymore. Also, they were not spending as much time working on their real estate business, which was actually much more profitable than blackjack anyways. On the last day of the year 1993, General Partners chose to close down Strategic Investments. Their limited partnership ended and the money was paid out to the players and investors of the team.

1994 - This was not the end of the MIT blackjack story

After the main MIT team broke up in 1993, a small group the MIT players decided to create their own independent teams. There were two notable teams. One was the Reptiles, run by Mike Aponte, Wes Atamian and Manlio Lopez. The other one was the the Amphibians, run by Semyon Dukach. They both sort of competed against each other to see which team won more money. Some say that each team won over a million dollars and had over 50 members at one time or another. One player from the Amphibians team actually won the secret Blackjack Ball tournament in its third year and was crowned the title 'The Best Blackjack Player in the World' by Max Rubin, the famous host of the annual event. The winner's unofficial name was known as 'Most Feared Man in the Casino Business'.

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The Real Mit Blackjack Team