How 'Advantage Players' become winners in the casino and in life

New York Post

14-06-2025

Many casino gamblers expect to lose money. And they are rarely disappointed.
But advantage players do the opposite. As detailed in my new book, 'Advantage Players' (Huntington Press), casino winners meticulously study the games, devise strategies, put up their money, play accurately, and go home with wallets fattened.
The book takes a deep dive into the world of advantage players — people who play games advantageously. 'Advantage Players' delves into a secret society of professional gamblers who always aim to find an edge.
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12 Book author Michael Kaplan with magician David Blaine. Blaine is an advantage player when it comes to magic. Kaplan deployed advantage play thinking when it came to finding a treatment for his cancer.
Tamara Beckwith/NY Post
12 A new book about the world of advantage play, in gambling and beyond.
They do it through legal techniques that include card counting (tracking the dealt cards in a blackjack game to gauge the cards that remain), hole-carding (capitalizing on sloppy dealers who unwittingly reveal their hole cards) and shuffle tracking (following specific clumps of cards through shuffles, thereby knowing when they will be dealt).
The most talented advantage players combine all three moves — or more.
As one source, a veteran winner, gushingly told me, 'We out-house the house.'
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Because casinos hate to lose and can kick out anyone for any reason, sometimes advantage players (or APs, as they like to be called) take extreme measures to stay in action.
John Chang, a founding member of the famous MIT blackjack team, which was the subject of the movie '21,' told me about going far to keep from getting picked off by casino surveillance.
12 Kevin Spacey's character in the movie '21' was partly inspired by John Chang from the famous MIT card counting team.
©Columbia Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
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12 MIT kids, in the movie '21' and in real life, were serious advantage players, according to reports.
©Columbia Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
He dressed up as a woman to hide his identity. Team members saw it as the only way to play without getting booted. 'Cross-dressing worked in the Bahamas and Illinois,' Chang said. 'But in Atlantic City, they looked at my hands. An Asian host whispered in my ear, 'We know who you are.' '
Security loomed and, as Chang rose to leave, a guard said, 'Lose the pearls, Esmeralda.'
As Chang remembers it, 'I had to run around the casino in high heels and make sure they weren't following me.'
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12 Kelly 'Baccarat Machine' Sun alongside the actress Awkwafina, who is slated to play her in an upcoming movie.
Courtesy of Kelly Sun
More successful was his portrayal of the mega-rolling nephew of a Chinese computer mogul. Staffers at Caesars Palace were so impressed by Chang's 'lineage' that they let him log big wins on 11 straight occasions before cutting off his comps and play.
Such is the life of a successful AP.
Kelly 'Baccarat Machine' Sun and poker great Phil Ivey, both profiled in the book, teamed up to beat baccarat for tens of millions of dollars.
12 Woody Harrelson and the advantage playing gambler Don Johnson are seen living it up in the Hamptons.
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12 David Blaine uses advantage play thinking to be a better magician.
Tamara Beckwith
Sun trained her eyes to recognize minute inconsistencies on the backs of playing cards. After that spree, she pulled the ultimate advantage play: selling her life story to Hollywood. It is now being developed into a feature film set to star Awkwafina.
Don Johnson (the gambler, not the actor) garnered headlines for being the biggest nightclub splurger in Las Vegas. But, he explained, that was a cover as he crushed high-stakes blackjack unhampered.
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He worked with a crew of fellow APs who blended in with nightclub hangers-on and fed him information about upcoming cards while remaining unnoticed.
12 Stefan Simchowitz put an advantage-play move on the buying and selling of art.
Courtesy of Stefan Simchowitz
However, as is conveyed in the book, advantage players are not relegated strictly to gambling.
Magician David Blaine, art dealer Stefan Simchowitz, smoked salmon slicer Silverio 'Jay' Benitez, and movie directors the Safdie Brothers all use advantage play techniques to find success in their professions.
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The Safdies' AP move is to cast non-professional actors — such as retired NBA star Kevin Garnett and it-girl Julia Fox in the nerve-jangling 'Uncut Gems' — and get rave-worthy performances that ooze authenticity.
12 Benny and Josh Safdie are advantage playing movie directors, which is evident in their last movie, 'Uncut Gems.'
Annie Wermiel/NY Post
12 Casting Julia Fox in 'Gems' was an advantage play on the part of the Safdie brothers, critics claimed.
Courtesy Everett Collection
'We're not looking for actors who are responding to the back pages [of trade magazines],' Ben Safdie said. 'We're looking for people who are already playing the characters' lives. We transplant them into the films. I never understood doing it any other way.'
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My own bit of advantage playing is laid out in the epilogue. Two years ago, I was diagnosed with stage-four Mantle Cell Lymphoma, a rare and incurable cancer. My original oncologist in New York steered me toward the standard treatment: brutal chemotherapy that would have left me hospitalized. It tends to work temporarily and often ends in death after five- to eight-year life-draining chemo regimens.
Going into AP mode — I played on a high-stakes card-counting team, so I am no stranger to the mindset; plus, I was writing 'Advantage Players' — I found a better game at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. An oncologist there has helped to pioneer non-toxic treatments for the disease.
12 Michael Kaplan has not only written about advantage play, but he's used it in casinos and in life.
Brian Zak/NY Post
12 Don Johnson used advantage play gambling to extract many millions of dollars from casinos around the world, according to reports.
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I used AP aggression to wangle a quick appointment and wound up with a protocol that uses targeted drugs instead of chemo. I am treated this way by Dr. Peter Martin, a brilliant oncologist and researcher, at Weill Cornell Medicine in Manhattan. Currently, there is no cancer evident in my blood. The treatment has no side effects for me.
Of course, the real APs are the scientists/doctors who outplayed cancer and came up with the cutting-edge treatment.
As the book makes clear, sometimes being an advantage player means turning the tables on death. Other times, it leads to selling art creatively, raving about blackjack, or producing better movies. No matter what, though, I hope readers will be inspired to bring out their inner advantage players and be all the better for it.