King Of Bad Behavior

It’s my first week working as a dealer at a casino, and I am placed in the back because during that first week, everyone makes mistakes constantly and it’s easier for the “floor” to watch us. But some players know this and willingly seek out the weaker dealers, because if your dealer makes a mistake and there’s a dispute, it usually goes in the player’s favor.

A player sits down at the blackjack table next to mine, and starts betting heavily, $400 to 500 per hand. At one point, he has a twelve and the dealer has a six, in which case anyone will tell you to stay and hope the dealer busts. He stays, the dealer has a two under, then pulls a six, and then a four, for a total of eighteen. The guy starts cheering and says, “Sixteen!”, trying to convince the dealer she has to pull another card.

It works; the dealer pulls a king, and then she looks down and counts twenty-eight. She immediately turns to the floor, who explains that the dealer had eighteen and the player has lost, and as the king was exposed, it has to be “burned” or discarded. The player begins screaming and cursing, but she takes the money and there’s nothing he can really do.

Now the player has a meltdown. He realizes that he can’t win but that in trying to confuse the dealer, that king would’ve been his next round. No guarantee it’d actually be a good hand, of course, but it has a better chance of being something good. He’s yelling and screaming, and the floor calls over the pit boss, who also has to call over the shift supervisor, who all explained that an exposed card has to be burned.

At this point, in front of everyone and on I don’t know how many cameras, the player screams that the money means nothing to him, throws his drink at the dealer, and then grabs about $3,000 of his chips and throws them against the ceiling. It’s raining chips everywhere. Security then grabs him. Some of the workers gather the chips they can and give them to him. He’s given his cash, escorted out, and then banned from the casino.

Sadly, though, he does not get a pair of shiny bracelets or a free car ride to the hotel with the orange jumpsuits.

The poor dealer held it together on the floor, but in the break room, she was sobbing. But since then, she has ended up becoming one of the better dealers.