Blackjack: friends as teammates

A solo player for most of my blackjack career, I have partnered with my friend and one of my housemates for two years now. At the beginning of this year we took in our third housemate, a poker player, who had expressed a desire to join our ‘team’. I thought I had posted about some of the issues involved with training him earlier this year and now that this second partner and teammate has decided that blackjack play is not for him, I wanted to update, but can’t find the thread. It’s possible maybe I didn’t post those experiences on this site as I had thought, but I am still going to post this update as I think this experience, even though it didn’t work out, of working with friends as teammates, might benefit others.

So end of last year, my third housemate, who is a pretty unsuccessful poker player (sounds mean but true) expressed a desire to join our team. The one stipulation that I insisted on was no poker while he was a member of our team. I couldn’t have him having access to team funds and still playing his weak poker game on the side for obvious reasons. He not only agreed, but indicated he was done with poker and ready to move on. I reluctantly agreed.

So we began training in December at home. Being a non-BJ player, I was starting from scratch, basic strategy and all. In January we hit the tables, with him playing half my stakes. Well, same minimum but only half my regular top wager (smaller spread). I worked with him a great deal, watching his sessions more than playing my own. At first he was slow to pick up some things and I was concerned. But I take responsibility for that as I am surely not the best teacher. I have trained one other player, my current partner, but he knew the game and knew counting fundamental. It was just a matter of getting him to do things my way. With, this second attempt it really was starting from scratch. So I think maybe it wasn’t as much as he was slow to catch on to some things as it was my expectations were too high.

But anyway after a couple months he really came around. Things seemed to be clicking and he made great progress. I moved him up to full stakes and he was doing quite well. His one issue was that he was not very strong dividing fractions, so some of his true count conversions involving fractions were not as precise as mine are.

But despite that his game was growing stronger and his results were good, actually above EV, while mine lagged below EV, he has decided that playing blackjack for a living is not his calling and wants to return to playing poker. So, we have broke our bank and I paid him his share of winnings for this partial year and he is off to resume his poker career. I can’t tell you that I am not greatly disappointed in this development. Nor can I tell you that I am not a little hurt and a little angry. I put a lot of time and effort into working with him, especially the first couple months of this year. Time and effort, that as a direct result of, my amount of play and subsequently EV suffered from. In other words, there was a personal financial cost.

I do feel a little bit used right now. As it turned out, he just got a little payday about 17 grand for 3 and a half months, (which incidentally I think is more than he has made in his poker career) and went running back to what he was doing. But, I guess, I can’t really be mad that Blackjack is not his passion as it is mine, nor can I be mad that poker is his passion, (unfortunately for him, I don’t think he’s very good at it).

So even though I am disappointed and hurt at the moment, I tend to get over things and move on quickly, so I hope it will not effect our friendship too much going forward. That is the real danger of getting involved in a team situation with friends. The benefit is that hopefully, you have less trust issues with a close friend, but if it goes bad, it can cost you a friendship. Luckily I don’t think that is the case here.

So the bottom line is I am back to my 2 man partnership with my other house mate and dear friend, which has been working real well for a couple years. He handles all our machine play activities and plays a limited amount of blackjack and I log the majority of the amount of our blackjack play by about a 3-1 ratio. In a way even though a partnership, since the majority of play comes from me, it is almost like I am still a solo player, which I do believe is my strength.

So what I take forward from this experience is do be careful when working with friends. This blackjack stuff is tricky business. Friends as teammates, has the potential to end badly (worse than my situation) and cost you a friend as well as teammate.

Interesting story.

Can I ask how you do bankroll splits? Eg, if you and him log the same amount of hours, but the initial bankroll was all yours, how do you split up the winnings?

Good post, KJ.

I think it was very generous of you to invest the time training him. But I wouldn't be too upset that he chose not to continue. What happened was probably your best possible outcome -- he was honest about not wanting to continue, and the money was divided as you had planned to. Team memberships have ended a hell of a lot worse than that.

Whenever you train a new employee or partner, in any business, there is a risk that he will leave shortly after training. That's part of living in a free society. In the business world, they have non-compete contracts when the training is especially valuable. In blackjack, there's no such thing. Be happy he didn't join a competing AP team!

I admire your continuing passion for blackjack AP. Blackjack is such a grind that it's tough to make a living at it.

very interesting story.

If I were you I wouldn't be too upset or mad at him. If you think about any type of business. There is always money that is lost when training new employees. Some employees stay and some don't. It is just a fact of business life.
If think this holds especially true for a BJ pro. I see threads all of the time where APs suggest that the common folk don't realize how mentally tough and tedious being an AP is. I would expect a higher percentage of failures compared to successes. I personally would die to be able to play BJ for a living. 6 months into it I might feel differently.

question about your friend, if he is a bad poker player how does he make his income?

Quote: AxiomOfChoice

Interesting story.

Can I ask how you do bankroll splits? Eg, if you and him log the same amount of hours, but the initial bankroll was all yours, how do you split up the winnings?

I am not going to get too deep into that, Axiom. When my first friend and I joined in a partnership, he had little to contribute to the bankroll, but I made him contribute what he could. Our first bankroll was 93/7 % split. But I treated him as though he was fully invested. A great deal for him and certainly not the way any other team would operate. But this was my dear friend, who had up and followed me to Vegas a year after I relocated to be part of my life. He is pretty much my partner outside of blackjack as well, although we don't put 'labels' on things like that. So anyway, he re-invested his winnings into the team partnership so at the start of this year he was fully invested.

Now partner number 2, a good friend and house mate, (without the real personal stuff...lol), was pretty much in same situation. He absolutely had no money to invest, so I fronted his share, which again is highly unusual and a real good deal for him. So in answer to your question, yes, he just got a percentage of our team win for this year equivalent to his EV contribution, while having zero money invested. Yes, that was pretty generous of me, and I don't think I would do it that way again, so anyone reading.....don't be lining up to get this deal. lol

I've just always wondered how people do this. Ignoring special cases, how would you usually split up money? For example, suppose that you knew me, trusted me, and were well aware that I was a talented player, but for whatever reason I had no money to invest (lost it all in a divorce or something). So, you wanted to partner with me, and we played equal hours, what would the arrangement be? Eg, if we started with $50k of your money, played equal hours, and turned it into $200k ($150k profit), and broke the bank, what would my share be?

Quote: AxiomOfChoice

I've just always wondered how people do this. Ignoring special cases, how would you usually split up money? For example, suppose that you knew me, trusted me, and were well aware that I was a talented player, but for whatever reason I had no money to invest (lost it all in a divorce or something). So, you wanted to partner with me, and we played equal hours, what would the arrangement be? Eg, if we started with $50k of your money, played equal hours, and turned it into $200k ($150k profit), and broke the bank, what would my share be?

I have heard of a few different way. The one that made the most sense to me, was that when you break the bank, investor get their investment back first. Winnings after expenses are then divided 50% going to investors by their percentage of investment and 50% going to players and there are several different ways this second 50% can be split up, time played, EV contribution ect. So basically a player only gets to draw his share from one pool (50% of earnings) while a player who invested will get to draw from 2 pools (investor pool as well as player pool). This encourages players to invest.

Now that second part is also tricky, because whether you divide the players share by money won or EV contributed is a big deal. If you divide by percentage of actual winnings, then the player who has played well, but just come out on the negative end of variance (and remember this is short-term) may not see anything and that is a major problem. Such a situation almost would encourage some 'wrongdoing'.

Anyway, as I said, this is my first venture into team play, so maybe someone more experienced with team play will respond and correct anything I got wrong.

KewlJ, sorry you had to go through that. I have many professional poker player friends who live in the Valley. Here is what I know. They live from bankroll to bankroll. They go bust more often than I take dumps. Their sole purpose in life is to grind at a job for a few months, make enough money to put together a roll and then attack the cash games around town. The problem with this is they almost always land up in games they either cannot afford or are over matched in anyway.

I think (and this is only my personal opinion), your friend saw your team as an easy way to put together some money for the WPT or WSOP seasons that lie ahead. There are many heads up tournaments for cheap at Rio that will allow you to win a sattelite seat which is what most of the grinders try to do.

I hope I'm wrong but this is solely based on my previous experience.

Quote: Tomspur

KewlJ, sorry you had to go through that. I have many professional poker player friends who live in the Valley. Here is what I know. They live from bankroll to bankroll. They go bust more often than I take dumps. Their sole purpose in life is to grind at a job for a few months, make enough money to put together a roll and then attack the cash games around town. The problem with this is they almost always land up in games they either cannot afford or are over matched in anyway.

Please don't take this the wrong way, but these people are not pros. They are wannabes at best, addicts at worst.

I know pro players who do very well (make a hell of a lot more than I do at my job). They are never remotely close to being broke, and never will be.

Quote: AxiomOfChoice

Please don't take this the wrong way, but these people are not pros. They are wannabes at best, addicts at worst.

I know pro players who do very well (make a hell of a lot more than I do at my job). They are never remotely close to being broke, and never will be.

I don't disagree with you at all, they are wannabee's who get in over their heads in cash games they cannot afford.

That was not my point though as Kewl's guy obviously doesn't belong in the "stable poker pro" category.

Another thing, for every 1 poker pro who doesn't go broke, there are 1000 who continually do so, even the bigger guys, the super players. At some point MOST of their eyes are too big and they fall in.....

But you are right, there are the select few who have good money management skills and who probably are still living off their online incomes that had to run into the millions of dollars for some of them.

Really interesting, kewlj. Hesitate to ask questions, but just a peek in the door of your world is pretty fascinating stuff, thanks.

Quote: kewlj

Yes, that was pretty generous of me, and I don't think I would do it that way again, so anyone reading.....don't be lining up to get this deal. lol

Too late. I'm already lined up.

@KewlJ

Do you really have the secret to play like a computer in LV for years? I've been doing this for a couple years all over LV from small to big strip casinos and it has not been good for long-term longevity. Especially on the strip with high limit, you must be buddies with many casino hosts and we probably have the same friends, because you know MGM properties are the only places to play on the strip! haha

I think you KNEW at the outset what would happen.

He liked poker. He was NOT through with it. He could do well at BJ or have some great luck at it and a "fair split" had to involve winnings rather than "adjusted winnings" unless you made a prior agreement.

You made no prior agreement regarding your time, your divided attention in the casino, your teaching time (irrespective of good skills or not), etc.

Nothing whatsoever wrong with using housemates and friends or friends of friends or lovers or ex-lovers ... just don't go into the situation blind. And have a written agreement and follow it.

What is so difficult about doing that first? Would have taken less time than typing your post. Though I am glad that you did type your post here.

Remember one thing: Whether its poker, the bottle, heroin, wild sex or raw onions for breakfast..... whatever promises they make... they will eventually go back to it. It is their nature. So make plans for it. And settle the books as agreed upon. Recoup your investment funds, your time and your risk-premium. Its a business, not a social event.

Quote: SOOPOO

First of all KEWLJ--- I think this might be the first time I think you might be missing the boat.... It seems to me that you trained your friend as a favor to help your friend, not to help yourself. If you were truly training a person for the purpose of joining your business, you would have had contracts with specific terms (like how long they would have to work after training to be vested in any profits). You did a friend a favor, it seems like he not only tried, but succeeded, and then just realized that it was not for him. I can't imagine anything that happened would threaten your friendship, nor should it.

This thread has been split, with the roommate or not discussion moved HERE. The comment above was from SOOPOO directly addressing the OP, and the part of his same comment addressing roommates went with the other thread.

Quote: beachbumbabs

Quote: SOOPOO

First of all KEWLJ--- I think this might be the first time I think you might be missing the boat.... It seems to me that you trained your friend as a favor to help your friend, not to help yourself. If you were truly training a person for the purpose of joining your business, you would have had contracts with specific terms (like how long they would have to work after training to be vested in any profits). You did a friend a favor, it seems like he not only tried, but succeeded, and then just realized that it was not for him. I can't imagine anything that happened would threaten your friendship, nor should it.

This thread has been split, with the roommate or not discussion moved HERE. The comment above was from SOOPOO directly addressing the OP, and the part of his same comment addressing roommates went with the other thread.

Yes, this thread was inadvertently hijacked by me and others. Good call Babs!