Anybody you can cheat, I can beat on the square. The bigger the game and the more known names are around, the less likely there is cheating. The times I encountered cheating, it was not in the games for outlaws, bookmakers, and road gamblers. You would be crazy to try to cheat these folks. There was a big home game in West Texas at a joint called the Shop. It was outlaw heaven. Crossroaders, scufflers, and skillful con men came from all over. They would strut up licking their chops and limp away licking their wounds. It was a big tough Hold 'em game. The same people who would cheat in other places were on their best behavior there.

There was no house dealer. There were ex-cons, folks who had killed hijackers that needed killing,and folks who made you want to be polite and charming. A gambler's reputation is one of the tools of the trade. If word hits the street you cheat, then you can be barred when the game is not hard. There is a lot of trouble caused by people that think they have been cheated. If you are honest, the word spreads. Same if you are a "wolf", a known cheater.

One of my mentors, Ace, taught me all about cheating at cards and dice. This made me a "bird dog", one who can catch cheaters. He'd give me demonstrations of all the different ways to cheat and what to watch out for. It made me eternally suspictous. I never take my eyes off the deck. I check the back of the cards for nicks, marks, daub, grease, and whatever. I look all around for shiny things on the table like cell phones that are being used as a mirror. That's called "playing the light." I look for finger bandages that might conceal mirrors. My cards are always protected from the railbirds. I assume people are trying to cheat in small ways, even in a casino. I have written about Ace.

Once, in 1975, I played in this huge poker game run by a con man called,the Senator. In order to play, I had to give him half my action. I'd win every week and he'd pay me part of the money. One night after the game broke up,the Senator suggests I play heads up with this tall guy who had only watched the game. Ace taught me that if a citizen challenges you to play your road game, try him on the cheap but keep eye-balling the proposition. The idea is that if he can beat you, you can pull up. If you can beat him, he may go off on a big number. I agree to play and thought the Senator wanted half my action but he declined. I wouldn't let the Sentator sit behind me because I thought he might "send me over." The tall guy was Jack "Treetop" Straus. He had already won one World Series bracelet. I only pulled out $400. We both shuffled and dealt very slowly where they would be no room for doubt about cheating. We both were very aggressive and I knew it would not last long. I flopped top pair with big slick and he flopped two pair with 8,9 off suit. He busted me. I told him, "I've enjoyed all of this I can stand."

A few weeks later, the Senator ran in Titanic Thompson's son to cheat me. Fine partner he was. By this time, the money was like monopoly money. The Senator was like crime. He didn't pay. He could really talk up the action. Young lawyers and accountants were losing thousands on credit. Everybody played out of the chip box. I didn't carry money to the game.

Titanic's son came by one time and passed out business cards and gave some phony name. Outlaw whisper joints were usually on a first name or road name basis. The first night he played, I noticed that he moved both hands up and down while he dealt. Ace had taught me that a cheater will use the move or the grip when he is not cheating to maintain consistency. From the first he touched the deck, I was bird dogging him. It is best to make it obvious that you are checking for cheating. I took the deck and ran my thump from the bottom to the top on the corner. This makes the cards fly by like the frames of an old movie. If any card is different from the rest, it will jump out. I took a card and held it at an angle up to the light until the glare removed the pattern. If there was paint or marks, they would stick out. He was moving his hands like he could deal seconds or bottoms. You need marks or to peek to make seconds usesful. Seconds make a little swoosh sound since a card is coming from between two cards.

The first two times Ti's son dealt, he flopped a flush. I was watching him like a paranoid hawk. The pots he won were not very large. I dismissed a cold deck because he would have put out some action hands and won a huge pot. He quit right after that, having only played a little over an hour. He went into some mumbo-jumbo explanation of where he had to be as if gamblers cared.

At the end of the night, the Senator asked me if I thought the guy cheated. I told him I didn't think so but that he might be planning to cheat.

The next week Ti's son played and won several pots. I got in a hand with him and was pushing the top two pair, Aces and Eights all the way. I just knew he had flopped a pair of Aces with a big kicker. When I moved in on him, he studied a real long time with his hand on his cheek. Then he suddenly brought both hands down to his hole cards. Now he had two aces in the hole for top trips. If he had the nuts, he would not study after I moved all in.

I called the Senator out in the hall. When something is wrong, you go behind the back of your partner or friend and run your thump hard across the middle of their backs. This is like the gambler's nine, one, one. It says something bad could happen. The Senator told me to go on home. He was Ti's son's partner also. Later, when I went around in a futile attempt to collect, I saw Ti's son and Dandy Dan, a big-time traveling con man both trying to collect from the Senator. I saw Jack Straus a few times around Las Vegas. I asked him one time what happened to the Senator. He said,"He sleeps with Jimmie Hoffa." I learned later that Titanic's son was a real master at all forms of cheating. He held out a card between his hand and his cheek and kept cards behind his neck. He could cold deck out of the shirt jacket that was unbuttoned half way down.

In casinos, you will run into partners, even teams. In no-limit Texas Hold 'em, with a cheap enough blind, partners can be like a partner in a three-legged, tow-sack race. They get in each other's way. If they both get in the pot, they are giving you two to one on the money. I look hard at the player's to see who might be partners. Are they kinfolks? Demographically similar? Partners have a better edge in limit and are stronger than a garlic milkshake in sit and gos.

If someone is cheating, I never make a scene. However, they are cheating the good players and destroying the reputation of the game. It is the house man's problem.

Only once in thirty-five years or so, did I see a guy run in a cold deck at the Shop. It was really late at night and the two house man had gone home. I saw this guy in the bathroom with the door slightly ajar running up a hand.

The rich drunk made four eights and the big stack made four kings. I am not a tough guy. I went on home.

Where people deal themselves, they will pick up a few cards and kill them on the bottom of the deck. This is effective in gin and low ball. If you put four kings on the bottom in gin, you may each be dealt two kings but the bottom stacker will know it. This locating of cards is the hardest cheating move to detect and prevent.

Non-gambling friends ask me about cheating. They have this misconception. Real gamblers have to be more honest than the public in general. Bets are verbal and your word is your bond. In all my years I rarely saw any disagreements.
You are leaning over backwards to prove your honesty to the players who you want to come back.

The handful of cheaters I encountered were also tough guys with guns. They moved from town to town.

My dear friend the Mule used to do a move called "the Hat". This is done any place. He would pull out a deck of cards and ask another guy at the bar to deal him a poker hand...stud or Hold 'em. When he cut, he'd cap the deck with four cards, two aces and two kings. The sucker would deal himself two kings and think it was on the square. The Mule put the hat on marks mostly in dim after hours joints but he did put the hat on a man at Binion's celebrated mahogany bar duing the World Series. However, he would never cheat at the Shop.

It is a courtesy of the trade for professional gamblers to exchange information about who cheats and what is their move, who borrows money and keeps it, which markers are sure and solid. In casinos, we are all living under the-eye-in-the-sky. Cheating is mighty risky.

tl;dr

It's worth reading.