Originally Posted by
AxelWolf
Originally Posted by
Dan Druff
This is pretty much my opinion about kewlJ.
Card counting is actually the easiest form of +EV gambling to learn and get fairly good at quickly. Something like poker takes a lot of experience and hours at the table. Machine APing requires a lot of experience, connections, and trial-and-error, as well as a lot of time/travel in some cases.
In 2000, I developed an interest in learning how to count cards. As embarrassing as it is to admit, I was a ploppy -EV gambler up until then, despite being old enough to gamble since the early '90s. (In my defense, I only played low limits, and only gambled once every few months, so I didn't lose much.)
Anyway, I read a text file on the internet about how to card count, spent a short time running hands through a free simulator, and voila, I was a +EV BJ player. Was way harder and more time consuming to get good at poker, which I attempted the following year.
My point is that if kewlJ wanted to learn how to become a profitable BJ player, it wouldn't have been hard for him to learn. So anyone believing he's a BJ ploppy spinning a phony tale about being a counter is just speaking from a place of hatred.
At the same time, kewlJ has also been caught in a lot of lies over time, both on this forum and elsewhere. Therefore, it is unclear if he really makes much (or anything) playing blackjack these days, especially given the increasingly difficult environment to count cards and get away with it. I don't even bother anymore, except at casinos where I don't care about getting banned.
kewlJ is basically the Boy Who Cried Wolf of these AP forums. He has lied so many times that it's impossible to believe any stories he tells, which means that even when he's telling the truth, we think he's lying. That's entirely his fault.
Regarding him possibly being Asian, who cares? It doesn't matter at all what race he is. That has no bearing on anything else. I don't understand why his race is such a big talking point, aside from people trying to figure out who he is in real life.
I think it would be fair to say he has made a modest living playing blackjack. It's not that hard if you're dedicated.
Two points:
1. The specifics of his claim, primarily to have been doing it for 6 figures for 15 years straight or whatever it is, all in LV and with minimal backoffs, is actually highly improbable (for a white male, and originally a young one at that, in particular).
Facing skepticism on this point he has tried to blur the details a bit and claim that he has been a road warrior all this time, etc., but it all doesn't add up either way.
2. The elephant in the room is that he's quite obviously a compulsive liar (faked death, fake backrooming, fake machine glitch, fake sports bonus whoring, etc.). So why believe him on anything of this nature?
I would also point out, it's actually very easy for a liar to soak up all the available info online and make a fake story for themselves. It's just a matter of having the motivation to do so... which normal people don't.
Some people have taken the position that he must be a counter because he knows a lot about counting, but all of the information he offers is just rehashes of what has been available on BJ21 and other forms for decades now.
Am I saying he neither is nor was in any sense a legitimate counter? No, because I have no evidence either way. But I do believe him being a 100% complete fraud is entirely in the cards.
Reply With Quote