A couple of days ago, one of the pit bosses shared with me his money management betting system. In a nutshell, it supposedly works by betting on both Banker and Player every hand and increasing the losing bet one unit up to a max of four. I tried it for a few hands but quit when I hit even, unwilling to test a four unit bet with real money.
However, the money management part of it got me thinking about my own flat bet approach and whether or not I should incorporate it and if so, how. Since streaks and alternating Banker and Player sequences come up in every shoe, the idea of leveraging winning bets playing avant dernier during those times seems to make sense.
Taking the table limit as your target, simply divide back down to determine your bet order. For example, if the ceiling is $1,000 then a five-bet plan would go something like this: First bet, $65 (rounding up rather than an exact split of $62.50). If you win, then let the bet ride at $125. If you win again, then $250 and so forth until your betting the $1,000 max every hand until it loses. Once you lose, reset back to $65 and repeat. The object here is to only bet your winnings, never your principal. That way, when you catch a streak or sequence you have an opportunity to earn more than by flat betting (or so it seems).
If there’s a “fly in the ointment,” I suspect it’s the ratio of ceiling target bet to base that could be too high. Instead of five-bet, perhaps three-bet would work better and sustain more wins than losses. In that case, the target amount either has to come down or the base needs to come up. In other words, a $25 bet will double up only to a ceiling of $100 in three-bet and go no higher for subsequent bets before reset. The idea again being the gradual accumulation of more units while winning to offset whatever losing base bets go out.