BUSTER BLACKJACK

Is This Bet A Good One?

When playing Blackjack at your favorite casino, you have probably noticed that they offer side bets in addition to your Blackjack wager. This month we will take a look at the Buster Blackjack wager. This bet wins if the dealer breaks his Blackjack hand. The payout depends on how many cards the dealer takes to break his hand. Is this a good bet?

If you are a perfect Basic Strategy player, the casino has about a 0.57% advantage over you, meaning that you would lose 0.57 cents for every $100 dollars you put in play over the long run. If you play the Buster Blackjack wager it puts your disadvantage for the wager to around 4.7%. That’s quite a difference! I have friends that always play side bets every hand, then can’t figure out why they never win. I personally never play side bets because beating the game of Blackjack is hard enough without adding an additional way to lose.

The dealer only breaks about once every four hands on average. When they do break, they will bust with three or four cards about 25% of the time which has a payout of two to one. If you were wagering the Buster bet every hand for $10 it would cost you $40 to get one payout of $20 on average, losing $20 per four hands in addition to your Blackjack wager. That’s not a very good wager!

There are some payouts with the Buster bet that pay larger amounts but the chances of seeing the dealer bust using more than four cards are slim to none. For example, the chances of the dealer taking five cards to break is .0204. Six cards to break is .00264. Seven cards to break is .00021. And eight cards to break is .00001. I hate to be the flat tire on your hayride but the recreational player would probably never see an eight card bust. While it would be fun to hit a large payout, the average player doesn’t realize just how rare these events are when placing these wagers.

It is interesting to note that the casino edge changes on the Buster bet when different cards are removed from the deck. Removing an Ace, Two or Three changes the casino edge to .05112. While removing a Five through King changes the edge to around .0453. If you are dead set on playing the Buster bet it is a good idea to notice what cards have been removed from the deck. If there are no Aces left in the remaining cards to be played it would be difficult for the dealer to break with more

If you are a recreational player you might want to rethink about ning session. I have had many playing sessions where I was the only player who came out ahead because I was the only player at the table who wasn’t playing side bets.

The average player who plays side bets is giving the casino a 25% advantage over their play. The casinos use side bets to boost their profits on their Blackjack games. If you have been losing at the Blackjack tables, try skipping the side bets and see what a difference it makes to your bottom line. $

Writer TJ Jorgensen has been a professional Blackjack player for over 25 years. He is well known for his tournament play and has beaten some of the top tournament players in the world. He has also won the World Series Of Blackjack. His newest book “How To Become A Blackjack Jedi” is available online at Amazon.com.