Poker Strategies
After receiving pocket cards, you are immediately faced with a choice: play your cards and either raise or call the blinds, or fold.
Practice Matters
Pegging: A very old marking method which is sometimes still used.
Pegging: A very old marking method which is sometimes still used. Here the cheater uses the principle of Braille and is able to feel rather than see the marks. When he pegs, the sharper shows up at the game with a Band-Aid on his thumb or finger. This hides a sharpened thumbtack whose point penetrates the bandage and with which the cheat pricks the cards, usually only aces and kings, in the right places. A prick applied to the face of a card raises a small bump on the card's back. When the cheat deals, the thumb of the hand holding the deck feels the bump and he second-deals, retaining the high card for himself or a confederate. Your tactile sense is just as sensitive; run a finger over the card backs now and then to satisfy yourself that the cards aren't pegged; when any player has a bandaged finger, be sure to do it.
Sanding: Another method of edge marking, also requiring a
Sanding: Another method of edge marking, also requiring a bandage. There is a slit in the bandage and beneath it a piece of fine sandpaper. The cheat pulls the card's edge along the slit. Card edges become grayed with use, and the sandpaper cleans the dirt off, supplying a white edge that stands out clearly.