If you recall my last post I discussed what exactly insurance is in blackjack. This was my opener to my overall explanation that insurance can in fact be used in the grand scheme to make money from blackjack. But such a trick is not for the newly green players of blackjack. And it is not for online blackjack play, but that is because card counting is necessary to turn insurance to your advantage.
Blackjack is one of those casino games that players can use strategy to turn the odds in towards them. Card counting is a blackjack strategy of skill that can actually allow the player to turn the game’s overall odds in their favor and beat the house. This is because card counting allows the player to have a good idea of whether the remaining deck is rich in high or low cards. It is that same principle that allows card counting blackjack players to actually take advantage of insurance.
Remember from my last post that I said that all insurance is, is a side bet on whether or not the dealer’s hole card will turn out to be a 10 value card.
This translates over to card counting like so: 10 value cards are considering high cards. If, through counting cards, a blackjack player knows that the remaining cards are rich in high cards—meaning rich in Aces and 10 value cards—it means that the chances of the dealer’s hole card being worth 10 are increased. This is similar to how the chances of a player being dealt a natural blackjack are increased when the remaining cards are rich in high cards.
So the beginning of our blackjack strategy for taking advantage of insurance is to use card counting. And that means developing your skills in counting cards. But do not run off to the casino, counting cards and taking insurance if the deck is rich in high cards—there is one more piece that goes along with this blackjack strategy…