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Profiles of Professional Blackjack Players and Experts

This page is dedicated to some of the most famous blackjack players or professionals in the world. This page should continue to grow and you will be able to read about what each person did or what kinds of books they wrote. You can also view some of their accomplishments and find their websites where you can possibly contact them. Also, you will find many other experts besides blackjack players. These will include groups of people, mathematicians, statisticians and scientists who made breakthroughs in this card game. A few examples of these include land mark discoveries such as the card counting systems or those who fathered winning strategies and more.

Browse through the directory of professionals below. This list will be ordered alphabetically to find famous people in blackjack easier. Click on their name to read more details about them.

Al Francesco - Al is one of the most important players and experts of blackjack. He was the one who invented the "Big Player" blackjack team concept and put Ken Uston under his wings. When Ken wrote about Al's secrets, in his book, this previously unknown system was broken by the casinos only after Al made millions from them. Francesco is also one of the orignal seven inaugural members of the Blackjack Hall of Fame.

Barry Meadow - One of the most famous harness racing and horse racing gamblers in the world. He wrote numerous books about racing, gambling, blackjack and casinos. Barry Meadow was also a writer of sitcoms, Sports Illustrated, weekly newsletters. He even played professional tennis and did standup comedy. Meadow also appeared in the Ultimate Blackjack Tour.

Big Chuck Gorson - Gorson is an impressive professional gambler who made a living making six figure income for 15 straight years by playing blackjack and other casino games. He also played in the Ultimate Blackjack Tour and appeared on many TV shows including The Casino.

Brian Zembic - Most famous for taking strange and odd wagers. One of his most famous bets was taking a dare by his buddies to get breast implants and keep them for a year in exchange for $100,000. He also appeared on "The Man Show" and is a professional magician and gambler. Brian Zembic is also an avid blackjack player and online gambler as you can see from his profile.

Cathy "Cat" Hulbert - A great female blackjack player who is dubbed "the best female gambler on earth". Cathy started off as a blackjack dealer who noticed a player making strange bet variations, who happened to be part of the famous Czech card counting teams. Hulbert became a member of Ken Uston's blackjack team and also became a great poker player who actually won the 1993 World Series of Poker bracelet.

Charlie Ergen - A blackjack player with a peculiar history. He was caught counting cards and was thrown out of casinos in Las Vegas. This man once worked at Frito Lay and eventually became the CEO of Echostar and eventually Dish Network, a company that runs satellite TV systems.

Edward Thorp - Author of "Beat the Dealer" and the man who practically invented card counting. Thorp is a mathematics genius who taught as professor for years while playing blackjack on the side. He also wrote books on beating the stock market and how he made 20% annual returns for nearly 30 years in the market. Edward is also one of the seven inaugural members inducted into the Blackjack Hall of Fame.

Erica Schoenberg - One of the top female players of blackjack and known as the "Blackjack Babe". She is also known as the "Poker Babe" as well because she is excellent at both. Erica is also very talented at mathematics and has attracted training from some MIT team members. As one of the most successful professional gamblers of all time, Schoenberg has won nearly a million dollars in her career.

Henry Tamburin - A doctorate in chemistry and great student of mathematics once lost all of his money at blackjack on a first trip to Las Vegas before they even walked into a hotel room. He got personal with blackjack and made it a quest to master the game and come up with optimized strategies to beat it. He eventually did and wrote many books and over 700 articles over the years to become a big name in the gambling world.

Hollywood Dave Stann - You may have seen Hollywood Dave Stann on Television numerous times. In fact, he is a professional actor and also a professional gambler with a talent for mathematics as well. The "bad boy of blackjack" is known for trash talking and using psychological warfare and acting along with his game to become a great and popular player in the world of blackjack.

James Grosjean - Most famous for his advancements in blackjack player's civil rights, bankrupting Griffin Investigations and challenging other big casinos in the court of law. Grosjean is also a mathematical genius who wrote the book "Beyond Counting" and was the youngest person ever inducted into the Blackjack Hall of Fame in 2006.

Keith Taft - One of the first people to develop hidden blackjack computers was Taft. He was a physicist who worked with micro-computers and developed high tech blackjack computers with microchips. He helped players win millions of dollars and may have been the first person to ever record digital video into computer with hidden cameras.

Ken Smith - A very skilled player in blackjack who owns one of the most famous blackjack websites on the internet along with his own message board where many pro blackjack players hang out at, including Ken. Smith is known for his legendary blackjack tournament strategies and skills as well as appearing on televised events such as the World Series of Blackjack and the Ultimate Blackjack Tour.

Ken Uston - This player was a famous and interesting player who wrote the books "The Big Player" and "Million Dollar Blackjack". He is also one of the first inaugural members during the founding of the Blackjack Hall of Fame, an expert card counter and the one who beat the casinos in court to make it illegal for casinos to bar card counters in Atlantic City.

Lawrence Revere - Revere was responsible for developing numerous card counting systems under his name and writing the best selling gambling book ever "Playing Blackjack as a Business". Lawrence played on both sides of the table as a dealer, professional gambler and even a pit boss. He is easily one of the greatest men of the game.

Max Rubin - One of the most famous faces in blackjack. Max has hosted and served as a commentor on countless television events related to blackjack, written a book and hundreds of articles in magazines and uses his skills as a consulting. He is actually one of the members of the Blackjack Hall of Fame and hosts the annual world class Blackjack Ball tournament.

Michael Konik - Konik is an professional blackjack and poker player who happens to also be a great entertainer. His passion has always been in arts, music and literature. Michael as spent years writing over 100 publications including "The Man with $100,000 Breasts". He has also participated in the World Series of Blackjack, World Blackjack Tour and six times in the World Series of Poker.

MIT Blackjack Team - The MIT blackjack team has a long and inspiring history. This article explains the history of the team that the movie "21" as based off of. Learn how the team began, when it was at a peak and who the people were that started the most famous blackjack team in the history of the game.

Sam Vaughn - A great player who started off in craps but began playing blackjack tournaments as his "second game". It turns out he won millions of dollars playing blackjack over the years, including a single million dollar grand prize at the Hilton Million Dollar Blackjack Tournament III series.

Stanford Wong - One of the greats in the sport of blackjack. Stanford has a Pd.D in statistics and knows the complex math behind the game. Wong also wrote many books about blackjack including "Professional Blackjack" and is an avid card counter. He found a system to beat the house after the single deck shoe was being replaced with four deck shoes at casinos to fight card counters. He is also one of the seven inaugural members inducted into the Blackjack Hall of Fame.