I thought I was a shill, but alas, wikipedia set my ass straight!
...but you do not have the right calling people SHILLS, just because they pointed out what was already posted.
LH
In gambling
Both the illegal and legal gambling industries often use shills to make winning at games appear more likely than it actually is. For example, illegal Three-card Monte and Shell game peddlers are notorious employers of shills. These shills also often aid in cheating, disrupting the game if the "mark" is likely to win. In a legal casino, however, a shill is sometimes a gambler who plays using the casino's money in order to keep games (especially poker) going when there are not enough players. (This is different from a "proposition player" who is paid a salary by the casino for the same purpose, but bets with their own money.)
Bless this thread for a plethora of reasons.
I for at least 6 years have spent so much time playing low limit poker at a local card club, I was misinformed and often considered myself a 'shill'. But this thread has corrected my belief. Reading this thread, vaguely about the 'definition' of certain online casino bonuses, led me to reconsider the definitions I apply to words, for example, hmmm, shill. In doing this, I think I was forced to reevaluate what I defined myself as.
I have for a few years played 'proposition' poker for a couple local card clubs, and one Indian casino. And many a time I have had to curb my tongue after busting a gambler from the game, raking his (and in a couple cases, her) last chips into my stack, only to immediately be under fire from a verbal assault from said loser. (Not calling them a loser per se, just, they lost in the instance referred to, lol)
Now take into consideration that at all four places I have ever 'worked' for the club, I had to wear a badge saying I was indeed a prop player.
Well, one of the first times this happened, in 2004 I think, I had busted a guy who had AA as his hole cards and had been complaining about the '%$cking black box' that was newly installed at this poker table to shuffle the cards. Well, I called in bad position to a ridiculously over sized pre-flop bet with JJ in my hand. The board came low cards and when I checked, he insta shoved his hand with a 'flicking' jesture from his right hand as he said, "All in!" I took a little longer to decide what to do, but had a gut feeling that he had AK or small PP. I was dead wrong, but I had a bunch of chips, and I knew this guy to be a chaser, "win here and he will likely rebuy, lose here and he will still give a lot of em back" was my thought process.
This was at a $1-1-2 NL table and I think I had bout $600 in front of me. He had the max buy in of $200, and so the dealer told us we could "open" our hands if we like, since I had him covered, and no more betting would occur. We both did and I immed. congratulated him thinking my 2 outer was basically dead...
And then the dealer burned and turned a TEN. He then burned and slid the river off the top of the deck, and flipped over a red jack. With a mixed board and a T on the turn, my set of J's was the best hand. And that river was the last straw.
This guy was a consistent loser, but one needs to know a little background before you can tell if he knows 'why'. I knew him to be ignorant of the reasons he was constantly rebuying, so teasing him was not only immature and out of the question, it also would have cost me my job.
Needless to say, he went bizerk and he kept coming back to the same thing, as eventually the floor manager and a security guard dragged him off. He kept saying, "I new the black box was working with the shill." He repeated this bs about 30 times.
I asked a 72 year old co-worker that day what a 'shill' was. He told me, "You are!" And then he started laughing. I did not read the implied sarcasm, as he was goading me bc that is what the angry and dissatisfied customer had called me. I thought he meant, "A shill is a prop player. A prop player is a shill." So ever since, I considered the word synonymous with a prop player. A couple regulars in a card club near SF even nicknamed me "Shill" after a dealer who was working at the first place I mentioned told the now locally infamous story one night after he got the job at this place...
But tonight, while wishing there were good games at the local clubs at 3am on a Monday night, I chose to stay home and play a little on the Cake network and read Casinomeister. Which led me to Wikipedia. Which led me to,
prop, proposition player
A player who gets paid an hourly rate to start poker games or to help them stay active. Prop players play with their own money, which distinguishes them from shills, who play with the casino's money.
Which is clearly different than a shill. (and possibly a stupid move, I could have been playing with the houses money? No one told me that!)
So tyvm
Inetbet etc thread. I always knew I was ignorant, but I was unaware to what depths. And here I am, less uninformed than just 2 hours ago!
