Pat KOs the Strip Casinos During the Morales/Barrera Fight

An eager crowd filled the MGM Grand hotel-casino arena on Saturday night to watch Erik Morales and Marco Antonio Barrera battle for the WBC super-featherweight title.

Barrera bested Morales, who was a 3-1 favorite, but the true odds defying activity in Vegas last night was performed by my old teammate Pat who, with a handful of his new cohorts, plied our premier cheating move, Savannah, across The Strip's roulette wheels. Pat and his crew walked away with a pile of winnings and received NO STEAM! (unwanted negative attention from casino surveillance)

While I won't disclose the amounts of money involved, Pat and his crew pulled in a nice five-figure sum. As Pat relayed his adventures from the night, I noticed a few changes that he has made to some of the terminology he uses in running his team. The Pinch move remains the same, but he kept referring to signals and gestures that were different from the ones we used to employ, ones which by and large I inherited from the cheating team I was originally initiated into by my mentor Joe. The signals are akin to ones used in sports, a brush on a chin, a swipe at the nose, and the ever-dreaded "Run" signal, which I'm glad to know is still a call out of the name "Chester Gallo."

As readers of my book will know, Savannah is a Pinch Move that sometimes requires a good deal of patience as you wait for the chosen bet to hit. Patience paid off well for Pat. He paid out a few hundred dollars after switching out his chips on losing bets, retaining high value checks hidden beneath the angled $5s, giving up paltry stacks of $5s. While we used to run the move with $5000 checks, Pat was mostly capping off $1000s only once successfully winning on a hidden $5000.

Another interesting note is that Pat, whose real talent I always considered to be taking the money off the table (claiming), has successfully moved into the background, playing the part of security (from a safe distance, keeping a watchful eye for any discomfort from the pit crew). Although I cannot argue with his running the security role, as it is the proper spot for the man with the most casino experience of his team, I do consider it somewhat of a shame that he is no longer regularly raking off the bets in person. This for one reason alone, Pat, who would've been a great actor, was THE BEST CLAIMER EVER, bar none.