You may have heard the term ‘whale’ used in gambling or casino contexts – or even when related to video gaming. But what exactly does this mean? How much is a whale likely to spend on a trip to a casino, and when did the term first come into use?
We are about to go whale hunting to find out the answers to these questions and more…
The term whale is interchangeable with ‘high-roller’ or even the lesser-used ‘cheetah’ to describe a gambler who places extremely large bets. To qualify as a whale you would need to be dropping a minimum of $50,000 on the casino floor in a night, and that can run into hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars depending on how deep the player’s pockets are.
It’s not known exactly when the term ‘whale’ was used to describe these high-stakes players, but it appears to have come into common usage around the end of the twentieth century. Weak poker players are commonly referred to as ‘fish’, to be preyed upon by the stronger players – the ‘sharks’. It’s not that much of a leap to ‘whales’ as being the biggest fish of all. (Yes, we know whales are mammals but you get the point!)
The Biggest Australian Casino Whale
Australian media tycoon Kerry Packer is often mentioned as one of the biggest whales in the history of casino gaming. He is reputed to have won $33 Million AUD (that’s around $20M USD) over the course of a weekend at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, after which he tipped members of staff a cool million apiece. And that was in 1997, when a million dollars was worth something! His big win occurred while playing multiple games of blackjack at the same time, and it is a record win which is unlikely to be surpassed anytime soon. That’s not the kind of luck you can rely on though, and there are plenty of stories of big losses for Mr Packer too, including going through around $10 million at the London Hilton in just one night.
Rise and Fall of Archie Karas
Archie Karas came from humble stock in Greece, but in later life would embark on an incredible winning streak at the gaming tables of Las Vegas that became known as ‘The Run’. Karas was something of a pool shark from a young age, and later earned a reputation as a stellar poker player. His most spectacular run of success came in the early 1990s, when he somehow managed to turn $50 into $40 million due to a combination of skill, nerve and no little luck on the Vegas poker tables. His game of choice was ‘Razz’, a form of stud poker that rewards the lowest-value hands. The good times couldn’t last forever though, and in the end he gambled through that hard-won fortune, eventually ending up blacklisted from every casino in Vegas which put an end to his rollercoaster career.
As a general rule of thumb, the best advice is to only wager money you can afford to lose at the casino, so never try to emulate the betting patterns of a whale unless you have a bank balance to match. Better still, why not play for free at a social casino where you will never need to make a purchase and can still enjoy all the fun of the games!
