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Card sharp

 
Poker Guide: Card Shark
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Describes a player that is extremely good at poker.

SoundPoker Says: Most of the time these "card sharks" play poker professionally so one should cautious and weary when playing against someone with this label.

See Also: Bounty, Fish, Pigeon

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Wikipedia: Card sharp
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"Card shark" redirects here. For the TV game show, see Card Sharks.
The Cardsharps, ca. 1594, by Caravaggio
Gerard van Honthorst: The Cardsharks

A card sharp (informally cardsharp or cardshark) is a person who uses skill and deception to win at poker or other card games.

The label is not always intended as pejorative, and is sometimes used to refer to practitioners of card tricks for entertainment purposes. In general usage, principally in American English and more commonly with the "shark" spelling, the term has also taken on the meaning of "expert card gambler who takes advantage of less-skilled players", without implication of actual cheating at cards (in much the same way that "pool shark" or "pool hustler" can (especially when used by non-players) be intended to mean "skilled player" rather than "spindler").

A card sharp (by either of the gambling-related definitions) may be a "rounder" who travels, seeking out high-stakes games in which to gamble. The 1998 film Rounders dramatically illustrates this lifestyle.

The most common trick of a card sharp is called springing which is simply transferring a deck of cards from one hand to the other. You "spring" one card at a time but in a fast motion.

Contents

Methods

Wiki letter w.svg This section requires expansion.

Card sharps who cheat or perform tricks use methods to keep control of the order of the cards or sometimes to control one specific card. Most, if not all, of these methods employ sleight of hand. Essential skills are false shuffles and false cuts that appear to mix the deck but actually leave the cards in the same order. More advanced techniques include culling (manipulating desired cards to the top or bottom of the deck), and stacking (putting desired cards in position to be dealt).[citation needed]

Dealing the cards can also be manipulated, by dealing either the bottom card from the deck or the second one from the top instead of the top card. These are called Bottom dealing and Second dealing, respectively. Dealing may also be done from the middle of the deck, known as the middle deal or center deal, but this is not as common.[1][2]

Etymology and usage

According to the prevailing etymological theory, the term "shark", originally meaning "parasite" or "one who preys upon others" (cf. loan shark), derives from German Schorke/Schurke ("rogue" or "rascal"), as did the English word "shirk[er]". "Sharp" developed in the 17th century from this meaning of "shark" (as apparently did the use of "shark" as a name for the fish), but the phrase "card sharp" prefigures the variant "card shark".[3][4][5][6][7] The original connotation was negative, meaning "swindler" or "cheat", regardless of spelling, with the more positive connotations of "expert" or "skilled player" arising later, and not supplanting the negative ones.[5][8][9][3] "Card sharp" and "card shark" are synonymous,[5][7][10][11][4] although American English is somewhat, but informally, beginning to favor "shark" as a positive term versus "sharp" as a negative one.[7][12][13] (However not even all American dictionaries agree with this,[5] and some suggest the opposite.)[14]

In popular culture

Film

Card sharps are common characters in caper films, since the questionable legality of their hobby also plays well with that of their occupation. Notable examples of such films are:

Television

  • On Mission: Impossible, members of the Impossible Missions Force, particularly Rollin Hand, would often use their card sharp skills as part of a mission.
  • Sanford and Son featured an episode where card sharps defeated Lamont at poker; while he went to get drinks, Fred was able (through a specially marked deck and one of his many pairs of reading glasses) to defeat the card sharps and win Lamont's money back.
  • Stage magician and actor Harry Anderson (of Night Court fame) made several appearances on Cheers as card sharp "Harry the Hat".
  • On Prison Break, the character Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell is an expert card sharp, to the point where "there are maybe five people in this country who can do what I do with a deck of cards"; while this may have been an exaggeration, T-Bag uses this skill successfully in the episode "Bluff".
  • On an episode of Friends, Ross was debating with his doppleganger Russ about the correctness of the term "card shark" vs. "card sharp".

References

  1. ^ Maskelyne, John Nevil (1983). Sharps and Flats. Casino Press. ISBN 0-87019-049-0. 
  2. ^ Johnson, Karl (2005). The Magician and the Cardsharp: The Search for America's Greatest Sleight-of-Hand Artist. Henry Holt and Co.. ISBN 0805074066. 
  3. ^ a b Harper, Douglas (2001). "Online Etymology Dictionary search results". EtymOnline.com. pp. entries "shark" & "sharp". http://www.etymonline.com/. Retrieved 2007-07-08.  – gives the negative meaning only, for both
  4. ^ a b Hawkins, Joyce M. (ed.); Allen, Robert (ed.) (1991). The Oxford Encyclopedic English Dictionary (hardback ed. ed.). New York: Clarendon Press. pp. 1334. ISBN 0-19-861248-6.  – gives only the negative meaning for both; labels negative verb "to sharp" archaic.
  5. ^ a b c d Chapman, Robert L. (ed.) (1983). New Dictionary of American Slang. New York: Harper & Row. pp. 380.  – gives both positive and negative meanings for both "shark" and "sharp", labels them synonymous in this context, and indicates that positive sense of "shark" arose much later than the negative meaning, and later than it did for "sharp"
  6. ^ Partridge, Eric (1983). Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English. New York: Greenwich House. pp. 614. ISBN 0-517-414252.  – gives only negative meaning for "shark", and gives "sharper" as synonymous, without addressing the shorter form "sharp"
  7. ^ a b c McKechnie, Jean L. (ed.) (1971). Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged. New York: Simon & Schuster. pp. 274, 1668. ISBN 0-671-41819-X.  – gives both meanings for both terms and even for the obsolete "sharker", but provides only the swindler definition for "card sharp" and both definitions for the "card shark" version, thus contradicting itself at the "sharp" entry
  8. ^ Onions, C.T. (ed.) (1994). The Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology (hardback ed. ed.). New York: Oxford at the Clarendon Press. pp. 817. ISBN 0-19-861112-9.  – gives only the negative meaning for both "shark" and "sharp"
  9. ^ Weekley, Ernest (ed.); Scott, Anne (ed.) (1911). New Gem Dictionary of the English Language. London: Collins. pp. 418.  – current around time that "shark" gained a positive sense, gives only negative meaning for both
  10. ^ Kipfer, Barabara Ann (ed.); Princeton Language Institute (eds.) (1999). Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus in Dictionary Form (Second Ed. (paperback ver.) ed.). New York: Dell Publishing. pp. 306, 786. ISBN 0-440-23513-8.  – gives both meanings for both
  11. ^ "Dictionary.Reference.com search results". Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Lexico Publishing Group. 2007. pp. "sharp" dfn. 36 & 37, "shark" dfn. 2-1 & 2-2. http://dictionary.reference.com/. Retrieved 2007-07-08.  – gives both meanings for both, with negative meaning being primary for both, positive meanings informal
  12. ^ Soukhanov, Anne H. (sr. ed.) (1994). Webster's II: New Riverside Dictionary (hardback ed. ed.). Boston: Riverside Pub. Co.. pp. 1072. ISBN 0-395-33957-X.  – gives both for "shark", only negative for "sharp" and "sharper"
  13. ^ Guralnik, David B. (ed.) (1982). Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language (Revised) (Revised Ed. (paperback ver.) ed.). New York: Warner Books. pp. 547. ISBN 0-446-31450-1.  – gives both for "shark", only negative for "sharp"
  14. ^ "American Heritage Dictionary of the English language (online Fourth Ed.)". Bartleby.com. Houghton Mifflin. 2000–2006. pp. "sharp" dfn. noun 3 & "shark" dfn. noun 2. http://www.bartleby.com/61/. Retrieved 2007-07-08.  – gives both meanings for both, with positive being primary for "sharp" but negative for "shark"

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