Thomas Hyland

Who is Thomas Hyland?

Thomas Hyland is a well known card counter at the casino card game of blackjack. Since 1979, he has also been the manager of the longest-running blackjack team in history.

In a 2002 Blackjack Forum interview, Tommy Hyland reported that he started his playing career in 1979 after having been inspired by Lawrence Revere's book Playing Blackjack as a Business. His original blackjack team had four players who each put $4000 into the team bankroll. The team was launched when Atlantic City casinos offered blackjack with a rule called Early Surrender, which gave knowledgeable players an edge off the top. Within a few months, the Hyland team had built their bankroll to roughly $50,000.

When conditions worsened for card counters in Atlantic City, Hyland's original teammates headed to Asia to play. But Hyland stayed in Atlantic City and recruited golf buddies to form a new team. Among the professional gambling techniques Hyland's blackjack team has used through the years are computer play, shuffle tracking and ace sequencing, all methods that gain players a higher edge than card counting and make it more difficult for casinos to detect winning players.