Holy Rollers: The Card Counting Christians Who Beat Blackjack
Our American Stories
iHeartPodcasts
4.6 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 16 January 2026
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this episode of Our American Stories, one of the most successful blackjack teams in America was built around an unlikely bond: church friendships and trust. Colin Jones, founder of BlackjackApprenticeship.com, and David Drury, dubbed “the most notorious card counter in America,” tell how they learned to count cards, pooled bankrolls, and turned blackjack into a math-driven edge rather than pure gambling. They describe the discipline, long swings, disguises, and casino backoffs that come with winning, plus why honesty mattered when players were carrying huge amounts of cash. It is a strange double life, from church on Sunday to high-limit tables the next day.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.6 | Guaranteed Human. |
| 0:15.3 | This is Lee Habib, and this is our American stories. |
| 0:19.9 | And we tell stories about everything here on this show. from the arts to sports and from business to history, |
| 0:25.6 | and everything in between, including your stories. |
| 0:27.8 | Send them to Our American Stories.com. |
| 0:30.7 | They're some of our favorites. |
| 0:32.4 | One of the most successful blackjack teams in America is made up, surprisingly surprisingly of Christians. Here to tell the story |
| 0:40.0 | are two of the winningest players, Colin Jones, founder of Blackjack Apprenticeship.com, |
| 0:46.0 | and the player dubbed the most notorious card counter in America, David Jury. Here's David. |
| 0:53.5 | When I was maybe eight or ten years old, my father was a pastor of a church |
| 0:58.9 | and they were doing a big bonfire behind the church. And it was one of these events where you're |
| 1:03.9 | supposed to bring your rock records or your, you know, anything that is causing you to stumble and |
| 1:10.1 | you throw it in the fire and give a little speech. |
| 1:12.6 | And so I was an eight or ten year old kid and I said to my parents, what are we bringing to this fire? Because I want to throw something in it, you know? And they're like, well, we're the pastor. We don't have anything to throw the fire. I'm like, oh, come on. So we went all over the house and one of the things we found in the back of a pencil drawer was a single playing card. |
| 1:29.9 | And they said, well, okay, the things we found in the back of a pencil drawer was a single playing card. |
| 1:29.3 | And they said, well, okay, you can throw this in the fire. This represents gambling. |
| 1:33.3 | And at the fire, you know, it was my time and my dad spoke and said, you know, talked about gambling and I'm throwing this card in the fire. |
| 1:43.3 | I'm Colin and I've been a card counter for almost 20 years and I'm here with my good friend David. |
| 1:50.0 | I'm David and I've been a card counter for about, I guess about 15 years. |
| 1:56.0 | And for me, card counting started when I had just graduated from college with a math degree and not |
| 2:02.7 | really any ambition. And I was volunteering at a Bible camp and a friend Ben was up there. And he's |
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