First of all, everyone with any level of gambling skills understands and respects the difficulty of winning at roulette. Albert Einstein himself, who most people agree was not exactly a garden-variety moron, is reputed to have stated, “You cannot beat a roulette table unless you steal money from it.” He also said, “God does not play dice with the universe,” so it’s just possible old Albert had games of chance on the brain. Is it possible the man who devised the theory of relativity was a hopeless gambling addict? Let’s not go there. We should get back to the matter at hand.

The numerous even money bets that are available in a game of roulette have tempted more than a few players over the years to try to beat the game by using one or more variations of what’s known as the “Martingale” betting strategy. With this approach, the gambler doubles the bet after every loss, so that the first win would recover all previous losses, plus win a profit equal to the original bet. Yet many reputable expert will tell you that this betting strategy is fundamentally flawed and can only lead to an empty wallet. (Yours, not the casino owner’s.)