Venetian replaces poker card pitching with slide dealing

In brief

• The Venetian introduced slide dealing across its 50-table poker room in Las Vegas.
• The method keeps cards close to the felt instead of pitching them through the air.
• The operational trade-off is straightforward: less card exposure, with a new technique for dealers and players to learn.

The change is a useful example of a physical process responding to smaller recording devices. It does not depend on a new software platform; it changes the moment when sensitive information might become visible.

What changed on the floor

World Casino Directory reports that the Venetian became the first poker room on the Las Vegas Strip to adopt slide dealing room-wide. In the new process, dealers use a shoe and move the cards across the playing surface instead of tossing them through the air.

GamblingNews says the goal is to reduce the chance that a hidden camera positioned near table height captures a player's hole cards while a pitched card is briefly airborne.

Training is part of the control

The Venetian's poker operations director said dealers received training and practice time before implementation. The procedure still depends on consistent hand movement, table setup and supervision, so deployment quality matters as much as the written rule.

South Point adopted slide dealing in August, before the Venetian's change. That makes the Venetian first on the Strip, not first across Las Vegas.

What operators should measure

A room considering the same change should record exposed-card incidents, misdeals, hands per hour, dealer fatigue and player complaints before and after rollout. Camera placement and device rules should be reviewed at the same time; dealing technique is one layer rather than a complete security system.

The reports do not identify a specific cheating incident at the Venetian that triggered the change. They also do not provide measured results on game speed or exposure reduction. Those figures are needed before the procedure can be compared with other table-security controls.