Monday, February 11, 2013

The ‘King’ Kompromised

Animal Kingdom must love to train.

Saturday’s Grade 1 Gulfstream Park Turf Handicap race was his third race in a year’s time and, sadly, we won’t get to see him on American soil again. For, you see, this unconventional horse has an unconventional farewell campaign, a truly global one. (Well, he ain’t goin’ to France. C’mon, Graham’s a Brit. That stuff goes deep, man, deep. Just try and say Horatio Nelson in a Parisian Café and see how many croissants get thrown at you.)

Animal Kingdom is going to rack up as many frequent flier miles as Hilary Clinton. Animal Kingdom will bid farewell to the United States and head to Dubai, a flight that will take upwards of 7,000 miles. From there he’ll go to Royal Ascot, another 4,000 miles or so, and retire with possibly the most eclectic racing resume since Curlin.

Frankly, after what Graham Motion did with Animal Kingdom in 2012 was worth all the Eclipse votes Steve Asmussen got (2). AK was on the shelf for 259 days with a gut-wincing pelvic fracture. He came back and was arguably the best horse in a Mile-field and lost just a 1 ½ lengths to Wise Dan, the eventual Horse of the Year.

And on Saturday, his chance at victory wasn’t so much compromised by trip, but by tactics. Jockey Joel Rosario made Shaquille O’Neal look more capable. Too bad that’s Animal Kingom’s North American-send off, but what are you going to do?

The horse is five years old and a Kentucky Derby winner, which begs the question: why the hell are you still around? Don’t you have something better to do? Like, I don’t know, eat, drink, and “be merry”?

The last Kentucky Derby winner to be this old and to still be running was Funny Cide, and he only did because he was gelded and about—if not more—curmudgeonly than his trainer Barclay Tagg.

Animal Kingdom is an outlier. He won the Derby, then he got hurt. He came back. Then he got hurt. He came back again to finish to second. He’s got 20 owners. He prefers grass. He’s actually … The Most Interesting Horse in the World.

“He speaks English, in horse.”

“He’s a hunter and a jumper, but mainly a hunter.”

“He was unimpressed by War Horse … He is … the Most Interesting Horse in the World.”

“I don’t always run on dirt, but when I do, I prefer Kentucky.”

Facebook lit up after his loss to Point of Entry, mainly ripping Joel Rosario, namely on Alex Brown’s thread (go buy his book). He gallops horses at Fair Hill in Maryland and is practically roommates with Animal Kingdom, playing darts, drinking room temperature beer, dreaming of Pipa.

What I can’t stand is how people on this thread (not Brown)—one in particular—defended Rosario. And this goes for people who defend jockeys who make bad moves. They always say, “He’s the only who could know since he’s on the horse!” “The pace was slow!” “He has to make split-second decisions!”

So what? You know who else has to make split-second decisions? Quarterbacks, and we rip on them for bad throws. Batters, and we rip on them for grounding into a double play to end the game with the bases juiced. LeBron James, for missing a game-winning shot. Tiger Woods, for infidelity and missing putts.

So the people who defend jockeys need to stop being so insular. They are athletes, great athletes, but when they make mistakes, they need to get raked over the coals just like any other athlete in any other sport.

The beauty of this game—for jockeys—is they always get another chance (health permitting). Rosario is a quality talent, but don’t condescend and say things like, “Did anyone not notice that there was NO pace in this race ….They went the first quarter in 25 and the next in 25 2/5 .. He’s[Animal Kingdom] an off the pace horse in a ZERO paced race! If Rosario didn’t press, then they would have gone the ¾ in almost 1:16, and tried to close into a hors that had just been galloping.”

The pace was slow and Animal Kingdom wasn’t trailing by 15 lengths, but four. He didn’t move up to press the pace, he flat-out stole it. He used his turn of foot four furlongs too soon.

No matter. These things happen. One down, two to go.

Maybe in a few weeks he’ll break his Meydan, no?

If you or a loved one—or an enemy you’re looking to lure into your confidence—would like a hardcover, first edition book, I’m giving away (while supplies last, limit one per person) copies of Six Weeks in Saratoga: How Three-Year-Old Filly Rachel Alexandra Beat the Boys and Became Horse of the Year. If interested, email me at and let me know how you would like it inscribed. The only catch is I ask you to review it on Amazon. That’s it! What a world!

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Thursday, February 07, 2013

Champion Handicapper goes to …

Now that the Eclipse Awards are in the rear-view mirror, what better time to talk about the Eclipse Awards than now?

Naturally, in three weeks or so I’ll be sure to start talking about the Super Bowl and my two theories for the power outage. 1. Producers of Animal Planet’s Puppy Bowl IX pulled the plug in the Big Easy (the timing was too perfect. The lights go out and, what’s this, the Puppy Bowl starts? Follow the money …

2. The more plausible of the two solutions is this: it was Bane. We’ll the proper authorities figure it out.

Since we are a site that pays a certain degree of homage to the great and powerful horse player, I figured this idea would stoke your fires: Champion Handicapper. What is this sport without the horse player? And why not honor him?
The Eclipse Awards has become the annual ceremony to honor the “Big 5” trainers and Adena Springs. The Eclipse Awards recognize the best journalism of the year. It’s high time the other branch of horse racing gets its due.

The branches, just to get a bit didactic here, are horses, horsemen, journalists, and the horse player. This is a fair order of descending importance (and by that I mean perceived importance. We all know how important the horse player is. Actually, in the grand scheme, I’d put the horse player above the journalist.). Though the weight of the sport comes out of the pockets of the lowly horse player, gets its increasingly sparse coverage from its writers, so that what? The top tier may reap the rewards? Let’s take back the night.

The League of Handicappers, a nice comic-booky name. Register for the League. That’s all it takes to be a pro. Just sign up. But you’re in the pool with the big boys, the heavy hitters, and the small-fry blogger.

Through the League, every wager is recorded, every type of wager, at every track. Rules, you have to play at least five different tracks in a given year. Maybe John Pricci picked the most pure winners of the year, but Top Turf Teddy hit two Pick 6s and a Pick 4 on Derby Day.

It doesn’t matter how much money you actually win, that’s not a product of skill (though it can be). I wouldn’t much care of the guy who goes ALL-ALL-ALL. In fact, the League keeps track of how many times you’re inclined to use the ALL button. Sometimes it’s necessary, but this will keep any billionaire playboys from “buying the title”. Eligibility for the League, and thus to be considered for the Eclipse, needs to go to most skilled player. Already, the parallels can be drawn to the other disciplines.

Who wins the Champion Trainer? Going back 18 years, six trainers have one the award. Six. (Todd Pletcher 5, Bobby Frankel 4, Bill Mott 3, Bob Baffert 3, Steve Asmussen 2, Dale Romans 1). All these trainers have the power of numbers on their side. It helps to hit bullseyes when you have 100 darts to throw at the board when some of your competition might only have 10 darts with mangled flights and chipped points.

Just as the greater number of horses a trainer has increases his or her chances, so too does an increased bankroll. These things can be overcome. Horseman still need to be skilled. So too does the horse player. While exact monies wagered will be kept hidden and only known by the head of the mainframe, all that matters is picking winners and cashing exotics from tracks all over the country to prove you’re not just a one-track wonder.

I’d say that some of the days would have to include the marquee ones on the schedule, but that would take care of itself. Those are the days where you’re likely to catch an 18-1 horse or a favorite at 3-1.

Over the course of a calendar year, the numbers won’t lie and it will be put to a vote. And the winner is …

If you or a loved one—or an enemy you’re looking to lure into your confidence—would like a hardcover, first edition book, I’m giving away (while supplies last, limit one per person) copies of Six Weeks in Saratoga: How Three-Year-Old Filly Rachel Alexandra Beat the Boys and Became Horse of the Year. If interested, email me at and let me know how you would like it inscribed. The only catch is I ask you to review it on Amazon. That’s it! What a world!

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Tuesday, January 29, 2013

99 Problems but a mount ain’t one

Well, I’m assuming Russell Baze has some problems. We all do and there's barely enough booze to deal with it. And jockeys, lordy lordy, have some STUFF to deal with. You have to applaud Animal Planet. What subset of athlete is more interesting than jockeys? If HBO had a reality show the likes of Hard Knocks for jockeys, I think horse racing could get a ratings boost. Onward …

Baze knows this 50,000 times over.

This past weekend, aboard a horse named Finish Rich in NYC (c’mon, Finish Rich in NYC? This is one of the more unintentionally insensitive names for a horse. I’m extending this name to Wall Street, but, for all I know, the horse is owned by a falafel cart owner.)

Baze is 37 years into his riding career and rides every day with the passion and energy of a rider looking to earn his chops. Fifty thousand mounts in 37 years, that’s 1,351 per year. He’s won 11,839 races, for a 37-year win percentage of 24 percent. That’s very DRFese, but you handicapping-types get that.
To give you an idea of how long he’s been at it, just read this: Baze took his first mount during the administration of Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau. I mean, how old does that make you feel?

Jesus was just 1,975 years old.

The Death Star hadn’t even been built yet. More accurately, we weren’t aware of its having been built until 1978. Until the intrepid intergalactic journalism of moonraker George Lucas, we would still have no idea what was going on above us a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. (Frankly, I’d like something more concrete, say in 346 years ago in the Andromeda Galaxy 2.5 light years away, but that’s just the reporter in me.)

Baze has the type of records and accolades that will never be surpassed. He came from an era of a sounder racehorse and an era of smaller purses.

It reminds me an awful lot of golf. The era where Nicklaus, Palmer, and Player played, they played because they needed to, they won because they had to. They needed purse winnings to pay for food, travel, and family. They won because losing meant going to the car dealership to apply for a job or bag groceries at the Food Lion.

Nowadays, thanks to Eldrick Woods, who won The Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines Monday, the purses are astronomical. The FIO had a purse of $6.1 million. Eighty-three players made the cut. So, 83 golfers receive an average payout of $73,493. Instead of having to win these tournaments to get paid, all they have to do is finish 83rd and they will likely get anywhere from $10,000 to $20,000 for four days worth of work. Not to mention free clubs, shoes, gloves, and apparel (yes, I know they have to pay for travel, but if a golfer makes five cuts over the course of a 52 weekends, they can clear $100,000.)

Today’s jockeys enjoy a similar bounty, though not quite to the extreme of golfers. Jockeys at smaller tracks routinely make several hundred to several thousand dollars a day.

Because of this, what will the motivation be for a jockey to amass experience the likes of Baze? More importantly, with death and debilitation just a cannon bone away, why hang on for so long when the risk becomes reckless?

What will keep them around won’t be the money. It will be the drug-like addiction to piloting an animal 10 times heavier than they, to harnessing a carnal power woven into their DNA that knows no price tag. The end game awaits. It only ends once, everything until then is just the rush.

If you or a loved one—or an enemy you’re looking to lure into your confidence—would like a hardcover, first edition book, I’m giving away (while supplies last) copies of Six Weeks in Saratoga: How Three-Year-Old Filly Rachel Alexandra Beat the Boys and Became Horse of the Year. If interested, email me at and let me know how you would like it inscribed. The only catch is I ask you to review it on Amazon. That’s it! What a world!

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