All right...we'll call it a draw

The legend of King Arthur is well known. A myth0-historic figure, imbued by a moistened bink with the touch of destiny and the promise of a people. He gathers the scattered and listless knights-errant knaves and debauched soldiers-and binds them to the common cause of bringing a society out of the mire and squalor of internecine strife into a golden age.

I don't know any of the connections of Big Brown. I don't know anybody that does know any of the connections of Big Brown. I read the industry rags and I watch the blogrolls so I guess I am as informed as the rest of the herd. The opinions out there are not favorable regarding the connections of the Rule V.6 violator. Michael Iavarone is apparently a small-time, stock hustling pimp. Dick "Babe" Dutrow has seventy-two violations according to the Association of Racing Commissioners International. And Desormeaux...well his only knock is that he MAY have moved a little too early with Real Quiet. Yet here they are, about to crest the summit of racing immortality.

If he wins the Belmont Stakes, Big Brown will race at most two more times. Dutrow has already stated that he likes to give his horses a lot of time between races and the Travers and Classic are well spaced; nothing is gained by running him in any "preps". His Triple Crown should not be asterisked, umlauted or pronounced with a uvular fricative; he ducked nobody and beat them all at level weights (if he wins). He will not, however, be campaigned to promote horse racing but he will definitely be marketed. The people that fall for that though, will disappear as soon as he smells his first teaser mare; they are also the same people-I think-that explain the popularity of American Idol. If he loses, then there will undoubtedly be the discovery of "...an unnamed, non-specific injury that in no way compromised his soundness but for the welfare of the horse will lead to his retirement and a productive and lucrative career in the breeding shed." I don't know anything about quarter cracks or hooves, for that you should read Fran Jurga's blog, but if he does lose and runs poorly, then everyone and their mother will fall on Dutrow like a hypoglycemic Sumo wrestler on a water diet; whether the hoof issue has anything to do with it or not.

Big Brown better win and he should, on paper. There is a fine line between confidence and arrogance and like many things it depends on your perspective. The IEAH/Dutrow exacta has left that line far, far behind but whatever your feelings towards them are, nobody has claimed that they have done anything illegal with this horse. They are arrogant and abrasive-Dutrow was classless in criticizing Servis and Elliott for their run with Smarty Jones-but they have backed up their bravado every time; granted, Kramer dominated a group of kids in karate class but I think you get my point. Yet the question has never been asked of Big Brown; he has never had to look another horse in the eye and dig down within himself to meet the challenge and for that reason Dutrow should strut just a little less dramatically. Bernardini could not answer that question in 2006 and he was a monster, albeit with classier connections, so his defeat was not derided as much as Big Brown's would be.

Big Brown will not save horse racing or his connections and the latter most definitely do not need it. What he can do is give them the second chance that, ultimately, is what everyone wants; the warm embrace of a bed-wetters dream. He can bring horse racing into the twenty-first century, lob the proverbial scimitar of supreme executive power to one man who can gather the errant knights of trainers and owners and join the battle against the dysfunctional hydra that is the NTRA.

Because if something doesn't happen here, now, with this backdrop, then that spindly left front hoof with the 5/8in. quarter crack may as well be the left leg of the Black Knight that Arthur fights at the bridge.