Sound and fury

Class will tell.

The House Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection concluded its hearings today sans "Babe" Dutrow. He was a vet scratch apparently, feeling under the weather. Maybe he could have used a shot of Winstrol. The chairwoman Jan Schakowsky stated that the committee had not received word from Dutrow that he would not make the hearing. Dutrow claims he informed the committee of his planned absence. I wonder who is not telling the truth?
Update: Dutrow apparently was telling the truth. (10:15 in Paulick's live blog) Sorry Babe.

The panel, by and large, expressed its frustration with the industry in general and its eagerness to ban the use of medication in racing. A consensus was reached on the need for a governing authority for horse racing and the dysfunctional status of the current system, with the glaring exception of Alex Waldrop, president and CEO of the NTRA. Like the entertainment director aboard the Titanic, he claimed-with a straight face worthy of Oscar nomination-that the industry was best positioned to regulate itself and was making great inroads towards achieving self governing credibility. (My words, I'm not a journalist so I'm paraphrasing.) You bloody wanker, have the brass to step up to the plate and admit that you and the entire industry are useless and detrimental to the sport in general. Nobody wants to be told what to do but have the simple decency to admit that after so much time to fix your own mess you need to let someone in to do it for you. Piss off.

But I digress.

Curiously, TOBA has a new owner video thing on the Bloodhorse and in one of their presentations Dr. Chip Johnson, DVM, states that he, as a vet, has a truckload full of great stuff to make your horse run faster. WTF?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?? In the intro to the whole series, the moderator states that the purpose of TOBA is to increase the economics and integrity(IN THAT ORDER)of the sport.

Dutrow with his absence and Waldrop with his shrill cry of "...nothing to see here" prove that in the end, this whole charade was the classic "...tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Class will tell.

Which one of these is not like the other?

Since I can't come up with any brilliant ideas of my own, I am happy to steal some from better minds.

Much has been posted in the last few days regarding the state of the industry and the upcoming congressional hearings, the battle for ADW revenue and across the board purse cuts at several tracks. The product, in its current incarnation, is flawed.

History and tradition are all well and good but there are times when new blood is needed. Baseball lowered the mound and brought in the DH (nobody consulted with me on that), hockey put that glowing thing on the puck...well nevermind that one, american football brought in instant replay and even football experimented with the golden goal.

Horse racing, meanwhile, has only adopted higher takeouts and anabolic steroids.

What if, the jockey club or whoever is in charge of such things, allowed...wait for it...promotional logos on the jockey pants and saddlecloth? I know, they did that already but they could do it more. Allow the jockeys and whatever owner wants to, to place ads on the silks and pants. They could agree to a certain percentage of that ad revenue to go to the owner but most of it would go to the tracks purse structure. Work out the details...I'm just the idea man.

Don't like the ads on the silks and pants? What if they clipped it into the horse when they shaved them?

What if BMW Oracle formed a racing partnership? Exxon Mobil? National Geographic? Viagra? Would they own any geldings....?

Talk amongst yourselves.

Your package has been lost...

Photo: Anne M. Eberhardt


UPS does not deliver. Hooters shows up flat. No drugs, no horse.

Dick Dutrow GUARANTEED a win on the walk out to the paddock but Da'Tara intercepted his package and delivered him a big tall cup of Shut the hell up. The last few months Dutrow has been nothing short of abrasive in his assessment of Big Brown's abilities and his equal disdain for the rest of the sport. Big Brown was clearly not himself today and he left his trainer nose deep in a big, deserving bag of shit.

ABC and ESPN were equally classless in their post race coverage, concentrating solely on the loser and giving nothing but short shrift to the winning connections.

The old adage, class matters, applies to more than just the caliber of the horse. The connections should display some as well and Dutrow/IEAH seemed to have forgotten that this sport as well as life is humbling but here and now, at the end of all things, I don't really hold Dutrow's bravado against him.

Dutrow, until today, had the best horse. A maverick, he usually steamrolled through the competition; today just wasn't his day. Most people, dealt a hand like Dutrow's, don't have the brass to walk up and place a bet. Dutrow, called in all his markers and put it all on the line. The dice roll funny for everyone. He will have other days; it's margin call today.

Most people don't like arrogance because it reminds them that they have very little to be arrogant about and the schadenfreude is pervasive. Dutrow called his shot and swung away.

He should not second guess himself or shy away from the media, neither of which I think he will do. I am reminded of a scene from James Goldman's play, The Lion in Winter, when Geoffrey scoffs at Richard while they are waiting for the axe:

Geoffrey: You fool! As if it matters how a man falls down!
Richard: When the fall is all that's left, it matters a great deal.

Godspeed Big Brown...may you enjoy the breeding shed.

What seems to be the problem officer?

Churchill is dark tomorrow due to the Memorial day racing so I had no card to handicap. I spent the greater part of my day tweaking the layout of my blog and trying to figure out how to embed widget code and such nonsense onto the page. The trojan horse that infiltrates your computer is not my fault...

I did buy a car in less than thirty seconds and had it delivered twenty minutes after I bought it so the day was not a complete wash. Yeah...that's how I roll.

I read on DRF today-don't make me figure out how to link this particular snippet without unintentionally attaching the entire search history on my browser-that John Sadler was fined $500 by the Hollywood Park stewards for failing to report that one of his horses had been gelded since its last start. Now I don't know the man, nor do I know enough about handicapping to presume to say that the status of a horse's sexual equipment plays ANY part in my selection; to wit...man I can't believe that giraffe knocked me out of the Pick Four, dead last in its last seven and vanned off in its last but had I just bothered to notice that it was a gelding I could've SINGLED his ass. It did however send me off on a moderately entertaining flight of fancy, at least it killed off a few minutes of my day. Follow.

I don't know that $500 is an appropriately high enough fine. I'm sure that Sadler is a nice enough guy and a decent trainer. He certainly wasn't hoping to score a wagering coup on a $12500 claimer that would put him on easy street (and while yes, my modifier was dangling, I meant Sadler and not the $12500 claimer). It might very well have been an honest omission but the stewards should throw the bloody book at him. We need to start seeing some real fines and penalties handed out for transgressions. Rules are rules and when the inmates see that no one is at the helm then all bets are off...to mix my metaphors.

Oh, your horse tested positive for steroids? That's o.k., just pay us like, oh..I don't know, $2500, have your assistant saddle your horses for thirty days while you watch from the turf club and then we'll pretend this whole thing never happened. What's that? This is your second time you say? Come on (fill your favorite name here), you are making us look bad. We do these tests so people think we are doing something, not to actually catch anybody...COME ON!

Trainers need to have their license on the line when they saddle up...and don't make me go off on the trainer that "saddles" thirty horses in four different states on the same day. I don't know jack about training horses but I know enough to know that you need to be with the horse to put a saddle on it. There should be some version of the hippocratic oath they make you take when you pass your trainer's test. Why have the test if you are not going to expect some minimum standard of conduct? Are these people not responsible for the well being of their charges? Am I alone here? ...and where the hell was I?

It saddens me to think that this sport so rich in tradition and well..rich people, allows this to happen to a truly noble animal. We are all to blame. The next time you walk up to the betting window ask yourself '...just who the hell am I putting my money on?'