We get letters, texts, emails, threatening phone calls, and suspicious packages all the time. Here are some of the latest:
Dear Mr. Know-It-All,
Why are you so reluctant to give us your opinion of the top 20 Kentucky Derby contenders like everyone else gives us their top 20 Kentucky Derby contenders so that I can have an opinion about my top 20 Kentucky Derby contenders. Don’t you love America?
—Andrea Doria, Newport News, Va.
Andrea,
Be careful what you wish for. I am not a wagon to follow. Over the past decade, my Kentucky Derby (G1) colts at this point on the relentless timeline have included International Star , Mastery , Mo Town , Catholic Boy , Omaha Beach , Life Is Good , Practical Move, and Nysos . Can I pick ’em or what?
Anyway, what’s the rush? These colts are still babies chewing grain with milk teeth. Disco Time does not turn 3 until March 4. Citizen Bull , the champ, won’t celebrate his real third birthday until April 2. And check out First Resort , that smart winner of the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes (G2) last fall. If he makes the May 3 Derby field, he will have been a full-calendared 3-year-old for just 13 days.
Dear Sour Puss,
Lately you have been writing about tragic wildfires, dead and dying racetracks, horse fatalities, and jockey misbehavior. Is your life one long, sad country song? Does your therapist advise you to take out your dark frustrations on your innocent readers? Please take a breath and write about something light-hearted for a change—a stable goat, a girl and her off-track Thoroughbred, a group of happy billionaires teaming up to buy a racehorse. There is so much more to be positive about in horse racing. Or don’t you love America?
—Bill Williams, Buffalo, N.Y.
Dear Buffalo Bill (sorry),
Busted. You’re absolutely right. Reading the steady stream of bad news in horse racing is like being tied to a cold slab and subjected to water drip torture. Or watching an Adam Sandler movie. There was a time I could go weeks and weeks without writing about the inability of racing’s legislative efforts to end horse slaughter, or the necessity for an institutionalized funding method to secure the postracing and breeding careers of Thoroughbreds, or the need to limit stall allotments at racetracks to reduce the negative impact of super trainers, or to finally eliminate the Eclipse Award for apprentice jockeys (see this year’s latest statistical screw up).
So, as a much needed palate cleanser, may I direct everyone’s attention to the Feb. 8 running of the Sam F. Davis Stakes, scheduled for 5:14 p.m. ET near the end of a 12-race Saturday card at Tampa Bay Downs. The familiar suspects are accounted for—colts trained by Brad Cox, Chad Brown, and Doug O’Neill—but I guarantee there will not be a dry eye in the house if the winner is Naughty Rascal , a son of Rogueish out of a Smarty Jones mare who is trying to take trainer Gerald Bennett places he’s never gone before.
Bennett is 80, a nine-time Tampa Bay champion, and a survivor of enough health troubles over the past few years to fuel a season of St. Elsewhere. Naughty Rascal has three minor stakes wins to his credit, which took care of his $39,000 price tag for owners Ron Pugliese and Jim Georgeades. If their colt can shine in the Sam Davis, the Tampa Bay Derby (G3) awaits. And then … go ahead and dream.
Dear Mr. Humvee,
It seems like you’ve been around forever. How many racetracks have you attended? Which ones have you missed that are still on your wish list? And when is Santa Anita finally going to close so we don’t have to hear about it anymore?
—Tom Shelby, Birmingham, Ala.
Mr. Shelby, sir:
I have been around forever, if by forever you mean did I watch Bill Shoemaker in the room trimming Don Pierce and Wayne Harris at racetrack rummy and Robyn Smith work a horse around Santa Anita Park‘s old Anita Chiquita training track, where now sits Westfield Mall.
Such longevity has afforded access to many tracks—more than 50 worldwide—but for some reason it has been visits to the ghostly sites that have provided the most indelible impressions: the footprint of the Longacres oval in the property left undeveloped by purchaser Boeing; the familiar debris of the abandoned Dixie Downs in the hills outside St. George, Utah; a walk around lonely Hialeah Park, where the backstretch remains sheltered by its stand of Australian pines, turkey vultures still perch ominously on the outer rails, and the lingering flamingos take pink wing from the infield at even the gentlest approach.
As for Santa Anita, I believe the current winter-spring meet ends June 15, and I read that Saffie Joseph Jr. is hoping to run White Abarrio in the California Crown Stakes (G1) there this fall. Beyond that, even the owners of the track are not prepared to say. But there’s always hope.
Dear Answer Man,
How can horse racing tap into the enthusiasm generated by the Super Bowl? And who do you like in Sunday’s game in New Orleans?
—Merlin Olsen, Walnut Grove, Minn.
Big Guy,
Don’t get me started on that totalitarian regime called the NFL. Remember, those were the guys who wouldn’t give George Steinbrenner a franchise because of his association with horse racing and its decadent world of gambling. Those were the days.
A Super Bowl never lasts less than 3 1/2 hours. Last year, it went on for four. Such a marathon of mind-numbingly repetitive acts of senseless physical trauma can’t compare with the quick-twitch excitements of nine Breeders’ Cup events spread over about the same stretch of time. But there’s no accounting for taste. It can be argued that the most noteworthy cross pollination of football and horse racing occurred the day Hollywood Park was plowed under and in its place rose SoFi Stadium, one of the league’s crown jewels.
You’d think a racetrack like Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots would be a cool place to hang out on Super Bowl Sunday, especially with the game going on just down the road. But nope, there will be no racing in the Big Easy this Super Sunday, in helpless deference to the Big Game. As for who wins? Remind me … who’s playing?
