Labor Day Pains - By Evan Hammonds

Blood-Horse Staff — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:07:00 GMT

I remember turning the dial—yes there was a real dial back then—to CBS Sports to watch the 1981 Jockey Club Gold Cup (gr. I). Jack Whitaker was there and so was Heywood Hale Broun. Besides the appeal of watching John Henry take to the main track that afternoon at Belmont Park was the fact the 5-year-old mare Relaxing was taking on the boys. Analyst/handicapper Jimmy “the Greek” Snyder told us John Henry couldn’t win because he was a turf horse; Relaxing couldn’t win because she was a mare, and Peat Moss was too slow. John Henry held off a late-charging Peat Moss. Relaxing was a gallant third.

Hey, he took a stand.

Taking a bigger stand is owner Jess Jackson, opting to send out his 3-year-old filly Rachel Alexandra in the Sept. 5 Woodward (gr. I) at Saratoga. It’s a bold move with America’s racing sweetheart. It’s too bad she won’t be performing on network television.

The Woodward will be shown on TVG and HRTV, networks known to hard-core fans of Thoroughbred racing, but it’s doubtful their reach is enough to grab the general sports fans that may want to see how Rachel stacks up against her elders. It would be a coup for the sport if the Woodward was available on a network or a beefier cable station, say one of the ESPN channels.

A tough break for Thoroughbred racing is the calendar—Labor Day weekend is the traditional kickoff to the college football season. During the afternoon of Sept. 5 when the Woodward is slated to go, ABC has a blockbuster game of pre-season No. 9 Oklahoma State hosting No. 13 Georgia. On ESPN, it’s Missouri and Illinois. The Labor Day weekend docket at CBS is third- and fourth-round action of tennis’ U.S. Open.

The schedules for CBS, ESPN, and ABC (the latter two are majority owned by the Walt Disney Co.) have been booked for months. The National Thoroughbred Racing Association would love to step in with a half-hour or hour package and find a slot somewhere, but the obstacles are too much to overcome.

Alex Waldrop, president and CEO of the NTRA, points out it’s a “challenge” to maneuver across the TV landscape on a few weeks’ notice these days. Networks—and advertisers—like to lock in six-to-nine months out with a financial commitment.

Another hurdle is the New York Racing Association has an exclusive broadcast deal with New York-based entertainment network MSG Plus. Getting clearance from NYRA, MSG, TVG, and HRTV isn’t easy on the fly.

There is also a little matter of money. Waldrop notes that to put on an hour of television, it’ll run you about a quarter of a million dollars, and it’s more to sit down at the table with a network. The chance of getting a return on that investment through advertising or sponsorships is highly unlikely. Last weekend’s 90-minute Travers show—one slate of stakes races negotiated in a deal with MSG months ago—on ESPN didn’t begin to bring in that kind of coin.

Of course, the coin that could have lured Team Rachel to the widest audience would be the $2-million Breeders’ Cup Ladies’ Classic (gr. I) and a potential showdown with unbeaten Zenyatta. However, decisions fleshed out two years ago will keep racing’s No. 1 star from the World Championships. It was a marketing decision for the Breeders’ Cup to gain some traction and hold its event at the same venue—Southern California’s Santa Anita Park—in back-to-back years. That also made for the majority of Breeders’ Cup races to be contested over a synthetic surface in back-to-back years. On multiple occasions Jackson has made it clear Rachel Alexandra won’t compete on a synthetic surface.

In another marketing move, the Breeders’ Cup was split into a two-day, Friday-Saturday format, with the Friday races designated for females. That means that even if Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta met in the Ladies’ Classic (gr. I), it would take place Nov. 6, a Friday afternoon. Would Breeders’ Cup officials have the right stuff to call an audible and move the Ladies’ Classic to the Saturday, Nov. 7, program for greater reach?

For Labor Day weekend, the best-case scenario will be that the suits at ESPN will see the value of following Rachel and offer a similar treatment to the one that took place when she ran in the Aug. 1 Haskell (gr. I), giving an update after the race and positioning the results prominently on “Sports Center.”

In today’s programmed world, that’s as “front and center” as the industry can expect this time of year.

Evan Hammonds is Executive Editor of The Blood-Horse.

More Hero; Less Goat - By Cot Campbell

Blood-Horse Staff — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 19:51:00 GMT

The 2009 edition of the Triple Crown has been one of the most fascinating of recent times, although—with numerous high-profile scratches from the Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands (gr. I)—it did not start out to offer any special cachet. Calvin Borel emerged as the poster boy for the wonderful triad of races. After the Belmont Stakes (gr. I), however, I fear he is in some danger of being the goat, and I don’t want him to be.

Calvin Borel has long been one of America’s most underrated jockeys and one of our most endearing personalities. How could you not like Calvin, with that back-country smile, his heart-warming emotional outbursts, and such an obvious love of the animals he rides? He was the perfect pilot for the plain little gelding from New Mexico and his black-clad cowboy connections. Calvin just about literally rode the hair off Mine That Bird in the Derby, and it was thrilling. Great story.

Then Calvin jumped ship in a most honorable, up-front manner and won the BlackBerry Preakness (gr. I) with the beloved filly Rachel Alexandra. This was 11 days after she was bought and then supplemented to the race by Jess Jackson (and partner Harold McCormick), a man who is as “game as Dick Tracy.” Rachel wisely passed the Belmont, and Calvin was reunited with Mine That Bird, thanks to the incredibly long-suffering patience of that gelding’s connections.

Then the mistakes came. Calvin made the most ghastly blunder one can make in the sport of horse racing—or in any other field, for that matter. He guaranteed a victory. What an absolutely insane thing to do! First mistake.\

Second mistake: Calvin spent the week before the Belmont becoming the media darling of the sports world. Wonderful for horse racing, but this media blitz should have made room for some familiarizing rides on the mile and a half, big sandy track of Belmont Park, a tricky venue with which the Midwest-based Calvin is not on intimate terms. He did not ride any horse anywhere that week, instead trekking from studio to studio and enjoying the sights of Gotham. Not only that, but his agent did not line up a single mount in another dirt race for him on Belmont day itself. From a practical standpoint this was not smart, nor did it look good cosmetically. Calvin said he did not need that preparation, but still it did not look good.

Third and worst mistake was made at the three-eighths pole in the Belmont Stakes, when this fine jockey pushed the button. He asked Mine That Bird the big question, and he got the answer. The feisty little gelding went into overdrive, hit the front at the eighth pole, but began to struggle when he had gone a mile and seven-sixteenths. Calvin Borel—noted for his extraordinary patience and coolness in big races—uncharacteristically opted for an overland route and surely moved prematurely on a tricky racetrack with which he was not terribly familiar. He blew the Belmont, I believe.

I think this: If Calvin Borel, instead of Mike Smith, had ridden Mine That Bird in the Preakness, and if Mike Smith, instead of Calvin Borel, had ridden Mine that Bird in the Belmont, we would be celebrating the first Triple Crown winner in 31 years.

Calvin’s post-race comments were as good as he could muster. But the award for grace and class under pressure should go to Chip Woolley, Mine That Bird’s heretofore unheralded trainer. He showed enormous poise, patience, and character during the entire Triple Crown venture and deserves the respect and admiration he is now receiving. Except for one little glitch prior to the Preakness, so do his two owners—Mark Allen and Dr. Leonard Blach—good old boys from New Mexico.

Calvin Borel was about to earn his way into racing’s Hall of Fame, but the Belmont may have slowed that movement down. I hope it will not derail his ultimate admission to the hallowed hall. It should not. He is a fine human being, a credit to racing, and a hell of a jockey. The Belmont experience simply did not find Calvin at his best. His horse’s trainer and owners have seemingly excused this aberration from excellence. So should we all. In the meantime, racing needs more Calvin Borels and more hard-knocking geldings like Mine That Bird.

Cot Campbell is the president of Dogwood Stable, a racing partnership based in Aiken. S.C.

Final Turn : Rachel Alexandra

Labor Day Pains - By Evan Hammonds

More Hero; Less Goat - By Cot Campbell