OctavetheRave

This will be my last blog for awhile.  I was looking to Saturday to rejuvenate my passion for the game.  Instead, it was like the proverbial coffin nail.  The scumbags @ Twinspires.com have made racing @ Churchill - for most of us, the spring meet of choice - so horrendous, I doubt I'd be playing even if I could.  That said, I would have written this blog even if BB had won by 20, and today was having the ticker-tape parade down Broadway I thought was "a foregone conclusion!"

Long before the Derby, I opined that the best Triple Crown coverage anywhere in the sport would be right here on HorseplayerPro.com.  Even I couldn't have imagined how prophetic that opinion would prove.

Once again, Jeremy Plonk outdid himself.  His Countdown to the Crown has become a staple of the Triple Crown season, and a must-read-every-week for anyone who follows the game closely.  Mindful that he never missed a deadline on a column that averaged 7,700 keystrokes and 1,700 words per insertion - I counted !! - while running a website and only God and his wife know the sum total of what else, lays waste his moniker The Machine as understatement incarnate.

Toby Turrell was superb.  Mindful that throughout the chase his days began at 4:30 a.m., no other site nor publication had a man-on-the-ground everyday providing real-time reports, and insightful updates, never mind someone of Toby's knowledge, experience and credibility.

Pow?  Or is it Powe?  Forget him.  If there was a better 6^th Man of the Bench in all of sports so far in 2008 than Tim Turrell, methinks you're on drugs.  Where do you begin to praise his work?  Not just real-time video coverage of every major milestone throughout the chase, but a video log of key contender workouts, complete with audio.  His up-close coverage of BB's triumphant return following the Preakness was better than the network coverage itself.  Throw-in the fact that of the 448 credentialed, professional journalists covering The Belmont on-site in New York, it was Tim Turrell who got the jump on ALL of them, and broke the story worldwide of Casino Drive's injury and probable scratch right here on HOP, the guy makes a strong case for the media MVP of Triple Crown coverage.  The entire media!

Even Donald Harris, despite his anchor position on the Left Coast, provided knowing insight, colorful prose, and an unwaveringly positive perspective on Big Brown, his quest for history, and the pure joy such an event would mean to him, and to the game.  To me, his "Conversing with my Inner Child" piece summed-up better than anything I read in the past three weeks what a Big Brown victory would have meant to me, and I believe to all who love the game.

To all above, thank you.  Thank you, on behalf of all of us who love this game, for your untiring work and extraordinary commitment.

And no, I did not leave-out someone on oversight.  Instead, I have chosen to defer to an adage my Mom taught me as a kid, and that on this day has more relevance than any such person I can conjure in recent memory, TO WIT:

"If you don't have anything good to say about someone, it's better to say nothing at all."

We be gurn fishin!

Rave

Big Brown will start from the rail. If he breaks well, he will be on or near the lead, Dutrow said. "How could we not go the first sixteenth of a mile just to get in front, and make sure no one folds over on him?" Dutrow said.

http://www.drf.com/drfNewsArticle.do?NID=95214&subs=0&arc=1

June 5, 2008 -- Two days before The Belmont Stakes

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Knowing Rick Dutrow, Jr., eventually he'll break.  Eventually he'll tell the world what I'm certain he believes was the reason for Big Brown's demise.

Kent Desormeaux.

The signs were everywhere on Saturday.  Dutrow didn't go near his rider after the debacle.  To the contrary, he avoided Desormeaux like the plague.  As well, I believe, he should have.

In a previous blog, I opined that Dutrow would give instructions to Desormeaux on the order of, "turn him loose, let him rock, and show the whole world ...," just as he alluded to in the above-captioned quote.  Instead, it appears as if he gave Desormeaux no such instructions, and because he didn't, Big Brown's demise rests on his head every bit as much as it does on Desormeaux's.

Only, in hindsight, how could both have been so stupid? 

Like Desormeaux, Dutrow, and every handicapper alive, I too played-out in my head how the race would go on Saturday.  I did it purely from experience.  From knowledge of the participants.  Their strengths, and mostly their weaknesses.  Primarily, I did it from an historical perspective, mindful that history is our greatest teacher.

Well, for most of us it is.

For months, we've been hearing what a "smart" horse Big Brown is.  Thirty-five years ago, we heard the same thing, time and again, about Secretariat.  Go back and watch Secretariat's Preakness, and you'll get a telling glimpse.  On that day, Secretariat didn't want any part of "being rated."  He wanted to rock, and Turcotte gave him his way, despite how suicidal it looked as it was happening.  Secretariat's Belmont played-out the same way.  The "smart" horse gave the instructions, and Turcotte, once again, gave him his way.

I thought sure Big Brown's Belmont would go the same way, and was totally convinced after he drew the 1-hole.  After that, it all became academic: the gates would open; the fastest horse in the race would take advantage of his natural speed and perfect post to clear the field and avoid the only thing that possibly could jeopardize his run: getting banged around in traffic; and the rest, as they say, would be history.

However "smart' Big Brown might be, he's still a kid.  And what happens when a kid -- especially a spoiled, superstar kid -- suddenly doesn't get his way?  He sulks, he pouts, and more often than not, he walks off the field.

Big Brown told Desormeaux and the world what he wanted to do on Saturday.  He wanted to rock.  Desormeaux, for all his experience in big races, never mind in big races on fast horses breaking from the 1-hole, inexplicably had other ideas.

No foot problem.  No breathing problem.  No missing seroids.  No mysterious ailment.  Just a spoiled kid who wanted to rock; had a grown-up override him; sulked, pouted, and walked off the field.  Nothing mysterious about it.

If only they knew then what they know now.

It's called hindsight, and Desormeaux and Dutrow will have to live with it for the rest of their lives.

Octave-the-Rave

A few hours before the Enigma at Elmont, Bob Baffert spent an intriguing 15 minutes live on ESPN with Reese Davis.  Baffert was his usual guarded self, as most trainers not named Rick Dutrow, Jr. are these days, until Davis asked his opinion on why so many people in the press were openly pulling against a Big Brown victory.  Opined Baffert:

"In the Derby, nobody likes to pick the favorite.  They'd rather ... you know ... so all these guys who picked against him, they get upset.  That's just how the game is today."

It's one thing for a bunch of bloggers to speculate on all the negativity towards Big Brown these past weeks as the product of childish, 4^th grade sour grapes.  It's another altogether to hear it confirmed in spades - on live national television -- by someone like Bob Baffert.

"That's just how the game is today!"

I'd like to bet if you were having this same conversation with Baffert over a beer, he'd have ended that thought with, " ... and that's really sad, you know?  Sad for the game.  What they ought to do is just get rid of all these slugs.  You know?  Don't let the door hit you in the ass!"

Now, let's just hope Big Brown really does stay in training, all the way up to the Breeders' Cup.  Maybe that's what this is all about?  Maybe that's the silver lining in this black cloud.

The last laugh.

Octave-the-Rave

As the field warms-up prior to the start of tomorrow's Belmont Stakes, doubtless ABC will have its cameras fixed on Big Brown.  While the eyes of the racing world will be peeled on his repaired, front-left hoof, mine will be looking elsewhere: at his hind quarters.

CLOCKER-1 calls it "Burma Shave," a reference to a popular shaving cream from the old days.  I've heard it called everything from soap suds to fear foam, and a few I can't mention.  It's kidney sweat -- that white, foamy, shaving cream-like substance that builds-up between a horse's hind quarters, typically during warm-up, sometimes even sooner, and whose significance has been the subject of debate for years.

Many handicappers ignore it completely, regardless of the weather.  Others find it noteworthy only in cool weather, and routinely disregard it in warm weather.  I am from neither camp.  For me, it is as close to the kiss-of-death as an omen can get, even in the dead of summer here in South Florida.  Over my lifetime, horse's on whom I have wagered who display this sign of nerves, anxiety, or over-heating rarely run to expectation, and almost never win.  1.5 out of 10 would be my guesstimate, and even that might be generous.

For those who think it is heat related, here's a T.C. recap v. Big Brown to date.

Weather reports at Derby post had the temperatures at a "comfortable 78 degrees."  Trust me, or ask The Machine: 78º in Loovul may be comfortable in the shade on 4^th Street, but in the eye of the world's most electric fish bowl, it's plenty hot.  In the stands, the sunscreen had been out all day.  On track, my guess is it was closer to 85º.

As I watched the field loading on the Diamond Vision infield screen, more than half had kidney sweat, and a few had it dripping down their hind legs.  Big Brown was among the last to load.  He looked like he had just awoken from a nap. 

He was bone dry!  (So too, BTW, was Eight Belles.)

In Bawlmer, the temperatures were somewhat cooler, reportedly around 75º at post time.  Still, several horses displayed the tell-tale sign of nerves, anxiety, or over-heating: kidney sweat.  Not the Big Boy. 

Once again, he was bone dry.

Temperatures tomorrow in Nu Yawk reportedly will reach a sweltering 90º by post time.  Assuming a standard, numeric load, Big Brown will go in first.  Given the extreme heat and intense microscope under which Big Brown will have been subject all day, if once again he is bone dry and calm as a librarian on Thorazine, just put your feet up, sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride.

Rave

PS:  Remember Macho Again in the Preakness?  For those who do not get the Brisnet PPs, the highest last race BRIS number DOES NOT belong to Big Brown.  It belongs to Ready's ECHO (102), who earned it at Belmont Park, and whose dam sire's AWD is the 3^rd highest in the field at 8.4F.

WOW!  If you missed Jerry Bailey on Mike & Mike from Belmont Park this morning, do yourselves a favor and go to ESPN.com and click on "the best of Mike and Mike."  There you'll find the highlights from each day's show, and Bailey flat-out lit-up the Tote Board this morning.

Among the subjects of interest he broached include the current out-cry for greater safety, use of the whip, steroids, the Number 1 post position in the Belmont Stakes, and of course, Big Brown's TC run tomorrow.

Almost two years ago, I suggested Jerry Bailey would make the ideal, first-ever Commissioner of Racing.  Mindful that this spot was live; that he had no script; and was speaking strictly from his heart, and his knowledge of the game, if there is a better candidate in the game today for that position, I still can't name him.

Rave