The Importance of Being Earnest

What are things that are paramount in 2022 with regards to equine athletes? 

Horse deaths, wastage, sending out horses to race that probably should not have be sent out to race, to name but three.

For much of human history - any epoch really - humans were incredible killing machines. When we hunted and gathered we killed indiscriminately. When we settled Australia 70,000 years ago we wiped out dozens of species. When we moved to North America thousands of years ago, we killed everything in our paths. 

Even as recent as one hundred years ago during the exploration of the Arctic - when we began to be more sensible in countless matters, and were starting to be educated en masse - we still killed virtually every animal in front of us. Killing an animal was a feature of humanity, not a bug. 

In the last forty or fifty years - a tiny, tiny slice of humanity - remarkably, this feature has been completely flipped on its lid. An ingrained part of our DNA and culture is now found by most to be taboo. We can't imagine ever doing what "they" did, and we might rename a school or street for those who did; even though we probably would've done the same thing, because that's all we'd have ever known. 

Just this month a report on horse deaths at Santa Anita was released and the news was good. The reforms, hoped for by some, joked about by some others, seems to have worked pretty well. The pressure is off, it appears, until perhaps a next crisis. But kudos to California racing for stepping up to the plate. They said they were going to do something, and they did it. 

HISA is another brick in this new wall - the wall that modernizes human's use of animals because we aren't killing machines anymore. Like any new policy (check laws in congress or the House of Commons for reference) it can get blown off course, or bastardized. We talk more about HISA and lasix than keeping the eye on the prize, which is, of course, protecting the safety of the horses. 

But this organization - like it or not - is very important. 

The sport has to be honest with itself, and lead with conviction. Horse safety, wastage, doing better by being better stewards of the horses is not something we can address with lip service, or do it only when someone is looking. It's reality. The importance of being earnest is now the feature, not the bug. 

Have a nice Tuesday everyone. 

Watching Replays

DeRosa, and others, are talking about the importance of watching or not watching replays to handicap. It's a discussion I always find interesting. 

Like almost everything in this game, to me this is a matter of personal preference and what works for us. If we believe watching a replay makes us play the game more profitably, go for it. If not, and our time is spent better on other things, then we probably shouldn't. 

Do we have to watch replays to win? Absolutely not; players who play solely on performance or speed figures, along with pace scenarios or whatever else, do win. Conversely, people who watch replays can win as well. I believe, like a lot of things in handicapping, it's about knowing what we're good at, and knowing what we're doing. 

For newer players in the Thoroughbred game, replay watching is wading into a deep pool. We could see a horse look terrible in the last sixteenth, but the race was at 6 furlongs and this horse needs to be stretched out. Smart replay watchers discount this and wager, while others just see a dead horse. Sharp players (sharper than me!) can decipher a horse's action on a replay, with style and surface. For newer players this is like reading Latin. 

I respect those who put in the time to watch replays. Smart players like Chris Larmey or Mike Maloney (and many contest players) can make scores the sheets and the numbers don't see well. But trying to emulate them is pretty darn tough, in my view. 

Over to harness racing, replay watching is somewhat different. The race is one standard mile, the horses race each week, and trip can be just about everything. We can see who is live or dead, and especially for young horses, we can see how the horse paces or trots. 

Someone asked me today who I liked at the Big M, with their complete set of two year old races tonight. I can see who I like on the form, and these horses might win, but I don't have two hours today to dive into replays (luckily this blog piece took ten minutes).  I want to ensure my horse was not all out, was pacing or trotting like a good horse should, that the driver was confident. I won't dive into these races, for example, without a replay. 

A caveat of course, like with the Thoroughbreds, this doesn't mean one can't win without watching replays. The teams can and do. And if everyone is watching a replay and see that horse locked and loaded, is it worth 7-5 this time, or is the horse overbet because of replay? Again, that's simply a numbers game, and the numbers guys and gals are good at it. 

Have a nice Friday everyone, and whether you watch replays or not, good luck this weekend at the windows. 

Stewards Scorecards? How is it Even Possible.

There's quite the brouhaha today on last night's White Sox Blue Jays game. The umpire had a bad game. 

How do we know. Well, there's an accuracy card. 

Umpire: Doug Eddings
Final in 12: Blue Jays 6, White Sox 7#NextLevel // #ChangeTheGame#TORvsCWS // #CWSvsTOR pic.twitter.com/xF7KTGcGQi

— Umpire Scorecards (@UmpScorecards) June 22, 2022

None of us like getting judged at work, but welcome to the real world. We all do, albeit less publicly.

Now, MLB deems this worthwhile because of the "integrity of the game" and probably to a lesser extent, sports betting. They don't derive much revenue from the latter, but it's a reason. 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, let's fire up our stewards and judges scorecard for horse racing. A sport that does depend on betting to survive. 

We can't even make a scorecard. What state, what track, what jurisdiction? They all seem to have different rules, and a different way to judge. We have no baseline to judge a judge. We can't score something that's un-scoreable. 

We talked about the importance of institutions this week. This is a prime example of why they are important. A proper institution, whether in a game with independent contractors like golf, or a league like the NFL or MLB, would at the very least have a set of rules everyone adheres to. 

I think this is another instance exemplifying why a group like HISA has support, even though many can see its shortcomings. The business - for hundreds of years - can't really even come to grips with a set of rules that everyone follows. It seems like such a basic thing, yet in horse racing, with its disparate, ad-hoc structure, even the basic is elusive. 

Have a nice Wednesday everyone.