Sunday Spa Late Pick 5

[statuette]

Reminds me of nyc otb

[Socalman3]

statuette Wrote:
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> Reminds me of nyc otb

NYC OTB was way way way way better than NYRA and NYRA Bets are.  Not even a close call.

I just put in my self-exclusion at NYRA Bets and I also plan to skip playing horizontal bets at NYRA tracks.  I was fortunate enough to be able to cancel my bet today, but it really was dodging a bullet.

How can you make horizontal bets when they can make an announcement with no warning 90 seconds before the pool closes with major impact on your bet? How can you wager when they have the ability to change the rules after the bet has started?  If I were to bet with them again and got stung by something like this happening, I would have nobody to blame but myself.

PUBLIC SERVICE WARNING - you are putting yourself at extreme danger if you bet horizontally at NYRA. Once you put your money in their pool, you are at extreme risk of banana republic shenanigans going on and you may not be able to react in time to cancel your bet.

BTW, the people who suffered the worst beat here are the guys who put in two sets of bets (on turf and off turf) and on hearing the announcement that they were off turf cancelled their on turf bets. If you did that, you played it perfectly right and then when the changed the rules to make the off the turf races ALL WIN you got totally and completely screwed. I was not in that group, but those guys got totally burned.

[Socalman3]

Fairmount1 Wrote:
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> P5 payout of $25.00 for $.50 for each winning
> combo.  
>
> At least NYRA preserved as much of their 15%
> takeout before people could cancel as they could
> with how they handled it.


NYRA should not be allowed to keep that 15% take out.  Once they decided to pick and choose which rules to apply and which rules not to apply, they lost all authority and right to benefit from the game. They should be forced to disgorge that 15% to their bettors.  Up the rebates for non-CAW customers - totally should be double the amount -- $276,500 should be returned to small guy bettors.

[Socalman3]

Socalman3 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> statuette Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Reminds me of nyc otb
>
> NYC OTB was way way way way better than NYRA and
> NYRA Bets are.  Not even a close call.
>
> I just put in my self-exclusion at NYRA Bets and I
> also plan to skip playing horizontal bets at NYRA
> tracks.  I was fortunate enough to be able to
> cancel my bet today, but it really was dodging a
> bullet.
>
> How can you make horizontal bets when they can
> make an announcement with no warning 90 seconds
> before the pool closes with major impact on your
> bet? How can you wager when they have the ability
> to change the rules after the bet has started?  If
> I were to bet with them again and got stung by
> something like this happening, I would have nobody
> to blame but myself.
>
> PUBLIC SERVICE WARNING - you are putting yourself
> at extreme danger if you bet horizontally at NYRA.
> Once you put your money in their pool, you are at
> extreme risk of banana republic shenanigans going
> on and you may not be able to react in time to
> cancel your bet.
>
> BTW, the people who suffered the worst beat here
> are the guys who put in two sets of bets (on turf
> and off turf) and on hearing the announcement that
> they were off turf cancelled their on turf bets.
> If you did that, you played it perfectly right and
> then when the changed the rules to make the off
> the turf races ALL WIN you got totally and
> completely screwed. I was not in that group, but
> those guys got totally burned.

Dear Statuette,

You said NYC OTB, and I disputed that.  My apologies, it came to me overnight, that this is just like the Catskill OTB.

Anybody here remember Donald Groth?  That was the wisenheimer at Catskill OTB who defended the Fix Six Fraudsters as legitimate betting customers.  

Mind you, this Groth-character is somebody who saw nothing strange or unusual that somebody made a $12 pick six bet on a combo that took down the whole pool (i.e. they could have gotten the same payout for a sixth of the bet). This is like the kosher seller of pork.  Only a person who doesn\'t bet would somehow think the fix sixers were normal legitimate customers.  Anybody who knows anything about betting would have smelled a rat right away.

The point that is obvious is that NYRA and NYRABets are run by ignoramuses and you have to be a jackass if you would be willing to trust these morons to hold your hard earned money.

Sincerely,

Socalman3
Loyal Thorograph Customer since before they had internet accounts

[P-Dub]

Fairmount1 Wrote:
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> I think the rule is CLEAR.  There was approx 1
> minute and 36 seconds before the race ran when
> they announced the surface change .  Applying the
> rule to the facts, the change was KNOWN TO THE
> PUBLIC before the close of wagering on the p5. So
> the rule does not even apply for them to issue an
> ALL to my mind.  It should be a REFUND or let it
> play out with the changes with the tickets as they
> were wagered.  Now is the latter option fair?
> Well, maybe not, but does that give them the right
> to issue an ALL?    
>
> This is NYRA garbage again.  Hopefully TGJB
> doesn\'t delete this one like a post last weekend
> that involved NYRA decisions.  
>
> This should have been a REFUND.  That was the
> absolute correct decision once they ran the race
> so quick after the announcement.  This is madness
> and nonsense.  
>
> NYRA decided to NOT follow the rule which would be
> to leave the tickets wagered as they were, decided
> to apply an ALL rule that doesn\'t fit the
> situation, and put their 15% in their coffers and
> made some gamblers feel warm and fuzzy inside I
> guess.
>
> To be clear, I had zero dollars at stake here.  As
> an old, cranky poster used to once say about NYRA:
>  clueless clowns.  This was another example in
> many of late by NYRA.
>
> The best decision would have been to circle the
> horses for 10 minutes, announce to bettors to
> change their tickets if they desired or to cancel
> them.  But they rushed them in the gate and ran
> and why?  To keep the tv schedule?  IDK....but
> clueless idiots.

Fairmount meets me for the first time, he turns into P-Dub on the forum.

[BitPlayer]

I\'d be surprised if the stewards did not have a hand in this.  The rule is a NYS Gaming Commission rule and is thus subject to the stewards\' interpretation.

One problem is that \"known to the public\" is subject to a variety of interpretations.  Given that the announcement was made only shortly before the close of betting, what do we do about players who are at other tracks, at simulcast centers, or have briefly left Living Room Downs to grab a beer?  How long before the close of betting does an announcement have to be made at the track in order for most of the betting public to have heard about it and had time to react?  I\'m not a fan of the NYRA stewards, but this was not an easy situation.

The real question is what took so long to make the decision to take the remaining races off the turf.  I had an LOL moment when I read someone\'s post about possibly moving the races to Finger Lakes, but there was also an element of truth in it.  Given the Churchill Downs precedent, NYRA must have been worried about being forced to suspend racing (either on the turf or completely) and \"round up the usual suspects\" if any more problems occurred on Sunday.

[Socalman3]

BitPlayer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I\'d be surprised if the stewards did not have a
> hand in this.  The rule is a NYS Gaming Commission
> rule and is thus subject to the stewards\'
> interpretation.
>
> One problem is that \"known to the public\" is
> subject to a variety of interpretations.  Given
> that the announcement was made only shortly before
> the close of betting, what do we do about players
> who are at other tracks, at simulcast centers, or
> have briefly left Living Room Downs to grab a
> beer?  How long before the close of betting does
> an announcement have to be made at the track in
> order for most of the betting public to have heard
> about it and had time to react?  I\'m not a fan of
> the NYRA stewards, but this was not an easy
> situation.
>
> The real question is what took so long to make the
> decision to take the remaining races off the turf.
>  I had an LOL moment when I read someone\'s post
> about possibly moving the races to Finger Lakes,
> but there was also an element of truth in it.
> Given the Churchill Downs precedent, NYRA must
> have been worried about being forced to suspend
> racing (either on the turf or completely) and
> \"round up the usual suspects\" if any more problems
> occurred on Sunday.

Okay, then that makes it even more simple.  Whoever is the Czar of NYS horseracing is to blame because that person is the moron that hired a bunch of morons.  If there is no Czar of NYS horseracing, then it is Governor Hochul\'s fault.  I don\'t really understand why blame is relevant.  Somebody wants us to entrust them with our gaming dollars. Whoever that is.  That person (whoever it is that wants us to bet with them) cannot simply take our money, act like idiots, and then expect us to come back for more abuse.

The real problem I am having is that people at NYRA and NYRA Bets don\'t even think anything went wrong.  They don\'t even understand why a bettor would never want to bet again if things like this can happen.  That is what the real problem is.

I actually admit it is a tricky and difficult situation. But there needs to be an adult in the room who can at least say something like - okay, there is a lot of uncertainty, we cannot take peoples\' bets in uncertainty, so we just cancel those pools.  That would have been very logical and nobody would have had a complaint. Okay, so there was no adult in the room and they did the wrong thing. But after the dust has cleared, somebody should be acknowledging that something wrong happened and suggesting that they would do something about it. They depend on us trusting them and they act like we should just trust them blindly. They should be worried about us losing faith in them and working on regaining trust.

[Socalman3]

BitPlayer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I\'d be surprised if the stewards did not have a
> hand in this.  The rule is a NYS Gaming Commission
> rule and is thus subject to the stewards\'
> interpretation.
>
> One problem is that \"known to the public\" is
> subject to a variety of interpretations.  Given
> that the announcement was made only shortly before
> the close of betting, what do we do about players
> who are at other tracks, at simulcast centers, or
> have briefly left Living Room Downs to grab a
> beer?  How long before the close of betting does
> an announcement have to be made at the track in
> order for most of the betting public to have heard
> about it and had time to react?  I\'m not a fan of
> the NYRA stewards, but this was not an easy
> situation.
>
> The real question is what took so long to make the
> decision to take the remaining races off the turf.
>  I had an LOL moment when I read someone\'s post
> about possibly moving the races to Finger Lakes,
> but there was also an element of truth in it.
> Given the Churchill Downs precedent, NYRA must
> have been worried about being forced to suspend
> racing (either on the turf or completely) and
> \"round up the usual suspects\" if any more problems
> occurred on Sunday.

On the \"known to the public\" interpretation question, I think you are mixing up two things.  What might or might not be tricky is how to interpret it.  What is not tricky at all is when that interpretation needs to be communicated to the public.  They could have interpreted any way they wanted to, but they had to communicate that interpretation to the betting public prior to the pool closing.  What they cannot do is be silent, wait for people to enter their money in the pool, and then, after the first race is run, come out with an interpretation that defies common sense and common expectation.  I think the common sense default is that if the Public Announcer states something clearly and loudly on the Public Address system and on the live feed, it is mighty hard to say on a common sense basis that the information is not known to the public.  I get that it may not have filtered through to the whole public in time - but if you are going to make an interpretation like that, then you better also announce that uncommon interpretation at the same time you are making the first announcement.  There is no reason, other than sheer idiocy, to split the timing of the two announcements.

[BitPlayer]

Socal -

I agree with everything in both of these posts.

The executive director of the NYS Gaming Commission is Robert Williams.  I think he came in with Cuomo.  The approach to regulating racing under his leadership has been, in my mind, sloppy and illogical.

My recent interactions with NYRA Bets have suggested to me that some of the people working there don\'t know what they are doing.

In general, I think horse racing has a personnel problem that is only going to get worse.  It\'s not exactly an industry with a promising future.

[Socalman3]

BitPlayer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Socal -
>
> I agree with everything in both of these posts.
>
> The executive director of the NYS Gaming
> Commission is Robert Williams.  I think he came in
> with Cuomo.  The approach to regulating racing
> under his leadership has been, in my mind, sloppy
> and illogical.
>
> My recent interactions with NYRA Bets have
> suggested to me that some of the people working
> there don\'t know what they are doing.
>
> In general, I think horse racing has a personnel
> problem that is only going to get worse.  It\'s not
> exactly an industry with a promising future.


This makes me sad.

I recently attended the races for the first time at Colonial Downs.  Although the personnel were very energetic and cheerful and had the right spirit, they did not know or understand anything about horseracing. I shudder when I think how it is going to go with the Arlington Million there this upcoming Saturday.

I used to feel very angry at the Breeders Cup for no longer having the Series held at Belmont Park. I just thought it was crazy the NYC could not get a Breeders Cup.  Now I completely understand and I do not blame the Breeders Cup. In fact, I thank god that they had the god sense not to give the Breeders Cup to a NYRA track.

I feel like the only race of relevance in my life is who will die first, me or horseracing. I was long hoping I was going to die first so I could enjoy the sport in my old age, but am now feeling worried it is going to be the other way around and my old age will not be as enjoyable as I was hoping it would be.

[Socalman3]

Fairmount1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
 
>
> This is NYRA garbage again.  Hopefully TGJB
> doesn\'t delete this one like a post last weekend
> that involved NYRA decisions.  
>


You posted about NYRA being unworthy of trust and the post got taken down? Is that right?  I don\'t know the posts you are talking about, So, I cannot comment too much, but it would seem to me quite troubling from a consumer protection perspective IF you made a truthful fact based post warning bettors that NYRA is untrustworthy and beware and the post got taken down and, THEN, after that, Sunday Aug 6 happened.

Does anybody here know anything about HISA?  It would seem to me that Congress should have made some consumer protection rules for the horse betting public.  What NYRA did on Sunday August 6 should have been a violation of consumer protection laws.

It sickens me that NYRA took 15% out of that pool. It seems to me at a minimum they should offer a compensatory Pick 5 where they do not take anything out of the pool and they seed into the pool the 15% they took out of the tainted pool - and in the special compensatory bet, they should not allow CAW to participate in it.

Instead, they do not even admit or acknowledge, or even seem to know that they did something terribly wrong.  That is the absolute worst because with that it means you can just expect more of the same and you have nobody to blame but yourself the next time you get burned like this.

As bad as what NYRA did was bad, it is far far worse that they do not make any sort of public acknowledgement that what they did was wrong. This is like a corollary to the cover up is worse than the crime.  Here, the lack of ownership to the foul up is worse than the foul up. I suppose this is where the term SNAFU comes from, but, in the army, there is nothing a foot soldier can do.  Here, we all have the choice on whether or not to trust the leadership. Can you imagine if the soldiers complaining about SNAFUs could choose to walk?  They would be idiots not to and the army would not be able to survive.  Why should NYRA be able to survive in this environment?  The bettors will end up only having themselves to blame because they keep coming back for more.  The only possible way to effect change would be through a demonstrative concerted action.

If there were enough outrage, a significant amount of NYRA Bets customers could agree on a particular large bet that they will only make the bet through other websites and not through NYRA Bets. The handle on the race would be unchanged nobody has to skip a bet they wanted to make, but the allocation of the betting among bet takers would be altered and hopefully a meaningful message could be sent. However, quite pessimistic this could be orchestrated and if it were tried and failed the consequences would be worse than not even trying.  All I am doing is my own self-exclusion from NYRA Bets and doing all my betting on other websites instead.

[TGJB]

To be clear, I didn't take that post down because it was anti NYRA— I'm in the middle of suing the SOBs, aside from which their screwups cost TGPS a lot of money.

I took the post down because of something else in it.

[Socalman3]

TGJB Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> To be clear, I didn't take that post down
> because it was anti NYRA— I'm in the middle of
> suing the SOBs, aside from which their screwups
> cost TGPS a lot of money.
>
> I took the post down because of something else in
> it.


To the extent my post was critical of your actions, I retract that aspect of it, and I apologize to you for having done that. It was not my intention to falsely accuse you of wrongdoing.

[BitPlayer]

I see from Andy Serling\'s Twitter feed that he is going to have David O\'Rourke, President of NYRA, on at the beginning of Talking Horses today to \"discuss events from this past weekend.\"  I have no idea what the scope of the discussion will be (just the breakdowns, or also the off-the-turf decision making?), but it might be worth a listen.  The show starts at 12:05 EDT today and is usually uploaded to Youtube afterwards.

[Socalman3]

BitPlayer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I see from Andy Serling\'s Twitter feed that he is
> going to have David O\'Rourke, President of NYRA,
> on at the beginning of Talking Horses today to
> \"discuss events from this past weekend.\"  I have
> no idea what the scope of the discussion will be
> (just the breakdowns, or also the off-the-turf
> decision making?), but it might be worth a listen.
>  The show starts at 12:05 EDT today and is usually
> uploaded to Youtube afterwards.

Thank you for heads up on this. Due to work, I wont be able to listen to it live, but I will be very interested to hear what he has to say.  If it is anything less than abject acknowledgement of the failure, the problem remains.