Drugs and Modern Sports

[bobphilo]

Jerry,

Understood. I just felt that, given the hands off defeatist philosophy towards drug use advocated by some of the posters, it was appropriate to post another view calling for at least an attempt to recognize and deal with this problem.
The details of how this is best done is a legitimate matter of debate.

Bob

[bobphilo]

Chuckles,

Thanks for having both the intelligence and moral sense of getting the point of my post. Apparently, ignorance of the dangerous effects of performance enhancing drugs is a convenient excuse for some to vilify those that understand the evil that the use of such substances truly is. Funny how those that claim to not get it are the very ones bragging about how well they\'re doing by incorporating their knowledge of juicing trainers into their betting?

Bob  

[NoCarolinaTony]

Bob

Maybe Mr Oxley should use a different trainer.

NC Tony

[NoCarolinaTony]

Bob,

I am sure you\'re a good guy. In response to your most eloquent post, I wrote quite a few responses to you, only to delete them over and over. I don\'t want another BOB\"PHILO\" war with you as even I can tell, I am clearly out of your intellectual league, (IE you are the Yankees or Secretariat and I am the Kanapolis Intimidators or anything trained by John Candlin).

You clearly don\'t want to understand my point.

I sincerely do not want to have horses hurt or worse, nor do I want to see jockey\'s hurt or worse. I know that drugs and Shaking, and fixing are all still  part of the culture. It\'s been there for decades, no more now then before, and I use the inuendo information, when I wager, to asses the propects of a horse of a \"suspected Drug Trainer\" period!!! When it comes to racing I am a realist not an idealist. So if that is shameful, I can sleep at night.

The policing part belong to the authorities, the racing commisions, the NTRA, and the Breeders.  It seems those in power have no interest of increasing or better yet improving testing, or providing meaningful information such as Co2 levels or Vet information. The only Power that a schlock bettor has is to not bet or bet elshwere. Protest the \"BAD JURISDICTIONS\" by Moving the Dollars. Not sure bettors have much more influence than that. I think the offshore rebate shops got some attention of the commisions. In there defense, the powers that be, do seem to want to improve running conditions for horses by modifying the racing surfaces around North America. (perhaps an overreaction only time will tell).

It is also my opinion that many on here who villify trainers about drug use are really no more than whining about bad handicapping, bad training or trainers and really what amounts to nothing more. They use the excuse drugs as a poor excuse for their bad capping. It may make them feel good or sound good. Howver, PLEASE if you really feel that strongly about the issue, DO SOMETHING. If you \"REALLY\" have the \"inside dope\" rather than whine on this or any board, report it. I\'m sure there are more effective places to do it than this microculture of the racing community. Bob, you sound more like an animal lover than many of these other whiners, just to make it clear.

Good Luck with your social cause. What is your plan of action? Any luck with Spitzers office?

I don\'t really ever like to  shy from a good public debate, but in this case I am dropping it from this public forum.  I thought this was a handicapping forum and not a social issues forum. If you want to discuss this further, my email address is public.


NC Tony

[imallin]

Good post Tony, i feel the same way as you do.

Whats going on behind the scenes in racing is a shame. I can\'t imagine anyone would condone such behavior. BUT. As a horseplayer, all i can do is either bet on winners or not bet period. Cleaning up the game is not the responsibility of the horseplayers, its the responsibilities of the people who are policing the racetracks and the people who are policing the game, whoever they are.

I bet on these races knowing they are tainted. I factor \'taint\' into my handicapping. I wish they were not tainted, but what can i do? I have to handicap all the information at my disposal. Drugs are just one more \'handicapping angle\' to factor in. Hopefully one day i won\'t have to factor this in at all.

[marcus]

nct ,  If your calling Bob a Yankee Fan - that is a low blow  ...

I try not to assume too much when handicapping and suppose that puts me into as many as it takes away . But guessing who\'s doing what , when , where , why etc seems like it might be less estute than attempting to predict exactly within fractions of a point - trip and ground loss senarios in a crowded turf field but then again , I did wear the tools of ignorance back in my Baseball day\'s ...
Who Is Oxley ?

[NoCarolinaTony]

Marcus

Don\'t know who his Baseball team allegence is with, just an analogy so nothing intentional.

Drugs is not the primary consideration when handicapping, but a consideration, and usually all that history is built into thoro patterns and trainer patterns already. Only meaningful when it\'s in the claiming game  like going from low % trainer (like John Candlin) to a Scott Lake or Dutrow, Assmussen/BLasi, Cole Norman, Jeff Mullins, Drug O\'neill, Mike Mitchell. The other famous guys don\'t play the claiming game.

Mr Oxley Owned or Owns Horses such luninaries like  Manarchos, Sky Mesa, - Strong Contender, Dr. Pleasure etc. It\'s ironic that his trainer (John Ward and His wife, seems to be an an exclusive) usually has them ready to run early and flatten out after 2-3 races. A very similar pattern to many of the so called juice trainers, but I would not put him in that category simply because he has them ready early. His horses for whatever reason usually seem to get hurt. With the caliber of stock he has to run, a little bit of an under achiever.

NC Tony

[marcus]

NC Tony - I see what your saying about T - Pattern\'s + Claiming + Oxley , Thanks ...
 Some of these racing topics of discussions can be emotionally volitile and what is said can come out ( or
be interpeted ) wrong sometimes - I know becouse I\'m usually the one saying it ...  - marcus  

[richiebee]

NCT:

   Your response to Bobphilo was well reasoned and well presented. Your Jesuit mentors would be proud, even though we might have to tell them that your interest in racing is mathematical, and not pari- mutuel.

   Cant believe you took a shot at John Candlin. (If he had trained Lassie, Timmy wouldn\'t have lived through the first episode.) I have always thought it would be interesting to take 10 of his horses and give them to Dutrow or Pletcher for 3 months and see what result. Maybe TVG, which does an awful job of covering racing (as Beyer said,TVG hosts are the last people in America to find out that a horse has been scratched or that a race has been taken off the turf), could do this as a reality show.

[TGJB]

The Lassie bit is pretty funny.

[miff]

Richiebee,

You could give Candlin\'s stock to the Lord and they would not win.Unimaginably ill-bred, crooked looking NY bred slow rats and filly snails.

On the other hand, Rick Dutrow is a better trainer than the Lord, so I guess he would win with them.After all, remember someone posted here that Rick uses better feed, better blacksmiths, better vets, etc.That explains it!

Mike

[richiebee]

Miff:

    You and I had an exchange regarding Dutrow back in March of 05 on this board. I will still stand by the following, that Dutrow, Pletcher and Frankel are in a position to provide their stock with the best of everything-- feed, farrier, vet, equine dentist, help (especially exercise riders). Even with their alleged undetectable advantage, the fact that these trainer\'s horses enjoy \"the best of everything\" should never be discounted. Not to mention that these trainers are allowed to rest their stock when necessary.

    I am not naive Miff. I worked in Kentucky in the early 80s. A couple of the trainers I worked for would love to ship from Churchill to River or Latonia simply because it gave them a minute or two with their horse in a rest stop off of the interstate, away from prying eyes.

    I will reiterate, without trying to reopen debate, that (a) the \"usual suspects\" win percentage has not been greatly affected since the implementation of pre-race detention; (b)high volume, high win percentage trainers\' horses undergo more POST - race tests than horses from lower impact barns and (c)the 2 high profile suspensions in the past year (Dutrow/Pletcher) have not really involved performance enhancing drugs.

    Absolutely agree that the horses of the usual suspects are enjoying some sort of veterinary/pharmaceutical/ nutritional edge, and that the regulatory bodies responsible for detection and enforcement are badly overmatched. Add this to the fact that these barns are coddled by the Racing Office (stall allocations, races written for)and have access to the best bloodstock, it IS kind of amazing that they are, in general, BEATEN 75% of the time.

   Part 2 of the Candlin Reality Show. Part 1 was give Dutrow or Pletcher 10 of Candlin\'s horses for 3 months. Part 2 would be to give 10 of Candlin\'s horses to Oscar S. Barrera or Pistol Pete Ferriola or Gasper Moschera for 3 WEEKS.

[miff]

Rich,

Don\'t want to open a thread that goes on forever. I am close to several non-super trainers that have wealthy owners. These trainers have carte blanche regarding expenditure for the things you mention.They also have good quality/bred stock. They are very good experienced horsemen(1 Hall of Famer)

They have not been able to accomplish anything close to Ricks results perennially, all things considered. I have no idea what Rick does to be as successful as he is but I would wager all that I own that it is not ONLY the very important things you have listed.

I\'m not even hinting that you are naive.I have observed the move ups of horses visually and with TG.On the east coast,Dutrow is peerless.Pletcher has an annual replenishment of top quality babies and I do not find his results to be abnormal given that fact.Frankel, same as Pletcher, to an extent.

I do not think that Pletcher or Frankel are in Dutrows league, all things made equal.I do not consider Dutrows stock to be quite in the same league with many other trainers.Only recently, Dutrow has begun to have some expensive stock sent to him.

Unless he is caught, you are correct to assume that his methodology is superior to all others except that I know others do the same things with much less success.How can that be?


Mike

[TGJB]

Until we have both transparency (good comments by Hovedy on this a couple of weeks ago) and serious attempts to catch people, conversations about this are at the same level as Mantle vs. Mays (at least for all those not measuring things with real data-- Miff\'s point about watching certain trainers get large groups of horses to move up on TG is on point). We need vets listed on the program, CO2 levels published, and samples frozen, just for starters.

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

TGJB Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Until we have both transparency (good comments by
> Hovedy on this a couple of weeks ago) and serious
> attempts to catch people, conversations about this
> are at the same level as Mantle vs. Mays (at least
> for all those not measuring things with real
> data-- Miff\'s point about watching certain
> trainers get large groups of horses to move up on
> TG is on point). We need vets listed on the
> program, CO2 levels published, and samples frozen,
> just for starters.


Once again, for coincidence\'s sake, what do Todd Pletcher, Bobby Frankel and Rick Dutrow all have in common and precisely when did they become so formidable on the graded stakes scene? After answering that one accurately, lets talk some more about the quality of their stock and the good hay, oats and water they get.

Mantle was the phenom, Mays the Durable One.