At Best, Nobody Will Know Their Names; At Worst, Everyone Will : Special Kind of Pressure on Stewards

At 11:17 this morning, three men will be in place in the stewards’ box, high atop Hollywood Park, their sole task to uphold the integrity of equine economics. A formidable task, no doubt.

Is there any pressure in that?

At 2:32 this afternoon, seven races will have been run and $10 million in purse money will have been distributed. Those three men have to make sure that no horse, rider or trainer has taken any undue advantage. A tough chore, to be sure.

Is there any pressure in that?

The races will be viewed by an estimated 20 million people on NBC. The three stewards have four cameras to assist them in making their decisions. NBC will have 16. NBC also has a very strict time schedule it wants the track to follow. A second-guess opportunity, at the very least.

Is there any pressure in that?

Last year, more than $12 million was bet on the Breeders’ Cup races. Today, there should be an amount near that figure. The three stewards have to make sure that the interests of the bettors, most of whom will be losers, are upheld and everyone is satisfied. That’s impossible.

Pressure? You better believe there is pressure.

Pete Pedersen, Tom Ward and Dave Samuels are the stewards assigned by the California Horse Racing Board to officiate today’s Breeders’ Cup. At the very best, they won’t be mentioned. At the very worst, everyone will know their names.

This is especially significant when realizing that horse racing dances on the cusp of respectability. Stories about race fixing and drugging have clouded the public perception to a degree. Clouding it further is that most bettors lose. A handicapper is much more likely to blame a horse, jockey or even the industry than his own ability to pick a winner.

So, with that in mind, the stewards--for about 3 1/2 hours--find themselves under enormous pressure.

“Anybody who says you don’t feel it . . . well, you just can’t be that cold-blooded,” said Pedersen, who also officiated at the first Breeders’ Cup at Hollywood Park in 1984 and last year at Santa Anita. “Your blood has to churn up a bit.”

Keene Daingerfield, considered the dean of racing officials, remembers judging the centennial running of the Kentucky Derby in 1973 at Churchill Downs.

“I was shaking like a leaf,” Daingerfield said. “There is a tremendous amount of pressure. . . . You would like to think that you’re watching the same as you would the ninth race on a Tuesday but you’re certainly going to be aware of the importance.”

If that’s not enough, there is the belief that horses don’t get disqualified in big races. It’s thought that an official may err on the side of conservatism, causing some to couple Derby with demolition.

It’s a fact that no Kentucky Derby winner has ever been disqualified for interference.

“People ask me when a horse is going to be disqualified in the Derby,” Daingerfield said. “And I tell them, ‘When some horse needs to be disqualified.’ ”

Perhaps the most celebrated non-disqualification occurred in the 1980 Preakness. Codex made contact with Genuine Risk going into the final turn. Many, including Eddie Arcaro, ABC television commentator and former jockey, demanded that Codex be dropped from first. The stewards disallowed the foul claim.

John Nazareth, who helped Genuine Risk’s trainer LeRoy Jolley, told Times staff writer Ross Newhan after the race: “If the stewards say there was no contact today then one must be blind, one must be deaf and one must have drunk too many Black Eyed Susans. The stewards ought to be fired. . . . His number would have come down in New York and it would have come down at Beulah Park (in Ohio). This is the biggest story of all time.”

Well, not quite of all time, but it does underscore the importance and scrutiny a stewards’ decision undergoes in a big race.

Pedersen faced a similar situation in 1984 at the first Breeders’ Cup. In the $3-million Classic--1 miles--it appeared that Wild Again and Gate Dancer had interfered with Slew o’ Gold. The judges considered disqualifying both but decided to move Gate Dancer from second to third and leave Wild Again the winner.

“After the race, we got a call up in the stewards’ box,” Pedersen said. “Someone called to tell us what a lousy decision we made. I just thought it was someone at the track that the operator had let get up here. I asked him where he was calling from, and he told me Cleveland. He was just watching on television. That can only happen in the Breeders’ Cup.”

The Wild Again-Gate Dancer decision has easily survived public and industry scrutiny as a good one.

The stress that the stewards will feel today will probably only serve to strengthen their conviction in their decisions.

“The tendency is for people to become much less flexible,” said Marvin Karlins, a psychologist who wrote “Psyching Out Vegas” and writes a monthly column for Gambling Times. “It’s a condition called hardening of the perceptions. It’s no different than people in an auto accident. They tend to constrict their response.”

Karlins points out, however, that the more you deal with these stressful situations, the better off you are at handling them.

“It’s just like combat,” Karlins said. “There are people in the military who are trained to handle this kind of stress. If that’s the case, you can feel much more comfortable with their decisions.

“There is no doubt that there is a great deal more stress (at the Breeders’ Cup) and there will always be second-guessing. Whenever you’ve got a situation where there is TV replay, you’ll get this. You can almost parallel this to the judges in the Olympics.”

Another factor that can convolute an already confusing issue is the varied backgrounds of the jockeys. It is widely considered that California stewards are more lenient than those on the East Coast.

A steward in California tends to look at how interference affects the outcome of the horses that finish in the money. Pedersen describes it as a “no harm, no foul” attitude. New York stewards, though, go by the “foul is a foul is a foul” theory.

“I will say we’re not stewards that take numbers down without a good reason,” Pedersen said. “We’re not apt to disqualify for a minor incident. Some riders can be pretty good actors.

“The riders get keyed up. We don’t see as many mistakes (in the bigger races). The desire to win the big money will prompt some of them to take whatever advantage they can.”

This shifts the pressure to the East Coast jockeys, who suddenly are given a little more latitude when it comes to aggressive riding.

Most of the Eastern riders have ridden on the West Coast, however, and only the best jockeys have mounts in the Breeders’ Cup.

“You might see them give more ground in a less important race,” said Tom Ward, who will be officiating his first Breeders’ Cup. “But these riders are so good they can size up a situation well before it happens.”

Previously, the officials’ box has always had a former jockey as a steward. This year there isn’t one.

Hubert Jones, a former jockey who officiated last year’s Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita, gently tries to build a case for a jockey in every stewards’ box. It’s not a minority opinion.

“I feel much more comfortable with my background,” Jones said. “I understand the riders’ feelings and the problems they have. To me, it would be most helpful (to have that background).”

Pedersen concurs. “All things being equal, it’s wonderful to have a former rider in the stand. It’s certainly an advantage. But, we (non-jockeys) have to use our strengths to an advantage. We just have to try harder (without an ex-jockey.)

Daingerfield also agrees. “I think it’s good to have a rider in the box. But, as Mark Twain said, he may have never laid an egg but he’s a better judge of an omelet than any hen he knew.”

All of which, in some strange way, brings one back to the pressure three stewards must face for 3 1/2 hours on a Saturday afternoon.

“There are two $100,000 races at the end of the program,” Pedersen said. “But we’ll breathe one big sigh of relief when the Breeders’ Cup races are over.”