Koch’s Crew Should Have Clear Sailing

If you have a farm, bet it.

If not, bet your orchard or your hot tub or your IRS refund (fat chance, huh?) or your first born.

We’re talking slam dunk here.

Duke vs. Prairie View in basketball.

Bush vs. Anyone in November.

Justice vs. Mike Tyson forever.

Kanza will not win against America 3 today in the scheduled final race of the America’s Cup defenders semifinal series. You can bet everything you have on America 3 with no fear of losing. The problem, of course, is that the payoff would be so small you probably couldn’t see it with the world’s most powerful microscope.

Vegas wouldn’t touch this one. The odds against Kanza would have to be title to the Excalibur to 1.

Kanza is not that bad a boat, you say. It is, as of now, tied for first place in the defender semifinals with Dennis Conner’s Stars & Stripes. Never has so strong a competitor had so little chance to win.

To be sure, this has everything to do with people.

Bill Koch owns Kanza. There is no way in the world he wants Kanza to win. You see, Koch also owns America 3. Koch would like to see both of his boats in the defender finals beginning April 18. The next step to accomplishing that scenario is for America 3 to win today.

America 3 needs to win today to force a Monday playoff between Kanza and Stars & Stripes for a spot in the finals. If Kanza should win, America 3 is out and Kanza and Stars & Stripes advance to the finals. Koch wants that playoff. He wants that one shot, do-or-die opportunity to squeeze Dennis Conner out of the picture.

Is today’s race fixed?

If “fix” means that the winner is predetermined, then it’s fixed.

There’s nothing illegal about it, however. The feds will not investigate. One team is simply trying to maximize its potential.

All of this has arisen because of this bizarre format imposed upon the defenders by Koch’s America 3 team being given two entries and Conner only one. That, in truth, was all Conner can use, given that he was able to raise only enough money for one boat.

What Koch hopes to do is turn the defender finals into an exercise in boredom. Should two of his boats make the finals, it would be a best-of-13 intramural matching America 3 against Kanza. That is, unless Koch has a fifth or sixth boat under construction somewhere. Koch’s boats could race that whole final series against one another and Koch could still name the loser of the series to defend the America’s Cup.

That whole series would mean essentially nothing.

For this very reason, Saturday’s race between Stars & Stripes and America 3 meant so very much. Conner and Co. needed a win to knock America 3 out of contention for the finals and ensure that Koch would not have an opportunity to turn them into a good time for a long spring nap.

Conner set this up with that victory over Kanza on Friday. That left Conner in need of only one more victory. He went after it Saturday.

And he lost.

He can thank his lucky stars for that victory Friday. Without it, he would be done. Finished. Come back in ’95.

Saturday’s race was a very tense affair. America 3, for a change, had its back to the wall. It had to win or face the feared Conner through 13 races in that final series.

Conner jumped out on top and led through the first two legs before Buddy Melges, skippering America 3 , captured the lead near the end of the third leg. Conner never again led, though he stayed close enough to keep knuckles white on America 3 almost all the way to the finish line.

The tension and pressure Monday will be at the max. It will be the most critical race thus far in the three months of the regatta.

And most of this burden will be on Conner’s shoulders. The America 3 team, after all, is assured of at least one entry in the finals.

Dennis Conner is not.

The man is Mr. America’s Cup. He won it in 1980, lost it in 1983, won it back in 1987 and defended it in 1988. Here he is in his home waters off his hometown.

And here he is, sailing one race to stay alive with more than a month of sailing remaining.

Indeed, he is sailing for more than himself. He is sailing to make the defender finals interesting. He is sailing to make the defender finals competitive. He is sailing to make the defender finals meaningful.

If Dennis Conner is not in the finals, it will be to the detriment of the event. You won’t be able to find a happy face outside the America 3 compound. You may not even find anyone awake outside the America 3 compound.

You don’t have to be a Dennis Conner fan to root for him. You can root for him in spite of himself.

You can root for him so the defender finals won’t be just like today will be.