Baze Is a Man of Few Words but Many Victories as a Jockey

It was a safe bet before Friday night’s Eclipse Awards dinner that the shortest acceptance speech would be made by Russell Baze. A man of many victories on the backs of many horses, Baze finishes far back in the conversation league. It’s a good thing that he isn’t paid by the word. Compared to the jockey, a Gary Cooper script would be a filibuster.

This is not a good weekend for him to be tight with his tongue, because Baze, after receiving the Special Eclipse Award here, will be thrust before the microphones again Sunday, when he’ll be honored at Bay Meadows, one of his home tracks, as the first winner of the Isaac Murphy Award. Murphy, a jockey who won the Kentucky Derby three times before the turn of the century, was also a man of few words. He once said to a contemporary, a jockey well known for pulling horses: “Just be honest, and you’ll have plenty of money.”

Murphy’s integrity was severely tested at Saratoga in the summer of 1879. For the Kenner Stakes, he was to ride Falsetto, a colt who won the Travers after finishing second in the Derby. The horse to beat was Spendthrift, who had been second in the Travers. A consortium of gamblers, known to bet many times more than what a race’s purse was worth, approached Murphy, then 19.

He turned down the bribe, and Falsetto won the race. Years later, the husband of Falsetto’s owner said: “Isaac could have made enough to buy a bluegrass farm [in Kentucky] if he would have agreed to lose on Falsetto.”

Murphy once sold his house because he didn’t want to be in the same neighborhood as a gambling establishment. He died 100 years ago this Monday, only 35 and five years after his final Derby win. A black man, he was buried in a segregated Kentucky cemetery that didn’t even have a name.

Death was believed to have been caused by pneumonia and the continual strain to keep his weight down. In the off-seasons, Murphy’s weight would rise to 130-140 pounds, 20-30 pounds more than his riding weight. To reduce, he would avoid food and subsist on a diet of wine mixed with water.

His career lasted 20 years. He won more than 500 races, a big number for the time, and his overall winning percentage was .345, also exceptional. The National Turf Writers Assn. has named its new award after Murphy because the annual winner will be the jockey with the highest winning percentage.

Baze received the Special Eclipse Award because he was the first jockey to win 400 or more races four years in a row, and in 1995, when he won 448 races, he won with 29% of his mounts, the best in the country. That got him the first Isaac Murphy Award.

A few days ago, during a break in the racing at Bay Meadows, he showed his word-thriftiness during a conference call with reporters.

Question: Do you mind being a big fish in a little pond?

Answer: I think what I am is a mid-sized fish in a mid-sized pond.

Q: What was it like growing up in Vancouver?

A: I didn’t grow up there, I was just born there. It was just a matter of timing. My father was riding there when I was born.

Q: How come you’re not riding Cobra King anymore?

A: They said [Chris] McCarron was working him, and it wouldn’t be fair if he also didn’t ride him. It wasn’t my decision.

Baze has won 1,706 races in the last four years. His favorite horse? Not a stakes winner, but an old, unsound gelding called Sekondi.

“He’s a little horse with an ugly way of traveling,” Baze said. “But I always liked to ride him. He always comes with a rush. He makes his run, no matter what.”

Baze’s style is a lot like Sekondi’s. When that 400-victory target has been in the distance, Baze has made his run, no matter what.

*

Horse Racing Notes

Ed Friendly, president of the Thoroughbred Owners of California since the group’s inception three years ago, has told his board that he would like to resign as president but remain as chairman. Friendly wants to devote more time to non-racing interests. He and the TOC were instrumental in helping Santa Anita, Hollywood Park and Del Mar sign a five-year sponsorship with MGM Grand that has set up a potential annual bonus of $2.5 million for horses running in three races at the tracks. . . . Honour And Glory, who beat Afleetafair by two lengths while giving him three pounds in the San Miguel Stakes three weeks ago, carries six pounds more today in the San Vicente Stakes. Also in the field is Ready To Order, who makes his 3-year-old debut and first start since winning the California Breeders’ Champion Stakes on Dec. 28.