Baffert Knows Which Horse Is His Meal Ticket
They say horses are some of the dumbest animals around, which I guess really doesn’t make them much different from baseball players.
Now ordinarily the last thing I’m going to be upset about is an athlete who can’t talk, but in this case I’d love to get War Emblem’s take on how he feels.
From what I can tell, most horsemen don’t think much of War Emblem, calling him “one-dimensional” because he likes to break from the gate and then run as fast as he can until he wins the race.
Horsemen apparently aren’t much smarter than baseball players.
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RIGHT NOW War Emblem--the winner of the Kentucky Derby and Preakness--is the best thing happening in a dying sport. Del Mar, of course, is an annual aberration, drawing huge crowds because most of the people who live around here have only the Padres and Chargers to support, which makes for a depressing life and the need for escape by the surf. Eventually, they’re all going to laugh at the Chargers, and we’re all going to return to those quiet, nameless racehorse days of small crowds at Hollywood Park and Santa Anita.
This will be the first time in Del Mar history the winner of the Kentucky Derby has run here in the year of its Derby victory, and officials are expecting this year’s Pacific Classic to draw 7,000 more fans than last year’s race because of that.
Maybe the Sparks should think about having War Emblem make an appearance at one of their games.
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THURSDAY WAS supposed to be a big day here. They had a big news conference to pick post positions for the Pacific Classic, and because the horses weren’t talking, they called on trainers, owners and jockeys to come to the dais. No one representing War Emblem, however, stepped forward, including trainer Bob Baffert.
Now as we know the going rate for an appearance fee for Baffert these days is $50,000, so I just presumed Del Mar was cheap.
Or maybe, as the rumors have persisted, Baffert has no intention of running War Emblem, and has given only the appearance all week the horse is going to run.
That left others, whom no one really cares about, to do the talking.
Trainer Bobby Frankel, the nattering nabob of negativism in horse racing, was the first to chime in by telephone from Saratoga--and I wonder if Baffert would have agreed to come to the phone for $25,000? Anyway, the news conference began with track announcer Trevor Denman asking Frankel about the Pacific Classic.
“There are too many horses for that race track,” groused Frankel.
Well, you would have thought Frankel had just called the entire Pacific Classic field a bunch of donkeys, because Denman went to the mute button and quickly moved to the next person on the dais.
No one seemed to care what trainer Doug O’Neill had to say, however, because when Denman asked for questions, a reporter for the Daily Racing Form wanted to talk to Frankel again. Frankel hadn’t hung up despite Denman’s suggestion to get lost, and Mr. Sunshine said, “The horses on the East Coast are a lot better.”
He also said, “ ... with the exception of War Emblem,” but by that time Denman had him nearly drowned out, going to his “down the stretch they come and Frankel has been left way behind.”
The reporter from the Daily Racing Form and another associate immediately stood up and left the news conference, apparently upset that only glowing things about Del Mar were going to be allowed to be said on this day. I guess the Daily Racing Form prefers dirt to happy turf talk.
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BECAUSE BAFFERT has put a lifetime ban--twice--on talking to Times racing writer Bill Christine because he refuses to write only nice things about him, I had a hunch he wasn’t going to confide in Christine whether War Emblem was going to run Sunday. So I sought out Baffert in the paddock before the start of Thursday’s first race before his horse, Hezgotanothergear, ran.
I watched the genius of Baffert at work. He avoided the horse the entire time it was in the paddock, then gave precise racing instructions to jockey Laffit Pincay: “Good luck,” he said, and Pincay nodded. The horse finished second, and refused to comment when asked for an explanation.
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TRACK OFFICIALS wanted Baffert at the news conference, but he said he didn’t come for fear of saying the wrong thing. I hope Christine rips him.
He also said he has every intention of running War Emblem on Sunday--even after I made him swear on a saddle cloth he has not been pulling a fast one on everyone and is going to scratch the beast an hour before post time. He said the $10,000 fee to enter the race gets him a great meal in the Director’s Room, and he doesn’t want to put that in jeopardy.
“I scratch the horse, and you can bet those people in the Director’s Room will be yelling at me to put the lamb chop down,” Baffert said. “He’s going to run.”
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A TIP: Baffert said the Pacific Classic is a three-horse race, as far as he’s concerned, between War Emblem, Sky Jack and Milwaukee Brew.
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I WAS told boxing promoter Bob Arum was not at Del Mar on Thursday, and instead had taken his five grandchildren to Legoland--as if he wasn’t going to drop a bundle of money there.
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TODAY’S LAST word comes in e-mail from Jerry Reigel:
“You pick on [Times handicapper] Bob Mieszerski a lot, but he picked a cold superfecta over the weekend. Had you bet $10, you got $5,000 in return.”
I told him the blindfold would work.
T.J. Simers can be reached at t.j.simers@latimes.com
