Morning briefing

The mystery surrounding Big Brown and his failure to win the Triple Crown continues. It didn’t help that his trainer, Rick Dutrow Jr., snubbed Congress last week and didn’t show up for a hearing dealing with the ills of horse racing.

To get some answers straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak, David Thomas of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram interviewed Big Brown.

Thomas: “Much has been written about you. Some have said you weren’t worthy of winning the Triple Crown. Some have said you were merely the best of a weak group of 3-year-olds. How does that make you feel?”

Big Brown has the final say

Big Brown: “I can honestly say that I don’t read newspapers, so those things don’t bother me.”

Trivia time

The 69th running of the Hollywood Gold Cup is Saturday at Hollywood Park. Real Quiet won the Gold Cup in 1999 after winning the Kentucky Derby and Preakness and barely losing the Belmont Stakes the previous year. What jockey rode Real Quiet in the Gold Cup?

Dumb question

The Star-Telegram’s Thomas, in his interview with Big Brown, also asked the horse what he did after his Belmont disappointment.

Big Brown: “Not much. Just went to the barn, got off to myself and watched my favorite baseball team play on TV.”

Thomas: “Who’s your favorite team?”

Big Brown: “Duh -- the Phillies.”

Getting even

Thomas’ interview with Big Brown wasn’t exclusive. A Foxsports.com blogger who calls himself Dudski earlier claimed to have interviewed the horse.

When the blogger tells Big Brown that after the Belmont jockey Kent Desormeaux said, “I had no horse,” Big Brown’s response is:

“Why that little [bleep]. I drag his dead [bleep] around these [bleep] tracks and he says ‘I had no horse.’ What did he think he was riding, a big [bleep] red dog?”

And when asked what he thought when Desormeaux pulled him up, Big Brown says, “I had no jockey.”

Wine connoisseur

Tom Lasorda is quite the expert when it comes to food. And he’s also a wine entrepreneur. His pinot grigio, created by Casa Torelli Imports of Santa Monica, was named best wine in its class at the recent Los Angeles International Wine & Spirits’ first Wine World of Sports competition at the L.A. County Fairgrounds.

Lasorda sent over a bottle to his friend Whitey Ford, who was in Los Angeles last week to preview a memorabilia sale to take place during All-Star week in New York.

“All the balls I signed for Tommy over the years and he sends me a $3 bottle of wine?” Ford told Lasorda’s assistant, Colin Gunderson.

Gunderson pointed out it was actually a $35 bottle of wine.

Trivia answer

Jerry Bailey, who besides riding Real Quiet to victory in 1999 also rode 1998 Gold Cup winner Skip Away.

And finally

Anaheim stuntman Jim “Mouth” Purol’s planned attempt to sit in every seat in the Rose Bowl -- all 92,522 of them -- in five days without stopping had Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times bringing up an interesting point.

Of Purol’s seat feat, to begin July 7 at 10 a.m., Perry wrote: “Sore bottom? Pundits fear he’s about to experience the granddaddy of them all.”

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larry.stewart@latimes.com