Couch: Cheaters Never Prosper, Unless You're Bob Baffert
And here we go again with Bob Baffert, superstar thoroughbred trainer and king of the Kentucky Derby. He has seemingly figured out this sport like no one before him, defined the impenetrable way to cheat in horse racing, get famous and make everyone happy and rich. Unless he’s the victim of a conspiratorial plot, that is.
Fill your horse with banned substances, win, make networks happy, fail a drug test, deny, deny, deny, tie things up in appeals, make owners happy as they sell breeding rights, satisfy bettors, keep winning, stall, say anything and move on. Everyone is so happy that everything is swept under the rug and forgotten.
Then, do it again. Baffert won his seventh Kentucky Derby a week ago with the horse Medina Spirit, which will try to win the second leg of the Triple Crown Saturday at the Preakness, despite having failed a doping test at the Derby. It is so reminiscent of 2018 Triple Crown winner Justify, which won all three races in violation of horse racing rules after failing a doping test. Guess who Justify’s trainer was.
You already know.
Baffert called Medina Spirit’s failed doping (bethamethazone) test, “the biggest gut punch in racing for something that I didn’t do. . .It’s an injustice to the horse.’’
An injustice to the horse. I wish I knew why that makes me giggle.
Baffert didn’t clarify what the biggest gut punch is for something that he did do. But if someone is actually injecting horses with steroids or massive anti-inflammatories so they can run full-out, pain-free despite injuries, then they are endangering horses.
Meanwhile, horses in the U.S. are euthanized at such an alarming rate that the industry has gone to Congress to help set up a way to protect them.
“I’m not a conspiracy theorist,’’ Baffert said. “I know everybody’s not out to get me, but there’s definitely something wrong. Why is it happening to me? There’s problems in racing, but it’s not Bob Baffert.’’
LOL. Baffert sounds like horse racing’s Lance Armstrong. He’s already laying out the case for another BS-seeming excuse, the way he always does when his horses fail drug tests. That makes five times in the past year.
Yes, I say “seeming.’’ How do I know for sure whether a governing body will rule that this Baffert horse, like a previous one, accidentally ingested a banned drug from one of those patches you wear to stop smoking.
I didn’t even know horses were into cigarettes.
Oh wait, Baffert’s argument was that someone working with the horse was using the patch. Whatever.
Or maybe this one also ate hay that could, possibly, get contaminated with steroids, like another of Baffert’s horses. Or the chain of command of the test results will prove not to be pristine and perfect, as happened with another of Baffert’s failed testers.
Maybe the test will prove to have just been wrong. And the second sample will be negative in a few months, after the Triple Crown has been raced and the breeding rights sold, TV ratings finalized, advertiser money received and checks deposited.
It’s hard to prove anything. There is always some sort of loophole, some procedural imperfection for a lawyer to find. Or maybe Baffert is right and someone is out to get him.
Armstrong always accused the bike racing industry of sabotaging him, too.
I’ll agree with Baffert on something: Horse racing’s biggest problem isn’t Bob Baffert. The industry is now seriously jeopardizing horses in the way it breeds and races, and is so out of control. In any field, if there are ways to make money, someone will find them.
In 2018, Justify failed a drug test a few weeks before the Kentucky Derby and then the California racing commission hid the results and slow-walked them, not bothering to produce a report before the one thing that makes the sport popular: a Triple Crown winner.
That knowledge comes thanks to the reporting of The New York Times’ Joe Drape. After winning the Triple Crown, Justify’s owners sold his breeding rights for $60 million.
And in 2019 Drape wrote that two months after Justify had won the Triple Crown, “the board disposed of the inquiry altogether during a closed-door executive session. It decided, with little evidence, that the positive test could have been a result of Justify’s eating contaminated food.’’
And, poof, the case was gone. But Baffert never is.
Medina Spirit could be stripped of his Kentucky Derby title and purse but not until after the second sample collected from the horse also shows the banned substance. Then, Baffert can stall/appeal. Baffert has also been suspended from entering other horses into races at Churchill Downs.
All of this is temporary while lawyers go to work. Nothing will be resolved before Medina Spirit has the chance to win the Triple Crown. If Medina Spirit is finally DQ’d, Mandaloun would be declared the winner of the Derby. (If you bet on Mandaloun, though, you won’t get your money).
Mandaloun is not running in the Preakness. So, if Preakness officials ban Medina Spirit, then there will be no Triple Crown winner, which is the only thing networks are selling at this point.
“I do not feel safe to train. . .’’ Baffert told reporters Sunday. “It's complete injustice, but I'm going to fight it tooth and nail. I owe it to the horse, to the owner and our industry.’’
He owes it to the horse. Hehe.