Word from the just-concluded Breeders’ Cup is that total handle – wagering from all sources – was down 6.7% from last year, and was the lowest since 2020. Progress.
In other news, yet another death in NY has been disclosed long after it actually occurred. Dudes Naughty Girl, said the Gaming Commission Friday, perished at Monticello way back on Jun 27. Which of course raises the question, how many more have fallen through the recordkeeping cracks? Dudes’ obituary: “3-year-old mare found deceased in stall.”
I can’t imagine the abuse and the neglect of a horse that would lead to the horse dying in the stall they were kept prisoner in for 23-hours a day by these barbarians that think their stuff doesn’t stink. This is not horsemanship; this is abuse and neglect!
The lonely death of 3 year old Dudes Naughty Girl (such an insulting, impudent name) all alone in an unmonitored, tiny stall, away from her grieving mother, still only a filly NEEDING her mother, never even allowed to express her normal herd instinct, is the kind of travesty of caring behavior that it cries out for justice. And because it is animal abuse, it should have been prosecuted. I personally have a special contempt not only for the owners/trainers in racing, but also for the veterinarians who know that they do not serve the interests of the equines who are supposedly under their care and who neglect the horses in their tracks. I have rarely read about horses suddenly dying without the caretakers being aware that they seem at least somewhat ill or very grievously ill, and where they had an equine veterinarian actively involved. These racing industry “owners” KNOW full well, consciously, that they are playing Russian roulette with their TB’s and Quarterhorses and don’t care, so long as they don’t lose money on their “possessions “. Enraging and heartbreaking. We need to continue to convey the message to the unknowing public and legislators.
(Thank you, Patrick Battuello and Nicole Arciello, for getting out the facts and taking the lead.)
“Word from the just-concluded Breeders’ Cup is that total handle – wagering from all sources – was down 6.7% from last year, and was the lowest since 2020. Progress.”
Say, now I wonder how much of that was due to …. ME!
But, all kidding aside, in past years, both myself and my cronies would often bet tens of thousands of dollars on the Breeders’ Cup Weekend races, wagering thousands at a time, without blinking an eye, betting in all the formats, Pick-6’s, Pick-3’s tri’s, exactas, super’s, doubles, win, place show, you name it – if it was on the betting ‘menu’ -we bet it.
Yes, on occasion, we did win. Often, it was a lot of money. But things change.
My total betting bankroll so far this year:
$0.00.
That, my friends, will NOT change.
Handle is down because slowly, but surely people are wising up. Even casual attendees, who go to the track once or twice a year are now eschewing it for other avenues of entertainment. Abuse of the horses is paramount, particularly in young folks’ minds, and, with the advent and wide-spread availability of sports betting, for fans of horse racing, the writing is clearly on the wall.
Look no further than the subsidies propping it up if you have any questions that this is, indeed, a dying sport. Sooner or later, taxpayers will get pretty vocal about having their hard-earned money wasted on this so-called ‘sport’, and once the subsidies end, it’s goodbye horse racing.
Me, I absolutely loved this game when I was in it, but as the saying goes you can’t “un-see” some horrors once you ‘see’ them. Now, it’s just a bad, cheating, dishonest, cruel and abusive game all around, and more and more, people are seeing the light. Not that it was ever squeaky-clean. But I maintain that it has gotten much, much worse since it has lost it’s ability to support itself on its own without the taxpayer-funded subsidies.
Good riddance to bad rubbish.
-Joe
Joe, thanks again for being so determined to never bet on racehorses ever again in your life and for telling others who are throwing their money away on Pari-mutuel wagering what a crooked game that horseracing is. Maybe some of those gamblers win occasionally, but winning, or losing, a bet really isn’t the point at this point. The point is rising above the lying, cheating, doping of horses and all of the other abuses to the horses, besides the cheating other players in the game, to a higher level of awareness of what is right and wrong.
Every time anyone mentions the decline in wagering handle and the propping up of horseracing with government subsidies and government-directed benefits including tax write-offs and tax exemptions whatever they may be in each given state in the United States, I immediately think of the decline in the producing of new Thoroughbred foals. I can’t say which came first — the decline in wagering handle or the decline in the number of new Thoroughbred foals produced each year since 1986. Regardless of which came first, these two declines go hand in hand. Eventually, there won’t be enough horses to fill race cards leading to fewer opportunities for gamblers to bet on racehorses.
As a an English born & trained jockey told us almost 40 years ago in 1986″ why do want to ride horses?Racing is just a crooked , crummy , gamboling game.” We asked him why he was here from England, ” he said I can earn more here in the NW than I would ever in 10 years in England. He also said he had seen more wrecks & breakdowns here than he would have seen in a lifetime in England. We should have listened & remembered what he told us before becoming licensed to ride later on finally after many years riding illegally at bush league & private tracks. The shortage of state bred horses here on the west coast is already having effects.