John Pricci

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Caught in a wave of humanity while trying to escape the paddock traffic, I bobbed and weaved my way through a record Tampa Bay Derby crowd toward the winners’ circle, mouth agape while trying to process what I had just seen.

After all, there’s beat, then there’s beaten off.

I saw Mike Welsch and Dave Joseph, heads down, eyes on notebooks, scribbling furiously, so I rushed over, looked up, and saw Robert LaPenta, as shocked as anyone in the building.

War Pass may not be Seattle Slew, but in Tampa last Saturday he wasn’t even War Pass.

Craning my neck to get closer to the conversation, I strained mightily to hear what was being said while the owner of War Pass recounted what led up to his colt’s operatic non-effort when out came words referencing a slight fever earlier in the week.

“He didn’t just say that, did he?” I asked no one in particular, maybe not even myself. With that, a reporter turned, looked at me as if he, too, had heard something like this before and wished he hadn’t.

Looking for logic in chaos
When favorites are beaten people begin asking questions, trying to make logic soup from chaotic ingredients. But this was no ordinary favorite. This one was an unbeaten margin horse; this was the pro tem Kentucky Derby favorite that put a record 12,724 fannies in the seats. This one was 1-20!

And this was the one that spiked a fever earlier in the week.

Thinking before speaking is not always an option. Emotions cloud the brain as it tries to make sense of the surreal. The connections of racehorses never seem to be prepared for such moments, even if the chances are 1-20 that there will be more like these than the one in which they picture themselves draped in roses at Churchill Downs on May’s first Saturday.

So pardon the public if they don’t get it and forgive them if sometimes they would rather turn their back on this thing of ours rather than try to understand what happened and learn from it. It’s just the damn media that gods these horses up like they’re Pegasus reincarnate then are at a loss to provide the why behind such a momentous fall.

And make no mistake. This was King Kong off the Empire State building.

Horses are, first and foremost, living, breathing, magnificent animals. There’s nothing better for the inside of a man than the outside of a horse, it has been said. And that’s what the public relates to. Throw in a measure of invincibility and the magic of an American icon as the Kentucky Derby and the crescendo begins.

Racehorses are that and more. They are commodities bought on the open market which gives them value beyond aesthetics. Win some important races, do it in fast time, and the value increases exponentially. If they are singularly talented and high profile, and are coveted by oil glutted sheiks, they become worth what some successful people call “stupid money.”

The public needs to understand this, factoring in the realization that they are made of flesh and blood and tendons and pasterns and hocks and hooves, and that there’s nothing mechanical about any of it. Sometimes, as Ron McAnally reminded us, they give their lives for our pleasure. But sports fans must realize, too, that racehorses are treated better by their human caretakers than some humans take care of their own. Sad but true, the public needs to know this, too.