Posts Tagged ‘Jay Privman’

By Ray Paulick
What do jockey Martin Pedroza and quarterback Brett Favre have in common? Critics in horse racing and the National Football League say they both did a little favor to help a couple of friends set records in their respective sports.

Favre was lambasted in 2002 when it appeared he “took a dive” late in the final game of the season between the Green Bay Packers and New York Giants, allowing defensive end Michael Strahan of the Giants to set an NFL record for the most sacks in a single season. The move took some of the shine off Strahan’s accomplishment, but the sack and the record are in the books.

Favre was ripped by, among others, Mike Freeman in the New York Times for “handing” Strahan the record as if he were “throwing change into a Salvation Army bucket.” Freeman said it was the “kind of mistake Favre may never live down.”

Pedroza helped Garrett Gomez win his fourth consecutive money title by reportedly telling Santa Anita Park stewards he was not feeling well and took off Cenizo, his mount in the final race of the year at the Southern California track. Gomez got the pick-up mount, won the race, and earned more than enough money to surpass Julien Leparoux, who had been well in front when he stopped riding in early December to visit family in France.

Earlier on Dec. 31, after Gomez’s first of two scheduled mounts of the day finished sixth (he won with his second mount), it looked as though Leparoux would win his first money title by a $194 margin. All Gomez needed to do aboard Cenizo was break from the gate, and the horse would have earned an appearance fee of $400, enough to pass Leparoux, but Cenizo won, giving Gomez year-end mount earnings of $18,571,171, compared to Leparoux’s $18,560,371.

Unlike Favre, who was widely criticized, Pedroza only had to put up with a snarky blog post from the Daily Racing Form’s Jay Privman on Jan. 1. Under the headline “PEDROZA MAKES MIRACULOUS RECOVERY,” Privman wrote, “Garrett Gomez won the national money title in the last race on Thursday when jockey Martin Pedroza fortuitously took off what turned out to be a winning mount. Yet Pedroza was back in action Friday, looking just fine.”

Privman or one of the Form’s other Southern California-based writers could have done some legitimate reporting on the circumstances and ethics of the issue, but apparently chose not to, despite the fact more than a few people are crying foul over how Gomez won the title.
 
Ron Anderson, the agent for Gomez, says it’s much ado about nothing. (UPDATE: The original version of this article, which read "much adieu about nothing," has been changed because my French pun did not go over well with readers.)

“This is certainly not the first time this kind of thing has happened, and it won’t be the last,” said Anderson, who steered Hall of Famers Gary Stevens and Jerry Bailey to multiple money titles during their careers. “At least four jockeys came into the room and offered to give up a mount so Garrett could get the title. We didn’t fix a race, and it’s not like they opened up the rail to let him win. So there’s a guy who offered to take off his horse, and he took off.”

Anderson wasn’t sure, but assumed Gomez would pay Pedroza his share of the $10,800 winner’s purse in the race in question.

“I talked to Mike Smith about how some people are upset over this, and Mike started laughing,” Anderson continued. “He said, ‘Do you know how many times we took off for Angel Cordero? I probably took off 10 horses in two days so he could win the Saratoga title.’”

Anderson said Hall of Famers like Angel Cordero Jr. and Pat Day would get pick-up mounts at night tracks on New Year’s Eve to go after a money title.

“Julien (Leparoux) and his agent the last two days of the year went around and tried to get on horses at Calder and couldn’t do it,” Anderson said (something the Paulick Report was unable to confirm). “I don’t get how some people don’t understand this. I don’t even know what to say to them. This has been done numerous times, and it’s been done numerous times with more manipulation than just one race.”

Anderson takes pride in the title, especially when comparing the number of mounts and wins by Gomez, Leparoux and third-place finisher Ramon Dominguez.

“Julien won almost forty more races than we did (247 by Leparoux from 1,284 mounts, compared with 210 of 967 for Gomez), and Ramon, who rides all year in New York—arguably our biggest circuit—he won 180 more races than Garrett (a total of 391 wins from 1,651 mounts). It looks like a misprint, but he’s still behind us in money.”

“I get out of bed 365 days a year to try and get leading rider,” said Anderson. “This is what motivates me.”

To win the title, a jockey needs a tireless, sharp agent, and plenty of live mounts in big races. And when all else fails, it doesn’t hurt to get a little help from your friends.

Copyright © 2010, The Paulick Report

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By Ray Paulick
Last week I wrote that if I had a vote in the Eclipse Awards, I’d cast my Horse of the Year ballot for unbeaten Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Zenyatta. Well, I don’t have a vote, and I have no one to blame but myself.

A little more than seven years ago, I resigned from the National Turf Writers Association, one of the voting groups for the Eclipse Awards. The other eligible voters are selected staff members of the Daily Racing Form; chartcallers for Equibase; and racing secretaries at National Thoroughbred Racing Association member tracks. There may be a handful of others, including some Breeders’ Cup employees who have a vote.

I quit the National Turf Writers Association after the 2001 media Eclipse Awards were announced and then-NTWA president Jay Privman of the Daily Racing Form unfairly, in my opinion, questioned the eligibility of a piece written by one of the winners, Laura Hillenbrand. Hillenbrand, author of the best-selling book “Seabiscuit: An American Legend,” had previously won an Eclipse Award in 1998 for an article on Seabiscuit published in American Heritage magazine. Her 2001 award was for an original adaptation from the Seabiscuit book that appeared in Equus magazine.

As I recall, Privman, as NTWA president, sent an email to members criticizing the awarding of a second Eclipse to Hillenbrand and suggesting it was “unseemly” of her to even submit the piece for consideration. It was my understanding he was trying to have her stripped of the award.

I had never met Hillenbrand but admired her work, believing that her treatment of Seabiscuit (which was made into a wildly popular movie) was one of the biggest boosts in positive publicity Thoroughbred racing had received in many, many years. I even wrote that Hillenbrand be given an Eclipse Award of Merit, in part because of her personal circumstances: she was afflicted with chronic fatigue syndrome and often struggled to even sit upright and work on her computer while writing the book.

I was offended by the tone of Privman’s letter to NTWA members and asked several individuals on the board of directors to demand an apology or reprimand Privman for what I felt was an abuse of his office. When they did neither, I quit the organization.

Several years later, I asked an executive at the National Thoroughbred Racing Association if I could qualify to vote under the NTRA’s umbrella. I was told “no,” and remained on the sidelines when it comes to voting for Eclipse Awards, something I did for nearly 20 years.

If I really wanted to vote for the Eclipse Awards, I could put aside my strong disagreement with Privman and the NTWA board and reapply for membership in that organization. I’m just not ready to do that.

But enough about me.

There are many others who should have a vote for Eclipse Awards and do not. They include numerous individuals who cover racing regularly or on a full-time basis for television and radio, including ESPN, TVG and HRTV. They aren’t eligible because they aren’t “turf writers.” This group includes knowledgeable individuals such as Steve Byk of Sirius satellite radio’s “At the Races”; Carolyn Conley, Kurt Hoover and Jeff Siegel (among others) at HRTV; Bob Baedeker, Simon Bray and Todd Schrupp (among others) at TVG. It’s incomprehensible that individuals like these do not have an Eclipse Awards vote. In fact, I think it’s time to bring a public element to Eclipse Award voting in the same manner that Europe’s Cartier Awards have done.

As the ranks of full-time turf writers diminishes, racing should take advantage of the growing list of knowledgeable individuals who make their living covering the sport for non-print media outlets. To ignore this reality is just the latest confirmation that the people who run this sport have their heads buried in a place where the light doesn’t shine.

Copyright © 2009, The Paulick Report

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