I wasn’t planning to write about Kentucky Derby 147, even though Patty and I were in Louisville that week, visiting friends and relatives and betting the Derby online.
But now that the blockbuster story has surfaced about the winning horse, Medina Spirit, having failed a drug test administered shortly after the race, I can’t hold back.
The black hat here is none other than Bob Baffert, the most successful Thoroughbred trainer in the world but also one of the biggest turds to ever walk the backside of a racetrack.
With Medina Spirit having won the May 1 Derby, the 63-year-old Baffert became the trainer with the most Derby wins — seven.
No. 7 would be pulled down, however, if a second drug test, administered by a different lab, confirms that Medina Spirit had the drug betamethasone in his system the day he ran. Betamethasone is a corticosteroid injected into joints to reduce pain and swelling. The reason corticosteroids are banned is that they can mask pain and other problems, presenting a distinct danger of horses being seriously or fatally injured while overextending themselves.
Baffert has reacted to the failed test result with a barrage of denials and martyr-like entreaties.
“We didn’t do it,” he whined Sunday morning outside the Churchill Down barn where Medina Spirit was housed before being shipped Tuesday to Baltimore, where he is tentatively scheduled to compete in Saturday’s Preakness Stakes, the second leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown.
Further trying to shovel the responsibility away from himself, he proclaimed, “There’s problems in racing, but it’s not Bob Baffert.”
Tuesday he went on “Fox & Friends” to continue his moaning, and he later went on the Dan Patrick (formerly of ESPN) radio show and said: “Churchill (Downs) came out with a really harsh statement. I think it was a knee-jerk cancel culture kind of reaction. They violated my due process. Now I have to fight this in public.”
(A Sports Illustrated article earlier this year said Baffert’s political views are hard right and that he is a Donald Trump supporter. Is this a coincidence?)
**
I’ve been very familiar with Baffert since before he won his first Derby with Silver Charm in 1997. I remember that Derby particularly well because it snowed and also because I was able to buy two tickets outside the track for two friends but could not come up with two more, so Patty and I ended up watching the race on TV at the home of some friends.
He is, undoubtedly, an excellent trainer, but he’s also a chronic cheat. Winning horses he has saddled have failed drug tests 30 times over the last four decades, including five in the last year or so. Partly because of horse racing’s hodgepodge of rules and regulations, varying from state to state, most cases took months or years to resolve, and Baffert has been able to get away mainly with modest fines or brief suspensions.
…Baffert is a cheater at more than horse racing, though. In the early 2000s, he began dating a Louisville TV anchor woman named Jill Moss. At the time, Baffert, who lives in California, was married to a woman with whom he had four children. A very good friend of mine who lives in Louisville recalled a night, when Baffert was still married, that he saw Baffert and Moss going at it, so to speak, at a bumper car place in Louisville. Baffert subsequently divorced his wife, and he and Moss married in 2002.
**
Beyond his cheating at and away from the track, I came to personally realize Baffert was a first-class jerk in 2010, when I had the opportunity to meet him.
Two days before that Derby, I was in the Churchill Downs barn area with Joe Drape, turf writer for The New York Times. Joe is a Kansas City native, and I had known his sister, Mary Ann Drape, many years before meeting Joe.
After Baffert had posed for a photo with some fans, Joe and I approached him. Joe introduced us and then began interviewing him. Among other things, they talked about the unfavorable post position (No. 1, on the rail) that Baffert’s Derby runner, Lookin at Lucky, had drawn. (Ultimately, he finished sixth.) Joe also asked him about the weather forecast — heavy rain — and how Lookin at Lucky might handle a sloppy track.
As the conversation began to lag, I decided on the spur of the moment to ask Baffert a question about the horse that I liked, Noble’s Promise, who was coming out of the No. 3 post position.
So, I spoke up and said, “Where do you think Noble’s Promise will be?”
I will never forget this…Baffert fixed me with a hard stare for just a second and said, “I don’t have the slightest idea, and I don’t care.”
With that, he turned on his heel and walked away.
I turned to Joe, and we looked at each other — slightly in shock — for a couple of seconds. I said, “Sorry I fucked up your interview.”
Here’s a photo I took of Baffert and Joe that day…
**
The Baffert who snubbed me on April 29, 2010, that is the real Bob Baffert, not the glib, seemingly affable chap heretofore seen in TV interviews. He’s a cheat and an asshole, and I hope Medina Spirit gets taken down and his connections are denied the $1.8 million first-place check. (The trainer and jockey usually get 10 percent each.)
The only good thing about this story is that after negotiating for Derby tickets for a couple of weeks beforehand, Patty and I decided the day before the Derby not to go. Ticket prices were way too high — several hundred dollars each even for bad seats — and Derby Day is interminable, with the Derby race not going off until 7 p.m. Eastern time.
As in 1997, we watched on TV at our friends’ residence, a beautiful condominium facing the Ohio River. We had a great afternoon; we bet the Derby online; and we all lost.
But none of us bet on the asshole’s horse.
So what do they do with the betting once cheating has been established? All the money has already been paid out, hasn’t it. And, no, there’s no correlation between cheating at horse racing or being an asshole and your political ideology. Just look at how wonderful I am.
Well, yes, John, you are a good guy even though you’re conservative. And you like a lot of liberal reporters, which is another big plus.
And yes to your first point: The bets that were won and lost stay the same. The tickets have been either cashed or tossed. No undoing that.
Remember the old adage “Cheaters never prosper”? It’s been replaced by “If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying”.
I love “Sorry I fucked up your interview.” Made me lol. He sounds like a real shit and I hope he gets stripped of everything for being a cheater in life. Gross.
Thanks, Sarah…Oddly, the first time I wrote about that incident, back in 2010, I reported myself as saying, “Sorry I killed your interview.” I don’t know why I was hesitant to use the exact words, but for some reason I pulled back. I regret toning myself down back then.
It’s because that word has, sadly, become more and more commonplace. Call me a prude, I don’t like it. Next thing you know we’ll be hearing that other vile descriptor, the “c” word, just as frequently.
Baffert has just released a statement saying that he accidentally gave the horse the drug when he used an ointment that unknowingly contained it. Says he’s being transparent after conducting an investigation.
From “We didn’t do it,” to “Yes, we did it.” What a joker.
Thanks to John Altevogt for bringing me up to date on the latest development — that Baffert today acknowledged Medina Spirit was being treated for dermatitis with ointment that contained the banned steroid.
Here’s how Joe Drape, New York Times turf writer, began his story, posted this morning…
Cancel culture was not responsible for the Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit’s positive drug test. Nor was contamination responsible, or a conspiracy at work. No, his trainer, Bob Baffert, said Tuesday, the colt was being treated for dermatitis with an ointment that contained the drug in question.
Here is the gist of Baffert’s statement…
“I had him checked out by my veterinarian who recommended the use of an antifungal ointment called Otomax. At a veterinarian’s recommendation, the ointment was applied daily to Medina Spirit’s hind end to heal the dermatitis. Yesterday, I was informed that one of the substances in Otomax is betamethasone…I wanted to be forthright about this fact as soon as I learned of this information.”
This guy’s reputation is now, officially, shit. Trainers are completely responsible for how the treatment of their horses, and it is inconceivable that he and his assistants would not have known, or studied, what substances were in Otomax. It’s called cheating. This time he’s not going to get away with it…As they say in racing, “Take the horse’s number down.”
PS In other news, The Washington Post’s new female editor is a graduate of KU’s School of Journalism, one of Tom Eblen’s students..
Wow, that is great…55-year-old Sally Buzbee, a lifelong Associated Press employee and currently its executive editor.
NYT says: “She was born in Walla Walla, Wash., and grew up in the Bay Area and the suburbs of Dallas and Kansas City. She graduated from high school in Olathe, Kan., before getting a journalism degree at the University of Kansas and an M.B.A. from Georgetown University.”
I’ve never heard of her, but it looks like she’s a very deserving appointee.
Sally Streff Buzbee is a total class act. She was a great young reporter at The Star, where she met her husband, John Buzbee who was a reporter at (I believe) The Times. She’s had a stellar career at the AP, running the Washington Bureau and then the entire news report as executive editor. John eventually joined the Foreign Service and served bravely and usefully in rebuilding Iraq. He died of cancer some years ago.
Misstated that they met there. I think they were classmates at KU.
This writer’s a jerk.
Jimmyc……nobody cares what you think……apparently you lost you ass on the race. Boo hoo hoo😭😭😭
Some of my regular readers might be wondering who Richard and Mark are and where they came from. Well, a news compilation service, NewsBreak, linked to my post, and so far today I’ve had nearly 4,600 “views” on the post. So, it’s not our usual clubby, online community. And somewhere out in that big world, Bob Baffert has a few supporters, including Richard and Mark.
Welcome to the comments dept., boys! Fire away…
It’s a shame the writer couldn’t leave his ego at home. Just because Buffett did not fall over the writer he tries to assassinate Baffert. What happened to innocent til proven guilty. You just wanted to get attention! Sorry you couldn’t be professional. To bring his personal life in on this shows your prejudice.
Not looking for anybody to “fall all over,” just common courtesy.
Why did Trump’s name come up in this story. My take is you are Liberal asshole and that’s why. Why was politics even important in this story. You don’t like him and I don’t like you.
Why did Trump’s name come up? Doesn’t his name pop up in a lot of places? Fortunately, quite a bit less than it used to.
Suddenly, I’m yearning for our clubby discussions that focus on factual disagreement rather than a collection of meaningless ad hominems.
It’s an interesting glimpse of the larger world, isn’t it, John? When you get thousands of people in a room, instead of a few hundred, you get a lot more, uh, variety of opinions.
And a lot less intelligence. (Assinate?)
Gayle — I don’t want any of my commenters to look stupid from the grammatical standpoint. (Content is an entirely different matter.) So, I fixed Iris’ error…As usual, your eagle eye is at work.
(Gotta say the give and take has become much more interesting than I anticipated.)
They could take a lesson from your kindness and maturity.
Thanks…Took a lot of slings and arrows to get here.
What’s Trump got to do with your unproven opinions? You guys cant get over the fact you elected a dub that is brain dead, and now you weave Trump into what could be an interesting story. You probably also though Trump a Russian spy and Hunter Biden a virgin.
5,200 views today alone…and climbing. Thank you, NewsBreak!