OT: HBO Series "Luck"

I thought I’d throw up the fanpost to help paper over any gaps in the plot, etc….so shoot me a question if you run into one. From what I’ve read, the series starts to gel and hit stride in episode 4. Most of the great series take awhile to develop and hook you, I’m optimistic Luck will be a good one. But I’m a soft touch due to the subject matter. Seeing guys put together a pick six ticket and actually looking at a racing form made me weak in the knees.

quote she uses when she’s verbally jousting with the other jockey (real life HOF jockey Gary Stevens) as she works out Nolte’s horse in the morning. But my, what a view.

Maybe NASCAR is one of the few sports that doesn’t suffer from the mist of nostalgia, the overly important Jim Nance manly hoarse whisper voice over about the green jacket, etc..faux baseball reverence rubs me a bit wrong as well. The thing about Luck is that they have actual gamblers. the lifeblood of the sport. GRIT. It ain’t seabiscuit. or Top Gun.

the bulk of those races are “claiming” races, which means that any horse running in that race can be bought or “claimed” by anybody with a racing license. Escalante was bluffing. He didn’t think anyone would be willing to put in a claim on a horse that had just won at a higher level, and then was entered a week later at a lower level. Your question nails it directly: why would he put him up if he didn’t want to lose him? Most would assume he was trying to get rid of the horse. If your bluff succeeds, you pick up an easy score in purse money.

Escalante ran that horse in a race with other horses who had a claiming price of 20k, and the horse won going away, you’d typically expect to see him run again next time against the same level of comp, or maybe a half a step or two above where he just won. You’d be a little skeptical if that horse was entered back in a race for 10k, or half the price, just a week later (most horses need at least 2 or 3 weeks between races, good ones that are more than every day meal tickets typically go 5 weeks between starts). Escalante further tried to bluff by putting front wraps on the horses front legs….kind of like ace bandages? This usually indicates the horse might be sore, or suffering from some nagging injury. In any case, a horse you prob wouldn’t want to claim or buy. Or it could be just to give that impression, and the horse is actually fine. I know guys who won’t bet a horse that is wearing front wraps.

Claiming races are a tool that forces owners/trainers to run their horses against similar competition, because if you enter one at a level lower than its true ability, just to try and poach some easy money, someone is probably going to put a claim on it…happens at big tracks all the time. Escalante didn’t want to lose the horse. He didn’t think anyone in their right mind would be putting in a claim. Most horsemen would assume the horse was injured, or had shot its wad winning the race the week before. The only reason Renzo put in the claim was because it was the horse they singled in the Pick Six, so it was flukey sentimental reasoning. Escalante was trying to steal the purse money for a claiming race, which at the lower levels at Santa Anita, would amount to 25k or so, of which the winner would drag down 65% of that total, so what, approx 15k? A nice score. Unless your bluff gets called. Part of the intrigue of horse racing is trying to figure out that puzzle of what is the horse doing entered in today’s race? Is he meant well, or is it some other chicanery? This type of shit doesn’t really happen during big races like the Derby, Derby preps, Breeders Cup races, etc….you can generally assume everyone is on go legitimately, its only on the undercard filler where the claiming game and reading the tea leaves enters in. Kind of like poker.

When Nolte wasn’t trying to fuck his horse, did you catch him mumbling that some bluebloods in Kentucky killed his horsey’s daddy for insurance money? I’m assuming that is based in part on the suspicious death of Alydar, who ran second in all the Triple Crow races to the last TC winner, Affirmed, in 1978. It was in the early 90s, Alydar was towards the end of his stud career, and he was found one morning with a busted leg and had to be humanely destroyed. Insurance money bonanza. Big scandal. I don’t think anyone got popped for anything legally untoward, but it stank.