- Take a look at the entries for Philadelphia Park on Saturday. There's 123 prospective runners stuffed into the nine race card; 18 each in the first, second, and 4th. What was that about larger purses bringing smaller fields? Not at Philly Park these days. Kasey K's Philly trainer Keith LeBarron reports that the competition to just get into races is incredibly intense these days, especially with the track running live races only four days a week. Also lively is the action at the claim box; LeBarron laments that he's lost three horses in that manner this past week.
One of those was Mr. W.B., a disappointing 4th for Kasey K in Tuesday's 4th race. So ends his second stint with the barn; claimed for the same $7500 that we claimed him back for two races back. So we're in the market for a replacement.
- Handride, on his way back from the Power of Blogs panel in Arizona, touts some new features on the TBA homepage. However, don't expect to see yours truly under the TBA Tweets tab. Twitter has been in the news a lot of late; and that should be no surprise. It fits in snugly with our society's current obsession with portability and immediacy. Unfortunately, in addition to looking like little more than public instant messaging to me, it does so at the expense of substance. Call me old-fashioned, but I can wait a few hours, or even [gasp] until the next morning, for my news and commentary, and I prefer it to be well-considered and macro rather than instant and micro. So, tweet tweet yerself.
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Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Overflow at Philly
Posted by Alan Mann at 5:00 PM
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6 Comments:
Philly Park is a great place to run cheap, albeit mostly lame claiming horses for more than they are worth. this protocol will not survive the test of time, just look at the handle these full fields generate. the buzz in PA is they are hoping the backside horsemen go out with the money they are stealing, i mean making and upgrade their stock. No chance because there isn't a good horse owner that i know that would want a truly top level horse to be cared for on the deplorable Philly Park backsckside.
Yeah, I was told that the backside is indeed despicable, and that upgrades are due. But I guess that won't come until after the new slots building is finished....the one that Greenwood tried to get out of building in favor of keeping the machines in the grandstand and forever relegating the horseplayers to the 4th floor.
Yep, that twitter, tweeter or tweety bird shit (whateverit's called) reads more like a server error message to me, You can read it four times and still not be sure what it means and by that time I don't know what it means and I don't care either!
Ditto with the comments on the Philly backside. . it's deplorable and further proof that Greenwood has no interest in improving the product at Philly Park.
There are some at Philadelphia Park that would suggest it's the backside horsemen's association helping Greenwood Racing & Gaming, the track owners, to move real slow on improvements. This, even though publicly their leadership complains about Greenwood, as sort of a smoke screen. the theory being, if it remains a rathole, none of the big outfits with better horses will try and make it a permanent home, therby displacing the cling ons that should be doing something else for a living. those that have lived with bad conditions all along don't care because now the money is in the purses, health care and retirement that is paid for by the state slots subsidy. PA officials in Harrisburg are waking up though, and this may not last forever.
Didn't Smarty Jones train there?
Both Smarty and Rockport Harbor trained at Philly, but before the slot machines were installed and purses were at the level they are now.
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