Who says New York racing conversations can’t be interesting in freezing mid-December? Who said anything about the racing doldrums? Maybe we should thank NYC-OTB and our dear elected representatives 200 miles to the north for giving us so much fodder for chatter in this holiday season. The New York Racing Association has been widely pilloried…
The news from NYRA continues to arrive fast and furious, on matters both OTB and otherwise. In the “let’s get people to bet at NYRA” category, the Association released the following news today: Beginning next Wednesday, customers can sign up instantly for a NYRA Rewards account; members who sign up by December 31 will be…
Certainly, there are a number of variables to consider, but here’s a quick glance at NYRA’s numbers today compared to the last two Wednesdays of racing. There was no racing last Wednesday because of bad weather, and no racing on this day (second Wednesday after Thanksgiving) last year. Attendance Wednesday, 11/17: 2013 Wednesday, 11/24: 2,016…
I don’t generally post full press releases, but in the absence (yet) of a link to this release, here’s NYRA’s statement on the OTB situation, which seems worthy of distribution, given its forcefulness. OZONE PARK, N.Y. – The New York Racing Association, Inc. (NYRA) announced today that the provisions being sought by the regional off-track…
I don’t have HBO, so I didn’t see the episode of Costas Now in which noted sportswriter Buzz Bissinger went off on Deadspin’s Will Leitch on the subject of blogging vs. journalism. I did (as who did not?) read/hear about Bissinger’s bizarrely agitated and profane rant, and thus when I was recently catching up on…
So clearly there is little point in my trying to craft interesting, timely reflections about horse racing. All I have to do is pray for one of the cats to hit a bomb, note it online…and voilá! Record traffic; multiple comments; links from esteemed websites; and lotsa e-mail. I kid you not–more people came to…
Brooklyn Backstretch 