Cigar
08-03-2015, 12:03 PM
Christie booed at Monmouth Park I mean really booed--loud sustained and truly a thing of beautyMy two favorite spectators sports--both involving big creatures with small brains, who are owned by millionaires and who run around in circles guided by midgets--merged today and it was awesome.
First was a moment of true sports magic. Triple Crown winner American Pharoah won the $1.7 million Haskell Invitational with breathtaking ease. The horse hit the head of the stretch in second place. Jockey Victor Espinosa said "OK sovereign my lord whenever you're ready." The Pharoah kicked in and it was goodbye losers. I was on the rail screaming my head off along with around 65,000 other fans. When it was over Espinosa paraded the champion along the grandstand as American Pharoah walked nodding his head regally toward the crowd seeming to somehow absorb the praise and adulation as if he somehow understood that this uproar, this love was all for him.
For some reason American Pharoah and Espinosa were kept walking around outside the winner's circle for several minutes--I don't know if this had to do with a certain very important personage but it might have. At last, when they went in, the crowd cheered the trainer Bob Baffert and the owner Achmed Zayat almost as loudly as they had cheered the horse and jockey. Then another face appeared on the jumbotron. It was governor and presidential candidate Chris Christie there to present the trophy.
The crowd erupted in boos. I mean really loud boos. It was unmistakable. Everyone around me was booing too or laughing so hard they couldn't boo.
Now booing the Governor is something of a tradition at the Haskell--I've been going to it for years. The deeply unpopular John Corzine got booed too but I never heard anything like this. It was long, sustained and brutal. To make matters worse, the moment the camera shifted back to American Pharoah or Achmed Zayat or to Victor Espinosa or to Bob Baffert the crowd started cheering again. Then when Christie got on camera---booooooo!
Christie looked like he was going to kill someone, probably whatever aide suggested that he should show up at a sporting event in New Jersey of all places, worse yet at a classic and much loved track which a few years ago he had threatened to close down, a race track on the Jersey shore where people do not take allegations of his using Sandy relief money to pay off political backers lightly. Maybe Achmed Zayat is a supporter--he supposedly called Christie "Mr. President" after the presentation was over--or maybe Zayat has a great sense of the absurd.
Christie of course did not go anywhere near the horse which is a good thing because by all accounts American Pharoah is a very sweet horse, a creature of great nobility and excellent manners and decorum--unlike a certain governor I could mention.
Oh yeah Christie was booed and it was almost as beautiful as American Pharoah's victory.
http://www.nj.com/horse-racing/index.ssf/2015/08/gov_chris_christie_booed_mercilessly_--_twice_--_at_the_haskell.html
First was a moment of true sports magic. Triple Crown winner American Pharoah won the $1.7 million Haskell Invitational with breathtaking ease. The horse hit the head of the stretch in second place. Jockey Victor Espinosa said "OK sovereign my lord whenever you're ready." The Pharoah kicked in and it was goodbye losers. I was on the rail screaming my head off along with around 65,000 other fans. When it was over Espinosa paraded the champion along the grandstand as American Pharoah walked nodding his head regally toward the crowd seeming to somehow absorb the praise and adulation as if he somehow understood that this uproar, this love was all for him.
For some reason American Pharoah and Espinosa were kept walking around outside the winner's circle for several minutes--I don't know if this had to do with a certain very important personage but it might have. At last, when they went in, the crowd cheered the trainer Bob Baffert and the owner Achmed Zayat almost as loudly as they had cheered the horse and jockey. Then another face appeared on the jumbotron. It was governor and presidential candidate Chris Christie there to present the trophy.
The crowd erupted in boos. I mean really loud boos. It was unmistakable. Everyone around me was booing too or laughing so hard they couldn't boo.
Now booing the Governor is something of a tradition at the Haskell--I've been going to it for years. The deeply unpopular John Corzine got booed too but I never heard anything like this. It was long, sustained and brutal. To make matters worse, the moment the camera shifted back to American Pharoah or Achmed Zayat or to Victor Espinosa or to Bob Baffert the crowd started cheering again. Then when Christie got on camera---booooooo!
Christie looked like he was going to kill someone, probably whatever aide suggested that he should show up at a sporting event in New Jersey of all places, worse yet at a classic and much loved track which a few years ago he had threatened to close down, a race track on the Jersey shore where people do not take allegations of his using Sandy relief money to pay off political backers lightly. Maybe Achmed Zayat is a supporter--he supposedly called Christie "Mr. President" after the presentation was over--or maybe Zayat has a great sense of the absurd.
Christie of course did not go anywhere near the horse which is a good thing because by all accounts American Pharoah is a very sweet horse, a creature of great nobility and excellent manners and decorum--unlike a certain governor I could mention.
Oh yeah Christie was booed and it was almost as beautiful as American Pharoah's victory.
http://www.nj.com/horse-racing/index.ssf/2015/08/gov_chris_christie_booed_mercilessly_--_twice_--_at_the_haskell.html