Preakness 2012 Favorites: Racing Needs I'll Have Another to Chase Triple Crown
The sport of thoroughbred horse racing will be rooting for I'll Have Another to win the Preakness Stakes on Saturday and keep his Triple Crown dream alive.
As ESPN's Paul Moran points out, horse racing is currently reeling from a slew of scandals and controversies.
The New York Racing Association is under siege. Racetracks are struggling to make ends meet without the allowance of casinos.
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The issue of medication remains as a proverbial elephant in the room. As always, animal rights activists continue to campaign against the very practice of keeping, training and running horses for sport.
And then there's the general matter of public interest, or rather a lack thereof. Horse racing has largely been relegated to relic status for some time now. It's a realm reserved for the elite, one of the last bastions left within the sports world where the American aristocracy can still claim both a stranglehold and a distinctive exclusivity.
Because horses are prohibitively expensive to own and train...unless you're a Wall Street businessman, a Saudi oil baron or, say, J. Paul Reddam. He's the man behind I'll Have Another, but is better known as the Canadian who founded Cash Call, a mortgage lending company that once employed the late Gary Coleman as its spokesman.
That, along with trainer Doug O'Neill's somewhat shady history, makes I'll Have Another anything but immune to the black cloud that's been hovering over horse racing for years, if not decades.
A win at Pimlico wouldn't necessarily change that, though it would at least divert attention from the sport's troubles and attract some from the public at large.
The Belmont Stakes would certainly draw plenty more eyes, particularly from casual observers, if I'll Have Another were to take to the track with an opportunity to claim the first Triple Crown sweep since Affirmed in 1978.
It wouldn't solve any (much less all) of the problems plaguing horse racing, but it would serve as an uplifting distraction in the meantime.
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