some of you people are f##ked up !

[bodnarcny]

Is this really the place to attack people. Why not just post factual stuff. Talk about racing, training, horse care, track conditions, overnights, stake races. I could careless less if Nicole is pregnant (if true), who's banging who, who is charging sexual harassment, etc. I got to tell you this SCM debacle and the attack on him and his family is ruining the harness game. Mark Ford, Joe Faraldo, David Yarock and many others. From what I read Harness Racing is just one big Cartel. You wonder why you can't get the younger generation involved. The people (9 of 10) that I try to introduce to this business say its rigged. There's definitely rotten eggs in every game/sport/business. But if you tune into these threads (horseplop) everyone has a hand in the cookie jar in some way.
Just my opinion to the moderator: Don't kick anyone out. Just take down their offensive or nonsense post. PERIOD!

[Superfecta]

Too many assholes like you try to silence everyone. If you don’t like a thread then just move on to the next. The sport is on a downward spiral and if someone wants to post on here about it they have a right too.

[LUCPARK]

 THE BIG BARNS ARE SWALLOWING THE SMALL

SMALL STABLES REDUCING JUST TO CUT LOSES  ITS ALMOST
  IMPOSSIBLE TO BREAK EVEN LET ALONE MAKE MONEY ..

65  75 AND 100 A DAY PLUS PLUS PLUS .. ARE NOW THE NORM ALMOST EVERYWHERE

IMPOSSIBLE  TO INVEST ,,UNLESS ITS WRITEOFF OR A PERSON HATES MONEY

NO INTEREST FROM YOUNGER FOLKS 

TRACK ATTENDANCE IS DOWN EVERYWHERE UNLESS ITS A STAKES EVENT

TOO MANY HARNESS TRACKS ON EAST COAST,,AND TOO MANY WAYS FOR YOUNG CUSTOMERS TO DO  OTHER THINGS  BESIDES WATCHING  TIME DRAG BETWEEN RACES..

EVERY TRACK DOES IT,,BIGM IS WORSE THAN MOST AT DRAGGING
HOOSIER AND MOHAWK  NOT TO FAR BEHIND  ..


 

[Janny]

Trying to get my daughter and husband to go the harness track you’d think I was asking them to go to get teeth pulled.

Harness racing should do the following:

Between races, play music on the loudspeakers you hear at hockey games, baseball games, etc, etc.

Need to rebrand and do marketing of the young drivers on social media, tv, etc, etc.

Serve foods the millennials and gen-z kids like, e.g., craft beers, craft mixed drinks, etc, etc.

All of the aforementioned things need to be rolled out in a systematic way with advertising, tv, sports, and movie stars.

Not sure if these would work, but better than all of old guys looking around at each other all the time.

[Open bridle]

I been posting here for a while and I enjoy when someone post something informative about harness racing past or present. I take this forum for what's it worth. I skip over personal attacks and negative comments. If that's what some people are into go right ahead. It's a free country. But that's not for me and I'm not here to judge other people. Harness racing has been a favorite past time of mine for many years as a fan and owner.  And I will use this forum only as a place to add to that enjoyment.

[pocketrocketwinner]

Trying to get my daughter and husband to go the harness track you’d think I was asking them to go to get teeth pulled.

Harness racing should do the following:

Between races, play music on the loudspeakers you hear at hockey games, baseball games, etc, etc.

Need to rebrand and do marketing of the young drivers on social media, tv, etc, etc.

Serve foods the millennials and gen-z kids like, e.g., craft beers, craft mixed drinks, etc, etc.

All of the aforementioned things need to be rolled out in a systematic way with advertising, tv, sports, and movie stars.

Not sure if these would work, but better than all of old guys looking around at each other all the time.

To some degree, all of these have been tried (marketing racing as a spectator sport) and the results have been miserable. Unless they lower the takeout to compete in the gambling world, nothing else matters. Racing is a gambling game, not a spectator sport

[brownmoose13]

To me the most important thing racing needs to do is clean up the chemical warfare and the only way to do it is get the owners involved by sitting their horses for the term of the suspension. Hit the owners in the pocketbook and things will start to change. Suspending Burke and then allowing him to put his dad or brother down as trainer is a complete joke

[mwins]

The 2 dumbest things hear on this forum regularly

1) Punish the owners for a trainers transgression.
Why would I own horses if this was done? Instead, make the trainer change real. Maybe a different training center as a must.

2) The game is dead.
Really? M does 3 mil a night, Mohawk 2 mil.
The game isn't dead. Some of you guys just can't accept that it has changed. Get over it.

[kantseeback]

The controversial posts about who's banging whom is interesting and the main attraction here at plops. Without the controversy plops would be a place that would be akin to a place you could come to to watch paint peel.

The controversial stuff is the gravy if you will of the Plop Thanksgiving day dinner.

[Grandstand Handicapper]

The 2 dumbest things hear on this forum regularly

1) Punish the owners for a trainers transgression.
Why would I own horses if this was done? Instead, make the trainer change real. Maybe a different training center as a must.

2) The game is dead.
Really? M does 3 mil a night, Mohawk 2 mil.
The game isn't dead. Some of you guys just can't accept that it has changed. Get over it.

OK...I'll buy this. I completely agree on # 2. However, # 1 has been argued for many years. I hear you, if an owner is going to get punished, penalized to the point that it hurts financially, and so on, sure, what incentive is there. But here's my question: What if the owner is involved with the trainer's transgressions? Duplicitous? It's a very slippery slope. When, where, and how do you hold owners accountable? Steinbrenner never got suspended when a player of his came up positive for steroids. No owner did from what I can remember.

However, what if a team owner was more involved? Directly involved? What if the team owner facilitated making the steroids available. They or their staff searched out, found the known doctors, maybe even paid them some money, not for steroids directly, but they paid them to be available. What if the team owner made the doctors available -- gave them access to the locker room, training staff, and so on -- who were writing the prescriptions? While he wasn't a team owner, and there was no union, didn't Vince McMahon get indicted for this?

My point is that this problem has gotten so egregious, I feel you have to start holding everyone accountable -- trainers, drivers, vets, farm owners, compounders and equine companies, and yes, at a certain point owners. Let's see how this Howard Taylor situation plays out. Remember, there were other owners on the "master" list that was part of the other charges, indictments, trials, etc.

[Open bridle]

To me the most important thing racing needs to do is clean up the chemical warfare and the only way to do it is get the owners involved by sitting their horses for the term of the suspension. Hit the owners in the pocketbook and things will start to change. Suspending Burke and then allowing him to put his dad or brother down as trainer is a complete joke

Totally defeats the purpose of any regulatory action to begin with. 

[Grandstand Handicapper]

To me the most important thing racing needs to do is clean up the chemical warfare and the only way to do it is get the owners involved by sitting their horses for the term of the suspension. Hit the owners in the pocketbook and things will start to change. Suspending Burke and then allowing him to put his dad or brother down as trainer is a complete joke

Agreed. However, starting to suspend the owners, their horses, penalizing them, etc., is a very slippery slope. I own a horse, I send the horse to a trainer. I feel the trainer is honest, you don't, then what? My horse has a positive test, I know nothing about it, and I get suspended and so does my horse? Why? Because you didn't think my trainer was honest and I should have known better? Or because I simply made a bad decision with my trainer selection? No, there has to be a balance here.

[Grandstand Handicapper]

Totally defeats the purpose of any regulatory action to begin with. 

No it doesn't. It can't be the only thing. I agree, regulatory overhaul, action, and having it universal is first and foremost. I do think owner accountability is necessary when owners are duplicitous. 

[brownmoose13]

Let me clarify. You are in a stable and a horse gets a positive test whether it is yours or another owners. At this time you and all owners in the stable are made aware of the positive and the suspension. You would be told that the next positive the trainer gets, not only is he fined/suspended but the horse that got the positive also may not race or be transferred to another trainer for the same period. You were warned but elected to stay so suffer the consequences. If an owner cannot race his horse for 30, 60, or 90 days watch what happens. Until the owners face potential penalties the fines and suspensions are a complete joke and its business as usual. I am not picking on Burke but if my info is correct he has had roughly 20 positives. Now you can tell me how he, his owners, or the horse was really punished

[Grandstand Handicapper]

Let me clarify. You are in a stable and a horse gets a positive test whether it is yours or another owners. At this time you and all owners in the stable are made aware of the positive and the suspension. You would be told that the next positive the trainer gets, not only is he fined/suspended but the horse that got the positive also may not race or be transferred to another trainer for the same period. You were warned but elected to stay so suffer the consequences. If an owner cannot race his horse for 30, 60, or 90 days watch what happens. Until the owners face potential penalties the fines and suspensions are a complete joke and its business as usual. I am not picking on Burke but if my info is correct he has had roughly 20 positives. Now you can tell me how he, his owners, or the horse was really punished

I could buy into something like this, potentially. I still feel an owner has to be directly involved in order to be punished. If not, we are going to be punishing owners on an arbitrary basis when they may have been completely innocent and now they are being punished for "picking a bad trainer" with "bad" being a very subjective term. Burke for example is not OK, but Linda Toscano is? Joe Holloway is OK but Brett Pelling is not? I don't know of one top trainer who has not had a positive. My question is what is the positive for? If it's therapeutic and it's an overage or timing issue, well that's one thing. If it's some designer or exotic drug, that's a completely different story. There's a lot of lines to be drawn here.