Danzig,

This is your boss..get back to work. I'm watching you!

Did you just not read that horses are 'hosed' sometimes to help with colic or worms or shipping.

From what I gather, Sciacca fought that the horse that was being 'shaked' was not the horse that was RUNNING.

:eek: :eek: :eek:

Surely if the horses was being legitimately treated then it would be easy to prove right?

I have no idea, I am learning all this now, but for someone to fight this for FOUR YEARS, and to have many holes in the story according to someone that is CLOSE to the situation, someone I trust, I'll go with that instead of what the media has to say.

I'm just amazed. I really am surprised to read horseplayers defending cheating that is routinely stealing, yes stealing, money from our pockets.

The naivite around here is really surprising.

That apparently is the controversy ... was the horse seen being tubed by the undercover agent the horse that was racing that day, or was it another horse (the horse that raced the previous day) and the agent mixed up what stall/horse he saw tubed.

BTW, the horse in question (the horse racing that day) was not allowed to race that day.

I don't disagree with you, but I am trusting in what Byk has to say about it in an earlier post how the story changed multiple times, this and that.

Byk is good friends with Gary.

Byk is as loyal and as good a friend as someone can have.

That's admirable.

I know this.

I guess in hindsight I don't have much ammo here. I am not educated enough to open my mouth on this.

I just get the feeling that there is an alternate motive by others here(obviously not you) sometimes and feel the need to step up and defend. I call it the Oracle Syndrome

I would like to see any of the horseplayers around here readily name the top three or four drugs or concoctions trainers can use to cheat, and then say what effect those drugs would have on horses racing with that illegal help, and then tell me what jurisdictions do not or cannot test for those drugs.

I think a lot of us are just fed up with the rampant cheating in the game and have pretty much developed our own zero tolerance approach. Perhaps it isn't completely fair, but many people may feel that even if a trainer wasn't specifically cheating with a specific horse, if he was caught doing it in one situation, there is more than a reasonable chance he has done it in others.

Is this totally fair to the party involved? Probably not. However, it's a lot less unfair than trainers taking illegal edges to win races and effectively cheat the betting public out of their money. To me, this is the most important issue.

fought for 4 years and lost..

and had the suspensions increased as well...

Honestly now, if this was some other trainer with no connection to this board would you be defending him or would you be with me in being just a little bit suspiciuos

Why is it incumbant upon us to know what kinds of things people do to cheat us out of our money?

what would this have to do with the current discussion?

being able to name banned substances and who tests for what doesn't change the FACT that Gary was found guilty of milkshaking....whether he did it or not should not even be up for discussion.....if the trainer in question was Durtrow who here would defend him?

the naivitee that andy refers to implys that some posters here, including perhaps the host of the board are blindly assuming that because the guy says he didn't do it (since he is friend of the "team")then he didn't....obviously those investigating this issue felt otherwise...hence the guilty finding. I happen to like Gary personally...but I still think he did it.

Would an owner defend his guilty trainer so strongly if he owned the horse that came up positive ?

Many here criticized those owners that so strongly defended Patrick Biancone, and more recently criticized Maggi Moss. Is this not the same situation. Blackthroatedwind is clearly correct. If you aren't totally against anyone cheating, you condone it.

What are the odds that someone is caught the first time they do something?

If put in the same situation, would you cheat? If the answer is no then why would you defend this?

Either

A) Sciacca's barn knowingly did this

B) The investigator set them up

C) The investigator doesn't know how to identify horses and made a mistake

Feel free to tell me if there is another option

Out of those three options which seems more likely?

trainers with repeat offenses get defended every day. far as i know, this is the first time sciacca has served time. biancone had three suspensions so far this year that i know of.

thing is, an accusation isn't proof. if a horse who ran the day before was getting treated, that's not cheating. if they were milkshaking a horse about to race, obviously it is. if the latter is the case, then i think it's a shame that it took four years to have timer served.

i'm totally against cheating. if they feel the case was proven, then sciacca should rightfully serve the time.

i would NOT cheat. ever. where would the joy in winning come from?

as for which is most likely, i have no way of knowing, as i don't know much about the trainer in question.

was the horse in question tested? was it proven that a horse about to race had been milkshaked?

you have got to be kidding me...

why?

i'm serious. i would not cheat, and can't stand that others do. if you can't win something legitimately, wouldn't it bother you? it would me.

makes me want to throw up when i read 'future hall of famer asmussen'.

maybe you truly are a saint but the rest of the world is not like that...

the joy of winning is in the things you can buy with the money you've stolen

Call me cynical but money (be it from the purse or from the betting window) may be more of a motivating factor than "the joy of winning"....
IMHO Corruption thrives most in situations involving money or power...and either of these things can be used to get the other.

What about current or future hall of famers like Pletcher, Zito and Mandella?
Where do you draw that line?

As long as there is competition for money, people will work the edges to gain an advantage. You break the rules and get caught, you get fined and/or suspended.

If you have a beef that the penalties are too soft, why not campaign to make them tougher?

To a great extent the furor over Dutrow is a joke. He's doing his days and paying his fine, isn't he? To say he's "different" is wrong. He's NO different than the others who get fined and suspended aside from perhaps not being an overly penitent person.

Dutrow, for his faults, can flat out train a racehorse. A year ago people would point at him and Allday and claim it was the vet who moved his horses up. Well, he fired the vet a year ago and is doing ok. And Allday, aside from his outburst, is still a great vet.

Dutrow took Kip DeVille over from a guy named Netherland and moved him up. That makes him a criminal? Good trainers move up horses. It's not a crime.

Chuck Simon moved up that filly up 15-20 lengths in a few months. He's a good trainer. That's what is supposed to happen when a good trainer with a sharp eye takes a young horse from an average-to-poor trainer. They often move up.

I'm curious to know if Allday has done any work with Sumoneluveyou?

Perhaps I'm becoming extremely jaded, but it's really very amazing what we, as fans and/or handicappers, put up with in regards to the entire 'sport'.

Are there even enough benefits to be gained from milkshaking to even risk being caught? Seems pretty stupid to me.

The big thing to me is that a trainer not run an unsound horse. I support Dee Tee Stable, including Gary Sciacca running the NY string.

What do you think the milkshake was for, the horse was thirsty. The milkshake masks other drugs in the system, either performance enhancing drugs or drugs to relieve pain...either way your logic is flawed.

You can sort of argue when it comes to overrages, but milkshaking is just blatant cheating. The barn is a CHEATING BARN. It is that simple.

People that are his friends (some here obviously) defend him just like parents defend their children when they are on trial for killing someone. It is human nature. However, those on this board that will still use him and claim he knew nothing because he was on vacation, must think the rest of us are idiots.

The fact is the barn CHEATS. People who use barns that cheat help promote cheating. Nothing more to it than that. Those people that defend him now have absolutely ZERO credibility now when it comes to discussions on cheating in the sport. ZERO.


Sadly the biggest winners in the sport are the biggest cheaters. Just like in most sports. Horse racing is very close to joining the ranks of boxing because people continue to defend these cheaters.

[quote=Benevolus]

The fact is the barn CHEATS. People who use barns that cheat help promote cheating. Nothing more to it than that. Those people that defend him now have absolutely ZERO credibility now when it comes to discussions on cheating in the sport. ZERO.


QUOTE]



Could not possibly be said any clearer than that.

Don't forget, when this incident took place very few people were being caught for milkshaking, as testing only began in the last two years.

Maybe a stupid question, but were "Milkshakes" legal at any point? Or just something that was not tested for back in the day. At Flats and/or Harness Track.

BTW is right, the public should be outraged whenever any kind of drugging goes on. It should be a criminal offense. If these clowns faced punishment like people in the real world they wouldnt do it anymore.

Racing needs one governing body, and they need to take cheating serious. Snake Venom, Milk shaking, blocks/painkillers, all of that bullshit should land these guys in jail, off the grounds, and facing criminal charges.

If Chuck ran off to Cabo for a vacation do you think Cherie would be running around telling the vets to milkshake everything. It starts at the top, and it trickles down. The simple fact that Sciacca wasnt there just shows you how comfortable they were doing it.

The reason this game is stuck in the mud is because of its horrible reputation, something needs to be done

The really annoying thing about these guys cheating is they are screwing the gambler and the gambler is indirectly the guy who really pays their salary. It is almost like they have no respect for fairness to the guy gambling.

I don't have enough money to gamble a ton of money but I would not be happy if I lost a bunch of money when the horse I bet on ran 2nd to a cheater and then weeks later you find it out. The gambler still loses. It really hurts guys who spend thousand on pick 6's because they could lose out on a very big ticket due to one horse.

Go into a bank and steal a thousand and see what happens. These guys are influencing a lot more money than a G when they cheat and they get a couple months off. PUHLEASE.

dont think we can afford em..

Allday is all about Lubrisyn. I wonder if Dutrow can use Lubrisyn with his "juice". If not, maybe that is why Allday is jumping all over him.

There was once a time in the 90's when Sciacca was a top the Belmont standings with 30 wins - had a 26.1 win percentage from 115 starters with an avg win mutual of $14.30 for those 30 winners - and was a magical 21-for-56 (37.5% wins) with runners on the turf course.

Gasper Moschera was 2nd in the standings.

How times have changed!

Speaking of Lurbisyn, I saw some young short guy in a nice Loisville steakhouse wearing an old Lubrisyn baseball cap. Must of been Allday's son.

I have one of those caps too. :o

It seems like many trainers are now using it. He got Pletcher to use it and wear the jacket and now everyone is following. I bet it doesn't hurt to use and I don't think it is super expensive per horse ($1/day per horse), but I am skeptical of it. Seems like just another thing to make the breed more fragile.