My Wife, who could care less about horse racing, watched the entire ESPN broadcast, formulated her own opinion based on what she saw... and hit the Exacta and Tri.... She went to the track with me (for the first time as a horseplayer) today for the closing of TBD... Just sayin'....

That's my big complaint about NBC and ESPN when showing races.

Use a normal view or track feed of the live race, then they can use the blimps and other tricky camera angles for the replays.

Derby Wagering, Attendance Up Despite Weather
By Blood-Horse Staff

:tro:

A gentleman and a scholar, as I've already said. :p

Poker didn't explode because of Phil Hellmuth's personality. And it didn't explode because they decided to shine a light on the gambling aspect, either. Every idiot born yesterday knows that poker is gambling and always has been.

Poker exploded for one reason and one reason only: They found new and interesting ways to televise it and ESPN put it on the air....a lot. Television then educated the public and after a few episodes, every middle-aged man and college frat boy in America thought he was Doyle Brunson. Luckily, there was plenty of opportunity for them to put their money where their mouths were -- on their ADW Internet wagering sites.

Chris Moneymaker didn't hurt. That's when I think it went ballistic. That dude hitting SS with $100K was good publicity. I didn't see any of the network news this weekend, I just wonder if it got any attention on that?

GTFO... that is great! That is how you create a horseplayer.

:tro:

It hit some news stands, my mother saw it in her papers this morning (Buffalo News, Rochester D&C) but the dumbfuks reporting didn't even do due diligence on the story- they reported it as "some guy walking around with briefcase full of $100k in cash", not that it was a CNBC contest that he won the opportunity to bet.

Poker is pure gambling. Nothing else, nothing more. The millions of people that played poker after the exposure were looking to gamble anyway, they werent brainwashed into it.

TV educated the public about the strategy being used which is basically the gambling aspect. I understand that three live shows weeks apart on Saturday afternoons in the Spring isnt the same as edited wall to wall coverage. And i understand that NBC or ABC or ESPN is under no obligation to educate people on anything. But the idea that someone is sparked to bet on the races by flowery interviews or human interest stories versus someone winning a couple hundred dollars is flawed.

Perhaps an attempt to explain why people like certain horses, and why they don't like others, could enlighten people a little about what is so interesting about handicapping that many people devote their lives to it's pursuit. There are many stories within a race.....surely some of these could be interesting.

Well that's good news, any way you cut it.

My biggest gripe was, as usual, how they didn't show the finish order or payouts until much later. I used my phone to go to my adw site and get the pays.

That's awesome... I love it.

From the NY Post:

And yet NBC took this big, evolving story and repeatedly ignored it. For the next 90-plus minutes, instead of leaving the odds up along the top or bottom of the screen, NBC posted them once in a while, occasionally, now and then, seldom.

But NBC annually does this to Derby viewers and to itself. Imagine if the folks who run CNBC decided to keep the screen free of the latest stock market prices?

And so, once again, when we need no graphics, the screen is loaded with them; when we need 'em, there's nothing there.

http://www.nypost.com/p/sports/more_...MAg9T4kXvnbUMP

Pants -- I'm with you on that one... gotta love Diane Lane.

I dunno. In our celebrity-obsessed culture, seeing Michael Jordan, Jessica Simpson, and other glamerous people there and singing its praises gives a lot of people out there reason to think, "hey, maybe this isn't just a seedy, degenerate sport. This is HIP. What am I missing?" Think of them as celebrity endorsements, much like Charles Barkley for Right Guard, or Catherine Zeta-Jones for that phone company.

And really, whether you believe television doesn't -- or is under no obligation to -- educate, it does on a very basic, fundamental level. When Costas talks about different horses' running styles and how it could affect the outcome, or when guys like Goldberg give their picks and tell you why, it piques interest in people, which they may investigate further on their own later.

but you arent the typical "woman".. I mean your family vacations are centered around watching big russian guys check other big canadian guys into walls and gambling on ponies. You are like the coolest woman in the world.

typical "women" who watch the Derby (and Derby only) do it for the hats, dresses, and parties.

women, in general, arent gamblers (besides penny slots). Of course there are exceptions. But when you go to a casino or race track.. its men that are doing the gambling. The women you can find playing the penny slots.. the men are losing $4000 playing poker and black jack & pick 3's.

The way to get the girls to tune in to the Derby, is to show the other stuff. If the Derby coverage was basically a simulcast feed, nobody would watch it.

:tro:

NBC coverage started at 4.. race didnt start til 630. There is only so much "human uninterested in their stories" out there. I personally am a fan of showing hot chicks in dresses for 2 hours. Though I agree with your suggestion more.

I know that you said there are exceptions but I just can't agree.

Women aren't gamblers?

Penny slots?

I'd assume there are many more men than women who gamble but still..

How do we know this, that they don't gamble as much?

When you're at the track what's the ratio of men to women like?

Oh right well I got distracted by the last post but this is what I really wanted to say here.

MAKE IT STOP.

The Kentucky Oaks, the filly version of the Kentucky Derby, is broadcast on Bravo, which skews heavily toward female viewers. There are Derby segments on "The Today Show" in the run-up to the race focusing on everything from fashion to how to create the perfect mint julep.

"Women are watching the Derby more for the spectacle than the sporting event," McCarley said. "There's a balance you have to strike for the different people that you're watching."


http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/...n6447802.shtml