Flatter: New film critical of racing has familiar clunk to it

Places everyone. Since Kentucky Derby 2024 is at hand, there is about to be a one-hour documentary that will be critical of horse racing. Let us all assume our various roles.

We who love racing will be itching to react defensively to “Broken Horses.” That is the glibly titled, 64-minute film that FX will roll out Friday night before parking it on Hulu for on-demand access.

Here is the good news. This is not as bad a hit job as we might have feared when it was revealed in December that this documentary was being produced by The New York Times, which has a long history of accentuating the negative in racing.

Accentuating might not be strong enough. The Times deserves credit for exposing some of the ills that our sport’s establishment would just as soon keep under the carpet. It also has failed to provide the same stage for all the positives. When Santa Anita had its deadly winter and spring in 2019, the paper could not wait to headline them. When safety improvements reversed that trend, the Times was nowhere to be found.

The balance actually is better in “Broken Horses” than it has been in all the news that’s fit to print. Other than a short sound bite here or there, animal-rights extremists do not have a free roll in this film. The upstate New York pizza man who used to sell pies full of beef and pork products, the one who has made it his life’s mission to abolish horse racing, is seen for all of eight seconds and goes unidentified.

But make no mistake. This film is raw in its criticism of racing, and it has specific targets. The message of greed is unmistakable. It says there is so much money in the sale of horses and the running of the biggest races that cheating was bound to follow. And so, therefore, was drug abuse.

The deaths at Churchill Downs last spring and Saratoga last summer were low-hanging fruit. And yes, graphic images of breakdowns were shown, although not nearly as many as I feared I would see.

Eventually, Times writers cum film producers Joe Drape and Melissa Hoppert made Havnameltdown their poster child. About a third of the film dealt with his breakdown on Preakness day last spring. And yes, we see it again.

As expected, all roads in this part of the script lead to Bob Baffert. You could see that coming all the way up the 405 freeway. Drape has had it in for Baffert for years. The very first statistic he cited in the documentary came when he said, “Since 2000, Bob Baffert’s fatality rate is about seven deaths per 1,000 starts, which makes him one of the deadliest trainers in California.”

What Drape did not mention was that the average has dropped steadily since 2005 and precipitously since 2013. That Baffert has a lot of horses who have not had their race totals jacked up just to lower the mortality rate. That in the period of time framed in the documentary, Havnameltdown was an unfortunate exception for Baffert.

Veterinary logs supposedly showing the care Havnameltdown got before his death were rolled out and made to look like there was a record of neglect and abuse. At least it looks that way to the lay viewer.

That, of course, was why veterinarian Sheila Lyons was interviewed and is portrayed as an expert in the film. She was critical of Baffert when she was prompted time and again by Drape. What was not mentioned, though, was what Bill Finley pointed out this week in his Thoroughbred Daily News review of the movie. It was that Lyons never has worked at a racetrack.

Sure, you have your expert, and I have mine. It reminded me of a scene in the 1982 movie “The Verdict.” The one where an old doctor took the stand in a wrongful-death suit. James Mason’s lawyer character picked him apart for his shaky credentials and a history of being a hired witness who spent his time “testifying quite a bit against other physicians.”

I will not pretend to think I will change any minds here about Baffert. I have every expectation that the comments beneath this column will light me up for being a Baffert defender. If the accusation here is that, like the documentary, I have a particular point of view, I am guilty as charged.

What I am trying to illustrate here is that our frames of reference guide our perceptions. Not only do “Broken Horses” in general and Drape in particular have their own particular biases against Baffert, they have opposite opinions on display, too. They flimsily portray some of racing’s establishment as shiny knights who are heroes trying to clean up the sport.

Jockey Club stalwarts Stuart Janney and Arthur Hancock are depicted as champions of reform credited with pointing the FBI in the right direction to lock up the Jorge Navarro-Jason Servis posse and prodding senator Mitch McConnell to get the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act approved.

The documentary, however, never connected Janney and Hancock, blue-blooded scions of racehorse ownership, with the greed it blamed for fostering a culture of drug abuse and safety compromises. Even after it established last year’s deaths at Churchill Downs and Saratoga as flashpoints, the film practically blew through the inconclusive investigations that resulted from them. Maybe since Baffert had nothing to do with them, they were not as sexy.

If you have made it this far in this column, you know all the above rings familiar. “Broken Horses” is a technical gem that is not a chore to watch, but it reveals absolutely nothing new about racing’s biggest challenges. The Washington Post’s 4,823-word story about Baffert in 2021 felt like it could have been the working screenplay.

National Thoroughbred Racing Association CEO Tom Rooney said that the sport should be prepared to rebut this documentary.

“If you don’t respond, then there’s a pile-on effect,” Rooney said last month, remembering his days facing critics when he was in Congress. “It’s just like, ‘Oh, we got him. He’s not responding, so it must be true.’ You have to respond.”

The NTRA made a pre-emptive strike this week when it launched its Safety Runs First campaign. But a direct response to the documentary, like the documentary itself, remains to be seen.

We who live and breathe racing know all the issues, and we will be keenly aware that “Broken Horses” is a been-there, done-that film. But that is not the case for most mainstream fans who drive by our sport exactly one time a year, this buildup to the Kentucky Derby being that time.

After getting an advance look at the documentary, I started to formulate a response in my head, including what I would write in this column. I also compared notes with a few friends who are in the racing business. One of them offered a great question.

“Will your neighbor be watching Friday night?”

I paused a few seconds before my friend said, “I didn’t think so.”

You know, the NFL Draft, the Clippers-Mavericks game and new episodes of “Dateline NBC” and “Blue Bloods” will be on at the same time.