Flatter: What price comes with the new-look Churchill Downs?

This is the winter of our disconnect.

Show of hands, horsemen. How many times have you been jolted by your phone throbbing with text messages saying racing and training have been called off because it was too cold? If you have enough fingers to show me the number, it is only because they somehow did not fall off in the frigid air.

Readers in California and Florida cannot relate, because the weather is perfect there, and so is the future of racing. Ahem.

Churchill Downs unveils major building project.

It is 10 degrees outside as I write Friday morning in Louisville, Ky. Assets literally are frozen. They will be thawed soon enough to allow for Churchill Downs to resume being what it is 11 months of the year. Less the home of the Kentucky Derby and more a construction site.

The grandiose homestretch and first-turn and infield projects ballyhooed this week at about the same time as a quarterly corporate earnings report were impressive, indeed. Architecturally, they finally tie the eclectically designed high rises together to look a lot like the new monolith surrounding the paddock. The only things that seem out of place are the twin spires, which have turned into Waldos in the pretty pictures painted by architects and their AI acolytes.

My favorite passage in all the reports I saw came from NASDAQ, the clearinghouse that has been the stage for Churchill stockholders to have their money multiply 10-fold in the past decade.

“The company is making a substantial investment of up to $1.65 billion across multiple projects, which may raise concerns about financial strain and potential impacts on shareholder returns,” the NASDAQ analysis said. “The approval of government incentives is uncertain, creating a risk that planned projects may not proceed as outlined, potentially delaying improvements and affecting customer experience.”

As soon as I looked again at the arrow wandering to the upper right of the decade-long Churchill stock graph, and as soon as I read that federal money was not in play, I had to laugh.

First, I bet a real-life Michael Burry is not walking through that door with an encore to “The Big Short.” Not even if Christian Bale were to show up on the red carpet May 3. And the idea that Churchill would not win approval of anything from any branch of Kentucky government is about as likely as someone in Canada not being in a good mood after what happened in Boston on Thursday night.

Ah, but there was one other skeptical point posed by NASDAQ that finally brought home the short-term impact of all this building.

“Significant construction-related disruptions may impact the experience of guests during key events,” it said, “as projects are set to span several years leading up to the Kentucky Derby in 2028.”

There is that year 2028 again. The same one we have seen posing as an expiration date on Gulfstream Park even if the Stronach Group gets the Florida legislature to untether its casino and racing licenses. Untether, by the way, is just a less hackneyed way of saying decoupling.

So what is in all this for horses and horse owners and trainers and jockeys and grooms and hot walkers and, oh, who is that other group? Oh, that’s right. Gamblers.

Churchill boss Bill Carstanjen had a reference to “once-in-a-lifetime experiences for our guests” early in Wednesday’s news release. Maybe horseplayers were implied in that collective, but that word and specific synonyms were missing from Wednesday’s release.

Horsemen got one mention.

“CDI is also planning to invest in several infrastructure improvements at Churchill Downs anticipated to include backside improvements for horsemen and trainers as well as a new tunnel to the infield that will facilitate seamless access to and from the front side,” the Churchill statement said. “The tunnel will serve as an immersive underground journey for guests delivering 150 years of Kentucky Derby storytelling magic and building excitement for the day ahead.”

Tunnels are so trendy, aren’t they? In their poker game of racing’s high rollers, it was like Churchill looked at NYRA’s Belmont Park project and pushed in more chips before playing the river card.

I did not, however, see any splashy images of a new stable area. Not that it is squalor back there. Churchill’s barns are some of the nicest in the sport. Still, I have to wonder when the cranes come in what this redevelopment is bringing to the backstretch community.

Also absent were any details about why gamblers should embrace these initiatives. By gamblers, I mean those who bet on horses, not stock.

This month it was quietly announced that the sportsbook on the second floor of Churchill Downs had been closed.

“With 98% of sports betting made on mobile platforms such as FanDuel, there simply isn’t a profitable path forward for us to sustain profitability as a retail operator,” Churchill track spokesperson Darren Rogers told the Louisville Courier-Journal.

That is all fine and good 98% of the year. But what about all those visitors from around the world who show up just for the Oaks and Derby? For those two days and maybe even the whole week, the idea they are going to download a Kentucky betting app just so they can have some post-race action on an NBA playoff game or the Canelo Álvarez vs. Jake Paul fight feels like a bit of a reach.

In truth, the sportsbook is a microcosm for all these capital improvements at Churchill Downs. The catalyst for them is not that financial drain 98% of the year. It is that 2% when the track is the epicenter of sports. The argument that almost no one is going into the sportsbook can be expanded to say that no one goes to the track but for one glorious week.

The retort would be a potential Breeders’ Cup and the givens of the Stephen Foster and the Clark and the development of Downs After Dark cards. Those are decent enough crowd lures in the everyday scheme of racing, but against the backdrop of the massive stands that only will get bigger, the patrons rattle around like the last kernels in a jumbo tub of popcorn.

It was not entirely unsaid what would happen to Churchill Downs and, really, the Kentucky Derby, if 2028 were to yield not only glitzy new digs in Louisville but empty parcels of racing land in Florida and California.

Cue the talking points about declines in foal crops and racing dates and equine professionals and betting handle. I breezily have said for years that the Kentucky Derby could be run with 20 palominos, and most people who check out the sport only on the first Saturday in May would not notice. Maybe 98%.

Deep down in Wednesday’s news release were 715 boilerplate words of legalese, force majeure stuff and all that. It includes tuchus-covering language about “terrorist attacks, public health threats, civil unrest, and inclement weather, including as a result of climate change.” Blah, blah, blah.

Oh, wait. There were mentions, too, of “lack of confidence in the integrity of our core businesses or any deterioration in our reputation” and “failure to enter into or maintain agreements with industry constituents including horsemen and other racetracks.”

Industry constituents. Maybe horseplayers were mentioned after all.

Ron Flatter’s column appears Friday mornings at Horse Racing Nation. Comments below and at RonFlatterRacingPod@gmail.com are welcomed, encouraged and may be used in the feedback segment of the Ron Flatter Racing Pod, which also is posted every Friday.