Flatter: Without a horse, Lukas still sways the Kentucky Derby

Louisville, Ky.

In a crowd of more than 150,000 people who crammed every nook, cranny and billionaires’ aerie at Churchill Downs, there was no place quieter or more lonely Saturday night at 7:04 Eastern than the betting windows.

That is what happens when the longest of long shots wins a horse race. No one goes back to cash a winning ticket. Because there are not any.

If anyone would have been there after the Kentucky Derby, it should have been D. Wayne Lukas. If not for his decision in the dying minutes before the scratch deadline Friday at 9 a.m. EDT, Rich Strike would not have gotten into the race. And America’s greatest race would not have had its most unlikely winner in the last 109 years.

“At about five minutes ’til 9, my pony girl Fifi calls me on the phone,” said Eric Reed, who could not have been picked out of lineup even if every trainer stood in post-position order Saturday night. “She goes, ‘Don’t do anything with your horse. Don’t move him. ... I just got notification that Wayne is scratching, and you’re going to get in.' ”

Only 34 hours later, Reed had trained a Kentucky Derby winner. An 80-1 Kentucky Derby winner.

And jockey Sonny León, a native of Venezuela who never had raced in the Derby and never had won a graded stakes, suddenly was a Kentucky Derby winner. An 80-1 Kentucky Derby winner.

“I didn’t know if he could win the race,” said León, who is well known as the top rider at Mahoning Valley, which even eastern Ohio residents might not find without GPS and a bloodhound. “Turning for home he was like seven lengths behind the leader. I said I’ve got a shot. I found a lot of traffic. I said I had to wait, and that’s what I did.”

But not too long. When he came up on the heels of rapidly fading Messier, León had to fish or cut bait. Either go inside where there was no room on the rail. Or veer out one path and hope he had enough horse left to catch Epicenter and Zandon.

“I knew I got a horse,” León said, “so I moved the horse.”

In that instant, Rich Strike found space to his right – and clear sailing past two horses who had a combined $13 million put on their noses in win bets. Rich Strike had barely a half-million. Mattea Roach, the charismatic, 23-year-old “Jeopardy” phenom who just lost Friday night, singlehandedly could have matched those bets with her winnings. Too bad Mattress Mack did not aim his seven-digit wager at the longest shot on the board instead of the shortest.

Not to overstate what happened Saturday, but horse racing now has its version of the ultimate upset. Maybe not in the vein of the Miracle on Ice. Not like Buster Douglas over Mike Tyson. Come to think of it, this was a real-life remake of “Hoosiers.”

Eric Reed, who suffered through a barn fire 5 1/2 years ago in nearby Lexington and nearly quit the game, could take Gene Hackman’s place as coach Norman Dale.

Sonny León, who has labored in obscurity, could play Jimmy Chitwood, the kid who said he would quit the Hickory High basketball team if the new coach was fired.

Owner Rick Dawson could step in for Dennis Hopper as Shooter. Not the drunken assistant coach. More like the guy who would not give up on the people to whom he was loyal.

And what about the horse? Rich Strike would be the new character in this remake. His only previous victory was in a maiden race in which he was 17 lengths better than his outmatched competition. Oh, yes. It was a claiming race – at Churchill Downs, no less – and the colt who was sired by Keen Ice was bought from Calumet Farm for $30,000 by Dawson.

Transferred from Joe Sharp to the rebuilt stable of Reed, Rich Strike began his trip down the Derby trail in dubious fashion, losing the Gun Runner Stakes at Oaklawn by 14 lengths.

Then he spent the winter at Turfway Park, where he finished third twice and fourth once on the Tapeta track. But two of those results earned him the points he needed to get a whiff of the Derby entry box.

So on a gloomy Saturday when Bob Baffert was out, Donald Trump was in, and Mattress Mack could have made the biggest splash of all, it was the 86-year-old trainer who won the day before with Secret Oath in the Kentucky Oaks who moved a pari-mutuel mountain. Just when it seemed like he had had his swan song, it turned out the move that D. Wayne Lukas made to bypass the Kentucky Derby triggered the biggest race’s biggest shocker since the federal income tax was created by a constitutional amendment. Clearly, in 1913, upset had two distinct meanings.

Think about it. In a way, D. Wayne Lukas won the 2022 Kentucky Derby. Not for himself. For a bunch of guys who had the most unlikely of dreams come true Saturday.

May the celebration of the Rich Strike team continue until this cool Kentucky night turns into day. Just don’t disturb the quiet at the betting windows.