The fault in our stars? More thoughts on California Chrome and the ‘unfairness’ of life

June 9, 2014

So Cinderella turned out to be just as unpalatable as her stepsisters. By that I mean that the world is a little less enamored of Steve Coburn since he started crying foul – repeatedly – after his horse, California Chrome, lost his Triple Crown bid at the Belmont Stakes to Tonalist, who didn’t run in the Kentucky Derby or Preakness.

I never thought Coburn and the partner were interesting. I mean, how classy can you be when you name your venture Dumb Ass Partners? No, what was fascinating, beautiful, a dream, was that bright as a penny of a horse with his blaze and four white socks and curiosity about us two-legged types and poise and smarts and heart and in the end, none of it was enough.

And that’s heartbreaking but such is life. I still agree with Coburn, though, that it isn’t fair to come into the Belmont all fresh as a daisy and play spoiler. And I see that plenty in the blogosphere were thinking what I was thinking: You have to play every round of the French Open to get to the final.

The end of a California (Chrome) dream

June 8, 2014

How is it that you can fall in love with someone you don’t know?

What if that someone were a horse?

Millions of us fell in love with California Chrome these past few weeks and millions of us got our hearts broken as he finished out of the money in Saturday’s Belmont Stakes, which increasingly seems to be won by a horse you don’t care about. This year it was Tonalist, who didn’t run in the Kentucky Derby or the Preakness. He’s named for an art principle. (In more than 30 years covering the arts, I never once used the term tonalism. Let’s just admit it’s a pretentious name, and leave it at that, shall we?)

Anyway, CC’s more voluble owner, Steve Coburn, did Chromies no favors...

The Clippers deal and what the market will bear

June 2, 2014

Why is everybody up in arms about sports nut Steve Ballmer buying the Los Angeles Clippers for $2 billion?The team, people say, is worth $750 million at best. It’s all about the television rights jacking up the price in the second biggest market, others say.

I say it’s only about one thing – what the market will bear. It’s like the art market. (Or the stock market.) You pay $95 million for a Van Gogh, it’s worth $95 million. Now is a Van Gogh worth $95 million? Actually, I’d have to say that since he was a great artist – a great dead artist who can’t make any more paintings – then a Van Gogh is priceless. But we don’t live in a world of aesthetics. We live in a world of insurance policies – so much if your roof is damaged, so much if your windshield is cracked. Everything has its price, which is not the same as its value.

The equine Ali-Frazier – Affirmed and Alydar

May 10, 2014

Amid California Chrome’s quest for the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred racing – which continues May 17 with The Preakness at Pimlico Race Course in Maryland – comes Linda Carroll and David Rosner’s juicy new book “Duel for the Crown: Affirmed, Alydar, and Racing’s Greatest Rivalry” (Gallery Books, $26, 360 pages). It tells the story of two coppery 3-year-old colts – laidback Affirmed out of upstart Harbor View Farm in Florida and high-strung Alydar out of Calumet Farm in Kentucky, the New York Yankees of Thoroughbred dynasties – who in the spring of 1978 offered racing fans and the general public alike two very different approaches, the authors write:

“Despite their similar chestnut coloring and their shared bloodlines as descendants of the great Native Dancer, Affirmed and Alydar boasted the kind of clashing styles and complementary personalities that fuel the most enduring rivalries. Off the track, the refined Affirmed was as relaxed and easygoing as the regal Alydar was macho and aggressive. On the track, their contrasting styles forged the equine equivalent of Ali the Boxer versus Frazier the Slugger. Affirmed, graceful and swift like Ali, was the classic frontrunner, gliding with the precision of a stopwatch and flicking his ears to alert his precocious jockey (Steve Cauthen) to an impending challenge, while Alydar, brawny and bullish like Frazier, was the classic stalker, gearing up to unleash his come-from-behind knockout punch. The classic confrontation was so close that it would all come down to one champion’s indomitable will to win.”

Indeed, they would race each other 10 times in 14 months, with Affirmed usually gaining the upper hand, er, hoof. But it wasn’t easy.

Cinderella males: Jason Collins and California Chrome

May 5, 2014

The greatest story in sports is the Cinderella story, in which the player – perhaps he or she is even of the four-legged kind – comes out of nowhere or overcomes tremendous obstacles to triumph. Indeed, the reason the Cinderella story is a cliché is because we’ve seen it time and again and love it so.

In my new novel “Water Music,” the Cinderella man is Iraqi tennis prodigy Alí Iskandar, who withstands war, abuse, uncertainty and even a jealous rival to become world No. 1. And though his friends and lovers – Alex, Daniel and Dylan – have more materially to begin with, they, too, face real challenges in the quest to be the best. Maybe that’s why sports feature so many story lines of perseverance. Sports not only represent a way out for the athlete, but they attract the kind of people who already know what it’s like to be in it for the long haul.

At the moment, we’re being treated to several Cinderella tales, not the least of which features Joyce DiDonato and Juan Diego Flórez at The Metropolitan Opera. But I’d like to concentrate here on two superb athletes – Brooklyn Nets’ center Jason Collins and Kentucky Derby winner California Chrome.

The run for the roses and the trouble with horseracing

May 3, 2014

Time once again for the Kentucky Derby (6 p.m. tonight). Tara and Johnny will be there, presumably to talk fashion, not horseflesh. And there will be the usual breast-beating about whether the Cinderella winner – it’s always a Cinderella winner, with California Chrome this year’s front-runner and feel-good story, though some like Wicked Strong – will go on to become the first horse since Affirmed in 1978 to win the Triple Crown.

A confession: I’ve always loved horseracing, particularly the Triple Crown, which is at the heart of “Criterion,” the third novel in my series, “The Games Men Play.” As a child, I once memorized all the Triple Crown winners. My favorite is Affirmed, a racehorse so smart that you could call him by name and he’d come to you. Or so Lou Sahadi, his biographer, once told me. There’s just something about that select club of excellence, its distinctive personalities and the way the horses thunder around the track, all that sleek power and speed. Plus, they’re beautiful animals.

But beauty often goes hand-in-hand with brutality – at least in my books, which deal with the world of sports.

Will Sterling go gentle into that good night?

May 1, 2014

Well, Adam Silver, the new NBA commish, did the right thing re: Los Angeles Clippers’ owner Donald Sterling, but what a mess, huh? Will the NBA be able to enforce Sterling’s lifetime ban and $2.5 million fine? Will Sterling sue? Those are the questions of the moment.

Meanwhile, much of the blogosphere is still stuck on the private/public dichotomy. He was set up, this group says, plus, lots of people say things in private that don’t reflect how they act in public. I had this conversation over Easter dinner with a gay friend as he defended former Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich, who lost his job over his private support for the anti-gay Prop 8. This, too, was the act of a private citizen.

But it comes down to leadership.