TGJB Wrote:
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> I have no dog in this fight. But someone please
> explain to me why a guy would use a drug
>
> a) that doesn't move a horse up
>
> b) that he knows there's a test for
>
> c) because he's had a positive for it before,
> after which he swore publicly they would never
> allow it in the barn again.
>
> Walk me through the risk/reward on this. I have no
> idea whether Baffert is using something, but if he
> is it ain't this stuff. He's not an idiot.
You're starting out from a false premise - roughly, that Baffert sees the world and comes to his decisions in a way more or less similar to the way that you do. My experience as a criminal defense attorney leads me to think that you should reconsider the assumptions you've made above: that Baffert is intelligent, that Baffert understands risk/reward calculus the way you do, that Baffert has any degree of concern for previous positives he's had or statements he's made regarding those tests/medications, that you know everything the horse was given or what provoked this test or what effect it can have on the horse, and so on, and so forth.
(And by the way, the statements he has made publicly in the last 48 hours alone very seriously belie your assertion that Baffert is not an idiot.)
Since you invited the speculation, I'll take a shot: he otherwise had no chance to win the race, the horse was worth $50,000 or $500,000 before the race and about $50,000,000 after, and he has absolutely no reason to believe he'll ever suffer a consequence for any misdeed performed by himself or anyone urinating in the corner of a barn under his control - said another way, it is in fact
you who misunderstands the risk/reward presented to him by this situation, and not Bobby!
