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View Full Version : Shouldn't Racing be learning from this?


Poindexter
05-21-2015, 02:07 PM
Okay, I get it. Racing will not reduce take out. It is there bed, they can lie in it. Nothing I can do or say will ever change that. But what we keep seeing evidence of is when there is a mandatory payout with a good carryover the pools are huge. Last night, a harness track Pompano Park had a $200,000 carroyover in its 20 cent super high five and a mandatory payout. Like most of these mandatory payouts a lot of money was bet. In this case a whopping $1.2 million dollars. Now the takeout(not sure what exactly it is) exceeded the takeout(similarly when Gulfstream had a 1.4 million carryover in it jackpot pick 6, 5.67 million was bet. Once again the takeout nullifies the carryover. So theoretically it isn't a whole lot different(from a value perspective) than racetrack x announcing that for fan appreciation day we will be offering a zero takeout pick six or pick 5 or high 5......But the difference is that with the announcement of a zero takeout bet, I am not sure the pool would even be 1/4th of what they are when there is a huge carryover and a mandatory payout.

My point is that people respond well to big pools and big carryovers. Pompano Parks handle last night was it's largest in its 51 year history(the specifics of how much was high 5 and how much was other I do not know), but harness racing has been dead for a long time.

link to article about last night (http://xwebapp.ustrotting.com/absolutenm/templates/article.aspx?articleid=64343&zoneid=1)

So my point is if racetracks do not want to lower takeouts because they feel patrons will not respond, they can use other forms of promotion such as(this is just an example)

Santa Anita contributing $50,000 to create a Saturday late pick 4 carryover or bonus (with an extra $100,000 bonus if you are the lone ticket to hit the pick 4 which will very rarely ever happen-but people do not know that and would respond well to it). Obviously they have to get their adw's to partner with them on this and drastically reduce their cut for these pools-and the states as well would have to exempt or lower the taxation on these wagers-but if you want to grow this sport and you refuse to do the obvious and reduce takeout.....this seems like the best alternative to steer racing in the right direction.

Personally I think it is better to do this with pick 4's, because they are much friendlier to a small player than a pick 6 (especially the $2 variety which are too tough to hit) and by having to handicap 4 races you will likely bet a couple of them. For instance in last night super high 5 I handicapped 1 race played the super high 5 and that was it, had it been a pick 4 I would have handicapped all 4 races and not a chance I wouldn't have bet at least a couple of them.

Stillriledup
05-21-2015, 11:15 PM
Okay, I get it. Racing will not reduce take out. It is there bed, they can lie in it. Nothing I can do or say will ever change that. But what we keep seeing evidence of is when there is a mandatory payout with a good carryover the pools are huge. Last night, a harness track Pompano Park had a $200,000 carroyover in its 20 cent super high five and a mandatory payout. Like most of these mandatory payouts a lot of money was bet. In this case a whopping $1.2 million dollars. Now the takeout(not sure what exactly it is) exceeded the takeout(similarly when Gulfstream had a 1.4 million carryover in it jackpot pick 6, 5.67 million was bet. Once again the takeout nullifies the carryover. So theoretically it isn't a whole lot different(from a value perspective) than racetrack x announcing that for fan appreciation day we will be offering a zero takeout pick six or pick 5 or high 5......But the difference is that with the announcement of a zero takeout bet, I am not sure the pool would even be 1/4th of what they are when there is a huge carryover and a mandatory payout.

My point is that people respond well to big pools and big carryovers. Pompano Parks handle last night was it's largest in its 51 year history(the specifics of how much was high 5 and how much was other I do not know), but harness racing has been dead for a long time.

link to article about last night (http://xwebapp.ustrotting.com/absolutenm/templates/article.aspx?articleid=64343&zoneid=1)

So my point is if racetracks do not want to lower takeouts because they feel patrons will not respond, they can use other forms of promotion such as(this is just an example)

Santa Anita contributing $50,000 to create a Saturday late pick 4 carryover or bonus (with an extra $100,000 bonus if you are the lone ticket to hit the pick 4 which will very rarely ever happen-but people do not know that and would respond well to it). Obviously they have to get their adw's to partner with them on this and drastically reduce their cut for these pools-and the states as well would have to exempt or lower the taxation on these wagers-but if you want to grow this sport and you refuse to do the obvious and reduce takeout.....this seems like the best alternative to steer racing in the right direction.

Personally I think it is better to do this with pick 4's, because they are much friendlier to a small player than a pick 6 (especially the $2 variety which are too tough to hit) and by having to handicap 4 races you will likely bet a couple of them. For instance in last night super high 5 I handicapped 1 race played the super high 5 and that was it, had it been a pick 4 I would have handicapped all 4 races and not a chance I wouldn't have bet at least a couple of them.

I think Del Mar tried to "Seed" the pick 6 with 50k, i don't know if they still do that or not.

There's a lot tracks can do with betting menu's and whatnut, problem is that with the state governments involved, its a lot of red tape, not worth going thru the hassle. Also, if you are a race track 'higher up' and you suggest some kind of gimmick to create additional handle and it doesn't work, you look really bad, track execs don't want to rock the boat, they want to collect paychecks while keeping a stable job, there's really nothing much in it for them if they make a suggestion even if the suggestion works, but there's too much downside for them professionally, that's why people sit on their hands.

Racing failed by pumping BILLIONS of dollars into the pockets of owners via slot machines while not giving 1 cent of slots money to the players. That was a fail.