Gomez good sport in year’s home stretch

Despite a tumultuous final week of 2008, Garrett Gomez showed above all that he is a good sport.

Gomez is a sure thing to win his third straight champion jockey Eclipse Award. But in the waning days of ’08, his main goal was beating Jerry Bailey’s single-year purse earnings record of $23,354,960. Gomez finished $10,609 short of breaking that mark, and here’s why.

Gomez was well positioned to pass Bailey until the Eddie Logan Stakes at Santa Anita on Sunday. He appeared ready to win the Logan until his mount, Back At You, ducked into the rail, tossing the rider. Gomez was lucky to escape, losing a few front teeth and sustaining cuts and bruises.

The spill caused Gomez to miss six mounts, one Saturday and five Sunday. Substitute jockeys won on three of Gomez’s horses, with one third. Those four missed paychecks cost Gomez more than $100,000 in purse earnings.

Gomez tried his best Wednesday with three wins but came up just short of Bailey. In the Santa Anita winner’s circle, after his final mount for 2008, Gomez hammed it up for TV cameras and photographers when he ripped apart a fake cardboard check that was to be used if he passed Bailey’s mark.

Another interesting angle was that this showed how much Gomez affects the betting. Many of his horses are bet lower than their public morning-line odds.

But of the three Gomez horses that won with other jockeys, two were big overlays. Wild Diplomat (6-1 morning line) won with Joe Talamo and paid $19.40; Unusual Spirit (3-1) won with Mike Smith and returned $15.20; Proudinsky (5-2) paid only $4.60, but that’s because Rafael Bejarano replaced Gomez.

Great riders such as Gomez and Bejarano depress the odds, and top-flight jockeys such as Talamo and Smith can offer more betting value.

• HRTV WINS — In an upset, HRTV outpolled TVG in the Best Horse Racing Channel category in a year-end poll conducted by the Thoroughbred Times. TVG has more resources and wider distribution than HRTV.

• TWIN SPIRES — The Biggest Vegas Qualifier Ever will live up to its name Saturday. That’s when the online handicapping tournament will reward 25 guaranteed entries to top finishers: 15 to the National Handicapping Championship and 10 to the Horseplayer World Series.

• LUCKY’S — Lucky’s will launch a new Twin Quinella wager today. It will seed the pot with $500, and it will be offered Wednesdays through Sundays. The Lucky’s Twin Q will be offered at the Plaza and Terrible’s race books.

Richard Eng’s horse racing column is published Friday in the Las Vegas Review-Journal. He can be reached at rich_eng@hotmail.com.