2 Life Lessons from Big Brown
As most of you know, Big Brown failed in his attempt to become the first triple crown winner in 30 years on Saturday finishing last in the Belmont Stakes.
In the three weeks leading up to the race, Big Brown’s trainer, Rick Dutrow Jr., boasted that it was “a foregone conclusion” his horse would win the Belmont. Dutrow went as far as to insult the horse that looked like his main competition (before he was scratched Saturday Morning) Casino Drive by stating “He’s got no chance of beating our horse,” I’ll be in the winner’s circle when they get to the quarter pole.” Making reference to the fact that Casino Drive was bred in Japan, Dutrow said “All the Japanese people … thought Godzilla was dead,” he said. “They’re going to find out he’s not dead. He’s here”.
Well its fine to be confident. Actually its a good trait to have to be successful. However, obnoxious rudeness are not great traits.
Some call it Karma. Maybe the racing gods made Big Brown draw an inside post, tough for a horse who loved the outside. Maybe bad karma got Dutrow horse knocked around and bumped to the point of distraction.
Before the race most experts debated not if Big Brown would win, but by how many lengths would win by and the odd’s reflected this sentiment as Big Brown ran off as a very strong 1-4 favorite.
So here are the 2 life lessons.
First, you can be self assured and confident but don’t be an asshole.
Usually it just winds up working in the completely opposite direction and you wind up looking like an idiot.
Second, in life there is no such thing as a sure bet.
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Thats for sure!
John
http://unplain.com
This post is a classic!
Your post Rocks – spot ON
I agree with your life lessons
Valuable Post. Good lesson for domainers.
Hi Mike,
Another great post in your fine blog. How about Lesson #2.5 “Hedge your bets…. ”
I’m a bit of a horseplayer and I played a small “saver exacta” bet on the Belmont, throwing 3 other top horses in an exacta as a “saver “in case Big Brown didn’t fire. I didn’t have the winning horse included in my bet (as he was the longest odds in the field at 36-1) but my strategy was sound and felt like I played it correct. My $12 wager could have returned $600+ mitigating the dissapointment of Big Brown’s loss. You never know what can happen, so contingency planning can be invaluable.
Chris
You are right. You need to have a backup plan.
Nothing is 100% for sure, and if anything most people understate the risk of failure or problems.
That is why you see people not having flood insurance, even though its only a couple of hundred a year.