When live racing at Oaklawn Park begins a week from today, the track will introduce another innovation -- the Show Bet Bonus.
Oaklawn is increasing the payoff on show bets by reducing the takeout (money withheld to fund purses and operating costs) for on-track show wagering from 17 percent to 10 percent.
The lower takeout will not be applied to people wagering off track.
Show bets are the safest bet at a racetrack because if your horse wins (first), places (second) or shows (third) you get paid.
This new payout is going to be very appealing to people who like to play a show parlay, which is where you start with a show bet and roll the winnings over through however many races you like.
A few years ago at Churchill Downs, a couple of days before the Kentucky Derby, yours truly was invited to be part of a group that was going to play a nine-race parlay. That was the entire day's card and there was no cashing in early. My buddies were pretty serious players; me, anything more than $5 brings on stress.
For me that was about the same price as buying a tip sheet, and two of the guys were really good handicappers and already had their picks. Yours truly would have access to those picks, which is a good thing. Handicapping isn't a strength for this sports writer.
We hit the first eight races, including two races that paid more than $8. So the money was piling up pretty good.
Going into the final race our pot was more than $500 and of course one person, me, wanted to cash in. But it wasn't a hard sell to stay in because we had the 3-to-5 favorite, ridden by Pat Day, one of the all-time great jockeys.
Day's horse led by 5 lengths as the horses turned for home, but at the finish line he was in a photo for third, and it seemed an eternity before it was declared a dead heat, meaning we added about $60 to our total.
It was a fun day, but if there had been a Show Bet Bonus we would have made a lot more.
Innovative thinking -- like implementing this Show Bet Bonus -- is why Oaklawn keeps finding ways to attract the best horses and make its patrons happy when tracks all over America are struggling,
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Alabama is the only team to play in all three College Football Playoffs, but the SEC isn't the only conference to be represented every time.
The ACC and Big Ten have also had a team in each of the three playoffs. This year, of course, is a repeat of last year's championship game between the Crimson Tide and the Clemson Tigers.
Ohio State is the only team to have beaten Alabama in the playoffs, and that was in the semifinals of the first playoff in 2014 when the Buckeyes won it all.
The Big Ten has not fared well since the first playoff, with their representatives getting outscored 69-0 in the first round in each of the past two semifinals.
Last year Alabama beat Michigan State 38-0 and this year Clemson beat the Buckeyes 31-0.
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The 12-member committee that selects the four teams to compete in the College Football Playoff is starting to take on new personnel.
Members typically serve one three-year term, but terms for the first group were staggered to allow for an eventual rotation. Until the rotation has been achieved, certain members' terms are shorter or longer.
Next season, Kirby Hocutt (chairman and athletic director at Texas Tech), Barry Alvarez (AD at Wisconsin), Bobby Johnson (former Vanderbilt head coach) and Condoleezza Rice (former U.S. Secretary of State and Stanford provost) all depart.
Seven others rotated off after the first two seasons.
The group has four openings, two of them at-large; it seems it would be time to consider adding at least one more journalist.
Pat Forde of Yahoo.com or Ivan Maisel of ESPN.com seem like naturals. Nobody keeps up with college football better than those two guys.
Incidentally, Arkansas AD Jeff Long, who chaired the committee the first two years, has a year remaining on his four-year term.
Sports on 01/06/2017