Joe De Francis has taken the first step toward mending fences with Gov. Parris N. Glendening. De Francis says he's no longer going to talk about slot machines.
"Gov. Glendening won the election," De Francis said. "And I understand and respect his position on slots.
"You're not going to hear me running around screaming and hollering for slots anymore because I understand that that's something he's taken off the table, and I respect that."
Respect came slowly. The election was in November.
Ever since, Glendening has insisted that De Francis quit crying for slots. And prominent members of the horse racing community have urged De Francis to zip it or risk losing precious state subsidies.
Apparently, De Francis has finally gotten the message.
What's more, he has changed his tune about the state of Maryland racing. With a movement afoot in Annapolis to rescind his thoroughbred monopoly, De Francis has begun making the case for how well everything's going with him at the helm.
In an interview Wednesday at Laurel Park, he pointed out that Maryland horsemen in 1998 competed for record purses. That was after receiving a second straight year of state subsidies.
And he said that wagering in Maryland last fall increased 10.6 percent from the year before. Only one other track enjoyed a larger increase, he said, and that was Churchill Downs, which played host to the Breeders' Cup.
"With the exception of the Breeders' Cup host, no one other racing jurisdiction that I could find was up as much as we were," De Francis said. "So how can anyone say, 'Oh, things are going bad in Maryland. Racing is enjoying this great resurgence nationally, and Maryland is not participating?' "
The state study commission on horse racing, the Janney Commission, wrote in its recent report to Glendening: "We share the widespread dissatisfaction expressed to us concerning the current management of thoroughbred track facilities. There are many broad strategic issues that must be addressed if Maryland racing is to ascend to the 'major league' of thoroughbred racing."
De Francis continued his defense.
"I'm not expecting everybody to go out and have a parade for me," he said. "But I don't understand why everybody's running around saying the sky is falling."
Could that be because De Francis, in his (up-to-now) never-ending quest for slots, ran around for three or four years saying the sky is falling, the sky is falling?
"That certainly is possible," De Francis said. "I am and continue to be gravely concerned about the competition we face from our neighbors to the east and to the west. But we have been meeting that competition.
"Where I think there's been a misperception -- and I probably deserve as much blame for this as anybody -- is that in my raising the alarm about what's happening in Delaware and West Virginia, I have perhaps created the impression that we're not doing anything in Maryland. If I've done that, I've made a mistake."
He said he and his staff have "worked our tails off" trying to improve the state of horse racing in Maryland.
"And we've been successful," he said. "We are hard at work, however, on plans to take that success and carry it forward into the 21st century without them."
Without slots, he meant.
"We're working on what we can do at Pimlico. We're working on what we can do here," De Francis said, referring to Laurel Park. "We're not going to go gently into the good night, to quote a phrase from the poet. To continue on with that, we're going to rage against the dying of the light."
And with that, DeFrancis, the lawyer turned racetrack operator, rested his case.
Lee's last day
Tommy Lee is resigning today after 18 years as clerk of scales for the Maryland Jockey Club. He's been in charge of the jockey's room, making sure every horse has a rider, weighing jockeys in and out and notifying track officials of scratches and program changes.
Before accepting the job in 1981, Lee rode for more than 20 years as a jockey primarily in Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey. He won nearly 1,500 races.
"I guess I did all right," said the modest Lee.
He did "all right" enough in the mid 1960s to win the Dixie Handicap three out of four years. In 1963 he stole the Gallorette Stakes aboard the 44-1 Double Heritage, breaking first from the rail and controlling the pace so expertly that none of the 13 pursuers drew closer than half a length. The Daily Racing Form reported that Double Heritage had been "smartly rated."
Lee has traveled extensively on vacations, but after today he can travel throughout the world whenever he pleases. "I'm going to see how the other half lives," he said contentedly.
Yarrow Brae to stud
Audrey and Allen Murray have purchased the Grade II winner Yarrow Brae and brought him home to Murmur Farm in Darlington for breeding mares this spring. A son of Deputy Minister, the 4-year-old Yarrow Brae won four of 18 starts, including last year's Illinois Derby, and earned $571,580.
He is standing for $6,000 as an introductory fee, Allen Murray said. Yarrow Brae, the Murrays' sixth stallion, will help fill the void created by the death in January of the top sire Norquestor.
Of Yarrow Brae, Murray said: "We think he'll be a star here in Maryland and nationally in the next few years." But of Norquestor, he said: "We can't replace him. Besides being a money-maker, he was a family friend."
Around the tracks
Penn National and its off-track betting parlors have reopened for simulcasting after horsemen and management agreed Tuesday on a new contract. Live racing won't resume for a while. Larry Reynolds is recovering from cracked ribs and a punctured lung suffered in a recent spill at Charles Town. The injuries occurred four days after Reynolds won his 2,500th race. If Silver Charm captures today's $5 million Dubai World Cup (11: 15 a.m. at Maryland simulcast sites), the $3 million winner's prize will swell his earnings to $9,803,006, putting him well within range of Cigar's record $9,999,815.