Recently, my son told me of a great new (old) video game that has been consuming some of his spare time - College Football ‘25 from EA Sports.
I asked him, after he purchased it so quickly after its release, how he was so certain he’d like it, and his response was that they had basically given him 10 FREE hours of playing time in advance… to suck him in. And it worked.
Due to past legal issues over NCAA players not being able to get paid, there hadn’t been a new college football game from EA Sports in years. This version is therefore unique to the market, and the company ran with it.
A couple of years back I wrote this very column about our number one asset being very unique. I wrote that we had something in our midst that most people love, and that just about no other sport had… the horse.
I shared a story about how my friends and I, in our late teens and early twenties, were smart enough to use the presence of my family’s horses to convince girls our age to come to parties at my house after last call at the bars.
I asked why our racetracks and horsemen's associations didn’t use this incredible asset more often, to attract people to visit our tracks.
I suggested things, like the use of portable stalls in city-centres, where people might line-up to spend time with a horse, and where we could then present them with dinner vouchers or betting vouchers from our racetracks.
I received a lot of positive feedback on that column, but for the most part, as participation, and attendance at tracks continues to drop, I haven’t seen much action when it comes to introducing the public to our wonderful animals.
I do know that at The Meadowlands, they often bring groups of fans into the winner’s circle, to meet the horses and their connections up close - I applaud them for that.
I honestly try to introduce people to our horses whenever I can as well.
One of my partners recently had two of his children at Mohawk to see our two horses race. They enjoyed the action, and seemed to be having a good time, but that fun was multiplied by 100 when I took them to the paddock and allowed them to fuss over one of our gentle geldings who had just worked hard to finish third for them.
Who knew how easily two young adults in their twenties would fall in love with a horse, when just given a towel and told to rub his forehead and behind his ears? Ten minutes cuddling with their new equine friend, and their smiles told me they’d look forward to coming back again.
On another recent evening at the races, I watched as a young couple standing at the gate of the winner’s circle were told “No” by the security guard, when they asked if they could enter for a post-race photo. I went right over and suggested to the guard that it was ok, because I knew the winning connections, and that they wouldn’t mind. The guard agreed, the ecstatic couple entered, and the woman walked straight to the head of the horse, where the groom allowed her to rub the winner’s head for a few seconds.
You would have thought the couple had just won the lottery. They couldn’t contain their smiles or laughter as they exited the winner’s circle to thank me over-and-over. I even saw them going into the photographer’s office a while later to buy a photo, and as they thanked me again, I joked with the man that because his partner was now so in love with the horses, he had better buy her one. It might be a longshot to think they might, but to a degree, we bet on longshots in this business everytime we buy a yearling.
We have HORSES - close to 100 of them at the racetrack, every night we race, and hundreds of more that are retired and could use a purpose.
People LOVE horses.
We do next-to-nothing, for the most part, to let potential customers and owners interact with them.
I realize that groups like OSAS will sometimes have a retired horse at the track, for people to pet, and other times will let kids sit behind a horse in a double-seated jog cart. I truly applaud this as well.
But on a larger scale, what concentrated efforts are we making to share our horses up close with people?
How are we using our horses to attract new fans, and entice them to come to the track?
I could be wrong, but I don’t believe that we are.
When College Football ‘25 was first released, the EA Sports server crashed within a minute, from the onslaught of people clamouring for the game.
It was played by 2.2 million people in the first three days of its release - including my son, who was playing for free at that time - making it the third most played game on Xbox during that period, behind only Call Of Duty and Fortnite.
This year, Patrick Mahomes, the star QB of the Kansas City Chiefs, actually has a TV in his room at training camp, for just the first time in his eight years as a pro. He said that it’s mainly so he can play this new video game during camp.
When will we learn? We have something great to promote with, but fail to use it.
If we’re happy with the status-quo - declining attendance, declining participation, and the same Saturday night handles that we had 30 years ago - someone please just tell me. Because at times I really feel like I’m just bashing my head against a wall with some of this stuff.
Dan Fisher [email protected]