Padecky: Jackson's work isn't done

Jess Jackson has died and all the obituaries deal with what he left behind. As if Jess Jackson suddenly has become "past tense." As if he is a library book that can be put on a shelf to be used as reference material.

Oh my, how all the obituary writers missed the point. Fact is, when it comes to Jess Jackson the Horse Owner/Breeder/Moral Compass, the guy may just be getting started.

Has to do with this little thing happening right now in his barn in Kentucky. Rachel Alexandra, the 2009 Horse of the Year, is in foal, courtesy of her interaction with Curlin, the Horse of the Year in 2007 and 2008.

"This is like bringing Michael Jordan and Marion Jones together," said Santa Rosa's Mike Patricks, an ex-horse owner who has handicapped the races at the Sonoma County Fair for the past 14 years. "It's a possible sky's-the-limit, an unbelievable sire mating with an unbelievable dam and getting an unbelievable result."

Jackson, who passed away Thursday, wasn't shy about making the big entrance, drawing the spotlight and then keeping the focus on him with sentences that oozed intelligence, compassion, directness and a bit of a wink signifying that he enjoyed the whole gestalt.

That Curlin and Rachel will begat a superhorse that will later begat a super-duper horse that will spawn a widely popular video game match race between Secretariat and, say, just for fun, Pegasus, well, no one would dare say Jackson's time is over.

"Jess was one of those guys," said Jerry Hollendorfer, a prominent horse trainer, "that no matter where he was, he was always bigger than life. He'll always be a part of any discussion about the horse racing industry."

Hollendorfer has two of Jackson's horses and one of them, Ghost Reign, won a stakes race two weeks ago at Golden Gate Fields. Hollendorfer never saw Jackson swagger first, talk later.

"Jess always wanted to make a big splash," Hollendorfer said, "but any time I was around him he was always very gracious. I'll never forget the speech he made at the 2009 Breeder's Cup. He was very humble."

Much has been made about Jackson's spending $200 million on buying thoroughbreds, that if you keep throwing enough money at it, something will stick. Yet, said horse trainer Ray Thomas, that's only half the equation.

"He gave a lot of people jobs," Thomas said. "You got to remember that."

Never intimidated by the Kentucky bluebloods who run the industry, Jackson found few fans in that state when he said it was just wrong for agents not to disclose they were working for both the buyer and seller of a horse. In 2005 Jackson sued three of his former bloodstock advisers, alleging fraud. He settled out of court for $3.5 million and the case resulted in a 2006 Kentucky state law that explicitly outlawed such a practice in horse sales.

"He probably made a few enemies," said Richard Lewis, race director at the Sonoma County Fair. "A lot in the upper echelons in racing weren't too happy with him, but he was a man of his convictions."

Jackson didn't go out of his way to irritate, but irritation, even hostility, didn't bother him if he saw the cause as fair and just.

"He wanted everyone to be treated fairly," Thomas said. "He didn't want the big guy to have an advantage any more than the little guy."

Such evenhandedness didn't always sit well in an industry as political as the naming of a government appointee.

"Change comes slowly," Hollendorfer said, "to a sport deeply embedded in tradition for the last few hundred years."

Change never bothered Jackson, as growing up poor provided daily motivation for him to keep inspecting and tweaking his environment. If things could be done better, Jackson wouldn't let a little thing like tradition get in his way, like putting a spotlight horse out to stud after a memorable year.

When Curlin won Horse of the Year in 2007, Jackson decided to run the horse as a 4-year old. That shocked traditionalists. We don't do that. Get him in the barn to make money.

Instead, Jackson said, he wanted to do what was right for the industry. Keep Curlin out there to develop fan attachment.

"Jackson could have cashed in his chips after Curlin's 3-year-old year and bred him," Patricks said. "Yet he decided to do what was best for the sport and run him for another year. He was a real sportsman for doing that."

Change is not only inevitable but necessary, Jackson said. Think outside the box. And if you can't, I'll give you a little push. That's what he is doing right now in a Kentucky barn.

Sure, breeding is always a game of chance. Still, Jackson - with help from Curlin and Rachel - has created a possibility. In a sport that craves imagination desperately, Jackson has just given horse racing a huge bowl of it.

What if? Jess Jackson always enjoyed providing that question, almost as much as he enjoyed answering it.

For more North Bay sports, go to Bob Padecky's blog at padecky.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Staff Columnist Bob Padecky at 521-5223 or bob.padecky@pressdemocrat.com.