Anyone else plan on checking this out? Looks like a decent cast, written by the same guy who wrote Deadwood,
and has a wonderful director for the pilot in Michael Mann. Series appears to star Nick Nolte and Dustin Hoffman
among a number of other good 2nd tier actors. Based around the sport of horse racing which I have always found
fascinating but will likely dive deeper into the idea of on track gambling and slots as the series gets moving. I'll
be checking it out for sure and hope it is decent. I miss good Sunday night HBO programming and with the dead
of winter coming I'd like some options.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

At this point, HBO has earned me checking out any new series they come out with. I've got the DVR set up already

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Team Cutler.

They had a free preview of the pilot episode last month after the Boardwalk Empire finale. I thought it was incredibly confusing, and not very good. I'll give it one more chance, but after watching the first episode, I walked away thinking, "What the fuck just happened"?

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I read a quick review and that is what I took away from it too. There wasn't much character development, they
just seem to drop you into multiple storylines and you have no idea what is going on. I'll still watch and try to
figure it out. Looks too interesting to give up on it early. I have only been really disapponinted in one HBO series
I have followed in the past 7 or 8 years and that was John in Cincinatti ( also written by this writer). That was a
train wreck of a show.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

I'll try to stick with it. I guess Deadwood was a little similar with being hard to follow at times. That was a little more due to the dialogue than the story though. Hopefully everyone starts calling each other a cocksucker, then the show would be gold.

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I'll be checking this show out. I was reared at the racetracks of Chicagoland (and by Terry Boers). This show appears to focus on thoroughbreds but I was at way more of the standardbred races. Should be good as most HBO shows are for the first 2-3 seasons.

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Back off, Warchild. Seriously.

I really enjoyed this and didn't find it all that confusing. I don't know nearly as much as I'd like about
horse racing but I find it very intriguing. I watched it at 5am this morning so I'll likely give it another spin
to see if I missed anything. I thought the pilot was well shot, but not surprised since it was done by
Michael Mann. Didn't like to see them have to put the horse down at the end but obviously stuff like
that happens. I thought the cast was very solid and I can see this series being quite good with a little
more development.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

I found it amazing that in the first episode, the gang of 4 hits a $2.7M pick 6 ticket. If you're going to start off with that much of a bang, then you are leaving yourself a little short on plot drama in future episodes. Of course I suspect the gang of 4 will screw one another over......

It wasn't confusing and had lots of story lines. Dustin Hoffman needs to keep his shirt on or buy a man bra.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

+1

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

This is what ruined Spiderman 2 for me. Alfred Molina's man breasts and Kristen Dunst's snaggletooth kept taking me out of the action.

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Alright, Zizou! Another harness guy. Who are some of your favorite horses?

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Good question. Saw some of the real greats as a kid. Artsplace, Pine Chip, Beach Towel, Western Hanover, Peace Corps, Varenne, Gallo Blue Chip, Riyadh. Artsplace might be my all time favorite. As a 4yo he never lost a race and broke the all tracks record at the Meadowlands with Cat Manzi driving him in a division of the Driscoll series. 1:49 and 2/5. They showed the simulcast video of it on Mike Paradise's old show with Eleanor Flavin. He came to Sportsman's that summer for the US Pacing and American National and since SP had been turned into a 7/8 track with a long stretch everyone was hoping he'd set a new all tracks record. I think he ended up going 1:50 flat maybe?

Local horses I always liked: Big Tom, Rock Creek, Keystone Raider (more of an invader from the East as an aged pacer), Richard Lauxmont, Pane N Da BoBo, Uncork, Lake Hills Texas.

Favorite drivers: Dave Magee, Joe Anderson, Carl Porcelli Jr (used to have badass UDRS for a meet or two), Andy Miller, Tony Morgan, Darryl Busse, Walt Paisley. Walter Case Jr the Convict, Mike Lachance, Cat Manzi

Drivers I always lost with and therefore thought blew: Dale Hiteman, Randy Jacobs, Lavern Hostetler, Ronnie Marsh, Tom Harmer, Dan Knox

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Back off, Warchild. Seriously.

Alright! Real racing talk. Riyadh was always one of my favorites. I love a horse that can leave like a jet. That mile he ended up losing to Jenna's Beach Boy is one of the best races I've ever seen.

I like that you didn't just mention champion horses. If I'm not mistaken, Richard Lauxmont was the first horse Arthur & Shirley Levin ever claimed.

The first real good horse I ever owned was Mr. Blue Sky. Of course, he had the misfortune to be born the same year as Big Tom, Taser Gun, and a bunch of other good ones. Talk about a horse that could leave like a jet. Taser Gun was faster than the damn starting gate. Mr. Blue Sky didn't look like much. I think we only gave $10,000 for him at the Cottonwood sale. He wore a short set of hopples. It was almost like he was pacing in a box, but man, he could get around the corners. When we were training them down in Florida my partner, Brian Pinske, was convinced that the best Illinois-bred he had was a horse named Fast Muffler. And if you saw the two horses side by side, you'd think so too. But Mr. Blue Sky had a heart the size of a whale and Fast Muffler's was more like a pea.

When we shipped up to Chicago for the start of their three-year-old season, both horses were entered in the Spring Championship at Maywood. Mr. Blue Sky was stronger than I expected in his elim. Both horses made the final. Pinske drove Fast Muffler and Dean Magee was up behind my guy. They came off the last turn at Maywood and Mr. Blue Sky was down along the rail loaded with pace. I didn't think he could win, but he had a shot to get second. Suddenly, Dean moved over to get out of Brian's way and Fast Muffler slid past us. It cost me a few bucks. I wasn't too happy, but I knew some time it would go my way too.

The next race we entered was the Cardinal at Balmoral. The race went super fast for that time of the year. At the end nobody was pacing faster than Mr. Blue Sky. He was coming out of the harness. When he came back into the paddock, Pinske had an incredulous look on his face, and he said, "I thought he was going to go right by Big Tom." I think we got second or third in the final. Fast Muffler didn't even make it. Brian never suggested Fast Muffler was the better horse again. Later that summer Mr. Blue Sky beat Taser Gun at DuQuoin. He even beat Big Tom once or twice.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

caught the first episode last night...not bad .. has some potential ..i don't know shit about horses but i am an avid gambler ..how realistic is it for 4 guys who pool 1,600$ and turn it into 2.4 million in a day at the track?

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That isn't outlandish, but when a multiple race gimmick gets that big you're going to be playing against big syndicates that are covering a lot of combos. In the show, the guys used Escalante's horse as a singleton key horse. I believe he went off at 12-1. Then they hit a big longshot in the final leg. Very plausible that a small group could have taken down the whole pool that way.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

I remember Pinske. He had some good horses. Bret's Avenger was one of his big ones when I still went to the races. Young guy when he died if I remember correctly.

So you were in the owning and training part of the business? You must have been a Super Night regular back in the day. I always thought they should have used some of that big ICF purse money for one of the stakes races to attract more big name talent to the Chicago area. Me, my old man, and my uncle were just fans who went to the races a lot for several years. Sad state of affairs for harness racing in the area these days. They're racing for less now than 20 years ago.

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Back off, Warchild. Seriously.

I haven't missed too many Super Nights since they started. I should have won the Langley in 2001 with Diamond Man, but he jumped it off in his elimination. He crushed the consolation. I never had much luck betting on Super Night. The biggest ticket I ever cashed on Super Night was back at Sportsman's on a horse called Rana Diablo driven by George Kramer.

I got to know my way around a horse, but I'm a gambler at heart. I think Pinske appreciated my grandstand perspective. He was a genius with a racehorse but I came at the game in a different way. It was a good match.

Bret's Avenger was a nice horse. He put Brian on the map in Chicago. Pinkse and Dean Magee came up to Sportsman's from the Quad City/Fairmount "B" circuit the same summer. Of course, Dave was the king in Chicago then. He's about ten years older than Brian, Dean, and me. We used Dave to drive sometimes, but Dean was really our guy. All of us being the same age, we did a lot of drinking together.

In the summer of '99 I had a real top two-year-old named I Scoot Hanover. He broke his maiden at Balmoral making three moves with Pinske driving. We took him down to Springfield where he was a fast-closing second in the Review Stakes. Then we shipped up to Toronto for the Metro. Pinske drove him in the elimination and got him into the final along with another horse he owned named Southwind Halite. Brian asked me who I wanted to drive I Scoot. At the time that was a no-brainer. Chicago guy has a horse in an $800,000 race in 1999, he wants Dave Magee. We told Dave that this horse had a real shot in there, but I don't think he really believed it. I Scoot was a small horse and Dave has talked to tons of guys who think their colt is better than he really is. After Dave got stuck last on the rail and the horse charged furiously to get fourth money we were at an after party they had at Woodbine. That was the only time a driver has ever apologized to me. Dave said he was the best two-year-old he had ever driven and that he should have won the race easily. Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gb21LCp1HRM

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

totally on the fence here, hope it gets better, but I agree, someone could talk up in this show!

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

Watched it finally last night. It was okay. A little bored and had the volume on my TV jacked up trying to following everything. It's an HBO show so i'll give it a few more episodes.

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Team Cutler.

I could read this stuff all day. Very interesting JORR. Makes me miss my grandpa a lot, he would have loved to read it.

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I don't think this show is off to a good start. I don't really know what the point of it is but if the commercial for the rest of the season is to be believed it takes some sort of Sopranos like mob turn.

There are way too many characters in this and so many loose connections between them that it's hard to follow.
Most of the cast is hard to understand.
The horse racing scenes are well shot but pretty uninteresting.

I could see this getting pretty good but so far I'm not impressed. I'll still give it the whole season though because they may just be setting everything up still.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I saw Peta is up in arms because they had to put two horses down on the set of this show

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BR, you are spot on. I still think it has potential because I love the ponies and there are some decent actors in this. I am hoping it will all tie together and be easier to understand as the show progresses. The guy in the wheel chair is a real jerk, and I hope someone takes him out back and beats him silly. He wins $2.4M (1/4 of it his), and he becomes even more of a jerk.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

I thought last nights episode was pretty good. Can someone explain to me what is wrong with Nick
Nolte's horse? I realize he was bleeding from the nose but I couldn't figure out what the doctor saw
when she put the scope up into the horses nostril. I really enjoy this show and the acting is pretty
decent as well. I find it hard to watch Jason Gedricks character as the degenerate gambler. I can't
believe how much money he flushes down the toilet and that chinese guy that goads him plays a
great asshole character.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

A lot of the stuff in this show is hard to read. I am already getting sick of every race having so much drama. The chick's horse stumbles badly out of the gate and wins. In the other episode, the kid jockey kept winning improbable races and then falls off and gets hurt. The 4 bettors hit a huge jackpot. Rarely do individual races have that much drama. Sure, a horse will come from way behind, but this show is just offering too many improbable outcomes. Even the hold em game is one improbable hand after another.

I have watched every episode, but I don't really care about any of the plot lines. I would agree that the Asian casino guy is good. He is a complete jerk who would be taken out back and beaten in the real world.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

I haven't watched last night's episode yet since my girlfriend had to watch two fucking hours of an English soap opera, but I assume the horse was just bleeding from the stresses of racing/training.

A horse has a sensitive cardiovascular system that is naturally stressed during high speed work. Capillaries can break and cause blood to making breathing more difficult. There are many drugs used to treat breathing problems, i.e. bronchodilators like Clenbuterol. Each racing jurisdiction has different rules, but something like Clenbuerol must be cleared from the horse's system on race day or there will be a positive test.

Lasix (Salix) is legal and regulated by the state on race day. For a long time New York didn't allow it, but they finally gave in. There are a lot of questions about the effectiveness of Lasix and it has a reputation as something used to mask other, more serious drugs. First time Lasix is a popular betting angle. I'm guessing Nolte is going to put Get Up Morning on Lasix and he'll go right down the road.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Thanks JORR. If you happen to watch it and can enlighten me further I would appreciate it. Nolte
was definitely concerned for the horse and I didn't understand what was going on.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

So is this show any good? I have them all on DVR, but haven't been motivated to watch unless its worth it. I'm already so far behind on some other shows I like so adding another one is actually becoming a major decision in my life.

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to early to tell if it is good or not .. i know nothing about horses but it i starting to feel very unrealistic..first episode 4 bustouts hit a 2.4 MILLION purse...then a well known trainer (escalante) gambles on raising his horses odds only to lose his horse for 8 k that may be worth 50k? have not seen last night episode yet

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